2.

This ideal is attainable only through the principle of freedom of the soul.

3. Monkish education by laying extreme stress upon the single element of renunciation led directly away from the ideal of soul-freedom.

4.

The errors of Chivalric education grew out of the exclusive stress laid upon individuality.

5. Civil education took as its guiding principle utility, or adaptation to rational purposes.

6.

7.

The two religious systems that early assumed control of civil education erred in suppressing individuality.

The final "Free education" must provide for the education of all classes of society, by all available instrumentalities, for all the relations of free citizenship.

VII. PARKER'S HOW TO STUDY GEOGRAPHY.

(Completed last month.)

SECOND YEAR READING.

For members who have pursued either the Brief Course, the Advanced or the Complete Course of reading in 1892-3 the following series of books will provide their second year's work. New members. may take the following as their first course, or they may substitute from the series of last year as desired. It is only necessary that three books of the series be studied in the Brief Course, five in the Advanced, and seven in the Complete Course, and that written work as outlined in each month's syllabus be prepared by those who seek the Certificates and the Diploma of the International Circle.

BRIEF COURSE.

I. History of Education in the United States. By Richard G. Boone, Professor of Pedagogy in Indiana University. Psychology applied to the Art of Teaching. By Dr. Joseph Baldwin, Professor of Pedagogy in the University of Texas.

3. Memory, What it is and How to Improve it. By David Kay, F. R. G. S.

5.

ADVANCED COURSE.

4. Pestalozzi, His Life and Work. By Roger De Guimps. The Development of the Senses and the Will in the Mind of the Child. By W. Preyer, Professor of Physiology in Jena.

COMPLETE COURSE.

6. Higher Education of Women in Europe. By Helene Lange, Berlin.

7. The Ventilation and Warming of School Buildings. By Gilbert B. Morrison, Teacher of Physics and Chemistry in Kansas City High School.

The publishers of the International Education Series, Messrs. D. Appleton & Co., New York, will send to any interested teacher the outline Teacher's Course of Professional Reading, by Dr. Wm. T. Harris, U. S. Commissioner of Education, upon which outline the work of this Reading Circle is based.

SUGGESTIONS FOR THE ORGANIZATION OF LOCAL CIRCLES.

I. Increased interest in the reading and increased profit to even greater degree will result from the association of several teachers who can meet at regular intervals, once a month or oftener, for the discussion of their reading. It is not necessary that such circles include many members. Two or three teachers really ambitious for professional advancement, who will meet because of their interest in the reading and their desire to secure the highest benefit from it, will constitute a more efficient Circle than a large number among whom but few have real interest.

2. In graded schools of large towns and cities it will often be found that if the principal or superintendent rightly appreciates the value to his teachers, in their daily class-room work, that will result from such study of the principles underlying that work as this course of reading provides, a local circle can be formed to include all or part of the teachOne or more of the weekly teachers' meetings each month may be thus used to great advantage.

ers.

3. From these local circles the written work of individual members may be forwarded to the General Secretary of the International Circle, or it may be merely discussed at the meeting and there retained. Some written work is advised because it is deemed the most efficient form of study. But it is far better to read without writing than not to read at all.

4. Membership in the International Circle may be secured, without charge, by any teacher who will write for the application blanks. To secure full Correspondence membership, which entitles the member, upon completion of the required written work in either the Brief, the Advanced, or the Complete Course, to the annual certificate, and in three years to the diploma of the International Circle, it is necessary that two dollars accompany the application blank when it is filled out. This two dollars is not made an expense to the member since it constitutes him a subscriber for the full year to EDUCATION, in which magazine the regular monthly syllabi appear. For application blanks and further particulars, address

INTERNATIONAL READING CIRCLE,

Care of D. Appleton & Co.,

1, 3 and 5 Bond Street, New York.

FOREIGN NOTES.

GREAT BRITAIN.

Educational Resources of Liverpool. - The National Union of elementary teachers held its annual conference at Liverpool this year. The Union having assembled here also in 1876, the development of the educational resources of the city in the seventeen years intervening naturally excited attention. From statistics published, it appears that the population of the city numbered 517,950 in 1891, a decline of sixty-three per cent. in the decade. Since 1876, however, elementary school accommodation has increased by fifty per cent., enrollment forty-four per cent. and average attendance has risen from seventy to eighty-five per cent. of enrollment. Liverpool is a great centre of denominational education, church schools comprising seventy-four per cent. of the elementary pupils. A spirit of helpful coöperation has been promoted among the schools by two agencies, i. e., "The conference of School Managers," and the "Liverpool Council of Education.” The latter is an "association of the friends of education formed in 1874, to promote and encourage elementary education by every available. means." The means it employs are to encourage regular attendance and discourage capricious removal or frequent migration from school to school by awards of certificates and medals; to stimulate study by offering scholarships to pupils of the elementary schools; to enable them to attend the Lower school of the Liverpool College or the Institute; to give grants to pupil teachers who take a high place in the Scholarship examinations, and to give bonuses to teachers for the success and conduct of the school penny banks.

