THERE is not, in all the expanded area of human thought, any theme more important or more prolific of good or evil to man, temporal, spiritual or eternal, than is the theme of human education. It has commanded the attention, and more or less engrossed the thoughts, of the most gifted minds and the most philanthropic hearts that have adorned our common humanity. The capacity of man, the dignity of man and the destiny of man have been more or less popular themes in every age, and amongst all the civilized nations of the earth. The three most engrossing questions in every age, in every clime of earth, and in every tongue of man, are, were and ever will be, What am I? Whence came I? Whither do I go?

      These are the loftiest, the most profound and soul-engrossing themes on which the mind of man can concentrate all its powers and its energies. It is conceded by the highest tribunals of human science and human learning, by the greatest and best of all philosophers, that the only object seen, contemplated and admired by man, which the sun surveys or the earth contains--the only existence within the human horizon--that will never cease to be--is man. He of all earth's tenantry had a beginning, but will never, never, never have an end.

      It is this view of man, and this view only, that magnifies and aggrandizes the theme of his education, and that, in every age of civilization, has, more than all other themes, engrossed the attention, elicited the energies and commanded the activities of every truly enlightened philanthropist.

      But the proper philosophy of man, indicated in his origin, constitution and destiny, is an essential preliminary to a rational disposition and development of this theme. The first question, then, necessarily is, What is man? He is neither an angel nor an animal. He has a body, a soul and a spirit. He has a trinity of natures in one personality. While Jehovah has a trinity of personalities in one nature, [230] man has a trinity of natures in one personality. He has an animal nature, an intellectual nature and a moral nature. Hence the prayer of the greatest apostle and ambassador of heaven was, "May God sanctify you wholly"--in body, soul and spirit. These are not two, but, three, entities, and these three are in every human being. Man has an animal body, an animal soul and a rational spirit. Two of these are earthly and temporal--one is spiritual and eternal. He is, therefore, not improperly called a microcosm, a miniature embodiment of universal nature, or of the Divine creation.

      We do not, then, wonder, standing on the pinnacle of this temple, that there was a Divine interposition in behalf of humanity in its ruins, and none for the angels who kept not their first estate. And this, indeed, is no ordinary attestation of the dignity of man.

      Hence the institution of a remedial system, to elevate, dignify and beatify man, was introduced by the Creator himself, and consummated by the incarnation of the Divinity in our humanity. This is the proper stand-point whence to survey the special providence and the special grace vouchsafed to man as he now is, in his lapsed and ruined condition.

      Hence the true and enduring sub-basis of a rational and adequate education of a human being, is a just and true conception of man, not as he was, but as he is now, and as he must forever be. Any system not based on these conceptions cannot possibly meet the demands of our mature, or develop and perfect a human being to act well his part in the great drama of human life. The only text-book for such a system, and such a study, and such a perfect development of man, is that inestimable volume, vouchsafed by God himself, in progress of completion some sixteen hundred years. It develops his nature, his origin, his destiny, and counsels his course in life with special reference to his full development and preparation for the highest honors, pleasures and enjoyments of which he is capable. It adapts itself to his highest reason, to the strongest and most enduring cravings of his nature, and reveals to him the only pathway to true glory, honor and immortality. Hence we conclude that this volume should be a standing and a daily text-book in every primary school, academy and college in Christendom.

      But this is not all. The true philosophy of man demands that a rational and systematic course of instruction should be instituted and prosecuted with a special reference to the conscience, the heart and the spirit of man, as to the understanding or intellectual powers, the taste and the imagination of the pupil or the student. The whole world [231] within him, as well as the whole world without him, should not only be defined and developed, but cultivated, matured and perfected, in full harmony with his origin and destiny, not only as far as appertains to the present world, but also as relates to the future and the eternal world.

      Man was not created for this earth as his whole patrimony. He was destined to be a cosmopolite, not of our planet only, or of our solar system, but to have intercourse, free and cordial, with the tenantry of all worlds, and to be a peer of the highest circles of the highest sphere of God's universe. He is, in fact, through the interposition of the second Adam, made a peer of the highest realms in creation, and a joint heir with Adam the Second, who is himself heir of all things. May we not, then, with still more emphasis and earnestness, inquire, What should his education be?

