The kinds of knowledge which should be studied in the schools, and diffused by books, tracts, and oral lectures, among the people, form an important topic of consideration. It is not for me, at least now and here, to obtrude an inventory of my favorite subjects, or favorite books: but the claims of a few subjects upon our regard are so overshadowing, as to make dissent scarcely possible, and their omission wholly unpardonable, in any extensive view of the connexion between popular education, and popular government.
Foremost of these, is the subject of Constitutional Law, and Political Right: something of which might be taught, even in childhood. If the children of Rome were obliged, at school, to lay up in memory the laws of the Twelve Tables, with all their ferocious absurdities; how much more should the children of our country learn those fundamental laws, which guarantee to them the noble inheritance of a rational and virtuous freedom! Even to very young minds, the structure and powers of our two governments may be rendered intelligible by familiar and impartial treatises, with clear oral explanations. The merit of impartiality in these political lessons, is illustrated by the odiousness of a departure from it, which startled me the other day, in reading the THIRTY-FIFTH EDITION of a popular and in other respects an excellent History of the United States,9 designed for schools; where that section10 of the Federal Constitution which declares the powers of Congress, is presented thus: "The Congress of the United States shall have power to make and enforce all laws which are necessary to THE GENERAL WELFARE—AS to lay and collect taxes," &c.—going on to enumerate the specified powers, as mere examples of Congressional omnipotence! And the myriads of tender minds, which probably already owe all their knowledge of the Constitution to the abstract where this precious morsel of political doctrine occurs, can hardly fail to carry through life the impression, that the powers of Congress are virtually as unbounded as those of the British Parliament. Now, to make patriots, and not partisans—upholders of vital faith, not of sectarian doctrine—treatises for the political instruction of youth should quote the letter of every such controverted passage, with a brief and fair statement of the opinions and reasonings on both sides. The course of political study would be very incomplete, without the Declaration of Independence, and Washington's Farewell Address: and occasion might readily be found to correct or guard against some fallacies, afloat among mankind, and often mischievously used as axioms. "That the majority should govern," is an instance of them: a saying, which, by being taken unqualifiedly as at all times placing the majority above the Constitution and Laws, has repeatedly caused both to be outraged. Witness the "New Court Law" of Kentucky, in 1825; and a very similar act passed by Congress, in 1801. The prevalent opinions, that parties, and party spirit, are salutary in a republic; that every citizen is in duty bound to join one or the other party; and that he ought to go with his party, in all measures, whether they be intrinsically proper or otherwise; if not fallacies so monstrous as to make their currency wonderful, are at least propositions so questionable and so important, as to make them worthy of long and thorough investigation before they be adopted as truths.
9 By Charles A. Goodrich. The abstract of the Constitution is taken, he says, from "Webster's Elements of General Knowledge."
10 Article 1 § 8.
Without expending a word upon that trite theme, the utility of history to all who have any concern in government, I may be allowed to remark, that works for historical instruction, instead of being filled with sieges and battles, should unfold, as much as possible, those occult and less imposing circumstances, which often so materially influence the destinies of nations: the well-timed flattery—the lap-dog saved—the favorite's intrigue—the priest's resentment or ambition—to which field marshals owe their rise, cabinets their dissolution, massacres their carnage, or empires their overthrow. Yet the reader need not be denied the glow he will experience at the story of Thermopylæ, Marathon, Leuctra, or Bunker Hill. All those incidents, too, whether grand or minute, which may serve as warnings or as encouragements to posterity, should be placed in bold relief, and their influence on the current of events, clearly displayed. Numberless opportunities will occur, for impressing upon the minds of young republicans, truths which deeply concern the responsibilities involved in that name: the artifices of demagogues—the danger, in a democracy, of trusting implicitly to the honesty and skill of public agents—the worthlessness of popularity, unless it be "the popularity which follows, not that which is run after"11—the importance of learning to resist the erring impulses of a misguided multitude, not less than the unrighteous mandates of a frowning tyrant12—the ease, so often exemplified, with which a people may be duped by the forms of freedom, long after the substance is gone—the incredible aptitude of example to become precedent, and of precedent to ripen into law, until usurpation is established upon the ruins of liberty—and the difference between true and false GREATNESS, so little appreciated by the mass of mankind. This last point could not be better illustrated, than by a fair comparison of Washington with Bonaparte: a task which Dr. Channing, of Boston, has executed, in an essay among the most elegant and powerful in the English or any other language.
11 Lord Mansfield.
12 The "ardor civium prava jubentium," not less than the "vultus instantis tyranni."
To render Political Economy intelligible to a moderate capacity, dissertations sufficiently plain and full might easily be extracted from the writings of Smith and Say, and from the many luminous discussions, oral and written, which it has undergone in our own country. Miss Martineau has shewn how well its truths may be set forth in the captivating form of tales: and the writings of Mr. Condy Raguet teem with felicitous illustrations.
Practical Morals—I mean that department, which teaches, and habituates us, to behave justly and kindly to our fellow creatures—will ever be poorly taught by dry precepts and formal essays. No vehicle of moral instruction is comparable to the striking narrative. How is it possible for any school-boy to rob an orchard, after having read Miss Edgeworth's "Tarlton?"—or to practise unfairness in any bargain, when he has glowed at the integrity of Francisco, in purposely shewing the bruised side of his melon to a purchaser? or not to loathe party spirit, when he has been early imbued with the rational sentiments contained in the "Barring Out?" In short, to be familiar with the mass of that lady's incomparable writings for youth, and not have the principles and feelings of economy, industry, courage, honor, filial and fraternal love, engrained into his very soul? Or how can he fail to find, in "Sandford and Merton," for the daily occasions of life, the happiest lessons of duty and humanity, and for those great conjunctures which never occur in many a life time, the most resistless incentives to a more than Roman heroism?
Other branches of knowledge are desirable for the republican citizen, less from any peculiar appositeness to his character as such, than from their tendency to enlarge his mind; and especially because, by affording exhaustless stores of refined and innocent pleasure, they win him away from the haunts of sensuality. "I should not think the most exalted faculties a gift worthy of heaven," says Junius, "nor any assistance in their improvement a subject of gratitude to man, if I were not satisfied, that to inform the understanding, corrects and enlarges the heart." Felix Neff, the Alpine pastor, whose ardent, untiring benevolence, ten years ago, wrought what the indolent would deem miracles, in diffusing knowledge, and a love of knowledge, amongst an untutored peasantry, found their indifference towards foreign missions immovable, until they had learned something of geography: but so soon as they had read the description of distant countries, and seen them upon the map, they conceived an interest in the people who dwelt there; and entered warmly into the scheme of beneficence, which before had solicited their attention in vain. "Their new acquirements," observes Neff, "enlarged their spirit, and made new creatures of them; seeming to triple their very existence." Geometry, he remarked, also "produced a happy moral development:" doubtless by the beauty of its unerring march to truth. Arithmetic it is superfluous to recommend: but its adjunct, Algebra, deserves cultivation as an exercise to the analyzing faculties; as an implement, indispensable to the prosecution of several other studies; and as opening a unique and curious field of knowledge to the view.