If correctly informed, in the German universities, which will probably not suffer by comparison with those of any other country, the pecuniary compensation of teachers depends mainly upon their ability and fidelity.

We would by no means question the faithfulness, or the ability, of the gentlemen who fill professorships in our colleges, or the wisdom of the policy hitherto pursued.

We would simply raise the question, whether, judging from the past, we are warranted in the belief that a permanent additional income, of thirty thousand dollars annually, will be likely to accommodate the course of instruction, and the usages of our colleges, to the means and the wants of the middling class in the Commonwealth,-a class which furnishes a very large majority of the laboring men, in all the professions and useful avocations in society; or, by making its officers more independent of popular will, remove a college education still farther from the reach of all but a favored few.

4. Hence we infer, that a princely endowment of colleges is not the most direct mode of promoting the cause of popular education.

We have before remarked that we regard colleges as essential to a complete system of popular instruction. These, however, occupy a subordinate place-mere auxiliaries in the great work of educating the people.

In the elaborate report of the majority, from whom we regret that we feel compelled to differ on this subject, these institutions are represented as centres, around which the whole system revolves, -as luminaries, upon which the elementary schools are dependent for light and warmth. To our minds it appears obvious that the natural order is here inverted-that the elementary schools are the real fountains of popular wisdom,-that they are the gentle rills whose silent but perennial flow fertilizes and imparts vitality to the popular mind, and thus furnishes the only aliment upon which academies and colleges can subsist.

A corrupt fountain cannot send forth pure water. Would you then clarify and purify the stream, go to its fountains. And if you would increase the quantity, as well as improve the quality, of its waters, instead of causing a torrent to flow into its

mouth, permit a gentle shower to descend upon the whole region, whose limpid waters, having moistened and fertilized the soil, will at length be poured, by a thousand gurgling streamlets, into its swollen channel.

That truth is eliminated,—that mathematical and metaphysical propositions are reduced to scholastic form,-that the interests of literature, the arts and sciences, are promoted, and important facts, the result of long and patient investigation, are brought within reach, and adapted to the capacities of all classes, by the colleges, we readily admit. Neither will it be denied, that a large portion of those who have distinguished themselves as statesmen, as philosophers, as artists, poets and benefactors, have never enjoyed the benefits of academical education. And of those who have shone with greatest brilliancy in college halls, and subsequently been most distinguished in the useful walks of life, a very large portion, we believe, have imbibed the first inklings of knowledge, have caught the first glimpse of the hill of science, in the district school.

We would no more say, therefore, that the colleges are the fountains of popular wisdom, than that the Connecticut sustains that relation to its tributaries, because, forsooth, its waters, after being poured into the bosom of the ocean, ascend in the form of vapor, and subsequently fall in showers to swell the waters of these tributaries.

It is obvious that our fathers regarded public free schools as the foundation upon which their favorite university must rest. In 1642, six years after they had founded Cambridge College, a law was enacted providing for public instruction in the colony of Massachusetts Bay. In 1647, another act was passed. In 1692, still ampler provision was made for the diffusion of learning through the community. Again, in 1701, we find them legislating upon the same subject.

It cannot be denied that colleges do exert a reflux influence upon common schools; but they borrow far more than they lend.

They could no more exist without common schools, than he stomach without the aid of the other organs.

The history of colleges in our country establishes this fact conclusively.

What has become of the many richly endowed colleges and universities, in those states where the school master had not been? Just so far as the common-school system has been sustained in a healthy condition, colleges have flourished. Beyond this, they have either drooped and died, or are now waiting, in a state of hybernation, the approach of their natural allies.

To make, therefore, liberal appropriations to the colleges, to the neglect of the common schools,-richly to endow the former, at the expense of the latter, the very thing which the petitioners ask, is not consistent, we believe, with a sincere desire to promote the true interests of collegiate education.

5. We oppose the prayer of the petitioners, because we deem it premature. Four years, at least, must elapse before the sum at which the school fund is limited will be reached. Why should the legislature at this time be called upon to enact a prospective law, which will not begin to take effect till 1852; and that too, when so many exigencies may arise, which would induce the government to adopt a different course?

Does an exigency now exist, which warrants such legislation? May not this subject with safety be left to those who may come after us, and may have funds at their disposal, as we have not? Will not the effect of granting the prayer of the petitioners be to limit the appropriations of the state for educational purposes, for many years to come, to the sum now doled out to the common schools? Will it not effectually close the treasury of the Commonwealth against all additional wants which may originate in the increase of population, and the daily growing interest in the cause of popular education? Are the people of this Commonwealth, in view of the rapid march of improvement in every thing which tends to elevate and improve the condition of man, ready to say to the children of succeeding generations, Thus far, through our instrumentality, and with our consent, shall ye come, and no farther!

However much we might be disposed to make appropriations in aid of the colleges, under other circumstances and at another time, we oppose this prayer now as inopportune.

The praises of popular education are in the mouths of all;

but

we have reason to fear that its importance is but partially appreciated.

The statesman who neglects the intellectual and moral wants of those for whom he legislates, we regard as no less a madman than was he who thought to chain the waters of the Hellespont.

Our freedom will prove our bane unless the people, the original source of all power, are so far enlightened as to exercise the various functions of power aright.

"Universal suffrage," says a popular writer, "is either a blessing or a curse, according to circumstances.

"It is a blessing to a nation whose citizens use it with intelligence; it would be a curse to any people so far wanting in that attribute as to allow themselves to be made the tools of ambitious demagogues."

We have but one alternative, it is either the diffusion of knowledge among the people, the enlightening and purifying of the whole mass, or despotism.

We trust the policy of Massachusetts will continue the same as heretofore; that while "it shall be the duty of legislators, and magistrates, in all future periods of this Commonwealth, to cherish the interests of literature and the sciences, and all seminaries of them," it may be their special aim to nourish with a liberal hand, and to watch with a vigilant eye, the interests of the public free schools.

By these considerations, we are induced most respectfully to recommend that the petitioners have leave to withdraw their petitions.

R. B. HUBBARD,

SAM'L WARNER, Jr.

HOUSE.....No. 113.

Commonwealth of Massachusetts.

In the Year One Thousand Eight Hundred and Forty-Eight.

RESOLVE

On the Petition of the Guardian of the Punkapoag Indians.

Resolved, for reasons set forth in said petition, that there be paid, out of the treasury of the Commonwealth, to Thomas French, guardian of the Punkapoag Indians, the sum of seventy dollars and seventy-two cents, and that the governor draw his warrant therefor accordingly.

Passed to be engrossed.

SENATE, March 25, 1848.

Sent down for concurrence.

CHAS. CALHOUN, Clerk.