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be expatiated upon to the extent of a volume; the remnants these, of barbarism which still clings to us and our institutions, customs, habits, and manners. I will venture to enumerate a few of these. We direct yet, for example, an evil eye to our fellow-men in other communities, and speak of our natural enemies! We are disgraced by national jealousies, national antipathies, commercial restrictions, and often offensive war. We have our game laws and criminal code also to account for. Brought to the standard of sound ethics and reason, there are many of our customs that have as little chance as these of escaping the reproach of barbarisms, which an educated people would disown; cruel rural sports, for example, fox-hunting, horse-racing, betting, gambling, prize-fighting, dueling, and excessive convivi. ality. The character and engrossing claims of rural sports, as they are called, will astonish a future beiter educated age. Such an age willAscarcely believe the butcher work that then befell' the unsparing slaughter of all that is furred and feathered and finned, in field and flood, on mountain, moss, and moor;' they will discredit the graft of the hunting stage of the race upon a civilization, at its lowest, immensely in advance of that stage; they will reject the story that the boast of the Iroquois and the Esquimaux was also the distinction of the most polished ornaments of our drawing-rooms,-namely the havoc of their unerring aim, the life they have extinguished, the blood they have shed, the head of game' they have gloried over as trophies spread out dead before them, and the larders which they have outdone the butcher in stocking!. All is not right in our habits of thinking, -in other words in our education,when our elite' can claim, and multitudes can accord, a certain distinction to a capital shot,' the victor in what the Olympics knew not a steeple chace,' or the proprietor of a pony which can trot sixteen miles an hour !"

In the same chapter Mr Simpson points out the effects of ig. norance in producing bad health, and in leading to false views of the aim of life. Its operation in the latter case he exemplifies by referring to the pursuits of young men born to large for. tunes, who have succeeded in minority to their paternal estates, and, on attaining majority, are entitled to pursue happiness in their own way.

“It is quite lamentable,” says he, “ to observe the humbling, the debasing course they almost always adopt. Rational views of themselves, of human nature, and of the institutions of society, would be invaluable to such individuals; but they have no adequate means of obtaining them, while posi

“I say engrossing claims; for I grant that killing game is as legitimate as killing mutton, and do not quarrel with a subordinate and moderate resort to the field by those whose main avocations are more useful and dignified. It is a healthful exercise ; I cannot concede to it a higher merit.”

tively false views have been implanted in their minds by a perverted education.” A very instructive case of a young man of this description is then detailed, but to this we have room only to allude.

Among the causes of the evils which afflict the upper ranks, the author rightly considers the absence of any thing like adequate moral training as one of the most prominent. He shews that moral education has long been appreciated and recommended by philosophers, though it is only now that their advice is beginning to be followed. Milton and Locke both advocated moral training. The latter, in his “ Thoughts concerning Education,” says: “ Learning must be had but in the second place, as subservient only to greater qualities. : Seek out somebody (as your son's tutor,) that may know how discreetly to form his manners : place him in hands where you may as much as possible secure his innocence, cherish and nurse up the good, and gently correct and weed out any bad inclinations, and set. tle him in good habits. This is the main point, and this being provided for, learning may be had into the bargain." Lord Kames also has the following excellent remarks. It appears unaccountable that our teachers generally have directed their instructions to the head, with very little attention to the heart. From Aristotle down to Loeke, books without number have been composed for cultivating and improving the understanding : few in proportion for cultivating and improving the affections. Yet surely, as man is intended to be more an active than a contemplative being, the educating of a young man to behave properly in society, is of still greater importance than the making him even a Solomon for knowledge.”

Mr Simpson is a decided opponent of the sacrifice of so many years to classical education as are generally devoted to it. He fully discusses the advantages claimed for it by its advocates, and successfully points out its bad effects in a moral point of view. Of his remarks on this subject our space will admit only a short specimen :-" The advocates of the dead languages uniformly avoid, or at least mistake, the true ground of the

controversy. They expatiate on the absolute merits of classical literature, but never dream of comparing it with the education which it excludes. When the question, however, is set on this latter ground, it is capable of great abridgment; for, though we should grant much of absolute value to the actual attainment of classi. cal accomplishment, the experience of centuries bas demonstrated that it is of value to so few of those who are forced to pursue it, that the patient repetition of the error from generation to generation,—the unquestioned duty of each oblivious father to enter his son in the classical curriculum, as he was entered by bis son's grandfather, in which he is to devote years to what is ex

VOL. IX.-NO. XLI.

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pected to be faithfully forgotten, more majorum, -affords a striking proof of the force of an ignorant custom enthralling an imperfectly educated people. Were the actual value, then, of classical study tenfold what it is, if it be true that ninety-nine in every hundred who engage in it fail, and for centuries have failed, of attaining to that degree of proficiency which is of any value at all, then classical study is not the proper education for ninety-nine in every hundred of those who at present lose their time in the pursuit of it; and who, as there is no substitute, are left uneducated to all useful practical ends and purposes. What is therefore wanted, is to abolish the exclusiveness of the dead languages ; to allot them their proper place as subjects of study; to render them easily accessible to all who seek them, either as necessary to a learned profession, as a direct gratification of taste, or as an elegant accomplishment; and at the same time to substitute in early and general education, objects of study more practically useful, which, from their nature, will be better remembered, and will furnish the substantial power of knowledge and resource for life. All the real benefit to society from the classics, will thus be preserved ; it being obvious that no benefit accrues in any way whatever, either to the student or the community, from their stated oblivion.” The author supports his opinions by the high authority of Milton and Locke.