      What then is the meaning of the word education, inquire the sparkling eyes around me? It is a Roman word, of etymological composition. It is tantamount to development--a complete development. It enlarges, invigorates, beautifies, adorns and beatifies the soul and spirit of man. King Solomon endorses this theory in affirming that "a man's wisdom makes his face to shine;" that "its merchandise is better than silver, its increase than that of fine gold." "It is more precious than pearls; and all the objects of desire are not equal to wisdom." He affirms that "its ways are ways of pleasantness; that all its paths are paths of peace;" that " it is a tree of life to those who possess it, and that happy is he who retains it."

      But there is knowledge without wisdom; and there may be, at a certain angle, wisdom without much knowledge. We have occasionally met with persons of much knowledge possessing little wisdom, and with some possessing much wisdom with little knowledge. Education, however, imparts knowledge rather than wisdom; while wisdom uses knowledge with discretion, applying and appropriating it to high and holy purposes. Wisdom and knowledge are of the same paternity, but not of the same maternity. They are, however, eagerly to be sought after; and he that seeketh them with all his heart shall attain to wise counsels. They are the richest gifts of God to mortal man.

      Education, we repeat, is the development of what is in man, and, according to Webster, "it comprehends all that series of instruction and discipline which is intended to enlighten the understanding, correct the temper and form the manners and habits of youth, and fit them for usefulness in their future stations." It is, therefore, physical, literary, moral and religious. No irreligious man is, therefore, a [232] well-educated man. His head may be large and crowded with ideas; but his heart is dwarfed and cold to God and man. His conscience is callous, if not seared with guilt, and his moral sensibilities morbid, if not paralyzed to death. When we affirm the conviction that every well-educated person must be a genuine Christian, we would not be understood as holding or expressing the idea that a Christian is the mere fruit of a good literary, moral or religious education. Still, without education, in some measure, no man can be a Christian. He must understand in some degree the oracles of God. Since the Bible contains the oracles of God, and since these oracles are written in human language, that language, whatever it may be as a mother tongue, must be the vehicle of all intercommunication between heaven and earth, between God and man. Now, if that language be not understood by any particular person, he cannot come to the knowledge of his God or of himself, so far as God has spoken to man, either of himself or of man, or so far as the most enlightened man can develop in words the being of God, the providence of God, the moral government of God, or the general salvation which he has provided for man in his moral ruin.

      Education is, therefore, essential to the salvation of any man in whose hand God, in his moral government or overruling providence, has placed a Bible. This measure of education, essential to a man's self-reliance, his origin, responsibilities and destiny, and to his appreciation of a revelation from God concerning a remedial system, and man's present lapsed and ruined condition, is as indispensable to his immortal spirit and happy destiny as are atmosphere and lungs to his animal life and health. We merely assert these positions, because they are conceded by every man of sound judgment and self-disposing memory. And, therefore, a certain amount of education is absolutely necessary to give to every man the means of possessing and enjoying the life that now is, or that future and everlasting life to come.

      For this end, there is in every child an innate craving after knowledge, as constant and as insatiate as the craving for congenial food. There are, indeed, degrees of it discernible in all children; and, as a general rule, in the exact ratio of the cravings for knowledge is the power or faculty of acquiring it.

      But of all the knowledges of earth and time, the knowledge of our eternal destiny is rationally the all-absorbing, soul-captivating and soul-subduing craving of humanity. A human being devoid of this is not compos mentis, nor, indeed, compos corporis. Lungs without atmosphere would not be more useless or worthless than this insatiate [233] craving for light and knowledge without some communication from the Father of our spirits on the soul-absorbing theme of our future and everlasting destiny. This is, after all the disquisitions on the certainty of a revelation from God to man, embracing his future and eternal destiny, the most palpable a priori argument in favor of the prince of school-books--the Holy Bible.

