every description. Cicero, in speaking of the value of a good memory to the orator, says: Quid dicam de thesauro rerum omnium, memoria ? quæ nisi custos inventis cogitatisque rebus et verbis adhibeatur, intelligimus, omnia, etiamsi præclarissima fuerint in oratore, peritura.*

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In the ordinary process of education, the memory frequently receives undue attention, and is cultivated at the expense of higher intellectual powers. "Young learners," says Dr. Jahn, are accustomed to do violence to the faculty of memory, when they earnestly strive to learn every thing by rote, or, at least, to retain it in the memory. By efforts of this nature, which are overstrained, they fatigue the memory, deprive it of its natural vigor, and debilitate it; whence it comes, that they remember what they obtain in this manner with the greatest difficulty, and, of course, easily forget it. The memory loves freedom, and is refreshed, nourished and strengthened by it." Hence, in educating the young mind, the memory should not be unduly tasked, but only trained to a spontaneous, healthy activity, in co-operation with the other mental powers. In the discipline we propose, there is little danger of giving a disproportionate employment to the memory. If the languages are properly taught and studied, the pupil must think and reason and decide as well as remember.

2. The study of the languages enables the student to command the attention at will, to fix it, for any length of time, upon a single point, and to form those habits of patient investigation and nice discrimination, which are essential to intellectual eminence. This is the most difficult and painful part of the whole business of education. Indeed, it is difficult for the best trained minds to gain a perfect control of the attention, so as to command it at will and concentrate it for a longer or shorter period, upon a given subject. This habit is by no means the gift of nature. The mind naturally loves ease or amusement, better than toil and solid improvement. It is disinclined to patient thought. It loves to indulge its own idle reveries, to sport with its own spontaneous musings, to brood over the creations of its own imagination, and to follow its own vagaries to the ends of the earth. Every man who has instructed others," says Dr. Johnson, " can tell how much patience it requires to recall vagrant inattention, to stimulate sluggish indifference, and

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* De Oratore, Liber 1: 5.

to rectify absurd misapprehensions." "In order to grapple successfully with the difficulties of science, the mind should be brought to the task, in a collected and unruffled state. No half subdued gust of passion should start up, no melancholy train of thought should pour in its muddy current, no sudden start of skittish fancy or engrossing remembrance of darling diversion, no dreams of romance should come in to ruffle the smooth surface. The whole soul should be only a mirror of thought, whose every image should be well defined and without distortion."

Such a perfect control of the emotions, passions and thoughts can only be acquired by the truly philosophic mind, and that by intense application and rigid discipline. Still, trial, effort and practice may do much, even for the feeblest intellect. Confined attention is always irksome to the undisciplined mind, and it readily welcomes any amusing day-dream, which may help to expel unwelcome thoughts. This subject is so happily illustrated by Dr. Beecher in his "Plea for Colleges," that I cannot forbear quoting his remarks. "Human indolence abhors this habit [of confined attention] as nature does a vacuum; and the mind can be brought to it only by the power of habitual training. It is this aversion to close attention, which produces in the early stages of college life, so many partial insurrections against the languages and mathematics; and such profound and eloquent dissertations upon the inutility of the one, and the folly of plodding through the sterile regions of the other; and such warm-hearted eulogies of the literature and various knowledge, which glitter on the surface, and for the acquisition of which the eye and the ear and the memory may suffice; with little taxation of thought and mental power, in which the inspirations of genius are idolized and hard study stigmatized; in which, instead of putting in requisition the whole energy of the soul to turn the key of knowledge, the young gentleman may skip through college with kid gloves and rattan, worship Bacchus and Venus, and cultivate the graces before the glass and before the ladies; and take his diploma, with all his college honors blushing thick upon his vacant head;-a system of education that might suffice to qualify men to govern monkeys, but never to form and govern mind."

Now it is found, by long experience, that the study of the languages is an excellent remedy for languid attention and intermittent application. It is impossible to advance a single

step without careful attention. The interpretation of language requires thought, reflection and reasoning. In the more difficult passages it requires undivided attention and intense application. The student must not only have a clear idea of the separate meaning of the words, but also of the thought presented to the reader by their combination. He must not only be familiar with the general meaning of each word, but he must know its particular meaning in the passage he is examining. He must form a just conception of the import of each sentence, and of its relation to the context. The precise thing indicated by every word and every sentence must be presented to the mental eye, and the exact shade of thought which lay in the author's mind, must be exhibited under new forms, and in new relations, so as not to lose one of its original characteristics. This requires a careful attention to all the circumstances of the writer's situation,-the time, the place and the cause of his writing. The author's peculiar mental and physical constitution, his mode of life and habits of thinking should also be investigated. Sometimes an author cannot be fully understood and appreciated without an intimate knowledge of the geographical, commercial and political condition, domestic manners, mental habits, private and public life of the people to which he belonged. So that frequently the whole field of ancient lore must be explored, and the whole world of antiquities be laid under contribution to illustrate a single author.

