If the time now spent in attempting to make pupils find out for themselves the names of words by spelling them, were employed in pronouncing words without spelling them, we believe the pupils of our primary schools would make in the first two years full twice the advancement they now do.-Ohio Journal.

NOTICE.

The Connecticut State Teachers' Association will hold its next semiannual meeting at Middletown, commencing Monday, Oct. 24th, at 2 o'clock, and continuing through Tuesday evening, Oct. 25th.

Oct. 3

Teachers' Institutes for Connecticut will be held as follows:
South Coventry and Brookfield.
Southington and Mystic.
Branford and Plainfield.

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Each Institute commencing on Monday evening and closing with the exercises on Friday evening.

PRIZE ESSAYS.

The following Prizes for original Essays are offered by the Massa chusetts Teachers' Association :

To the members of the Association, for the best Essay, on either of the following subjects, a prize of twenty dollars.

1. "The importance of increasing the number of Female Teachers qualified to give instruction in the Higher Departments of Education."

2. "The Evils and Remedies of Whispering, or Communicating, in School."

To the female teachers of the State, for the best Essay, on either of the following subjects, a prize of twenty dollars.

1. "Best Method of Conducting a Primary School.” 2. "Thoroughness in Teaching."

The Essays must be forwarded to the Secretary, Charles J. Capen, Esq., Latin School, Boston, on or before the 15th of October. Each Essay should be accompanied by a sealed envelope, enclosing the name of the writer. The envelopes accmpanying the unsuccessful Essays will not be opened. The prizes will be awarded by an impartial Committee; but no prize will be awarded to an Essay that is not deemed worthy of one. The successful Essays will be regarded as the property of the Association.

Newburyport, April 18, 1853.

W. H. WELLS, President.

THE late discussion in regard to the Prize Essay read before. the American Institute, at New Haven, on "Crime-its Cause and Cure," has excited the attention of educators and philanthropists throughout the country. It was a singular fact that the committee of gentlemen who read the essay and awarded it the prize, had not been able to discover that the educational system of New England was referred to in terms of strong derogation, nor had they found in it, what nearly all who took part in the debate seemed to have found, anything which they deemed a libel upon the educational system of this part of the country.

There was, without doubt, much misapprehension of the author's meaning, in the first part of the essay; and much that was not intended to apply to our system, was understood as having a direct bearing upon it. This was unfortunate, and might have been avoided, had the author entered into a fuller expression of his views as to the relative merits of the systems of different countries. The manner in which statistics were applied we believe to be erroneous, and the conclusions unreasonable and unsatisfactory. But a careful perusal of the essay in question, will, we think, have a more favorable impression on the public mind in regard to it, than would be entertained from the aspect which it presented to the highly distinguished gentlemen who participated in the debate; and will satisfy all, that, although statistics may have been misapplied, due credit was given to New England for the relative superiority of her educational system in respect to its moral character and influ

ence. Such superiority was distinctly admitted in that part of the essay to which we have referred.

Admitting that the author entered into no especial laudation of our system of education, yet we cannot see that its comparative excellence was underrated, nor that there appear, after a careful perusal, real grounds for so much severe censure.

We trust the essay will be published, so that its fallacies, if it contains any, may be exposed; and also that the truly noble views which have been advanced in the latter part of it, may exercise their proper influence. The moral influence of our common school system of instruction is not so strong as it might be, and it was the chief object of the essay to show this, and point out the remedy. It therefore deserves attention. There are propositions in it which are somewhat startling, and which open a wide field for discussion. We trust that they will be fully considered.

We would now call attention to the following communication.

For The Massachusetts Teacher.

MR. EDITOR.-The last number of the "Teacher" contains a report of the doings of the American Institute of Instruction, at their late session in New Haven. The reporter attempts to give an abstract or outline of the essay, read by me before the Institute at that time.

With the general fairness of the report in relation to the essay, and of the debate which ensued thereon, I had no fault to find. But there are one or two points misrepresented or overstated, (it is presumed without any evil intent,) which I wish to set right, that the misconception, already prevalent to some extent in regard to the character of that production, may not be confirmed and more widely spread through the medium of your journal.

On page 310, fourth paragraph, the report holds the following language, viz.:-" He (Mr. P.) doubted whether, when we have simply taught one to read, and no more, we have really done him any good. Facts would show that to make one good, we must do something more than to teach him to read and write. This of itself only makes men more capable of doing evil.”