      But we argue not this question as though it were still a doubtful one. We argue from it as from a fixed fact, fully and cordially and gratefully conceded by those whom we now address. The Bible, indeed, is the tongue of the universe, ever unfolding its mysteries, ever developing, the awful and glorious character of that magnificent Architect whose sublime and awful fiat broke the solemn silence of eternity, and gave birth and being to a thousand millions of suns, and thirty thousand millions of attendant planets,--

      One of the most obvious and impressive arguments for the intellectual and moral dignity of man, is the fact that nothing short of the infinite, the eternal and the immutable, can meet and satisfy the cravings of his spiritual nature. There is more of philosophical fact than of fable in the tradition that the son of Philip and Olympias--Alexander of Macedon--having conquered the world that then was, hung his sword and trumpet in the hall, weeping that his arm was hampered, and had not room enough to do its work, in a world so small as ours. Ambition reddens at this tale, and hangs its head in solemn contemplation. But the truth, the glorious truth, the soul-subduing truth, is, that nothing but the infinite and the eternal can satisfy the cravings of an enlightened human soul. This thought--fact may I call it?--is enough to show to any one of grave reflection, that, whatever may be said of the physical or the intellectual nature of man, the moral and the spiritual are his transcendent glory and felicity. And hence we argue, that any and every system of education that does not contemplate this at a proper stand-point is perfectly at sea, in a boisterous ocean, without sail, compass, or pilot aboard, and, therefore, can never anchor in the haven of safe and happy repose.

      Hence our position, our capital position, is, that the Holy Bible must be in every school worthy of a Christian public patronage, and not in the library only, but daily in the hand of teacher and pupil, professor and student. A dwelling-house without a table, a chair or a couch would not, in our esteem, be more unfit for guests, than a primary [234] school, an academy or a college, without a Bible--not in the library only, but daily in the hand of the student, in solemn reading, study and exegetical development.

      The most highly educated minds in Christendom will, nemine contradicente, with one accord, depose that for simplicity, and beauty, and intelligibility of style, as well as for the grandeur, the majesty and the sublimity of its oracular developments, it has no equal, much less superior, in all the libraries and archives of literature and science, of ancient or modern institution. It stimulates all the energies of the human soul, awakens all its powers of thought, elevates its conceptions, directs its activities, chastens its emotions, and urges it upward and upward in the career of glory, honor and immortality.

      There is an unreasonable and an unfortunate prejudice in some regions, touching the introduction of the whole subject of religion, especially of speculative creeds and catechisms, into the public seminaries of this our age and nation. Into the merits or the demerits of this economy and dispensation of religious truth, or of theoretic and speculative disquisitions of a religious bearing, we have neither taste nor time to enter.

      Suffice it to say that there is a catholic, as well as a provincial, formula of Divine truth, and that neither of them ought to be placed upon the table, to be theologically dissected or embalmed. Christianity is an abstract noun, from the adjective Christian, and that from Christ the consecrated. But the Bible being a book of facts, and not of theories, it may in these be studied, believed, obeyed and enjoyed, without one speculative oracle, on the part of teacher or pupil.

      It is universally conceded by all, whose judgment is mature and worthy of authority amongst the masses, that no man was ever healed, saved or restored to health or life by an assent or subscription to any abstract formula in physics, metaphysics or theology. We live not, we cannot live, on alcohol, or on any distilled spirits whatever; but we can live and enjoy good health on bread and water. And so it is in religion. No man ever entered heaven, according to the Bible, either on physics or metaphysics. It is by faith, based on facts, and not by mere doctrines, orthodox, assented to, that any one is reformed, sanctified or saved. So the learned, and the truly religious, of all creeds and human platforms, unequivocally proclaim.

      Why not, then, rather carry the Bible than the catechism to school? Why not listen to God rather than to man? Are we more safe in the teachings or in the hand of man than of God? Who teaches like Him [235] who possesses not by measure, but without measure, the Spirit of all wisdom and understanding,--who taught on earth and who speaks from heaven, with the plenary inspiration of the Holy Spirit of all wisdom and understanding? No school, worthy of Christian patronage, ever was or can be founded on a catechism, or on the speculative dogmata of any sectarian formula of opinions. We demand, and the age we live in demands, facts, and not theories, Divine oracles, and not human dogmata.

