or to relate what they have done. But the teacher's effort to control circumstances often fails, and children supply the lack of observation and thought by a remembrance of mere words and phrases. The performance of a little boy, in whom I had a personal interest at the time, illustrated this point to my mind in a striking way. He was a pupil in a modern primary school, where the first steps of reading and of writing were taught simultaneously; and the writing was taught, not only as a mechanical art, but also for the supposed expression of thought. It occurred to me that I would test his acquired power in this respect; and I proposed that he write a letter to his great-grandmother, of whom the boy was very fond. I first taught him how to write the words "Dear Grandmother” and Your affectionate grandson," at the beginning and at the end of his letter, supposing these words too difficult for him at his stage of advancement. His own name he could write. I then told him to write his letter and show it to me before sending it. This is what the little boy wrote:

"DEAR GRANDMOTHER: Can you run to the hill? I can run. Run, boy; run!” There may have been a touch of original thought in the youngster's application of his familiar primer language to the case of his venerable relative, but it was rather unexpected.

*

* *

Let us turn now from school studies to school discipline. There are a few things that need to be said, and some questions which may repay your further investigation.

In the first place, I note with much pleasure one sure indication of improvement in our discipline. There is much less corporal punishment than there was a few years ago; and I hear that good order is even more prevalent. My statistics at the office show that reported cases of corporal punishment have diminished over one-half. In the primary schools they have diminished fully two-thirds; in the grammar schools nearly two-fifths. Now, if this movement could go on with some acceleration, it is possible that the schools of Boston might pass into the twentieth century practically free from corporal punishment. I doubt not that we are all agreed that such a consummation is devoutly to be wished. Is it not, then, worth working for?

I have called corporal punishment a means of school discipline; but I must at once qualify by assigning it the lowest rank among the means at the teacher's command. The aim of school discipline is not merely the outer one of good order in class room or yard, but much more the inner one of moral improvement in the scholars; it is right conduct from free choice, not from compulsion; it is the development of character toward good citizenship, through the formative influences of school life. Now, corporal punishment has about the same relation to the development of moral character in school children that the police force has to the moral elevation of a community. Both apply outward restraints to conduct; both secure obedience through fear of the consequences of disobedience; but neither seeks to touch the higher springs of action; neither is profitable for edification. The boy who gauges his conduct so as just to escape a whipping in school is likely enough to become the man whose moral sense will be satisfied by keeping himself out of jail. True moral culture seeks the development of character through systematic efforts to bring into habitual action the higher motives. It is at once the most essential and the most difficult part of the teacher's work. But in so far as this difficult work is done, do the occasions for the use of forcible means of discipline diminish and disappear. And it is because I feel sure that work of this kind in our schools is now supplanting corporal punishment that I hail the reported diminution of it as a welcome sign of improvement.

But I must not fail to point out some particulars in which still further improvement seems immediately possible. For this purpose let me ask your attention to some matters of record. Last summer I sent for the records of the corporal pun

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ishments that had been inflicted during the months of March and April, that I might learn the causes for which this form of punishment had been used. In two-thirds of these records the cause assigned was "disobedience" or disorderly conduct." How flagrant these offenses might have been was not stated in most cases. But it would seem probable that in schools where boys are whipped for "tardiness," for "truancy," for "inattention," and for "neglect of work "— offenses which involve no branch of “good order "-the same punishment would likely enough be given for comparatively mild cases of "disobedience" and "disorderly conduct”—as, for example, disorder in the lines, or disturbance of the filing reported by the monitors.

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It may be indeed, I am strongly inclined to believe-that a closer observance of the spirit of our regulations, which require us to avoid corporal punishment "in all cases where good order can be preserved by milder measures," would result in a diminution of the corporal punishment scores for "disobedience" and "disorderly conduct." However this may be, our regulations can hardly be held to warrant the infliction of corporal punishment for the other causes already named-“ tardiness.” “truancy," "inattention," and "neglect of work;" nor for most of the rest mentioned in the reports—“leaving school without permission," "impudence," "use of bad language," "stealing," ill-temper," "telling falsehoods," "bad behavior on the street," "destroying note sent to parents," and "untidiness." Is it for the correction of miscellaneous faults like these that the defenders of corporal punishment wish it retained in the schools? I think not. Let me quote, from the report of one very eminent defender of corporal punishment, language used by him thirty years ago, but still profitable to consider:

"There would be no good purpose accomplished," he says, "by concealing the fact that the prejudice which exists with regard to corporal punishment is due largely to its indiscriminate, unwise, and excessive use by some teachers. The constant infliction of it for trifling offenses, if not an abuse, is an unwise use of it, not only because it takes the place of those moral and ennobling influences that teach the pupil to govern himself, but because it destroys the principal power of this kind of punishment, which should be found, not in the infliction of bodily pain, but in the disgrace and shame associated with it."

