2 " * * * For all the Athenians and strangers that were there," Paul tells us, spent their time in nothing else, but either to tell or to hear some new thing." Like them, we roam the world of pedagogy far and wide, to find something "new in matter and method, never dreaming that often the old may be infinitely better; that under our very feet and all about us are "" acres of diamonds," if we have but eyes to see them. Swedenborg tells of the perpetual buzzing noise that attends the groups of those known as "reasoners" in the spirit world, men wise in their own conceit. At times he drew near to one group or another to learn what might be the subject of their earnest disputation, and what sort of discussion it might be that in the distance buzzed and hummed so steadily. And the buzzing of these self-styled "reasoners" grew louder-that was all-while from the silent, patient heavens came the still small voice of Wisdom, the only voice in all the wide expanse that spoke to his soul. We too may hear this voice, if we will, as it comes down to us from God and from the fathers; and in obedience to its calm behest, we will not vainly attempt to give the child instruction in all the subjects of human knowledge. We will teach but a few things, those which are essential, or which seem most desirable. In these few things, which will be made to touch very many things of vast importance and undying interest, we will give definite knowledge. We will do this in a way to attract, so far as we can. So far as we can also, we will give only such knowledge as is worth retaining, and is sure to be approved best by the child grown to the mature life of intelligent manhood or womanhood. Nor will we forget this truth of tremendous importance in the work of the teacher-that it is not one generation only that is before us in the school-for in teaching these boys and girls we are, in a degree, teaching their great-grandchildren. Are we teaching the best things? We are everywhere trying to do this. But there is so much blundering theory, so much mistaken practice. There is unrest and dissatisfaction everywhere amongst thoughtful people. They tell us the schools are not doing their work as it ought to be done, either in the matter of sound elementary scholarship, or in moulding thought and character and shaping life to the high ends that may fairly be expected of them; that they are working far too much on the low plane of self-interest and vulgar self-seeking. And all this is true of very many schools both in city and country. There are schools in which things sweet and noble, generous and beautiful, seem seldom or never to be thought of or spoken of; in which the splendid imagery of the poet is never made to pass before the rapt vision of the child; in which the grandeur of heroic achievement or self-sacrifice is never held up, to be regarded by the growing boy or girl with quickened heart-beat, and imitated humbly afar off. Alas, for the men and women who were children where all this was true! And alas for to-morrow where this is true to-day! You have perhaps forgotten some of the teachers who taught you the alphabet and spelling, penmanship and arithmetic, grammar, geography, and what not-a "dry grammatical cinder" one and another of them may have been, for whom you have neither gratitude nor affection. But the man or woman who gave you glowing thought and noble imagery, the thrill of heroic impulse and high aspiration, he or she is immortal. Who are the best people you have known? those whom you have most enjoyed? from whom you have had most good? They who knew fine things and loved them, who thought them, and said them, and wrote them, and sang them, and put them deep into your heart of hearts for time and for eternity. Would we be so remembered by some of our pupils when we have "crossed the bar," the path is open and the way is clear. But it is a way in which none are found to walk, save only unselfish souls of wise purpose and high Unselfishness is the secret of all true success, of all enduring good report, in teaching as in any other worthy field of effort. "He that saveth his life shall lose it." The self-seeker, working for mere wages, is in the long race a failure, never truly beloved, and soon forgotten. Not courage. mine" but "thine" is the animating spirit of the best lives. Think of the influence of a noble life such as this upon a large school! Teachers such as these are the very elect of God. They are God's angels dispensing heavenly manna to His children. We care little to remember