      Had it been compatible with Divine wisdom and prudence to substitute a formula of abstract doctrine, or to give what we call a synopsis of Christian doctrine and sound orthodoxy, could he not, would he not, have given us an infallible summary--a stereotyped and a divinely patented formula of sound opinions, in mode and form to a scruple? The fact that He who foresaw the end of every institution from the beginning, and who foreknew all the involutions and evolutions of human kind, did not do it, is, to our mind, an unanswerable argument against any effort of man to do it.

      In our studies of what is commonly called nature, or the material and spiritual universe, we observe that, despite the four elements of the moderns, God in nature, in providence, in moral government, and in redemption, presents nothing to man in the abstract, or absolute elementary form, but every thing in a concrete and relative form. So contemplated, the universe and the Bible bear the demonstrable impress of one and the same mind and will. To the educated eye of sound reason, there is one supreme intelligence everywhere manifest, without a single aberration; and there is, to the cultivated ear of religion, an omnipresent harmony, without one discordant note in all the spheres of God's own universe.

      There is no apology for skepticism or infidelity, in heaven, earth or hell. There is not a more demonstrable proposition in the whole area of enlightened reason and cultivated intellect, than that the same mind that projected the universe and created the body, soul and spirit of man, also projected the oracles of Eternal Truth, which constitute the materials of that volume we so emphatically and impressively call the Holy Bible.

      The works of the great sculptors, carvers, painters, architects, the Phidiases, the Praxiteles, the Raphaels, the Michel Angelos, of worldwide fame, are not more marked and characterized in the monuments left behind them, than are the shepherds, the husbandmen, the fishermen, the prophets, kings and priests, that were the oracles and the amanuenses of the Holy Spirit of all Divine wisdom and knowledge, [236] embodied and embalmed on the pages of that much-neglected volume emphatically denominated THE BOOK OF LIFE TO MAN.

      This is not only the family Bible, the Sunday-school Bible, the church Bible, but should be the common school, the academy, the college and the Congress Bible, and daily read, studied and practised in and by them all.

      The Bible is, indeed, the tongue of creation. It inspires sun, moon and stars. It not only echoes in the thunders of heaven, in the tempests, the whirlwinds, the earthquakes and the volcanoes of earth, but it speaks in the still small voice of morning and evening, in the conscience, in the heart and in the soul of man. It was the great moral engine of ancient civilization, so far as it obtained a local habitation and a name amongst human kind.

      For the best essay of modern times on the subject of the best means of civilizing the tenantries of the provinces in Great Britain's East India possessions, a rich medal was voted to the author of an essay whose theory of civilization was, "Give to Pagandom the whole Bible in every man's vernacular, and teach every man to read it." The Bible and the schoolmaster are God's two great instrumentalities to enlighten, to civilize and to aggrandize man.

      The Assyrian empire was annihilated by the Medo-Persian, the Medo-Persian by the Grecian, and the Grecian by the Roman. But Bible civilization, even in its rudimental elements, fettered by Grecian and Roman philosophies, falsely so called, sapped and mined the bases of Pagan governments, and gradually paved the way to a more rational, humane and dignified civilization.

      The whole philosophy of the highest civilization ever exhibited on earth or, indeed, conceivable in our horizon, is summarily comprehended in two precepts, on which, according to the greatest philosopher that ever appeared amongst men, depend the whole law and the prophets. These two precepts are but two manifestations or applications of one principle. Love to God and love to man, on the part of man, is the gravitating principle conservative of a rational and moral universe. The centres of all systems are attracting and radiating centres. It is so in the physical, the moral and the spiritual universe. The analogies of the physical to the spiritual, or of the spiritual to the physical, universe, so far as observation extends its dominion, aided by the light of the Bible, and what is sometimes called the light of nature, fully and most satisfactorily demonstrate and attest that they are the offspring of one and the same supreme intelligence, and, therefore, they severally, more or less, interpret and sustain one another. [237]

      We may change the terminology of whatever constitutes our beau ideal of a perfect social system; but the facts or realities of humanity, in its most extended horizon, are the fruit of a piety based upon a Divine communication. Hence the Bible, daily in the hand of every pupil in every school, is not only the best antidote against the frailties and the follies of man, but is also the sovereign directory in all that constitutes an amiable, honorable and magnanimous man or woman.

