manage a school than the committees elected by the respective cities and
towns. Judged as individuals, this is probably true; though upon this
point I prefer to admit a claim rather than to express an opinion. But
positively incompetent school committees are the exception in
Massachusetts; usually the people make the selection from their best
men. But in the public school you get the immediate, direct supervision
of the public. Not merely in the election of committees, but in a daily
interest and vigilance whose results are freely disclosed to the
superintending committee, as every inhabitant feels that his
contribution, as a tax-payer, gives him the right to judge the character
of the school, and makes it his duty to report its defects to those
charged with its management. The real defects of a school, especially of
a high school, will be first discovered by pupils; and they are likely
to report these defects to their parents. In the case of the endowed
private school, the parent feels that he buys whatever the trustees have
to sell, or takes as a gift whatever they have to offer free; and he
does not, logically nor as a matter of fact, infer from either of these
relations his right to participate in the government of the school. In
one case you have the observation, the judgment, the supervision, of the
whole community; in the other case you have the learning and judgment of
five, seven, ten, or twelve men.
2dly. The faithfulness of the teacher is very much dependent upon the
supervision to which he is subject. This is only saying that the teacher
is human. In the public school there is no motive which can influence a
reasonable man that would lead him to swerve in the least from his
fidelity to the interest of the school as a whole. No partiality to a
particular individual, no desire to promulgate a special idea, can ever
stand in the place of that public support which is best secured by a
just performance of his duties. In the private school, with a
self-perpetuating board of trustees, the temptation is strong to make
the organization subservient to some opinion in politics, religion, or
social life. This may not always be done; but in many cases it has been
done, and there is no reason to expect different things in the future. I
concur, then, unreservedly in the judgment which has placed this
institution, in all its interests and in all its duties, under the
control of the inhabitants of Bernardston. When they who live in its
light and enjoy its benefits cease to respect it, when they to whom it
is specially dedicated cease to love and cherish it, it will no longer
be entitled to the favorable consideration of a more extended public
sentiment. As all trustworthy national patriotism must be built on love
for state, town, and home, so every school ought to esteem its power for
usefulness in its own neighborhood its chief means of good.
It will naturally be inferred, from the remarks made upon the singleness
of purpose and fidelity of the public school to the cause of education,
that the instruction given in it is more thorough than is usually given
in the private school. But, in examining yet further the claim of the
public school to superior thoroughness, I must assume that it enjoys the
advantages of comfortable rooms, adequate apparatus and competent
teachers. And this assumption ought to be supported by the facts. There
is no good reason why any town in Massachusetts should be negligent or
parsimonious in these particulars. True economy requires liberal
appropriations. With these appropriations, the best teachers, even from
private schools and academies, can be secured, and all the aids and
encouragements to liberal culture can be provided. Is it possible that
any of the means of a common-school education are necessarily denied to
a million and a quarter of industrious people, who already possess an
aggregate capital of seven or eight hundred millions of dollars? But the
character of a high school must always depend materially upon the
previous training of the pupils, and the qualifications required for
admission. When the high school is a public school, the studies of the
primary and grammar or district schools are arranged with regard to the
system as a system. There is no inducement to admit a pupil for the sake
of the tuition fees, or for the purpose of adding to the number of
scholars. The applicant is judged by his merits as a scholar; and where
there is a wise public sentiment, the committee will be sustained in the
execution of just rules.
In the public high school we avoid a difficulty that is almost universal
in academies and private schools--the presence of pupils whose
attainments are so various that by a proper classification they would be
assigned to two, if not to three grades, where the graded system
exists. The vigilance, industry and fidelity of teachers, cannot
overcome this evil. The instruction given is inevitably less systematic
and thorough. The character which the high school, whether public or
private, presents, is not its own character merely; it reflects the
qualities and peculiarities of the schools below. It follows, then, that
the attention of the public should be as much directed to the primary
and grammar or district schools as to the high school itself. Of course,
it ought not to be assumed that the existence of a high school will
warrant any abatement of appropriations for the lower grades; indeed,
the interest and resources of these schools ought continually to
increase.
Nor can it be assumed that your contributions to the cause of education
will be diminished by the bequest of your generous testator. He did not
seek to lessen your burdens, but to add to the means of education among
you.