those who directed for us only the dull routine of school life, but we venerate the memory of the sainted ones in our school calendar who were teachers indeed! For they made real to us the "splendor of grass and flower," the privilege and the glory of living in a world and in an age like this; the beauty, and the duty, and the promise, of human life. How wrought they this miracle of grace? By giving, without measure or stint, the best they had in their own richly endowed natures, and the best they had gathered from all the world beside, "giving all as though they gave nothing." "The way to the blessedness that is in music, as to all other blessedness," says George Macdonald, "lies through weary labors, and the master must suffer with the disciple." So if the best results are to be had in this study of the best thoughts of the masters, the teacher must be willing-glad, indeed-to do this work along with his pupils. These choice things must soon be apart from the printed page, and "in the air;" and in all this the reward, for both teacher and pupil, is hardly less in the "living present" than in the certain future. Besides, pupils are encouraged to do this work all the better if it be done by the teacher, to whom they look as leader and guide. It is often surprising with what readiness a song, a hymn, a poem of some length, or a prose selection, may be learned by a large school with some help and direction on the part of the teacher, though for the most part they may be committed to memory without such assistance. "We learn to do by doing," and the memory is greatly improved and strengthened by this exercise. There is nothing in the average school curriculum to equal this in its lasting influence upon mind and heart. We must know the ordinary branches of knowledge, but they are largely of "the machine," fitting us the better for the business or professional life of the world. And this is what they are meant to do. What high thought or noble purpose, moulding life and shaping character, do pupils get out of arithmetic, or algebra, or geometry, or other science, as it is usually taught? For these better things we must look elsewhere. The time appointed for our school work is short, and the grist that is ground in the schools has in it a very large proportion of bran and "chopped stuff." Let us put in enough good wheat, and run the mill with such care as to insure at least fairly good Graham flour for human souls to feed upon. Our thoughts come we know not whence or how. Let us put into the mind of youth all the suggestiveness towards good thought that lies in our power. The mind will have something to exercise itself upon; and to rise to good requires more effort than to sink downward to the low plane of idle personalities, cheap gossip, evil suggestion, and ignoble aims. The Therefore during school days commit to memory much that is best in our literature. We have all the favorable conditions. pupils are with us in the schools. The programme of their work is arranged by ourselves as, in our judgment, shall be for their best good. We can give to them a vast store of precious treasure-wealth that can never be squandered or lost, like that inherited in the way of bonds and mortgages, city real estate, or paternal acreswealth that will increase by more than earthly compound interest, and which, either in itself or in its essence, can be taken with them when they go beyond-for is it not immortal treasure? Regarding this great matter as I do, from the standpoint of human duty, human responsibility, and a confident expectation of the life to come, if I were a superintendent of schools, I would give this subject a prominent place throughout the course from the primary to the high school-if principal of a Normal or Training school it should be my first purpose, whatever else must give way to do this, to put abundantly into the thought and memory of those preparing to be teachers the fine gold of literature, which they having would again pass on to their pupils in after years in unceasing round of benefaction-as a teacher, I would give it (as I do) the place of honor upon the school programme-as Sunday-school superintendent, I would take enough time, though it might be half the time of the session, to teach a hymn or psalm, or similar precious thing to the entire school, having concert recitation of others that had previously been taughteverybody, old and young, so far as possible, taking part in the exercise-as Secretary or official in charge of Young Men's Christian Association, or