directed. Pupils should be encouraged to read biographies in connection with their historical reading.

MR. RICHARDS wished to offset some "executive remarks," made by Mr. Brown. He did so by referring to an examination passed by a young man for a public position. After passing the examination in a highly satisfactory manner, he lacked executive ability.

REPORT OF COMMITTEE ON HIGHER

EDUCATION.

HIGHER INSTITUTIONS REQUIRED.

According to the division of departments adopted by this Council, we understand "the Higher Education" to mean that part of our educational work which has to do with bringing forward, fit for active service, those who may be properly called, in Chinese phrase, "superior men"-men prepared to be leaders of thought and influence and authority and bold enterprise for the advancement of mankind and the general welfare of society. Its formal processes begin with a young man when he enters college, and terminate when he goes out from under teachers, to show, in his own individuality and action, what he has come to be and to possess.

It will help us to apprehend the institutions required, if we consider briefly, in the outset, what are the direct aims of the Higher Education. The education which comes before it is devoted to germinating processes for unfolding the faculties of the soul and starting them in active, systematic exercise. The Higher Education takes up the work thus begun and carries it forward for the maturing and expanding of minds to the highest degree practicable. Its aim, controlling at first, prominent through all its stages and methods, is discipline-the training which brings out every faculty in full strength, which removes excrescences, fills out deficiencies and brings forward in symmetrical development, minds well balanced in all parts, and prepared to enter efficiently upon any line of life-work.

It aims, also, to give expansion to the mind. It opens the wide world. of truth, and calls the student to acomprehensive survey of the range of things that may be studied, introduces him to a close acquaintance with specific departments of truth, and initiates him into the methods. and processes pertaining to each, so that if, for his life-work, he shall devote himself to one line of investigation, he may prosecute that with due recognition of the relations and claims of other departments. This warrants us to call it a liberal education.

Another aim of the higher education is the accumulation of knowledge,

for the mind itself to feed on, and for use in contact with other minds. While it favors a general knowledge of many things, it insists on an accurate knowledge of some things, leaving each student free to follow the prompting of his own taste and disposition, and to adapt his work to his circumstances and plans for life. A liberal education thus implies a broad culture, rich stores of knowledge, a general apprehension of things that may be known and a well-defined consciousness of some things thoroughly known.

Above and through all, the higher education aims to secure influ ences positive and direct on the forming of character. For the development of the whole man, intellectual and moral culture must be blended. The period of life when, with most persons, character is determined, is from the age of eighteen to twenty-five. The most effective work of the higher education comes within the same period, and the moral bearing of that work should be carefully and constantly regarded. This aim will be accomplished not so much by direct precepts and prohibitions, as by sentiments favorable to the things which are true and pure and just and honorable, made prevalent by the example and spirit of teachers, and by plain appeals to the reason and conscience of each soul, free and responsible for its own conduct.

The outcome of the work prosecuted with these aims will appear in the perfecting of the individual soul. To bring out the noblest faculties of the man in completest unfolding, to give to each, conscious possession and command of his own powers for any use, and to mold the spirit so that truth and purity and righteousness, love to God and love to men shall rule the life and shine out as the charm and glory of complete manhood,-to do this for each one and for as many as possible-this is the ultimate result, the final cause of the higher education. Society exists for the advancement of the individual and not the individual for society. Education, as the instrument of society, is accordingly directed to the perfecting of individuals. Every stage in the process must be made to contribute to this result, so far as the time, the appliances, and the quality of the subject will permit.

At the same time, we have to recognize the fact that no man liveth to himself alone. Those for whose individual development education has done its best, are to live in association with their fellows. In society they are to exemplify and illustrate the benefits they have received. Society is to feel their presence. By a law as fixed and constant as that which sends the sun's light and heat to affect all

life on our globe, the influence of those most highly educated is made to pervade all social life. The souls of all are quickened, raised, refined, thereby. So in this aspect of the matter, the results of the higher education appear in formers and reformers of society,leaders in the world's civilization.

To speak more in detail, it sends forth broad-minded, energetic men to direct the great enterprises by which material blessings are multiplied and distributed; it prepares women to be good wives and mothers, and, at the same time, centres of light, queens in happy homes, ruling by the divine right of intelligence and love; it raises up capable teachers of all grades, such as are needed at the desk of the primary school and in the chair of the college professor; it gives the necessary outfit for the physician, the lawyer, the minister of religion and the high-minded journalist. Its results appear also in scholars, artists, authors, poets, investigators, and specialists in science, whose busy brain-work prepares and disseminates truth in forms fitted to be food for human souls, gratifies refined tastes, and draws out of nature's hidden sources new treasures to increase the sum of human knowledge and the means of human happiness.

We come now to the main question, What are the institutions required to carry on the higher education with such aims, for such results? It seems to us the two names, the College and the University, embrace all. Both these names have been sadly abused, being very frequently adopted by pretentious institutions, of all grades, from the common school upwards. Let us try to bring out a distinct view of the proper place and functions of each.

The American college is an institution sui generis. The name was introduced from old England, but the institution to which it is applied was conceived and has been unfolded to meet the peculiar exigencies of this new world. The records of New England inform us that as early as the year 1636, "the Lord was pleased to direct the hearts of the magistrates to think of erecting a school or college, and that speedily to be a nursery of knowledge in these deserts and supply for posterity." The college realizes this thought as it cherishes a love of knowledge and promotes its increase and trains and fits men for service in the State and in the Church and in all posts of influence where educated mind has power. Upon beginnings of education, made in the common schools, it rises to a higher plane, and while adding continually to the stores of knowledge, directs its chief efforts to that training of minds somewhat matured, which secures to

each, self-knowledge, self-possession in the full command of all the mental faculties,―breadth of view respecting the range of truth, its departments and applications, and a moral and religious character, based on love of truth for its own sake and prompting an unselfish devotion of all powers and all acquisitions to the good of men and the glory of God.

Under this leading idea, we need to notice a few things peculiar in the organization and routine of the college. Waiving now the question of the co-education of the sexes, we speak of a college as an institution for young men, believing our leading thoughts to be applicable as well to the higher education of young women, whether that be prosecuted in an institution which admits both sexes, or in one exclusively for women, properly called a college.

1. The college is peculiar in respect of the persons with whom it deals. They are young men, somewhere between the ages of fifteen and twenty-five--the best years are from eighteen to twenty-two. Then the capacities of the soul are well awake and are under the control of the possessor's will-power. Under special preparation they have gained some knowledge and some relish for learning. Yet they are flexible, impressible, ductile, just in a condition to be most effectively molded by wise training.

2. The college is peculiar as respects the length of time covered by its course of study. This has been fixed at just four years, not by any arbitrary enactment, but as experience has proved that this measure of time secures best results of the training contemplated. If the period is curtailed, something will be wanting. If it is prolonged, it must involve some retrenchment on either the preliminary preparatory culture, or on the subsequent university or professional study. On this point, Matthew Arnold well says, "The total cultivation of the man is the great matter, and this is why the term of years is prescribed, that the study may not degenerate into a preparation for the examinations; that the student may have the requisite time to come steadily and without over-hurrying to the fulness of the measure of his powers and his character; that he may be securely, thoroughly formed, instead of being bewildered and oppressed by a mass of information hastily heaped together."

3. Another peculiar feature of the college is the prescribed curriculum of study, enforced in great part by daily recitations. We need not enter here on the vexed question, how far the student should be allowed to select his studies. We may readily admit that