There is also an inherent power of discipline in the public schools,
where they are graded and a system of examinations exists, that is not
found elsewhere. Neither the pupil nor the parent is viewed by the
teacher in the light of a patron; hence, he seeks only to so conduct his
school as to meet the public requirement. Moreover, as admission to a
high school can be secured by merit only, the results of the
preliminary training must have been such as to create a reasonable
presumption in favor of the applicant, mentally and morally. Hence, the
public schools are filled by youth who are there as the reward of
individual, personal merit. Practically, the motive by which the pupils
are animated has much to do with their success. If they are moved by a
love for learning, they attain the object of their desires even without
the aid of teachers; but where they are aided and encouraged by faithful
teachers, the school is soon under the control of a public sentiment
which secures the end in view.
This public sentiment is not as easily built up in a private school;
for, in the nature of things, some pupils will find their way there who
are not true disciples of learning; and such persons are obstacles to
general progress, while they advance but little themselves.
And, gentlemen trustees and citizens of Bernardston, may I not
personally and especially invite you to consider the importance of a
fixed standard of admission and a careful examination of candidates?
This course is essential to the improvement of your district and village
schools. It is essential to the true prosperity of this seminary, and it
is also essential to the intellectual advancement of the people within
your influence. You expect pupils from the neighboring towns. Your
object is not pecuniary profit, but the education of the people. If your
requirements are positive, though it may not be difficult to meet them
in the beginning, every town that depends upon this institution for
better learning than it can furnish at home will be compelled to
maintain schools of a high order. On the other hand, negligence in this
particular will not only degrade the school under your care here, but
the schools in this town and the cause of education in the vicinity will
be unfavorably affected. Nor let the objection that a rigid standard of
qualifications will exclude many pupils, and diminish the attendance
upon the school, have great weight; for you perform but half your duty
when you provide the means of a good education for your own students.
You are also, through the power inherent in this authority, to do
something to elevate the standard of learning in other schools, and in
the country around. What harm if this school be small, while by its
influence other schools are made better, and thus every boy and girl in
the vicinity has richer means of education than could otherwise have
been secured? Thus will tens, and hundreds, and thousands, of successive
generations, have cause to bless this school, though they may never have
sat under its teachers, or been within its walls.
In a system of public schools, everything may be had at its prime cost.
There need be no waste of money, or of the time or power of teachers. As
the public system must everywhere exist, it is a matter of economy to
bring all the children under its influence. The private system never can
educate all; therefore the public system cannot be abandoned, unless we
consent to give up a part of the population to ignorance. It may, then,
be said that the private schools, essential in many cases, ought to give
way whenever the public schools are prepared to do the work; and when
the public schools are so prepared, the existence of private schools
adds their own cost to the necessary cost of popular education.
But we are not to encourage parsimony in education; for parsimony in
this department is not true economy. It is true economy for the state
and for a town to set up and maintain good schools as cheaply as they
can be had, yet at any necessary cost, so only that they be good.
Massachusetts is prosperous and wealthy to-day, respected in evil report
as well as in good, because, faithful to principle and persistent in
courage, she has for more than two hundred years provided for the
education of her children; and now the re-flowing tide of her wealth
from seaboard and cities will bear on its wave to these quiet valleys
and pleasant hill-sides the lovers of agriculture, friends of art,
students of science, and such as worship rural scenes and indulge in
rural sports; but the favored and first-sought spots will be those where
learning has already chosen her seat, and offers to manhood and age the
culture and society which learning only can give, and to childhood and
youth, over and above the training of the best schools, healthful moral
influences, and elements of physical growth and vigor, which ever
distinguish life in the country and among the mountains from life in the
city or on the plain. And over a broader field and upon a larger sphere
shall the benignant influence of this system of public instruction be
felt. In the affairs of this great republic, the power of a state is not
to be measured by the number of its votes in Congress. Public opinion is
mightier than Congress; and they who wield or control that do, in
reality, bear rule. Power in the world, upon a large view, and in the
light of history, has not been confided to the majorities of men.
Greece, unimportant in extent of territory, a peninsula and archipelago
in the sea, led the way in the civilization of the west, and, through
her eloquence, poetry, history and art, became the model of modern
culture. Rome, a single city in Italy, that stretches itself into the
sea as though it would gaze upon three continents, subjugated to her
sway the savage and civilized world, and impressed her arms and
jurisprudence upon all succeeding times; then Venice, without a single
foot of solid land, guarded inviolate the treasure of her sovereignty
for thirteen hundred years against the armies of the East and the West;
while, in our own time, England, unimportant in the extent of her
insular territory, has been able, by the intelligence and enterprise of
her people, to make herself mistress of the seas, arbiter of the
fortunes of Europe, and the ruler of a hundred millions of people in
Asia.
