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Tothe Editorofthe Christian Observer. THE evil effects of a merely fashionable education, and of habits of trifling reading, have been often exposed in your pages; but as they are long likely to continue to be extensively experienced, and in many quarters are little regarded, I am anxious to introduce to your notice, and to the attention of your readers, a new and powerful auxiliary in the warfare against these insidious enemies. I allude to the late eminent Dr. Dwight, President of Yale College, Connecticut; whose valuable system of theology is not less well known or highly valued in this country, since its republication, than in his native land; and to whom the public are further indebted for an interesting and valuable, (though often too minute, and therefore so far heavy) series of Travels in New England and New York, from which I transcribe the following chapter*. It needs no panegyric to entitle it to serious consideration; while the lively style in which it is written is well calculated to attract those whom it is the object of the author to benefit. Most happy should I be if it should answer the purpose of inducing any parent or young person to lay to heart a subject which, though often trifled with, is of great, and may be of infinite, mo

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I will now communicate to you some observations concerning a mode of education adopted to some extent, as I believe, both here [Boston] and in many other places; particularly

* Dr. Dwight's Travels have just been reprinted in London, from the American edition, in four large closely printed volumes, price two guineas. Dr. Dwight was among the earliest and warmest friends of the Christian Observer in America. His strong recommendatory letter affixed to the prospectus of the re-print of that work at Boston, with some additional particulars, will be found in the Christian Ob server for 1815, p. 838, and 1816, p. 642. CHRIST. OBSERV. No. 257.

those which are wealthy and populous. In almost all instances, where it is pursued at all, it is chiefly con fined to people of fashion.

The end proposed by the parents is to make their children objects of admiration. The means, though not sanctioned, are certainly characterised, by the end. That I have not mistaken the end may be easily proved by a single resort to almost any genteel company. To such company the children of the family are regularly introduced; and the praise of the guests is administered to them as regularly as the dinner or the tea is served up. Commendation is rung through all its changes. Were you to pass a twelvemonth in this country, and to believe all that you heard said by people, not destitute of respectability, whatever opinion you might form of the parents, you would suppose, that the children were a superior race of beings, both in person and mind; and that beauty, genius, grace, and loveliness, had descended to this world in form, and determined to make these States their future residence.

The means of effectuating this darling object are the communication of what are called accomplishments. The children are solicitously taught music, dancing, embroidery, ease, confidence, graceful manners, &c. To these may be added what are called reading and travelling. You may very naturally branches of education. My objecask me what fault I find in these tion lies originally to the end which is proposed, and to the direction which it gives to the means-in

themselves harmless, and capable of being useful. Children educated in the manner to which I refer, soon learn that the primary end of their efforts, and even of their existence, is appearance only. What they are, they soon discern is of little consequence; but what they appear to be is of importance inestimable. The whole force of the early mind' is directed therefore to this object, 2 Q

and exhausted in acquiring the trifles of which it is composed.

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.. The thoughts of a boy thus educated are spent upon the colour, quality, and fashion of his clothes, and upon the several fashions to which his dress is to be successively conformed; upon his bow, his walk, his mode of dancing, his behaviour company, and his nice observance of the established rules of good breeding. To To mingle without awkwardness or confusion in that empty, unmeaning chat, those mere vibrations of the tongue, termed ashionable conversation, is the ultimate aim of his eloquence; and to comprehend and to discuss, without impropriety, the passing topics of the day, the chief object of his mental exertions. When he reads, he reads only to appear with advantage in such conversation. When he acts, he acts only to be admired by those who look on. Novels, plays, and other trifles of a similar nature, are the customary subjects of his inves-, tigation. Voyages, travels, biography, and sometimes history, limit his severe researches. By such a mind, thinking will be loathed, and study regarded with terror. In the pursuits to which it is devoted, there is nothing to call forth, to try, or to increase its strength. Its powers, instead of being raised to new degrees of energy, are never exercised to the extent in which they already exist. His present capacity cannot be known for want of trial. What that capacity might become cannot be even conjectured. Destitute of that habit of labouring which alone can render labour pleasing, or even supportable, he dreads exertion as a calamity. The sight of a classic author gives him a chill; a lesson in Locke or Euclid, a mental ague. Thus in a youth, formed, perhaps, by nature for extensive views and manly efforts, sloth of mind is generated, dandled, and nursed on the knee of parental indulgence. A soft, luxurious, and sickly character is spread over both the understanding and the affections; which for

bids their growth, prevents their vigour, and ruins every hope of future eminence and future worth. The faculties of the mind, like those of the body, acquire strength only by exercise. To attain their greatest strength, both must be exercised daily, and often to the utmost. Had Goliath never exerted the powers of his body, he would have been an infant in strength: had Newton never exerted those of his mind, he would have been an infant in understanding. Genius, in the abstract, is a mere capacity for exertion. This is the gift of nature, and is all that she gives. The utmost of this capacity can never be conjectured, until the mind has, in a long-continued, habitual course, made its most vigorous efforts.