The school board of Liverpool has taken advantage of all the powers reposed in it by the education law of 1876 for dealing with the neglected children of drunken and dissolute parents. As a result there are now five industrial schools, i. e., four under the school board, and one denominational. Besides ordinary instruction these schools provide food and simple industrial training. The school board opened in 1878 a truant school for boys at Hightown, a few miles out of Liverpool. This is a certified industrial school, with special arrangements as to its discipline and management; the period of detention is short. The boys, on evidence of improved behavior, are permitted, on license, to return home and attend any public elementary school chosen by the parents. If there be a relapse into the old ways of truancy the license

is withdrawn, and the boy is at once re-admitted to the truant school for another period of detention. The success of the scheme is illustrated by the fact that fifty per cent. of the boys are never re-admitted, and twenty-five per cent. are re-admitted only once. Liverpool led in the matter of manual training of boys in elementary schools, by the introduction of a scheme of advanced kindergarten up to standard (or grade) four, and culminating in a three years' course of applied drawing with practical instruction in woodwork at suitable and convenient centres. To the same classes a three years' course of lessons

in mechanics is imparted — thus equipping a boy in general intelligence and handiness for beginning the work of his after life. Many of the denominational schools have availed themselves of the services of the Board's staff in the manual training and mechanics course.

Besides instruction in needlework (which in some cases includes dress-making), domestic economy, and practical cookery, the girls have now instruction, alike with the boys, in such scientific knowledge as is imparted by a course in elementary physiology, physiography and chemistry.

The Secondary education of Liverpool is supplied by two great proprietary schools-the "Liverpool Institute" and the "Liverpool College," the Catholic Institute, St. Francis Xavier Jesuit school and about one hundred private schools. The "Institute originally the Mechanics' Institute consists of three schools, a High school and Commercial school, both located in the building in Mount street, and a Girls' school in Blackburne House, which is situated near the Institute.

The Liverpool College is a church of England school organized on about the same lines as the Institute, but providing also religious instruction. The secondary schools of Liverpool have no endowment, but depend upon fees, subscriptions and the grant earned by passes in the science and arts examinations. University College, a constituent part of Victoria University, is the crown of the system.

National Union of Elementary Teachers.-The National Union assembled for its twenty-fourth annual conference on Easter Monday. Since its former meeting in Liverpool (1876), its membership has risen from 9,000 to 23,000. The president elect, Mr. C. Bowden, in his inaugural address discussed the chief problems demanding the active interest of the Union; namely, the pension scheme for teachers and the general improvement of their position, and the organization of secondary education and its correlation with public elementary education. Mr. Waddington of the executive, submitted a paper on child labor which set forth in a convincing manner the evils of this policy as

pursued in the factory and mining districts of England. This evil culminates in Lancashire, which has fifty-seven per cent. of the half timers (i. e., children who attend school half time), under the factory act which applies to children above ten years of age, and forty-nine per cent. of those under the education act which is applicable to those ten years of age. Mr. Waddington estimates that 70,000 children are annually sacrificed under the "Factory and Workshop act," and that “100,000 spend half their school time after the tenth birthday, in the streets." His arraignment of the greed of Lancashire parents was severe. The annual report showed the affairs of the Union to be in a flourishing condition. The orphanage fund (for the children of deceased teachers), received $20,000 during the year, and 210 orphans were cared for. The Union conducted 776 lawsuits for teachers unjustly deprived of their positions, victims of unreasonable charges, etc., at a total cost of $5,040. The employment of a special law official to deal with this branch of the Union's work has reduced the average cost of cases fully one-half.

The Irish Teachers' Annual Conference, held at Dublin, April 5-7, was unusually spirited. A proposition to have the Irish language included in the curriculum of the training colleges for teachers was received with enthusiasm. As in the English conference, a pension scheme for teachers was earnestly advocated.

BELGIUM.

The burgomaster of Brussels, M. Buls, recently presented to the commercial council a report upon the unemployed in which he discussed the relation of primary instruction to the labor problem. He noted that a large proportion of those who fail in the struggle for a living enter upon the effort without preparation. The remedies which he advocates for this phase of the evil are, obligatory education up to the fourteenth year at least; but not in primary schools organized as to-day, with overcharged programmes and theoretic training. It is necessary, he says, to maintain the intellectual exercises in order to develop the power of observation and initiative, but in place of seeking these exercises solely in books and in the study of the natural sciences, it is by means of manual work that they must be cultivated. In the opinion of M. Buls, the public school during the obligatory period should confine itself strictly to imparting the elements of reading, writing and arithmetic, and should supplement this instruction by exercises designed to develop in the children the dexterity and skill which are essential to artisans.

ITALY.

The bill requiring the communes to pay the salaries of teachers promptly, has passed the Senate and has been favorably reported by the