and some would leave the grammar school or collegethe intermediate schools which he had planned-" with," as he expressed it, “a sufficient stock of knowledge, to improve themselves to any degree to which their views may lead them," other youth were to enter what he termed the Professional Schools," and to pursue "each science” “in the highest degree it has yet attained.” One department of the university, which was to be classed in some respects with the professional schools was to be so peculiar that it is proper to pause for a moment to give it especial attention. “The school of technical philosophy," the statesman wrote, “will differ essentially in its functions from the other professional schools. The others are instituted to ramify and dilate the particular sciences taught in the schools of the second grade on a general scale only. The technical school is to abridge those which were taught there too much in extenso for the limited wants of the artificer or practical man. These artificers must be grouped together, according to the particular branch of science in which they need elementary and practical instruction; and a special lecture or lectures should be prepared for each group-and these lectures should be given in the evening, so as not to interrupt the labors of the day. The school, particularly, should be maintained wholly at the public expense, on the same principles with that of the ward schools." After speaking somewhat in detail of the classes of youth who would attend the different professional schools, Jefferson added: "To that of technical philosophy will come the mariner, carpenter, ship-wright, pump maker, clock maker, machinist, optician, metallurgist, founder, cutler, druggist * * * dyer, painter, bleacher, soap maker, tanner, powder maker, salt maker, glass maker, to learn as much as shall be necessary to pursue their art understandingly, of the sciences

of geometry, mechanics, statics, hydrostatics, hydraulics, hydrodynamics, navigation, astronomy, geography, optics, pneumatics, acoustics, physics, chemistry, natural history, botany, mineralogy and pharmacy."

Jefferson's idea of providing for courses of technical instruction was meant to meet a want which many thoughtful people have sometimes felt is worthy of very much more consideration in America than it has received Perhaps there is no institution of modern times that more effectually accomplishes such an end as the statesman had in view than does the Cooper Institute of New York, where mechanical drawing is taught, and where evening courses of lectures, illustrated by experiments, especially interesting and valuable to mechanics, are delivered. There have been writers who have spoken with much approbation and pleasure of the good which is being accomplished in some European nations by making considerable provision for what is called technical instruction for youth. It is held that these departments of instruction have enabled many a youth to learn how to earn an honorable support and have raised the taste and skill of workingmen to a degree which has sensibly added to national wealth and honor, and that this sagacious improvement in the courses of public instruction has been especially apparent at great International exhibitions which have been held in England and in France. There have been thoughtful people who have felt that American youth too often grow to manhood destitute of any knowledge of mechanics or of useful trades and are thereby in danger of leaving profitable and honorable manual employment to foreigners who have enjoyed in European schools advantages of a kind which should be widely introduced into America. While all intelligent people will agree with much that has been

said by these thoughtful writers, yet, to arrange the details of an industrial department of any educational establishment will require much wisdom. There are people who shrink from contemplating a question which, if of very great importance to a republic, is at the same time very difficult to solve in a practical and satisfactory manner. There are some general propositions with which every one may be expected to agree. For example, a knowledge of letters is of such importance to all classes of citizens that it may be said to be the basis of almost all studies-scientific and industrial not less truly than of literary acquirements. A very large number of artisansindeed of all classes of people-would find a knowledge of mechanical drawing-by which the eye can be addressed sometimes far more satisfactorily than the earhighly useful to them in many departments of work. Such instruction might well be given in all public day and night schools. A knowledge of commercial arithmetic would be valuable to every class of society and might be taught sometimes in very practical ways—such, for example, as by commercial book-keeping. Almost every section of a land so vast as that of the United States has some special industry that in some cases it would be of a great advantage to youth to understand. In some parts of the United States there are mines of the precious metals or of coal or of some other useful products of the earth, respecting which much that would be interesting and useful could be taught even in common schools, as well as to evening classes of people particularly interested in such industries. In other sections of the United States. there are other industries such as manufactures, or fisheries, about which information might be very interesting to a certain class of citizens. While the number of lecturers who are capable of interesting and instructing

classes of artisans—especially on some important branches of industry—are not as numerous as could be desired, yet wisely arranged courses of lectures will have an elevating tendency in a community. Doubtless, however, as far as many industries are concerned, money could probably be laid out even to better advantage than by providing courses of lectures respecting them. For instance arrangements could be made by which whoever chose to do so could consult books respecting these useful employments. Jefferson held that the establishment of libraries which would be accessible to mechanics of every community would be instrumental in doing a vast amount of good. Books which would render friendly services to scientists, and to men engaged in various useful handicrafts, he would have welcomed into the United States free of duty.

Almost every industry is dependent more or less on one or more of the sciences. Scientific schools such as have been established in recent times in connection with some of the leading colleges in the United States give much of the kind of instruction needed by youth who are to engage in industries in which chemical and various kinds of other knowledge is required. Jefferson proposed in a paper which he wrote and submitted to the Legisla ture of Virginia—a paper which was signed by Madison and by Caleb and by other of his distinguished colleagues who were associated with him in founding the University of Virginia—that students should be helped in gaining an acquaintance with some of the useful industrial arts by being enabled to visit, in a way just to every one, different factories. He wrote: "The use of tools too is worthy of encouragement, by facilitating, to such as chose it, an

*" 'Early History of the University of Virginia," J. W. Randolph, 1856, P. 442.

admission into the neighboring workshops." A plan similar to the one suggested by Jefferson has been recommended by an able writer on technical education, who has further advised that students should write essays respecting the industries which they examine, and thus be encouraged to see what is written on these arts in encyclopedias and in other works of information. By such a plan they would be introduced to a variety of industries some of which might be esteemed especially worthy of cultivation.

Many an American youth who has grown to manhood without having acquired a knowledge of any useful handicraft, or business, has felt that his education had been imperfect, and has, perhaps, even died of a broken heart, feeling that however useful he might hope to be in a general way to society, his life was a failure because he was unable to earn his own support. Jefferson was far too wise not to recognize that while a certain class of youth might be so happily situated in life that he could conscientiously advise them to devote their time to studies by which they might be enabled to promote the general well-being of society, yet that there were vast numbers of youth who should be skilled in manual arts or in professions. In the University of Virginia some young men were to be prepared to become engineers, others physicians, others lawyers or members of some other useful professions. It is hardly necessary to here dwell upon the time which he gave to the establishment of the departments of law and of medicine. It may, however, be here stated that Jefferson felt that the science of medicine was in his day in a very unsatisfactory state. While of surgery he had a high opinion he felt that physicians often did more harm to their patients than good. He felt that in his day the custom of bleeding patients