from his exacter pupils. But he has a right is carefully remembered, there are special to assume that they are all known already to reasons why the colleges must hold out a his students, and need no further inculcation helping hand to those, to whom the best from him. And the misery of a Scotch pro-school-teaching has been absolutely denied. fessor is, that with the bulk of his classes, But, however it may condescend, the college such an assumption would be merely a class must be considered, in so doing, to be ridiculous mistake. To act upon it would simply striking its roots somewhat deeper be to pile up heavy parapets and turrets on a building, the foundations of which are unsound. He is reduced to the lower work of stopping the chinks as best he may, and then bidding us sleep in dubious safety: "Nos urbem colimus tenui tibicine fultam On this view the spheres of schoolmasters and professors are distinctly and clearly defined. Each must thoroughly understand both rules and principles; but the schoolmaster teaches principles through the medium of the rules-the professor should be able to assume the knowledge of the rules, and to devote his whole strength to the expansion and elucidation of the principles. And on this distinction the whole machinery of both schools and colleges should rest. into the earth. Its own proper glory is in the swell and expansion of its branches, which should rise broadly in the face of heaven. But there is another respect in which we ought to note the bearing of these principles on the position of the schools. If a schoolmaster must be thoroughly familiar with the loftier teaching, which is to breathe life and intelligence through the frame-work of his rules, it follows that he requires qualifications scarcely less important than those of a professor, a truth which finds a practical recognition in the fact, that Scotch schoolmasters, from even the humbler positions, are still not unfrequently exalted to the professorial chairs. Why, then, does that truth find no recognition whatever in the rank now assigned, in general, to the heads of the provincial schools? It is shameful to think of the degradation which is reflected, as we have Never, therefore, let a boy leave school seen, on those most important institutions, unless, indeed, you acknowledge him to be by the mode in which their masters are at a hopeless dunce, who never ought to go on once overworked and underpaid. We do to college at all-until all the rule-teaching not wish to see Scotland return to that which is connected with school work is curious level of educational equality, when effectually finished. At college he must pass two professors of humanity in the metropoliinto some subjects which are entirely new; tan University were promoted, in succession, and in them must make acquaintance with to the rectorship of the High School; and something in the shape of rules, on which all exacter knowledge rests. But the accomplished scholar has now learned to receive them in a different spirit, and under an altered character. He can at once accept them in the light of principles; can at once grasp them, not as in his earlier youth, by a mere effort of memory, but by the instant appreciation of sympathy and knowledge. He seizes them, on the first hearing, as thenceforward to be permanent conditions of his intellect, and constituent elements of his thought. For mere rule-teaching, on school methods, a college is worse than a bad school. It attempts a sheer impossibility, which is also a gross impropriety; and it must really be pardoned when it fails. two rectors of the High School were promoted to the Grammar Schools of Stirling and Prestonpans.* Nor again do we recommend that subversion of ranks, which has gradually crept into the English system, where a great schoolmaster is ten times better paid, and is a ten times more powerful and important personage, than a university professor of the ordinary range. But what we are urging is, that the schools of Scotland will never prosper, till the rectors of country grammar schools are enabled to hold a higher social rank; till they receive, from the pro fession itself, some counterpart to that position which English masters owe to their clerical characters, as well as to their endow. ments; till, in short, they are all recognized as members alike of one learned and dignified corporation, to which belong some of the Considering the necessary inequality by which schools must always be distinguished, it would be absurd to say, that on a mere measure of acquirement, the lowest class in * Steven, App., pp. 50-53. There were reasons a University shall be always higher than the for Thomas Buchanan's removal to Stirling; see Hist., highest class in the highest school. We have P. 12. But the other promotions seem regular enough. At another period, a metropolitan professor of huseen that it is not so in England. And in manity accepted the rectorship of the Canongate Scotland, so long as the difference of method Grammar School.