Such is the language of the report. The italicizing is mine. Now I will give you the language of the essay. "Facts will show that to make men good, we must do something more for them than teach them to read and write. Knowledge, an enlightened intellect, unaided and unrestrained by moral culture, may only serve to make a man the greater villain." This is quite different from the language of the report.

Intellectual culture makes a man more capable of doing either good or evil.

Again, the following language on page 212, paragraph first, professedly setting forth the doctrine of the essay, does not do it justice. "Legislatures have seemed to take it for granted that all that was necessary to reform men, was to enlighten them. A school does not generally embrace the idea of inculcating good moral principles and good manners. The same thing is true of our school-books. And the same defect runs through our Normal Schools, and the examination of teachers." The essay does not say this either of legislatures, or schools, or normal schools, or examinations, or books.-The essay says: "Legislators and educators and all have been too much in the way of thinking that in order to reform the world it is only necessary to enlighten it. Look at our legislation, our books, our examinations, our rules and regulations; yea, the whole school movement. A good school with us, in the ordinary acceptation of the terms, is understood to mean one in which the languages and sciences and polite accomplishments are well taught, where a boy may be prepared for college, or for the counting-room; and a girl fitted for polished society. By a good school is not meant, I will not say in any degree, but, first of all and chiefly, a school in which sound principles and good manners are inculcated; where the cardinal virtues of justice, temperance, and truth, occupy the same platform with grammar, history, and arithmetic." The essay does not set forth that either our legislatures or our schools repudiate or totally neglect morals in education, but that they do not sufficiently insist upon them, they do not put them on an equality with the intellectual branches of study.

The

The debate, which seems to be pretty faithfully reported, is almost throughout a misrepresentation of the doctrine of the essay. Those who took part in it, speak of the essay as though it imputed the increase of crime and immorality directly to education, to the education of our schools. But it is not so. essay only asserts that the education of our schools has not prevented the increase of crime; that it has not checked it so much as it might have done; and for the reason that there has been a deficiency of moral training in them. It closes with an earnest exhortation to teachers, and all others interested in the subject, to give that attention to moral instruction which its relative importance demands.

It is my intention to publish the essay, so that all who wish it, may be able to judge of its character, and see whether it merits the denunciation it has received of being "a slander and a libel" upon our common schools.

Respectfully yours,

C. PEIRCE.

Waltham, Oct. 12, 1853.

POPULAR EDUCATION IN THE UNITED STATES.

(From the Edinburgh Review for July, 1853.)

THE man still lives who can remember the United States of America as the humble dependencies of Great Britain. A few remote colonies fringing the shores of the Atlantic, hemmed in by mountains and forests, had made little impression on the wilderness. Almost without roads, a mere bridle path sufficed for their weekly mail. No banks nor moneyed institutions gave aid to commerce. Agriculture resorted to the rudest tools. A small class of vessels confined to the coasting trade, the fisheries, or an occasional voyage to the West Indies or Europe, formed their shipping. Manufactures and the mechanic arts were in their cradle. A little molasses was distilled into rum. A few coarse cloths were made in the hand loom, and so inferior were the sheep that a traveller predicted broadcloth could never be manufactured.

Some iron had been melted with charcoal, but furnaces and forges languished under jealous governors. The vast beds of coal which underlie the Middle States were unknown, and cotton, the great basis of modern manufactures, had not blossomed in the Colonies. The policy of the mother country was to make marts for her merchants, and to restrict the Colonies to the cultivation of tobacco, indigo, rice, and to breadstuffs, and the shipment of these staples, with staves, lumber, and naval stores, to the mother country. These articles were dispensed by England to the residue of Europe.

The population of these Colonies was less than 3,000,000; and their chief seaports, Boston, Newport, New York, and Philadelphia, contained each from ten to twenty thousand inhabitants.

But the Colonists, although poor, and indebted to the British merchants, had carried with them from their native land an inalienable love of freedom; were tenacious of their rights, and resolute in their opposition to excise and stamp acts. They spurned the idea of taxation without representation. England was sadly misguided; a seven years' war ensued. The British arms, often victorious, achieved no permanent success, and were finally foiled by an endurance never surpassed. The Colonists prevailed, but their success was almost runious. At the close of a protracted war they found their country impoverished, their Union dissolving, their seaports desolate, their ships decayed, and the flower of their youth withered in the field or in the prison-ship. From this period of gloom and exhaustion little progress was made until the adoption of the Constitution in 1788, and the funding of the public debt under the wise administration of Washington.