similar organization for the benefit of young men or young women, I would make this one of the leading features of the work to be done. Any man doing this work well, would be more than millionaire in ability to confer benefaction upon his kind, just in proportion as spiritual things are of greater account than material things. Owing to a change in the school hours of our city some years ago, which being general included the high school and took an hour from our day-against our protest that the time was too short,-we were compelled to drop certain work that was important, though not directly in the line of school studies, and at length I became so dissatisfied with results in a direction in which the school had previously been strong, that, some four years ago, I determined to cut out a period of two hours each Tuesday morning, and have some of the most gifted and best men in human history come in to help us during the brief period we could afford for them. They have companied with us from time to time, and the boys have enjoyed their blessed association. Our own great mistake as a teacher has been that we did not give these good men and women this cordial invitation full forty years ago. We usually have in the boys' high school of Lancaster, one selection in prose and one in verse, each week, during the greater part of the session. We take things striking, suggestive, strong, tender, beautiful-a few of them only, and from many sources, for the field of literature is very rich in treasure and we can but gather a little here and there. We think about these things, talk about them; the boys recite them in concert; they write them from memory in blank books kept for this use, with attention to spelling, punctuation, use of capitals, arrangement of lines and matter. Two or three or four of these are named on the blackboard for declamation day, which comes round to each lad once in two weeks, and he recites what is called for when he goes to the platform. It is desirable to have something in the hands of the pupils from which they can get much of what is wanted. We have used the Lincoln Literary Collection, published by the American Book Company. The teacher commits these selections to memory as well as the boys, and the book is hardly referred to by either after learning them, except to make sure of a doubtful word or phrase, so as to be as near "letter perfect as possible. The average time per week given to the learning of these things by the boys is from two to three or four hours -and the teacher gives more time to it than the average pupil. The memory is strength. ened by this work, and in every way good results from this feature of our weekly programme, which is continued through the greater part of the year. Do we forget these things? Of course we do. But they are readily recalled. It is only the phenomenal man that remembers everything! A very small proportion of the pupils have difficulty in committing to memory, and for these some allowance must be made. To hear a large school recite, in concert, these fine things one after another, by the dozen, without reference to the book-some of them the choicest in all the world of literature-is out of the ordinary experience, even in these latter days of universal education, elaborate school curriculum, and expert school management. The habit in the schools of touching the Bible for themselves and thinking of it on week days is also good. It is astonishing, now and then, when Bible characters or events are spoken of, to find how few pupils are familiar with the facts or references. Bible wisdom is the best the world has known, and in the wash and slush of printed matter of our time, boys and girls are growing up in comparative ignorance of the Book. If you doubt it, try the next school you enter. Teach the boys and girls the first Psalm, the eighth, the twenty-third, the Beatitudes, the thirteenth of Corinthians, and other immortal things from the Bible. Teach them a number of the best hymns. Make them their own by reciting many of them one after another in concert and individually, until these are as familiar to them as the Lord's Prayer, and themselves as sure upon them as upon the multiplication table. The list of the past two years, as we take it from our memorandum book, might readily be made better, but it is good enough for our purpose. COMMITTED TO MEMORY DURING 1894-5. The Song of the Camp, by Bayard Taylor; and Enduring Influence. Labor is Worship, Mrs. F. S. Osgood; and The Nobility of Labor, Orville Dewey. In