—Ib., p. 4. D-15 VOL. XXIV. highest duties and places which public men can exercise or fill. to those who framed the Indian Report, for the testimony which they bear to the value Let but the position of Scotch masters and of the highest general education. In the foltheir schools be raised, and we fear no exam-lowing sentences we have the answers to a ination, no competition, which the sons of hundred fallacies, which have long retarded Scotland can be summoned to encounter. the progress of our schools :-Give them the firm basis of a higher discipline, under a more advanced and dignified "It is undoubtedly desirable that the civil servsystem, and they will stand their ground ant of the Company should enter on his duties against the world. They carry to the com- while still young; but it is also desirable that he bat the self-denial of their hardy social train- should have received the best, the most liberal, the ing, and the vigour which is congenial to fords. Such an education has been proved by exmost finished education that his native country aftheir northern clime. They bear with them perience to be the best preparation for every callthat spirit of reflection, which leads them so ing which requires the exercise of the higher powsoon to realize their position, their prospects, ers of the mind. Our opinion is, that their individual responsibility. They bear the examination ought to be confined to those with them a firmness which sometimes seems branches of knowledge to which it is desirable stubborn, a gravity which is occasionally that English gentlemen who mean to remain at . We premature, a precision which some would home should pay some attention. think it most desirable that the examination should call pedantic; but firmness, gravity, and be of such a nature, that no candidate who may precision, which have everywhere placed fail shall, to whatever calling he may betake himself, Scotch names high on the roll of public in-have any reason to regret the time and labour fluence, because they are the germs of practi- which he spent in preparing himself to be examincal power, of imperturbable perseverance, of ed. Nor do we think that we should render any sagacious administrative skill. service to India by inducing her future rulers to neglect, in their earlier years, European literature lieve that men who have been engaged, up to one and science, for studies specially Indian. We beor two-and-twenty, in studies which have no immediate connexion with the business of any profession, and of which the effect is merely to open, to invigorate, and to enrich the mind, will generally be found, in the business of every profession, superior to men who have, at eighteen or nineteen, devoted themselves to the special studies of their calling." And now there is another question. If ever we acquire the endowments which are to raise our schools, and develop our universities, till the former become more generally efficient, and the latter claim their true position, as the great fountain-heads of national learning; what shall we say of our capacity to supply that purely professional education, which some branches of the new examina tions demand? In other words, can our general schools, even when most efficient for their proper duties, prepare boys for naval, military, and civil service examinations, or must we still avail ourselves of the services of purely professional schools? At this moment, we believe, professional schools are not in the highest estimation with the public. Haileybury is virtually gone. Carshalton, it is generally understood, is going. The work of Woolwich has been suddenly shared with other schools. There is a growing disposition to urge some fundamental change at Sandhurst. We conceive that professional colleges may still be needed; institutions of a higher rank than any which could now be found. But as to "the hybrid half-school, half-college system, fear that it has produced unquestionable mischief; and we could scarcely sorrow at its fall. we But we have no wish to enter on the invidious details of that uninviting subject. Let us rather express the gratitude we owe Oakfield, i. 155. We do not say, however, that we adopt the vigorous condemnation which this eccentric writer passes on both Haileybury and Addiscombe...78; ü. 233. to other examinations; to those for instance But it may be urged, this will not apply which relate to various branches of the medical service; to those for the artillery and engineers; to those for the army in general, and the navy; to those which meet candidates for entrance at the professional schools which still exist, or which may hereafter be remodelled in the form of colleges. The medical examinations, in which, as might have been anticipated from the excel See It scarcely needed the first signature to the Report to identify the author of these passages. especially Mr. Macaulay's Speeches on India, July 10th 1833, and twenty years later, in June 1853. Compare, for instance, the following sentences: "If the Ptolemaic system were taught at Cambridge instead of the Newtonian, the senior wrangler would nevertheless be in general a superior man to the wooden spoon...If, &c., the man who understood the Cherokee best would generally be a superior man to him, &c. the young man who cast nativities best would generally turn out a superior man the young man who shewed most activity in the pursuit of the philosopher's stone would generally turn out a superior man." (Speeches, p. 151.) . The youth who does best what all the ablest and most ambitious youths about him are trying to do well, will generally prove a superior man."-(Indian Report, p. 12.) 