      A gentle-man and a gentle-woman may be, and, indeed, often are, confounded, in our current dialect, with a genteel man and a genteel woman. But these are the mere creatures of the tailor or mantuamaker, the barber or the milliner, possessing the fashionable diction and mannerism of a Bostonian, a Londoner or a Parisian. These, indeed, are the creatures of perverted reason and romantic fancy; often at war with head, and heart, and conscience, alienating the reason, the moral sensibilities and the affections, from all that is truly amiable, estimable and praiseworthy in the legitimate aspirations of man or woman.

      Education is a transcendently interesting theme. Its merits, its claims, its achievements, its enjoyments, its honors and its rewards, are not to be told in a few minutes, nor inscribed on a few pages. It is more than mere science, art, literature, philosophy, theology or Christology. It is the perfect development and decoration of man, body, soul and spirit. It develops and adorns his animal, intellectual, moral and spiritual nature. It enthrones reason and conscience within him, and subordinates his animalism to the direction and control of an enlightened conscience and a purified heart.

      To achieve these, is the great end and intention of a rational, moral and religious education. And, as assumed in our premises, it must be adapted to our whole constitution, our position in the social compact, and our eternal destiny in the universe of God. Any of these overlooked, neglected or disparaged, must ordinarily, in the common course of human events, terminate unfortunately and unhappily. The individual pupil is, first of all, the loser, but society must, more or less, suffer in every such failure.

      We have in all communities, formally or informally, a joint-stock concern. The honest, industrious, frugal and successful operators in the busy hive of humanity do always suffer from, and generally have to pay all the costs of, all the drones, spendthrifts and marauders within their respective localities. More than half the common and necessary expenses of social life are imposed upon us through the neglect of a rational system of universal education, in the perfect [238] development of what legitimately enters into its unsophisticated definition and import.

      Were we arithmetically to compute our taxes, annually paid, chargeable to the neglect of a rational system of intellectual, moral and religious education, based upon the mature oracles of reason, of human experience, and the authentic annals of expenditures on account of the drones, loungers, loafers, technically defined, in erecting for them pillories, jails, court-houses, penitentiaries, prison-shops, hospitals, houses of correction, armies and navies, to say nothing of lawyers, judges, courts of oyer and terminer, &c. &c., all of which, or most of which, are the legitimate results of the entire or partial neglect of timely physical, intellectual, moral and religious culture, they would be astounding. These, indeed, are the cardinal points in human education, in reference to which the ship of our humanity must direct its course across the ocean of human ignorance and depravity, at the peril of vessel, cargo and all the hands aboard.

      No sage philosopher, no profound political economist, no common philanthropist, no minister of State or of Church, has given to this subject a tithe of the thought and earnest attention which its vital importance and its superlative claims legitimately demand at our hands. That an amelioration of the social system is practicable, and that it is desirable, every man of enlightened reason and sober thought must admit. A cold indifference, indeed a sinful apathy, seems to exist on the part of many who possess an influence which, were it discreetly used and brought to bear on the public mind, might not only stay the progress of this social delinquency, but introduce such a system of moral education, based on the true science of man and of the social system, as would at least prevent the growth or spread of these noxious elements, which ultimately work the degradation and ruin of every people.

      We hold it to be a paramount duty of every citizen, to seek the good of that people amongst whom himself and his posterity are, by Divine Providence, located. The amor patriæ of the Greeks and of the Romans, of the ancient and modern Jews and Gentiles, though not a virtue wholly disconnected from our native selfishness, is still a duty of paramount importance, not merely to ourselves, but, in its wide-spreading and long-enduring influence, more or less bearing upon the destiny of subsequent generations.

