COMMON SCHOOLS-THE PRESS.

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vast array of peaceful warriors, their front extending from CHAP. south to north, nearly a thousand miles, marching west, and subduing the fertile valleys by the axe and ploughshare; advance parties have taken position on the shores of the Pacific, while a line of posts keep up communication with the main force.

The youth of the land have not been forgotten. Pub- 1647. lic schools, having their origin in Massachusetts, have become the heritage of nearly all the States. At convenient points, Congress has set apart of the public lands, nearly fifty millions of acres, for the special support of the common schools in the new States and territories. The older States, in the mean time, have been making laudable exertions to increase their school funds. The number of pupils in academies, and in the common and private schools, is more than three millions and a half; and in colleges, theological seminaries, medical and law schools, the students number nearly twenty thousand.

In no respect has the mental energy of the nation manifested itself so much as in the encouragement given to the public press. The common schools taught the youth to read; the innate desire of acquiring knowledge was fostered, and the fascinating newspaper, as it statedly enters the domestic circle, reflects the world and records the progress of the age. Here we meet with the speculations of wisdom and science, the effusions of sentiment, the sallies of wit." By this means the most retired can be brought into sympathy with the world, whether in in its wars and desolations, or in its glorious yearnings after excellence, peace, and happiness.

66

At the commencement of the Revolution there were but thirty-five newspapers, and they of a very limited circulation; now there are over four thousand. The 1860. important questions of the time are discussed in their columns, and upon these questions the nation acts, and thence they pass into history. If the issues of the press

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CHAP. are kept pure, the blessing in all its greatness far transcends mortal ken. Public opinion has been termed a tyrant; but it is a tyrant, that, if vicious, can be made virtuous; can be reformed, if not, dethroned. Let the virtue and the intelligence of the nation see to it that it is a righteous tyrant, and submission to its iron rule becomes a blessing.

In intimate connection with this intellectual progress is the increase of public libraries. These are as diversified as the wants of the people. There is the village or Sunday school library, with its few hundred volumes; the social or circulating libraries, containing much of the current literature of the day. An important feature was introduced at the formation of the public library in New York city, bearing the name of its founder, John Jacob Astor, and since increased by his son. It is designed to furnish standard works on the varied subjects of useful human knowledge-an armory for the practical student, through whom the influence is to reach those who cannot personally avail themselves of its treasures.

In art we have those who have exhibited evidence of genius that may yet give the nation a name honored among those eminent in painting and sculpture. Her sons have not been surrounded by models from great masters to awaken in early life the slumbering genius, nor have they been encouraged by a traditionary reverence among the people for such manifestations of talent. It has been in the face of these disadvantages that they have reached their present high position, not by passing through a training, laborious and preparatory, but almost at a bound.

A nation may glory in her great men, but it is the great body of the people we rejoice to see associating themselves for purposes of doing good or for self-improvement. Such an association is the Temperance movement, which has had an immense influence for good upon the

INDIVIDUAL RESPONSIBILITY-CHARITIES.

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nation. The moral phase of the subject has taken deep CHAP. hold of the minds and conscience of the people, and in the end the cause must prevail. There is also no more cheering signs of the times, than the people themselves becoming more and more acquainted with their civil rights and duties, and in their demanding virtue and political integrity in those who serve them in a public capacity, and when there is a dereliction of duty, their appealing promptly to the ballot box.

Governments had hitherto interfered more or less with the liberty of conscience; they assumed that in some way they were responsible for the salvation of the souls of their subjects. Free inquiry and a knowledge of the truths of the Bible, and the separation of church and state, shifted that responsibility to the individual himself, and it also became his recognized duty to support schools of learning and sustain religious institutions. This change in the minds of the people commenced in the Great Awakening under Jonathan Edwards. To this principle of individual responsibility may be traced the voluntary support, and the existence of the various benevolent operations of the day, in which all the religious denominations participate. These in their efforts are not limited to the destitute portions of our own country, but in foreign lands also may be found the devoted teacher of Christianity and its humanizing civilization, supported and encouraged by the enlightened benevolence of his own countrymen. The same principle produces fruits in founding asylums for the purpose of relieving human suffering and distress, or smoothing the pathway of the unfortunate. The men of wealth more fully appreciate their responsibility, and the mental energy exercised in its accumulation, has been consecrated to doing good. Millions have thus been bequeathed to aid or to found institutions of learning, that the youth may be secured to virtue and intelligence—a

CHAP. blessed influence that will increase in
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age.

power from age to

We inherit the English language and its glorious associations-the language of a free gospel, free speech, and a free press. Its literature, imbued with the principles of liberty, civil and religious, belongs to us; we claim the worthies of the mother country whose writings have done so much to promote sound learning, a chaste literature and a pure morality, with no less gratitude and pride than we do those of our own land. The commerce of the world is in the hands of those speaking the English language; on the coasts of Asia, of Africa, in Australia, in the Isles of the Pacific, it has taken foothold-may it be the means of disseminating truth and carrying to the ends of the earth the blessings of Christianity.

The ultimate success of this Government, and the stability of its institutions, its progress in all that can make a nation honored, depend upon its adherence to the principles laid down by our fathers. Let the part we are to perform in the world be not the subjugation of others to our sway by physical force, but the noble, the magnificent destiny, that has never fallen to any people, to subdue by the diffusion of a Christianized civilization.

THE END.

INDEX.

Associations, non-importation, 282, 296, Calef, Robert, 193.