If these observations are just, they furnish every parent an easy and sure directory for the intellectual education of his children. If he wishes them to possess the greatest strength of which they are capable, he must induce them to the most vigorous mental exertions. The reading education which I have described, will never accomplish the purpose. Hard study, a thorough investigation of mathematical science, and a resolute attention to the most powerful efforts of distinguished logicians; in a word, an oldfashioned, rigid, academical education will ever be found indispensable to the youth who is destined to possess mental greatness.

On girls, this unfortunate system induces additional evils. Miss, the darling of her father and the pride of her mother, is taught from the beginning to regard her dress as a momentous concern. She is instructed in embroidery merely that she may finish a piece of work, which from time to time is to be brought out, to be seen, admired, and praised by visitors; or framed, and hung up in the room, to be still more frequently seen, admired, and praised. She is taught music, only that she may perform a few tunes, to excite the same admiration and applause

1823.]

ments.

President Dwight on Fashionable Education.

for her skill on the forte piano. She is taught to draw, merely to finish a picture, which, when richly framed and ornamented, is hung up to become an altar for the same incense. I have Do not misunderstand me. no quarrel with these accomplishSo far as they contribute to make the subject of them more amiable, useful, or happy, I admit their value. It is the employment of them which I censure; the sacrifice made by the parent of his property and his child at the shrine of vanity. The reading of girls is regularly lighter than that of boys. When the standard of reading for boys is set too low, that for girls will be proportionally lowered. Where boys investigate books of sound philosophy, and labour in mathematical and logical pursuits; girls read history, the higher poetry, and judicious discourses in morality and religion. When the utmost labour of boys is bounded by history, biography, and the pamphlets of the day; girls sink down to songs, novels, and plays.

that

Of this reading, what, let me ask,
are the consequences? By the first
novel which she reads, she is intro-
duced into a world literally new; a
middle region between "this spot,
which men call earth," and
which is found in Arabian tales.
Instead of houses, inhabited by mere
men, women, and children, she is
presented with a succession of splen-
did palaces and gloomy castles, in-
habited by tenants, half human and
half angelic, or haunted by down-
right fiends. Every thing in the
character and circumstances of these
beings comes at the wish or the call
of the enchanter. Whatever can
supply their wants, suit their wishes,
or forward or frustrate their designs,
is regularly at hand. The heroes are
as handsome, as dignified, as brave,
as generous, as affectionate,as faith-
ful, and as accomplished, as the au-
thor supposes will satisfy the demands
At the same time,
of his readers.
they have always a quantum sufficit
of money; or, if not, some relation

291

dies at the proper time, and leaves
them an ample supply. Every he-
roine is also a compound of all that
is graceful and lovely. Her person
is fashioned "by the hand of har-
mony." Her complexion outvies
the snow, and shames the rose. Her
features are such as Milton's Eve
might envy; and her mind is of the
same class with those refined beings
to whom this great poet, in his list of
the celestial orders, gives the elegant
name of Virtues. With these de-
lightful inhabitants of Utopia are
contrasted iron-handed misers,proffi-
gate guardians, traitorous servants,
and hags, not excelled by those of
Lapland itself. It ought not to be
omitted, that in this sequestered
region the fields and gardens are
all second-hand copies of paradise.
On them, whenever it is convenient,
the morning beams with every tint
of elegance, and every ray of glory:
and, when Aurora has no further
use for these fine things, her sister
Evening puts them on herself, and
appears scarcely less splendid or
less delightful.

With this ideal world the unfortunate girl corresponds so much, and so long, that she ultimately considers it as her own proper residence. With its inhabitants she converses so frequently and so habitually, that they become almost her only familiar acquaintance.

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But she must one day act in the real world. What can she expect, after having resided so long in novels, but that fortunes, and villas, and Edens, will spring up every where in her progress through life to promote her enjoyment. She has read herself into a heroine, and is fairly entitled to all the appendages of this character. If her imagination may be trusted, she is to be romantically rich, and romantically happy. The mornings which dawn upon her are ever to be bright, the days serene, and the evenings fragrant and delightful. In a word, the curse pronounced upon mankind is, to her, to lose its gloomy influ2Q 2 ence; and sorrow and toil are to

fly from the path in which she chooses to walk through life.