      No man on earth, by any Divine or human warrant, lives solely for himself. Others providentially have lived, and do live, for him; and both religiously and morally he is obliged to live for others, or to make [239] his life profitable to them. No man, in any society, lives for himself or dies for himself. This is an oracle both of reason and of revelation. And this fact alone is superlatively suggestive of the premises from which we should reason on the whole subject of education--physical, intellectual and moral. The world is so constituted, that its fortunes or its misfortunes may be materially, if not essentially, changed for the better or for the worse by the education of one individual actor in the drama of one generation. This actor, this agent for good or evil to contemporaries and to posterity, on some scale, large or small, often has been, and may hereafter be, the creature of a propitious or an unpropitious education. Histories and biographies of all sorts--literary, moral, philosophical, political and religious--abound with examples and illustrations of the influence, direct and indirect, of the incalculable good or evil commenced, conducted and consummated, by individuals, clubs, associations, councils and conventions, in each or in all of which, one, two, or three master-spirits, prompting, inspiring, guiding and controlling, have originated, matured and consummated crises of good and evil, in Church and State, in public and in private life, in sciences and in arts, useful and ornamental, the tendencies and bearings of which have continued for generations past, and will continue for generations to come. Old Testament and New Testament history, Chaldean, Persian, Medo-Persian, Grecian, Roman, German, French, English and American histories and biographies, furnish materials for a hundred volumes in proof of the position, that sometimes one, two or three distinguished men have stamped their image, not merely on the coinage of their respective countries, but on the masses that have handled it, and transmitted it, with their manners and customs, during hundreds, if not thousands, of years. The Bible alone, which is, or ought to be, in every man's hands at least once or twice a day, furnishes, in its biographies and narratives, enough, and more than enough, to convince any reasonable man, that education, good or bad, has been the most immediate, and continuous, and potent agency, in the fortunes and misfortunes of mankind, from Adam and Noah down to this present hour.

      From this meagre outline of the all-permeating and all-potent agency of education in the affairs and destinies of the tribes, and nations, and empires of earth, we are authorized to conclude, that it is the paramount duty, privilege and honor of every family, tribe, state and empire on earth, to take it under its most special care, direction, supervision and patrimony.

      The richest mine in any community is its mind. In it are found the [240] wealth of nations, the honor, the dignity and the aggrandizement of every community on the verdant earth. It is a Divine decree, which should be as familiar as household words, and as oft repeated, that educated mind must govern, and does govern, the world, and the universe, of which it is a constituent part.

      Our lawgivers, our law-interpreters, our judges, our executives, should know this, feel it, realize it, and patronize national education, to the utmost extent of constitutional limits. Why should we not work this mine with more intensity of interest, with more careful and paternal solicitude, with more liberality of support, with more generosity of endowment, than any other mine of national wealth--than any other fountain of national dignity and prosperity? All those lawgivers and rulers are penny-wise and pound-foolish, whose national coffers are replete with gold, while a majority of their population are steeped in ignorance, and more or less polluted with crime.

      To keep within the precincts of one letter of our English alphabet, we ask--How many more Franklins, Fultons, Fausts, Farels, Fauquiers, Fayettes, Fénélons, Fergusons, Fields, Fieldings, Findleys, Flavels, Fleetwoods, Flemings, Fletchers, Forbeses, Fosters, Forces, Francises, Frederics and Fullers, might we, and mother England, have had, provided only, as a people, we had sooner learned that educated mind is the true riches, the true honor and the real estate of any and every people!

      But our time and our premises are too much restricted to enter into the development of this theme. But we need not go far abroad in search of argument, illustration, or proof of the incomparable value, benefit and importance of education, in all its bearings upon the destiny of man now, henceforth and forever. In fact, the whole earth, with all its riches, real and personal, was designed by its Creator to be one grand constellation of schools, of every rank and order, for training, developing and perfecting humanity, not merely to eat, drink, frolic, dance and die, but to live, reign, triumph in immortal youth, to bloom and fructify forever in the eternal paradise of God.