These things have happened in obedience to a law which knows no change.
Power in America is with those who can bring the greatest intellectual
and moral force to bear upon a given point. And Massachusetts, limited
in the extent of her territory, without salubrity of climate, fertility
of soil, or wealth of mines, will have influence, through her people at
home and her people abroad, proportionate to her fidelity to the cause
of universal public education.
NORMAL SCHOOL TRAINING.
[An Address delivered at the Dedication of the State Normal School, at
Salem.]
The human race may be divided into two classes. One has no ideal of a
future different from the present; or, if it is not always satisfied
with this view, it has yet had no clear conception of a higher
existence.
The other class is conscious of the power of progress, is making
continual advances, and has an ideal of a future such as, in its
judgment, the present ought to be. Both of these classes have
institutions; for institutions are not the product of civilization, as
they exist wherever our social nature is developed. Man is also a
dependent being, and he therefore seeks the company, counsel and support
of his fellows. From the right of numbers to act comes the necessity of
agreement, or at least so much concurrence in what is to be done as to
secure the object sought. The will of numbers can only be expressed
through agencies; and these, however simple, are indeed
institutions--the evidence of civilization, rather than its product.
They are always the sign, symbol, or language, by which the living man
expresses the purpose of his life. Therefore, institutions differ, as
the purposes of men vary.
The savage and the man of culture do not seek the same end; hence they
will not employ the same means.
The institutions of the savage are those of the family, clan, or tribe,
to which he belongs. There the child is instructed in the art of dress,
in manners and language, in the rude customs of agriculture, the chase,
and war. This with him is life, and the history of one generation is
often the history of many generations. Their ideal corresponds with
their actual life; and, as a necessary result, there is little or no
progress.
But the other class establishes institutions which indicate the
existence of new relations, and exact the performance of new duties. As
man is a social being, he necessarily creates institutions of government
and education corresponding to the sphere in which he is to act. If a
nation desires to educate only a part of its people, its institutions
are naturally exclusive; but wherever the idea of universal education
has been received, the institutions of the country look to that end.
When Massachusetts was settled there were no truly popular institutions
in the world, for there was really no belief in popular rights. And why
should those be encouraged to think who have no right to act? The
principle that every man is to take a part in the affairs of the
community or state to which he belongs seems to be the foundation of the
doctrine that every man should be educated to think for himself. Free
schools and general education are the natural results of the principles
of human equality, which distinguish the people and political systems of
America.
The purposes of a people are changeable and changing, but institutions
are inflexible; therefore these latter often outlast the ideas in which
they originated, or the ideas may be acting in other bodies or forms.
Institutions are the visible forms of ideas, but they are useful only
while those ideas are living in the minds of men. If an institution is
suffered to remain after the idea has passed away, it embarrasses rather
than aids an advancing people. Such are monastic establishments in
Protestant countries; such is the Church of England, as an institution
of religion and government, to all classes of dissenters; such are many
seminaries of learning in Europe, and some in America.
Massachusetts has had one living idea, from the first,--that general
intelligence is necessary to popular virtue and liberty. This idea she
has expressed in various ways; the end it promises she has sought by
various means. In obedience to this idea, she has established colleges,
common schools, grammar schools, academies, and at last the Normal
School.
The _institution_ only of the Normal School is new; the _idea_ is old.
The Normal system is but a better expression of an idea partially
concealed, but nevertheless to be found in the college, grammar school
and academy of our fathers. Nor have we accepted the institution so
readily from a knowledge of its results in other countries, as from its
manifest fitness to meet a want here. It is not, then, our fortune to
inaugurate a new idea, but only to clothe an old one again, so that it
may more efficiently advance popular liberty, intelligence and virtue.
And this is our duty to-day.
The proprieties of this occasion would have been better observed, had
his excellency, Governor Washburn, found it convenient to deliver the
address, which, at a late moment, has been assigned to me. But we are
all in some degree aware of the nature and extent of his public duties,
and can, therefore, appreciate the necessity which demands relief from
some of them.