"Nothing looks more suspicious," he says, further on in the same report, “than the constant occurrence of such reasons for corporal punishment as impertinence, inattention, disorder, restlessness, disturbance, playing, tardiness, not one of which, unless aggravated in its character, is worthy of it, but should be met by some other form of punishment. The kind, sympathetic teacher rarely reports impertinence as a cause for punishment, for it is generally the reflection in the pupil of anger, undeserved reproof, or bitter sarcasm on the part of the teacher. Children would be more than human to sit quietly under the taunts and jokes which we have known some teachers to indulge in. Inattention and restlessness too often originate in the teacher's lack of ability to make the studies interesting; disorder, disturbance, playing, in a want of that quiet power which makes itself constantly felt as a check upon the pupils, or, it may be, in a most foolish waste of power by attempting to enforce too strict discipline."

Earlier in the same report the writer had said:

"We feel that only in cases of gross impropriety, of willful, determined disobedience, and persistent defiance of the regulations or of the authority of the teacher, is corporal punishment justifiable."

This language, used by a defender of corporal punishment, has my hearty approval. My own position on the corporal punishment question ought to be well known, for this is not my first utterance upon the matter; but I have found myself extensively misrepresented. I am not in favor of taking away the right to use corporal punishment; but I am in favor of the teachers trying to reduce

the use of it to less than one-tenth of the present amount. Nine-tenths of it as now used I believe to be wholly unwise and unnecessary. * *

*

Children's offenses against morality, their lies, their thefts, their oaths are not usually best treated with harshness and severity. Children are often more ignorant than wicked. They are not adults. They need enlightenment more than punishment. The elements of right and wrong in their conduct need to be pointed out and explained to them with a tender earnestness that should touch their better feelings and win them over from the wrong to the right. One child so persuaded should rejoice the teacher's heart more than ninety and nine children restrained from wrong conduct by the mere dread of punishment.

XII.-ADDRESS BY HON. ABRAM S. HEWITT, LL. D.,

At the Dedication of the New Site of Columbia University, New York City, May 2, 1896.

*

* * This occasion has a significance which demands and justifies an explanation, familiar as it must necessarily be to the students of history and to the friends of education, but necessary in order to comprehend the genesis and the mission of the new university, destined to radiate its influence for good in all time to come from these buildings which we are here to dedicate to the service of God and man. Let it be remembered, however, that we are here not to dedicate buildings alone, but also to dedicate to the responsibilities and duties of advancing civilization the wealth, the energies, and the potentialities of the millions of men who will in the ages to come constitute the population gathered around this center of light and learning.

It is well that these ceremonies have been inaugurated by unfurling the national flag, which is the emblem of the sovereignty of the people. In every clime and under every form of government the flag represents the principle of loyalty to the constituted authority. Patriotism is not peculiar to any land nor to any people, but is the property of humanity wherever organized society exists. But with us the flag has a special significance. It represents not merely love of country, but something more. It is not only the ensign of the whole people, but it is the evidence of the liberty of the citizen, without which the Stars and Stripes would be for him but a badge of slavery. We are accustomed to speak of our Government as an indestructible union of indestructible States," and in one sense this is a true definition, but in a larger spirit the Republic is rather to be regarded as an aggregation of units, every one of which is an independent citizen with equal rights and correlative duties.

But whence is the citizen to derive his knowledge of the nature of his rights, and how is he to rise to the full measure of the performance of his duties? Political knowledge is not a natural endowment. It is the growth of painful experience, and the outcome of training through ages of effort and sacrifice. The history of the world is the record of its acquisition. In its range are included the lessons of every age and every nation. Heroes and saints, statesmen and demagogues, tyrants and traitors, have alike made their contributions to its evolution. The silent masses of the people have suffered and died in order that humanity might at length achieve freedom. There is not a region on this great globe which has not made its mark upon the final record which we call civilization. But among all the peoples of the world to none has the opportunity been so propitious for waging the conflict between right and wrong, for carrying on the struggle between ignorance and knowledge, as in this land of ours, which seems to have been reserved under the providence of God for settlement by men who