      From a consideration of this lofty and profound theme, an important and practically interesting question arises in every inquisitive and earnest mind, How is this education to be prosecuted, and, in some degree, perfected? To answer such a question, might occupy the details of a handsome volume. We can only say at present, that the great text-book of humanity, especially in its moral, spiritual and everlasting relations and enjoyments, is emphatically the Bible; not on the shelf, nor on the family stand, but daily in the hands, under [241] the eyes and upon the conscience and the heart of every pupil capable of reading it. I do not mean in the nursery, the infant school, the seminary, the academy, the college, the university, but in whatever you may please to call the school, the Bible must be daily, solemnly read, and the attention of the pupils or students concentrated upon it, with corresponding literary and exegetical developments, in harmony with the capacity and attainments of the pupil, whether child or stripling, whether in full manhood or womanhood. We have wrought out this problem to our entire satisfaction during the last fifteen years, in college life; and we previously wrought it out for seven years in academic life, and have proof, strong as Holy Writ, of its practicability, power and efficacy.

      In the Holy Bible we have five books in the Christian Scriptures and five primary books in the Jewish Scriptures. These are, in their simple facts and documents, an all-sufficient library for this department of education. We have two other Bibles for two other collateral studies, which constitute and consummate our studies of religion and morality. These are the volumes of the earth and the heavens: the former, the text-book of geology; the latter, the text-book of astronomy. These three infallible volumes severally studied, analytically and synthetically, furnish ample data for any and every student in the great family of man who desires to comprehend himself in his origin, relations and destiny in this magnificent universe.

      But, in the details of moral culture, it should be noted with much emphasis, that of those pupils that enter schools of all orders, a fearful majority are beyond the period of successful moral culture. Neglected at home, they enter schools from which they very seldom can receive that culture most essential to the full exhibition of their spiritual and moral constitution. If this be neglected in the nursery and infant school, as it is in a majority--a fearful majority--of cases, there is not that full assurance of hope which we so fondly desire to entertain that it can be done in the most primary school beyond the nursery. There is a seed-time in humanity as well as in the seasons of the year, which, if passed, is rarely, if ever, to be recalled but by the special grace of God. Paul's compliments to Timothy, touching his grandmother Lois and his mother Eunice, are like apples of gold in pictures of silver, and ought to be committed to memory by every mother in Christendom.¹

      But, When may moral culture most hopefully commence? is a grave [242] question--a most interesting question. Shall we say in grandmother Lois, or in mother Eunice? Before birth, or after it? This is to me, and to you, ladies and gentlemen--Christian ladies and Christian gentlemen--a very grave, serious and highly interesting question. But a word to the wise is sufficient on any thing. It must commence with the commencement of our being, and be continued till the period of our full physical and moral development. So have said our Solomons and our Apostle Pauls, with all the good and great, the learned and wise men of the last three thousand years. As the twig is bent, the tree's inclined. But it is not merely to commence with our being, but to be continued, in the female sex, to the age of eighteen, and in the other sex--more slow to learn--till three times seven, or one-and-twenty years.

      My old friend, Robert Owen, of Lanark, Scotland--once well known in this city--took the position, and stoutly maintained it, that man in his prime was but the creature of mere circumstances. But, since the era of new spiritual communications, he has learned better, and abandoned the position, and now imagines that there is more in man than flesh, blood and bones, and that there are at least infernal spirits, and that the presumption may now be entertained that there are also supernal spheres, with supernal tenantry, all of which were to him, in by-gone days, less than problematical.

      But God's own Book of books is a book of facts, and not at all a book of theories. Facts are for children and the great masses of humanity; philosophies, speculations and doctrines, abstruse and metaphysical, are for philosophers and dogmatists, and not for the great masses of humanity. Moses begins with facts and palpable documents, and ends with them; so do all other inspired writers. They give us every thing in the concrete and nothing in the abstract. Hence, the divine area of creation, of providence, of moral government and of redemption furnish the proper materials of history and prophecy, which include the contents of both Testaments.

      This is the material and the manner of all the inspired documents; and it should be the material and the manner of a useful and practical education. We can discover no good reason why there should be any difference. God is revealed to man by what he has done and what he has said, just as man is revealed to man by what he has done and what he has said. Moral culture is the great end of all human education. This is the polar star of our whole theory. Much experience, [243] and more observation, have most satisfactorily convinced us that this can never be achieved without the instrumentality of God's own Book of Life. Scholastic ethics are jejune provisions for an immortal mind. God's Book is the only book of life to man. His oracles are living oracles, and they are also life-giving oracles. The word of God is a living and a life-giving word. It imparts the light of life to a benighted world. It is a monumental fact, to be read and studied and admired by every reflecting and cultivated mind, that God created the universe by his word. In the only infallible and satisfactory account of the origin of the material universe, we are informed that twice seven fiats give to it birth and being and location. This antedates all the existing and all the dead philosophies of man by thousands of years.

