they prescribed, was designed for the education of priests, who formed, in fact, the only educated class in the middle ages; and who probably intended, by means of an exclusive education, to render perpetual the influence over the masses which they had so successfully usurped.

Such being the nature of an English university, it may well be supposed that its organization is adapted to answer its end. As at present constituted, however, Oxford and Cambridge are not universities, in the sense in which this word is used on the continent of Europe. They are a collection of colleges, all teaching the same branches of study, while the University, as it formerly existed, teaches nothing, or until lately, nothing that was required of the candidate for a degree.

Our ancestors, of course, would never have thought of establishing, in the infancy of our country, a congeries of colleges such as form the University of Oxford or Cambridge. They took a single college for their model. Let us then briefly consider the nature of a single college in one of these splendid establishments.

Each college forms a distinct society, of which one object, at least, was the education of youth, over whom it exercised a vigilant and universal superintendence. Hence all the arrangements of the college were made to conform to this idea. The whole society was intended to form but one family; master, fellows, tutors, and students, all sitting at the same table. A college building is always a quadrangle, open in the centre and admitting of but one entrance. The gate is closed at a certain hour, after which no one can either enter or go out. Within this quadrangle every officer and student resides; and, of course, the intercourse between them must be frequent, and the means of supervision as perfect as the nature of the case could require. If a system of this kind were to be adopted, we do not perceive in what manner the present organization of a college in an English University could be improved.

Such is the model from which all our colleges in this country are copied. We adopted the unchangeable period of four years, and confined the course of education almost exclusively to Greek, Latin, and Mathematics; adding, perhaps, a little more theology and natural philosophy.

In tracing the progress of collegiate education in the United States, the Report presents the following course of studies in the Colonial colleges, which continued without essential modifications until the Revolution, and in fact till the beginning of the present century :

The time allotted to a collegiate course was as in England fixed to four years. The studies pursued were Latin, Greek, Mathematics, Natural Philosophy, and Locke on the Understanding, while some attention was generally given to theology and the Hebrew language. These latter studies were the more important, inasmuch as a large portion of the students were designed for the ministry, and theological schools had not yet been established. The number of studies was limited, and the same time was allowed to the pursuit of them as in the English Universities.

Dr. Wayland speaks in terms of high praise of the character of the education given in these early colleges :

At these colleges were educated some of the profoundest theologians that any age has produced. They nurtured the men who, as jurists and states

men and diplomatists, in the intellectual struggle that preceded the Revolution, shrunk not from doing battle with the ablest men of the mother country, and won for themselves, in the contest, the splendid eulogy of Lord Chatham, the noblest of them all; the same men who, when the Revolution was accomplished, framed for us, their successors, the Constitution of the United States, perhaps the most important document that the eighteenth century produced. We certainly have then no reason to be ashamed of the colleges founded in our early history.

Is it not more than probable that these men gained much of that intellectual training which lent such an elastic energy to their minds, by pursuing a very few studies at a time with great care? "The chief art of learning," says Locke, "is to attempt but little at a time." We have long been impressed with the importance to the student of attempting no more studies than he has ample time to understand thoroughly, not to commit to memory the general arguments and trains of thought, so as to recite fluently, but to discover the more important principles which underlie each science or branch of learning, and then to trace out their relations to the material world, or the affairs of men, reflecting upon them, converging the rays of collateral reading upon them, crowding back on all sides the dusky veil of the unknown, till the whole subject rises up before his mind radiant with the light of real knowledge. In studying a single branch of learning in this manner, the student may not only get a full idea of the subject matter of that branch, but a general idea of perfectness of the manner in which all subjects should be studied an ideal which shall become the type of all his notions of completeness and excellence, and thus in all afterlife lend to his intellect a steadier and more vigorous aim, sharpen its sagacity and enlarge its comprehension. But we must dismiss this topic for the present, as we shall have occasion to refer to it again in the sequel.

But, with the present century, a new era dawned upon the world. A host of new sciences arose, all holding important relations to the progress of civilization. Here was a whole people in an entirely novel position. Almost the whole nation was able to read. Mind had been quickened to intense energy by the events of the Revolution. The spirit of self-reliance had gained strength by the result of that contest. A country rich in every form of capability, had just come into their possession. Its wealth was inexhaustible, and its adaptation to the production of. most of the great staples of commerce unsurpassed. All that was needed, in order to develop its resources, was well-directed labor. But labor can only be skilfully directed by science; and the sciences now coming into notice were precisely those which the condition of such a country rendered indispensable to suc

cess.

This was an important crisis in the history of collegiate education in this country. To remain in its present condition was impossible. Every one

conceded that a knowledge of those sciences on which success depends in the various departments of active life, must be communicated to students in our higher seminaries of learning. Here two courses presented themselves to the directors of these institutions. In the first place, they might have said: The studies which we now teach occupy the whole time allotted to a collegiate education. It is barely sufficient to accomplish the work now actually before us. We will introduce as many other departments of learning as the public may demand, and we will teach them well, but this work cannot be done in four years. You must therefore either extend the time of an edu cation, or you must leave each student to select those studies which he shall choose, our own responsibility being to teach well whatever we teach at all. Or, on the other hand, they might have said: The time of education is fixed at four years. This is the period allotted to a preparation for the learned professions. Some degree of knowledge of these sciences is required of every liberally educated man. We will, from time to time, introduce every new branch of science into this period of study, by curtailing every other that may have been previously taught, thus increasing the number, and teaching every one less perfectly.