In chapter third is given a succinct, clear, and comprehensive view of the faculties of man, and their relative objects. “If the being to be educated,” says he, “ is man, some knowledge of his nature would seem to be a requisite preliminary to his actual education. Treatises abound in which we are told that man ought to be trained according to his nature, in harmony with his faculties; but, with a few recent exceptions, no educational writer has made an attempt which deserves the name of systematic, to inquire what that nature is, or those faculties are. I'he trainers of horses and dogs proceed much more philosophically; they leave nothing to hazard, but study, with the utmost care, the distinguishing qualities of the animals, and apply the best treatment to those qualities. But any kind of training is held good enough for the human animal, and moreover any kind of trainer who professes to undertake the office. When the principles which ought to regulate education are understood, this grievous error will be corrected. It will then be known, and the knowledge acted upon, that education is a process calculated to qualify man to think, feel and act, in a manner most productive of happiness. It will be known that he has a certain constitution of body and mind, having certain definite relations to beings and things external to itself, and that in these relations are the conditions of his weal or woe. Education will then be seen to have three essentials,-first, by early exercise to improve

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the powers and faculties, bodily and mental ;-secondly, to impart a knowledge of the nature and purposes of these powers and faculties ;—and, thirdly, to convey as extensive a knowledge as possible of the nature of external beings and things, and the relutions of these to the human constitution.”

Now, as it is Phrenology alone that furnishes a practical analysis of the human mind, and makes known the faculties to be improved, education must continue to be vague, misdirected, and ineficient, as it has hitherto been, unless the aid of the new philosophy be called in. Mr Simpson has accordingly introduced with much skill an account of the human faculties as revealed by Phrenology, in such a way as to avoid collision with the prejudices of unphrenological readers. His mode of proving to such readers the existence of the faculties established by Phrenology is to describe them in succession, and to challenge the reader to deny their existence. “I feel so confident,” says he, " that all my postulates as to human powers, impulses, instincts, or faculties, for we need not dispute about names,—will be conceded to me, from the impossibility, as I humbly view it, of refusing the concession, that I am content to peril the whole argument, upon the admission by every educated person–First, that the impulses now to be enumerated form constituent parts of man; and, Secondly, that, as is true of the physical structure and organic functions, each is related to some object or objects in nature, moral or physical, external to itself, but directly pointing to it, upon which it is exercised. I wish it, however, to be distinctly understood, that I do not found upon physiological evidence of the truth of the analysis of faculties which I am humbly to offer, because that evidence is not generally admitted ; I do not require to trace each faculty to a disputed cerebral origin ; the faculties shall be merely metaphysically submitted seriatim to the reader's judgment, and his own experience appealed to; and any one which he does not recognise in man, I am quite contented that he shall reject. If, too, he does not think the relative object correctly added to each faculty as we advance, that too he is at perfect liberty to disallow.” Å luminous and accurate description of the faculties is then given ; this is followed by some useful general observations applicable to them all; and the chapter is concluded by a short dissertation on what has been accomplished by Mr Combe in throwing light upon the Deity's moral government of the world.

The fourth chapter is entitled “ On Education, as adapted to the faculties Infant Education.” In this chapter the author expounds at considerable length the principle that each faculty must be exercised directly on its own objects, -explains the nature of physical, moral, and intellectual education,--and discusses in detail the manner in which infant training ought to be conduct

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ed. There are also some very just observations on the religious instruction of children, and on the employment of medals and prizes as a stimulus to exertion : and, finally, the objections urged against infant schools by persons ignorant of the principles by which they are regulated, are successfully demolished.

The education of children after the sixth year forms the subject of chapter fifth. Lessons from objects, according to the Pestalozzian system, are now to be more extensively given than at the infant school ; by which means the pupils will acquire considerable knowledge of the external world. After this, Mr Simpson proposes to give them some acquaintance with their own nature. Why,” he asks, “ should not the pupil, who

, has reached nine or ten years of age, begin to know the faculties of his mind ? "Is there any thing in those, for example, which have been detailed in this treatise, which may not be made as plain to him as the lessons on objects and their qualities? There is no need for leading him deeply into metaphysical inquiry on the functions of his faculties : a simple elementary knowledge of them and their every-day modes of operation, 'above all, their inseparable connexion with their related objects, might be impressed on his mind in such a manner as not only to be perfectly comprehended by him, but firmly impressed on his meinory, and applied in his ordinary experience. This branch should constitute a paramount object of concern with the teacher ; he should spare no pains to put his pupils completely and intelligently in possession of it. The transition will be easy from the analysis of the faculties to their ethical combination, made plain to the

young in their daily intercourse. I have seen the experiment tried on children under twelve years of age with the most flattering success; they have manifested a knowledge and estimate of motives, and a readiness in appreciating, and even regulating conduct, far above what the great mass of the educated' ever dreamed of being necessary to intelligent existence.” He thinks also that the pupils may " with great ease and ad

“ vantage be familiarized with the general structure of their owu bodies, and with the functions of the digestive and other organs, which bear the most obvious relation to the preservation of health and strength ; while uncleanly and unwholesome habits may be set prominently before their eyes, with their effects on health and life fully spread out to their view." Geography, Astronomy, History, Geometry, Mechanics, Natural History, and Natural Theology, as branches of education, are next treated of; but we pass on to what is said about political instruction, with Mr Simpson's views on which subject we completely agree.

“ Incidentally,” says he, “ throughout the whole time of the pupil in the school, and particularly in the latter years of his attendance, he should receive much and anxious instruction on