With these views, how disappointed must she be by the rugged course of nature! How untoward must be the progress of facts! How coarsely must the voice of truth grate upon her ear! How disgusted must she be to find herself surrounded, not by trusty Johns and faithful Chloes, but by ordinary domestics, chilling her with rusticity, provoking her by their negligence, insulting her with their impudence, and leaving her service without even giving her warning! Must she not feel, that it is a kind of impertinence in the days to be cloudy and wet; in the nights to be dark and chilly; in the streets to encumber her with mud, or choke her with dust; and in the prospects to present nothing but the mere vulgar scenes of this vulgar world?

The very food which she eats (for eat she must) will disgust her by its coarse unlikeness to the viands on which her imagination has so often feasted. Her friends, even those most intimately connected with her, will lose all the amiableness with which they are invested by natural affection, because they differ so grossly in their persons, manners, and opinions, from the fine forms of fancy, and from the poetical minds, whose residence is a novel or a song. In a word, the world will become to her a solitude, and its inhabitants strangers; because her taste for living has become too refined, too dainty, to relish any thing found in real life.

If she is at all pleasing and amiable, she will be addressed. But by whom? Not by a Corydon, a Strephon, or even a Grandison. At the best, her suitor will be a being formed of flesh and blood; who intends to live by business, and to acquire reputation by diligence, integrity, and good sense. He is in pursuit of a wife, and therefore can hardly wish for an angel. It will be difficult for him to believe, that a being so exalted would as

sume the marriage vow, do the ho nours of his table, direct the business of his family, or preside over the education of his children. He has hitherto spent his life, perhaps, in acting vigorously in the counting room, contending strenuously at the bar, or pursuing with diligence some other business merely human. How can such a being frame his mouth to lisp the pretty things which alone can be in unison with so delicate an ear? Figure to yourself the disgust, the pain, the surprise, of this silken existence even at the most refined language of honesty, and at the most honourable sentiments of affection, obtruded on her by such a suitor.

Should some man of art and mischief happen to think the conquest worth obtaining, how easily might she become a victim to the very accomplishments in which she considers all excellence as involved!

To

Besides, this life is always in some degree a season of suffering and sorrow. In what manner can our heroine encounter either? patience and fortitude, she has from her infancy been a stranger. With religion she is unacquainted. Principles, such as religion approves, she has none. This world has daily blasted all her expectations: with the future world she has not begun a connexion. Between the Bible and novels there is a gulph fixed, which few novel readers are willing to pass. The consciousness of virtue, the dignified pleasure of having performed our duty, the serene remembrance of an useful life, the hope of an interest in the Redeemer, and the promise of a glorious inheritance in the favour of God, are never found in novels; and of course have never been found by her.

A weary, distressed, bewildered voyager amid the billows of affliction, she looks around her in vain, to find a pilot, a pole-star, or a shore.

Under the influence of this education, persons of both sexes, also, are in extreme danger of becoming

a voluntary prey to the modern philosophy, and to the principles of enchantment and perdition which it so successfully holds out to minds destitute of sound principle and defensive prudence. Unaccustomed to think, they are pleased to find others willing to think for them. Unaccustomed to reason, their minds will be perplexed by every argument advanced against their opinions. The admission of truth, the comprehension of good sense, require the toil of sober, vigorous thought. The admission of fiction, and of philosophical as truly as of poetical fiction, demands nothing but the luscious indulgence of fancy. To a soft and dainty mind, a taste fascinated by mental luxury, how much more congenial is the latter employment than the former! How improbable is it, how hopeless, that such a mind can fail to reject the dictates of sober truth and sound understanding, and from a self-indulgence, by habit rendered indispensable, imbibe the wretched doctrines, created by the philosophists of the present day! How improbable is it, that any mind, which has once imbibed these doctrines, can escape from absolute ruin!

I know, that this education is expressly attempted with a view to

superior refinement; but it is not a refinement of the taste, the understanding, or the heart. It is merely a refinement of the imagination; of an imagination, already soft and sickly; of a sensibility, already excessive; of a relish, already fastidious. To a genuine perfection of taste it bears no more resemblance, than the delicate white of decay to the native fairness of complexion; or than the blush of a hectic to the bloom of health. In every part of it the dictates of common sense are laid aside: that which is of the least importance is most regarded; and that which is of the greatest, most forgotten. To enable children to appear with such fashionable advantages as to gain admiration and applause, is the sole concern. To enable them to be what they ought to be,-wise, virtuous, and useful,is left out of the system. The mind, instead of being educated, is left to the care of accident and fashion. Dress, manners, and accomplishments, are placed under expensive masters, and regulated with extreme solicitude. With this education, what can a son or a daughter become? Not a man nor a woman, but a well-dressed bundle of accomplishments. Not a blessing nor an heir of immortality, but a fribble or a doll.

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