1856. Scottish Schools for the Middle Classes. lence of her training, Scotland has held a but when that one precaution had been taken, But now what fresh duty will hereby de- Now the principle of this examination, preceded as it was by very scanty notice, was "to place it upon the basis of the general education of the country;" to "accept, as the means of comparison, the subjects which form the staple of the instruction in the public schools, where the candidates might be supposed to have been educated." We do not see how the authorities could have adopted a sounder principle. They had & right, indeed, to stipulate for special excellence in such branches of a general education as are especially connected with ordnance duties; a circumstance which perhaps told with some injustice on individual cases; *It is noted under the former head, that the Edinburgh Academy sent one who did not succeed; but it should be borne in mind, that the youth at which they lose their pupils for the university exposes the Scottish schools to a special loss of credit in these contests. Thus, of three successful candidates in the second division, of which the Edinburgh University claims the merit, we observe two names that appeared not long since in the lists of the Edinburgh Academy, where they no doubt received their main education. For instance, among the candidates for the prac carefully watched and wisely matured. If We note a few changes in the announcements their pupils, without abandoning the ancient that they impose no degrading restrictions, centre, let that plan also be fairly tested. If, that they dictate no unseemly conditions; and again, as others have suggested, they can that, great as is the advantage which they find for some a firmer centre in mathemati- may bring to the services with which they cal studies, and yet not resign their classics, are connected, it is scarcely greater than the even in those cases, altogether, we should be benefit which they may confer on the whole willing to watch patiently, though less hope- system of our classical schools. fully, the results of that experiment also. Into these details we shall not enter. we must crave leave to conclude with one word of warning, begging them to take good heed, while they are aiming at improvement, that they lose not one atom of important principle, and that they never descend for one moment from the elevation of their only proper ground. But ART. IV.-1. Die Zeichen der Zeit: Letters to Friends on Freedom of Conscience, and the Rights of Christian Congregations. By CHRISTIAN CHARLES JOSIAS BUNSEN, Royal Prussian Actual Privy Councillor, Doctor of Philosophy and Theology. 2 vols. Leipzig, 1855. Ueber Christliche Toleranz; on Christian Toleration; a Lecture delivered before the Evangelical Union in Berlin, on the 29th March, 1855. By FRIEDRICH JULIUS STAHL. Berlin, 1855. It is the province of public schools to watch carefully the just claims of the public; but to lead, not to follow, in deciding how they may be most wisely met. They must themselves undertake the task of 2. moulding education in conformity with existing necessities; but they must never debase themselves by running heedlessly and thoughtlessly at the heels of change. The true work of great schools is, not to secure more pupils, but to maintain great princi- Do any of our readers wish to form for ples. It is better, if need be, to submit to themselves a just notion of a thoroughlysome temporary unpopularity, than to resign educated, highly accomplished, well-experitheir high position by swerving at the im- enced, pious, patriotic, healthy-bodied, healpulse of each passing movement. Recent thy-minded, and in every respect harmonious events may furnish us with one illustration. and well-rounded German gentleman, let There never was a more foolish, though un- them be introduced forthwith to the Chevaintentional, affront to schools, than when lier Bunsen, and study him attentively; for public examiners presumed to dictate to like most of his countrymen, who are worth them, not only subjects, which was strictly anything, he is not a man to be looked at within their proper province, but the pre- merely with a passing glance, however sharp, cise portions of appointed authors and the but demands to be perused like a good book, precise editions of historical and mathema- and to be handled with a certain seriousness. tical publications. In some cases the mat- Our common habits of international crititer assumed a still worse aspect, when such cism are certainly not the results, in the editions had been published by the examin- general case, of very profound study, or ers themselves. Some schools, we believe, very extensive observation; they are a buncondescended to obey the order, and to split dle of mere impressions accidentally and up their classes for special instruction, ac- hastily taken up, and leaving a type on our cording as Cæsar, or Virgil, or Livy, was minds not of the thing itself, as it lives and wanted; according as Mr. A, or Mr. B, or grows from its own peculiar centre of organMr. C, was likely to examine the pupil in ism, but only of a few striking points of his own peculiar work. Others maintained the thing-points, that is to say, as they the more dignified attitude of continuing to happen to strike us, and as they affect that teach Latin, or mathematics, or history, as extremely unphilosophical, and not over their duty bound them, but of teaching charitable humour, in which it is the pride them, even at the risk of some temporary of Britons to contemplate foreigners. Some inconvenience to their pupils, from the thirty or forty years ago there were few books and in the manner which their own experience recommended as the best. Now that evil is, or soon will be, ended. While many could suggest detailed improvements in the papers of the two great examinations to which we have especially referred in this Article, no one can deny that, on the whole, they are full of the noblest promise; persons in this