Massachusetts has founded four Normal Schools, and at the close of the
present century she may not have established as many more, for she now
satisfies the just demands of every section of her territory, and
presents the benefits of this system of instruction to all her
inhabitants. The building we here set apart, and the school we now
inaugurate to the service of learning, are to be regarded as the
completion of the original plan of the state, and any future extension
will depend upon the success of the Normal system as it shall appear in
other years to other generations of men. But we have great faith that
the Normal system, in itself and in its connections, will realize the
cherished idea of our whole history; and if so, it will be extended
until every school is supplied with a Normal teacher.
This, then, is an occasion of general interest; but to the city of
Salem, and the county of Essex, it is specially important. Similar
institutions have been long established in other parts of the state; but
some compensation is now to be made to you, in the experience and
improvements of the last fifteen years. Intelligent labor sheds light
upon the path of the laborer, and, though the direct benefits of this
system have not been here enjoyed, many resulting advantages from the
experience of similar institutions in other places will now inure to
you.
The city of Salem, with wise forecast, anticipated these advantages, and
generously contributed a sum larger even than that appropriated by the
state itself. This bounty determined the location of the school, but
determined it fortunately for all concerned.
Salem is one of the central points of the state; and in this respect no
other town in the vicinity, however well situated, is a competitor.
Pupils may reside at their homes in Newburyport, Lynn, Lawrence,
Haverhill, Gloucester and Lowell, or at any intermediate place, and
enjoy the benefit of daily instruction within these walls. This is a
great privilege for parents and pupils; and it could not have been so
well secured at any other point. Here, also, pupils and teachers may
avail themselves of the libraries, literary institutions and cabinets of
this ancient and prosperous town. These are no common advantages.
We are wiser and better for the presence of great numbers of books,
though we may never know what they contain. We see how much perseverance
and labor have accomplished, and are sensible that what has been may be
equalled if not excelled. In great libraries, we realize how the works
of the ambitious are neglected, and their names forgotten, while we
cannot fail to be impressed with the value of the truth, that the only
labor which brings a certain reward is that performed under a sense of
duty.
Salem is itself the intelligent and refined centre of an intelligent and
prosperous population; and we may venture so far, in just eulogy, as to
attribute to it the united advantages of city and country, without a
large share of the privations of the one, or the vices of the other. Of
the four Normal Schools, this is, unquestionably, the most fortunate in
its position and surroundings. We, therefore, ask for the concurrence of
the public in the judgment which has established it in this city. If it
shall be the fortune of the government to assemble a body of instructors
qualified for their stations, there will then remain no reason why these
accommodations and advantages should not be fully enjoyed.
The Normal School differs from all other seminaries of learning, and
only because it is an auxiliary to the common schools can it be deemed
their inferior in importance. The academy and college take young men
from the district and high schools, and furnish them with additional
aids for the business of life; but the Normal School is truly the helper
of the common schools. It receives its pupils from them, fits these
pupils for teachers, and sends them back to superintend where a few
months before they were scholars. The Normal Schools are sustained by
the common schools; and these latter, in return, draw their best
nutriment from the former. This institution stands with the common
school; it is as truly popular, as really democratic in a just sense,
and its claim for support rests upon the same foundation.
In Massachusetts we have abandoned the idea, never, I think, general,
that instruction in the art of teaching is unnecessary.
The Normal School is, with us, a necessity; for it furnishes that
tuition which neither the common school, academy, nor college can. These
institutions were once better adapted to this service than now. There
has been a continual increase of academic studies, until it has become
necessary to establish institutions for special purposes; and of these
the Normal School is one. Its object is definite. The _true_ Normal
School instructs only in the art of teaching; and, in this respect, it
must be confessed we have failed, sadly failed, to realize the ideal of
the system. It is not a substitute for the common school, academy, or
college, though many pupils, and in some degree the public, have been
inclined thus to treat it. There should be no instruction in the
departments of learning, high or low, except what is incidental to the
main business of the institution; yet some have gone so far in the wrong
course as to suggest that not only the common branches should be
studied, but that tuition should be given in the languages and the
higher mathematics. A little reflection will satisfy us how great a
departure this would be from the just idea of the Normal School. Yet
circumstances, rather than public sentiment, have compelled the
government to depart in practice, though never in theory, from the true
system.
It so happens that much time is occupied in instruction in those
branches which ought to be thoroughly mastered by the pupil before he
enters the Normal School,--that is, before he begins to acquire the art
of teaching what he has not himself learned.