The latter was the course adopted to a greater or less extent by all the colleges in this country. It seems to have been taken for granted, that our colleges were designed exclusively for professional men; that they must teach all that professional men might wish to know; and that all this must be taught in four years; and in accordance with this idea, the former system was modified. The time of study was not extended, but science after science was added to the course, as fast as the pressure from without seemed to require it. The extent to which this system has been carried among us, may be seen by observing the annual catalogue of any of our colleges. In the oldest and most celebrated college of New-England, the course of study pursued by the undergraduate embraces the following branches of learning, to wit: Latin, Greek, Mathematics, comprehending Geometry and Algebra, Plane and Spherical Trigonometry, and Analytical Geometry, Ancient and Modern History, Natural History, Chemistry, Rhetoric, French, Psychology, Ethics, Physics, Logic, Botany, Political Economy, the Evidences of Religion, Constitution of the United States, Mineralogy, Geology, and German or Spanish or an equivalent, together with essays to be written in several of these departments, and instruction in Elocution.

Nor, in this case, were either the community or the colleges justly liable to censure. The fact is, the community, from imperfect knowledge of the subject, required an impossibility. The colleges, feeling their dependence on the public for support, undertook to perform the impossibility. Besides, these changes were not made all at once. But the movement once commenced, it could not be arrested until it had arrived at its present result.

We have aimed to make such extracts as will present to the reader what Dr. Wayland considers the two great defects in the American system of Collegiate Education. These are, that "science after science" has been added to the course of instruction, and that the time allowed the student for acquiring a knowledge of this continually lengthening course of studies has remained "fixed at four years."

Dr. Wayland has, we think, made out a very strong case, showing that, in this respect, our colleges have not been wisely managed. For the last twenty years or more, students nave been required to attempt more intellectual labor, in

a given time, than the human mind in a partially disciplined state can accomplish in such a manner as to invigorate its faculties, sharpen the perceptive powers, and cultivate those scholastic tastes which awaken, refine, and elevate the feelings of the heart, and kindle the nobler aspirations of the soul. To study for these objects under the present "highpressure" system is extremely difficult. While the many are occupied all the time in merely surveying the fields of learning over which they pass, only a few of the more gifted minds have leisure, after the survey has been completed, to gather the richer fruits and flowers and enjoy their flavor and perfume.

The Report closes the discussion of this branch of the subject with the following graphic picture of a student overtasked with lessons :

In such a case, if he study thoroughly, he will be able to advance in no one science beyond the merest rudiments; or else, if he desire to go over the whole science, he cannot possibly acquire anything more than the most general and abstract principles learned as a matter of rote, mere barren and isolated formulæ, of which he cannot see the relations, and which are never associated with any actual result. The student, never carrying forward his knowledge to its results, but being ever fagging at elements, loses all enthusiasm in the pursuit of science. He works wearily. He studies not from the love of study, but to accomplish a task. He can read nothing but his text-books, and he turns mechanically from one to the other. His own powers, except those of acquisition, can have no play. He learns to cram for a recitation or for an examination; and when this last is over, his work is done, and he is willing to forget all that he has studied. It gave him no pleasure, it has yielded him no fruit, and he gladly dismisses it all from his thoughts for ever. We fear that there is a large portion of the graduates of all our colleges, to whom these remarks may with truth be applied. If it be not so, they do great injustice to themselves in all their conversations on the subject.

It depends much upon the manner in which his recitations are conducted whether the mind of the student becomes thus wearied and jaded. To require him, while pursuing three or four studies at the same time, to retain in his memory for months the particular order in which the various and often unconnected topics of the text-books may happen to be arranged, evidently tends to produce this unfortunate result. The same weariness may arise from the student's attempting so many studies at once that he has not time to gain clear ideas of any, and consequently he is all the while floating on the surface in confusion, without ever dwelling on any one subject long enough to gravitate towards its centre.

But we cannot persuade ourselves that many students go through our colleges without deriving much greater benefits than President Wayland's sketch implies. The great major

ity of them receive substantial advantages from the present course of instruction, defective as it may be. A certain atmosphere around a venerable seat of learning-its associations and influences, all acting through undefinable agenciescreate in the student's mind new impressions, cultivate purer tastes, and awaken his manlier impulses to guide him aright in the duties and pleasures of life. Often in after years he will delight to trace upon the map of memory the days which he spent

inter sylvas Academi quærere verum,

which have become their own painters, and have left behind them memorials that time cannot efface. Even upon the merest wreck of a liberally educated man, whose vicious indulgences have sunk him into the lowest degradation, there will remain traces of the impressions of his classic studies.

Quo semel imbuta recens servabit odorem
Testa diu.

The Report now presents the subject from another point of observation. It states that in the early history of the country the colleges "supported themselves," but soon their incomes were not sufficient to enable them to pay the salaries of their Professors, and many of the colleges "were running in debt." This unfortunate state of things is attributed to several causes, but chiefly to the following:

A more important reason, however, is found in the relative changes in the masses of society, which, within this period, have been rapidly going for ward. It is manifest to the most casual observer, that the movement of civilization is precisely in the line of the useful arts. Steam, machinery, and commerce, have built up a class of society which formerly was only of secondary importance. The inducements to enter the learned professions have become far less, and those to enter upon the active professions vastly greater. The most coveted positions in society, seats in our highest legis Lative chambers, and even foreign embassies, await the successful merchant or manufacturer, no less than him who has devoted his life to what is called a learned profession.

From these, or some other causes, it is the fact that, within the last thirty years or more, it has been found that the colleges of New-England could not support themselves. The fact is, they were originally schools for merely the learned professions, and the proportion of those who desired a profes sional education was growing less. It is true the sciences which relate to practical life were tau ht in them, but they were taught only in reference to the professions. The portion of time allotted to them was merely sufficient to communicate that knowledge which was considered needful for a lawyer, or a clergyman; the physician pursued these studies in the regular course of his profession. The demand for the article produced in the colleges was falling off, not from the want of wealth, or intelligence, or enterprise in the