were dominated by a single idea, for which they were prepared to sacrifice home and comfort and wealth and all that men usually hold dear. The idea of personal liberty, which elsewhere was an abstraction, was made a reality in a new land, and the only land in which no aristocracy had ever existed and privilege was unknown. They were enthusiasts who came to a region where there were no prejudices to encounter, no abuses to overcome, no traditions to fetter the free spirit of man. While they claimed the right to worship God according to the dictates of conscience, they held this right always subordinated to the individual liberty of the citizen. In whatever else they may have differed among themselves or with their neighbors, civil liberty was never in question, and its rights were asserted whenever and wherever assailed by kings, governors, or parliaments. They regarded liberty as an end, and not as a means. "To secure it, to enjoy it, and to diffuse it was the main object of all their social arrangements and of all their political struggles. They held it to be the inalienable prerogative of man, which he had no right to barter away for himself, and still less for his children. It was a sacred deposit, and the love of it was the main instinct engraven in their hearts." These pioneers of freedom understood that without education liberty would perish from the land in which they had sought refuge. They were not numerous, but they were as prolific as they were earnest, self-reliant, and independent. It is estimated that the three millions who inhabited the British colonies which joined in the Revolution were descended from less than one hundred thousand immigrants, nearly all of whom could read and write, and some of whom were very learned men and statesmen of the highest order. They realized the value and necessity of education in order to preserve the liberty which they sought in a new world, and which they were prepared to defend at the peril of life and fortune. Hence they founded schools and colleges, even before they had acquired the primary comforts of civilization. Whatever else their children might lack, they were to be instructed in the knowledge of their political rights and their religious duties. Hence from the first religion and education were the inseparable guardians of liberty, equality, and property. These three primary elements of the social organization were never separated, and indeed never separable in the minds of the exceptional men who laid the foundations of the Republic upon the inalienable rights of man. They justly held that private property was the concrete expression of liberty, and that any interference with property was an attack upon individual liberty. They believed that all men had an equal right to acquire and hold property, but they recognized that this very equality of opportunity would necessarily involve inequalities of possession, due to capacity, thrift, and energy. Thus were developed communities of freemen, in which each man was master of himself, equal to every other man before the law, and recognizing no claim upon his property to which he had not assented as the price of the maintenance of order and the dispensation of justice.

While the love of liberty, and its dependence upon education were recognized in all of the thirteen colonies, Massachusetts founded Harvard College one hundred years, Connecticut founded Yale fifty years, and Virginia founded William and Mary sixty years before New York had made any provision for higher education. Her youth were thus forced (reluctantly, perhaps, but probably to their gain) to resort for education to these institutions, which were afterwards denounced by the enemies of freedom as "nests of sedition." It is provided in the will of the father of a patriot whose fame constitutes one of the chief glories of our college that his son should never" be sent to the colony of Connecticut for his education, lest he should imbibe in his youth that low craft and cunning which they disguise under the sanctified garb of religion."

And yet, to the cadet of a New York family, graduated at Yale, we owe the fundamental condition in the charter of King's College, granted in 1754, that no

tests shall

exclude any person of any religious denomination whatever from equal liberty and advantages of education." Moreover, in the long and bitter controversy which preceded the granting of the charter, the principle was laid down for the first time in the colonies that it was the duty of the State to provide for the education of all its children, free from the control of sectarian religious influence. The ideas thus propounded by William Livingston, the statesman and patriot, have all been incorporated into the legislation of the several States of the Union, and at length in the new constitution of the State of New York it is made a fundamental provision that no public money shall ever be appropriated to any educational institution under the control of any religious denomination.

The delay in the establishment of an institution for higher learning in New York was due, however, not so much to indifference or to opposition, as to the extraordinary variety in the nationality and religious belief of its inhabitants. Unlike New England, it was not homogeneous in creed or in race. It is said that eighteen different languages were spoken in the colony, and there were certainly thirteen different churches in the City of New York prior to the Revolution. When, however, at length the college came to be chartered, the leading denominations were all represented in the Board of Trustees, and, so far as instruction was concerned, unlike the colleges of New England, it was absolutely unsectarian, Nevertheless, King's College was the special care of the Church of England, and its site was the gift of Trinity Church upon condition that its president should always be a communicant of the Church of England. If, however, it were thus expected that its graduates would be less devoted to the principles of individual liberty and the right of self-government, its promoters made a grievous mistake, for in the controversies which were soon to ensue between the colonies and the mother country there were no more earnest advocates of the doctrine inherited from their Dutch, as well as from their English ancestry, that taxation should not be imposed without consent and without representation. * * *

The first president of the college, Samuel Johnson, was a man of great piety and learning, the friend and companion of Berkeley, and the correspondent of his illustrious namesake, the lexicographer. In view of what our college is now doing and what it hopes to accomplish, it may be well to put on record here the aims which Dr. Johnson proposed to himself in the conduct of the institution which he had undertaken to organize: "A serious, virtuous, and industrious course of life being first provided for, it is further the design of this college to instruct and perfect the youth in the learned languages and in the arts of reasoning exactly, of writing correctly, and speaking eloquently; and in the arts of numbering and measuring, of surveying and navigation, of geography and history, of husbandry, commerce and government; and in the knowledge of all nature in the heavens above us and in the air, water, and earth around us, and the various kinds of meteors, stones, mines, and minerals, plants and animals, and of everything useful for the comfort, the convenience, and elegance of life in the chief manufactures relating to any of these things. And finally to lead them from the study of nature to the knowledge of themselves and of the God of Nature and their duty to Him, themselves and one another, and everything that can contribute to their true happiness both here and hereafter." I think it will be conceded that if our university shall be able to cover this ground and to accomplish the results expected to be produced by the college course, no just criticism or complaint will ever be made by the most ardent friend of education. Certain it is that the scheme outlined in the original circular was carefully followed for more than one hundred years, during which the standard of scholarship was always of a high order, and the cultivation of morality and honor was maintained as the primary object of education.

If the leaders in the struggle for independence were college-bred men, the