country, who had any idea of the Germans more profound than what might be derived from these vulgar sources; but since then we have made vast strides in our knowledge of continental things, especially German; and if there is one public man more than another, a knowledge of whom has tended to raise our general esti mate of the German character and German he claims imperatively to be known; and worth, it is the Chevalier Bunsen. whenever known he cannot be otherwise There are various sorts of Germans. than loved, admired, and respected. There are learned German professors, the Of remarkable men there are two dismost heavy-laden of the book-consuming tinct classes: those who possess a peculiar and book-producing class; there are wild talent developed to an extraordinary degree German students, with long hair and large of intensity, and those whose intellectual boots, and infinite capacity for beer and to-wealth consists in the harmonious combinabacco-smoke, and freedom and fatherland, tion of various powers not naturally assoand philosophy, and all sorts of juvenile in- ciated together, often antagonistic and. appaflation; there are bureaucratic and diploma- rently incompatible. A Beethoven in music, tic Germans, men of admirable knowledge a Schiller in poetry, a Cavendish in science, in history, of exact accuracy in statistics, and may represent the one class; Goethe, Pastor of most unsullied honesty, but who look Oberlin of the Ban de la Roche, Dr. Chalupon human society as a mere machine, of mers, and the Chevalier Bunsen may reprewhich not the beams only and the cylinders, sent the other. Perhaps the most extraorthe cog-wheels, and the fly-wheels, and the dinary feats of what is called genius have bands, but the very steam and whole impuls-been performed by men belonging to the ive power comes from themselves; there first class; but with all the admiration are heterodox Germans, who believe neither which such feats naturally excite, it is often in Jesus Christ nor in the Gospel; and there difficult to conceal from ourselves the painful are orthodox old Lutherans, who believe feeling, that there is some great weakness that the Gospel can profit a man little, about such men just in proportion, as it would without the ipsissima verba of Luther's Cate- seem, to the extraordinary vigour of their chism, and that the sacrifice of Christ can favourite faculty. In fact, these men have save a man with difficulty, who does not un- put forth a gigantic growth; but it is all in derstand the theory of consubstantiation; one direction; you walk round about the then we have metaphysical Germans, who phenomenon, and find extraordinary luxu can construct a cosmogony as glibly as old riance on the one side compensated by perHesiod, and run you up the ladder from in- fect bareness on the other. On the contrary, finite nothing to infinite something, as lightly the minds which are great by virtue of haras a young lady at the piano rattles off her monious combination of apparently incomscales; and poetical Germans, who on mere patible excellencies, if they do not astonish moonshine and medieval imaginations, can you so much at first, are not apt to disaplive more comfortably than you do on beef point you on more minute inspection. There steak and other solid nutriment, and who may have been many more eloquent preachhave learned the art of falling in love with ers than Dr. Chalmers; but how seldom do death, and singing their passion in harmo- you find that rushing and equestrian oratory nious swan songs most musically. But these combined with such a various scientific culare merely such extreme developments of the ture, such a broad, cheerful, and expansive German genius, such glaring caricatures of piety, such a child-like simplicity of emotion, their most characteristic tendencies, as any and such a direct and soldier-like energy of John Bull with his naked cold regard of na-action? So it is with Bunsen. Prussia, tional prejudice and superciliousness may like Russia, has many clever diplomatists: discover; such caricatures, in fact, as make in no country of Europe are the masters of up the great mass of what those who have never studied the German mind under favourable influences, are accustomed to understand, when they reprobate any book, or any character, as essentially German. But the Chevalier Bunsen is not a man whom a sober-minded Englishman would ever dream of attempting to blow aside with a puff of British contempt in this fashion. We can make short work enough, when we are in the humour, with Immanuel Kant, and Hegel, and Fichte, and Schelling, and Oken, and even the Olympian Goethe, fastening cleverly on his weak points; but Bunsen is a German in a position with reference to us that will not allow him to be ignored, and of a type that will not admit of being caricatured; public business, and the regulators of social form more respected and more respectable; even the liberals in Germany, where they are not embittered by personal feeling, speak with just acknowledgment of the character and talents of the Prussian bureaucratists; but Bunsen, had he been a mere first-rate German diplomatist, would have failed to make that impression on this country, which we know he has made. In addition to mere diplomatic fidelity and acuteness, during the fourteen years of his residence amongst us, he exhibited to the men of this country a depth of profound scholarship, a breadth of philosophic survey, and a liberal flow of fine, healthy, human, and Christian sentiment, that took captive all who had any per |