The connection of each word, thought and paragraph, with every other portion of the work, must be carefully scrutinized, lest in translating we make the writer contradict himself. The nature of the subject discussed, and the logical sequence of the arguments must also be noticed, so that our interpretation may not be incongruous or irrelevant. This process requires a vigorous exercise of the powers of invention and comprehension. Thus the mind is kept in a constant state of healthy activity and pleasurable excitement. Its natural appetency for new truths and new relations is abundantly gratified. The pleasure of acquisition beguiles the tediousness of severe study, and the habit of patient investigation and critical analysis is formed without the consciousness of fatigue. "The power of making nice distinctions, and of separating things, which, to the ignorant and inexperienced, appear alike," says Prof. Stuart, "is one of the most important powers ever acquired and exercised by the human mind. I must believe that linguistic study, di

rected as it ought to be, viz. to acquire a knowledge of things that are designated by the words of a foreign language, is one of the most important means of improving and strengthening the faculty of nice discernment, that is within the reach of a young man." The same author acknowledges himself more indebted to this discipline than to all his other studies. The judgment is also called into active exercise, during the whole process of interpretation, in unravelling and recomposing every sentence and paragraph, but more especially in analyzing an entire work. The same faculty may be judiciously exercised in comparing synonyms, in determining their exact shades of difference, and in deciding why a particular word is used in a given place instead of another. In reading different authors, their peculiarities may be noticed, their excellencies or defects compared, and their merits determined. In this way, even the young student may create for himself a standard of merit, and form some notion of a higher and philosophical criticism. When he has once learned to think with precision, and to discriminate with accuracy, he will easily command right words and forcible expression for the vehicle of his thoughts. classical student, if he have clear ideas and definite notions of what he wishes to communicate, cannot want for words. His familiarity with the best models will generally secure him from inaccuracies in the use of language and offences against

taste.

The

3. The study of the classics tends to refine, chasten and exalt the imagination. Perhaps there is no one of the native powers of the mind, which usually exerts so important an influence upon our happiness or misery in this life, as the imagination. If properly trained and directed, it may become the source of the most exquisite pleasure; if neglected and abused, of the most excruciating torment. In those departments of literature which are the peculiar province of the imagination, the ancients stand unrivalled. In their poetry and oratory, the student is introduced to the most splendid creations of genius. It is the prevailing opinion of some of our best critics, that the infancy of society is most favorable to poetic excellence. Every thing then is new. All the impressions of the bard are fresh and vivid. The current of his thoughts gushes out warm from nature's living fount. As men advance in society, they become less susceptible to those lively emotions, excited by an ardent imagination. They deal more in general ideas and cold ab

stractions. The reasoning powers become more acute, the imagination more tame. The experimental sciences, which require time for maturity, advance with the improvement of society, while poetry remains stationary or retrogrades. "As civilization advances," says Macaulay, "poetry almost necessarily declines. In proportion as men know more and think more, they look less at individuals, and more at classes. They therefore make better theories, and worse poems. They give us vague phrases instead of images, and personified qualities instead of men. They may be better able to analyze human nature than their predecessors. But analysis is not the business of the poet. His office is to portray, not to dissect." "The Greeks," says Menzel, "translated beautiful nature; the middle ages translated faith ; we translate our science into poetry."

If this theory be true, the student can kindle the true poetic enthusiasm in his own bosom, only by stealing a coal from the altar of the ancient muses. A thorough acquaintance with ancient poetry will undoubtedly give him a just notion of the office of the imagination in literature, and reveal to him the secret process by which this "shaping spirit" creates the magic wonders of its power. It is not enough that the scholar views and admires these unequalled productions of genius; he must become familiar with them and feel their influence. It is not sufficient to notice and treasure up the beautiful conceits and striking expressions of an author; but he must strive to reproduce in himself the inspiration of the bard and the enthusiasm of the orator. He must, for the time, forget self, and, in imagination at least, exchange places with the author, live in the very midst of the stirring scenes that called forth the orator's pathos, or kindled the poet's fire, breathe in his spirit, be moved by the same impulses of feeling that actuated him, be touched by his sorrow, be melted by his tears, catch his fire, feel the same emotions of sublimity, and enjoy the same beauties that elevated or ravished his soul, soar with him in imagination, and train the whole intellectual being to like modes of thought. In this way he may acquire sufficient strength and nerve to wield the giant armor of men of other days.

By this process alone, can the student become an adept in classic lore. Some practical men may cry out: "Enthusiasm! extravagance!" Admit that it is enthusiasm. Great attainments were never made in any branch of literature, science or art, without some degree of professional enthusiasm. This de