      The Book of God is the only book of life, the only charter of immortality to man. A school, an academy, a college, without the Bible in it, is like a universe without a centre and without a sun. In its hallowed teachings and in its spiritual breathings upon our spirits they are stimulated, energized into all the activities of a moral, a spiritual and in eternal life that satisfies the perpetual cravings of our nature, the longings of our souls for the infinite, the eternal, the unfading joys of a blissful immortality.

      We demand no politico-ecclesiastical creed, rubric or platform, no red-book dictated and commanded or recommended by the civil sword or an intolerant priesthood. We want the Holy Bible of Protestant Christendom to be consecrated in the heads, the hearts, the consciences and the lives of our sons and daughters. We, therefore, plead with God, and we plead with man, and especially with the curators, the superintendents, the presidents, the professors, the teachers, of all seminaries of learning, to permit their pupils, if not to cause them, duly to listen to God speaking to them, teaching them and directing them in the path of life and honor and blessedness eternal. If, with Blackstone, we say, "The trial by jury is the palladium of our civil rights," the Bible in any school in America is the palladium of all our rights, titles and honors, temporal, spiritual and eternal.

      If, with the Honorable Soame Jenyns, of England, we place not patriotism among the Christian virtues because our Lord did not, being only social selfishness, we will not withhold that Book of books from any pupil of any school, in any section of humanity, which places philanthropy before our eyes in its most attractive forms, and which, indeed, enthrones it in the heart of every well-educated youth, as [244] the queen of all the social virtues. If our humanity be limited or circumscribed by political and social leagues and corporations, let us infuse into every youthful heart that spirit of universal benevolence by the teachings of that Divine Spirit which makes it our duty, our interest, our honor and our happiness to embrace in the bosom of Christian benevolence the whole family of man; in doing which, we practically imitate the Father of all mercies and the God of all grace, who causes his sun to rise upon the good and the evil, and who sends the early and the latter rain on the just and on the unjust.

      To the professional teachers of the youth of our country, we would express an opinion which we have long cherished, and which we esteem it both a duty and a privilege, on such occasions as the present, to express. Gentlemen, from many years' experience and observation--at least one-quarter of a century of my life a professional teacher--and familiar with many of the most reputable teachers in the Old World and in the New, for at least half a century, I have come to the conclusion that no class of men, in any department of society, have more of the good or evil destiny of the world in their hands and under their influence than the teachers of our schools and colleges. In forming this opinion, I have taken into my premises that everywhere-appreciated and highly respected and respectable class of men that occupy the pulpit--sometimes called the sacred desk--on at least one day in every week. They have very promiscuous and sometimes very unstable hearers, and they give them but one lesson, or at most two, in one week, and these are not protracted generally beyond the limits of a single hour, while most of you occupy the attention of your pupils more time in one month than they do in a whole year. In point of time and labor, one academic teacher is equal, in this area, to some ten or twelve religious instructors. Besides, you teach with a book in your hand, and the same book is in the hand of every pupil in your class. The preacher takes a verse, and you take a page or a plurality of pages, in a single lesson. You have, besides, this advantage--your classes are children, or young men with good memories, not deeply inscribed with the cares and troubles of life. Of course, then, you have a power paramount in shaping the destinies of mankind, greatly superior to that of the priesthood and clergy of this age. You read the Holy Scriptures, too, in the vernacular, and sometimes in the original; hence, in truth, I must regard you as quite as influential upon the destinies of the world as are the clergy of the living age. [245]

      Cherish, then, a high estimate of your noble calling, and estimate your responsibilities in the light of eternity; and act, accordingly, your part as responsible functionaries in planting in the heart, in the dawn of life, the seeds of those holy principles which enlarge the understanding, purify the heart and adorn with high and holy virtues the life of man. [246]

[PLA 230-246]