Memoriam, Alfred Tennyson; and Address at Gettysburg, Abraham Lincoln. The Star Spangled Banner, Francis Scott Key; Columbia, the Gem of the Ocean, D. T. Shaw; and My Country, 'Tis of Thee, S. F. Smith. Abou Ben Adhem, Leigh Hunt; and The Boys, Oliver Wendell Holmes. The Passage, Uhland; and Rienzi's Address to the Romans, Mrs. M. R. Mitford. Over the Hill, George Macdonald; and Among My Books, Alexander Smith. Small Beginnings, Charles Mackay; and The North American Indians, Charles Sprague. A Psalm of Life, H. W. Longfellow; and Hamlet to the Players, Shakespeare. Once to Every Man and Nation, J. R. Lowell; and The Mystery of Life. The Chambered Nautilus, Oliver Wendell Holmes; and Regulus to the Roman Senate (in part), Epes Sargent. Hannah the Mother; and Regulus to the Roman Senate (completed). Oh, Why Should the Spirit of Mortal be Proud? William Knox; and 1st Psalm. To-day and To-morrow, Gerald Massey; and XXIII. Psalm. Polonius to Laertes (Hamlet), Shakspeare; and The Cynic, Henry Ward Beecher. Ulysses, Alfred Tennyson. The Dying Gladiator, Lord Byron; and 13th chapter of 1st Corinthians. Knowing, C. P. Cranch; and Crossing the Rubicon, J. S. Knowles. To a Waterfowl, Wm. C. Bryant; Patriotism, Walter Scott. The Isle of Yew; and the Bible in the Nursery, Thomas De Quincey. The Destruction of Sennacherib, Lord Byron. The Dream of Clarence (Richard III.), Shakspeare. Marmion and Douglas, Walter Scott; Definite Training, John Ruskin. "The Good, Great Man:" and Spartacus to the Gladiators, Elijah Kellogg. Thanatopsis, Wm. Cullen Bryant; and XC. Psalm. Ozymandias, by Shelley; "Break, Break, Break," and The Bugle Song, Alfred Ten nyson. The Old Oaken Bucket, Samuel Woodworth; and Glory, Francis Wayland. Spring, Mary Howitt; and Angel Faces, Mrs. D. M. Mulock. The Drunkard, J. O. Rockwell; and the Fall of Wolsey (Henry VIII), Shakspeare. Procrastination, Edward Young; and Beauty of the Clouds, John Ruskin. Battle of Hohenlinden, Thomas Campbell; and The Gentleman, G. W. Doane. There is no Death, Edward Lytton Bulwer. COMMITTED TO MEMORY DURING 1895-6. Polonius to Laertes and Hotspur and the Fop, Shakspeare. The Dying Gladiator, Lord Byron; and Enduring Influence. The Song of the Camp, Bayard Taylor, and Our National Banner, Edward Everett. The Old Oaken Bucket, Samuel Woodworth; and Columbia, the Gem of the Ocean, D. T. Shaw. The Battle of Blenheim, Robert Southey; and the Mystery of Life. Providence, William Cowper; and Tribute to Washington, W. H. Harrison. Cato's Soliloquy, Joseph Addison; and Among My Books, Alexander Smith. The Drunkard, J. O. Rockwell; and Work, Thomas Carlyle. God Knoweth, Mary A. Bridgman; and The Red Thread of Honor, W. D. Adams. Abou Ben Adhem, Leigh Hunt; and Address at Gettysburg, Abraham Lincoln. The Closing Year, George D. Prentice; and There is No Death, Lord Lytton. The Lost Chord, Adelaide A. Proctor; and Hannah the Mother. The Charmer, Harriet Beecher Stowe. The City of the Living, Margaret E. Sangster. Thanatopsis, William Cullen Bryant ; and Brutus on the Death of Cæsar, Shakspeare. The Relief of Lucknow, Robert Lowell; and VIII Psalm. Over the Hill, George Macdonald; and The Beatitudes. Driving Home the Cows, Kate P. Osgood; and XC Psalm. Now, Charles Mackay; and Too Dear for the Whistle, Benjamin Franklin. Procrastination, Edward Young; and Hamlet to the Players, Shakspeare. Dickens in Camp, Bret Harte; and Ogg, the Son of Beorl, George Eliot. Labor is Worship, Frances S. Osgood; and The Reformer, Horace Greeley. Small Beginnings, Charles Mackay; and Fall of Wolsey, Shakspeare. Spring, Mary Howitt; and Greece, Lord Byron. Oh, Why Should the Spirit of Mortal be Proud? William Knox. DURING THE CURRENT SESSION. The following selections have been learned during the current school session, some being given year after year that they may become familiar as "household words:" Procrastination, Edward Young; and Enduring Influence. Lead, Kindly Light, J. H. Newman; and Spartacus to the Gladiators, Elijah Kellogg. To Agassiz on his Fiftieth Birth-day, H. W. Longfellow; and Abou Ben Adhem, Leigh Hunt. In School Days, J. G. Whittier. The Drunkard, J. O. Rockwell; Address at Gettysburg, Abraham Lincoln. He Giveth his Beloved Sleep, Mrs. E. B. Browning; Polonius to Laertes, Shakspeare. The Passage, Uhland; Among My Books, Alexander Smith. Battle of Blenheim, Robert Southey; and XC. Psalm. Green Be the Turf, Fitz-Greene Halleck; and LXXXIV Psalm. Each and All, R. W. Emerson; and XXIII Psalm. Goody Blake and Harry Gill, William Wordsworth; and CXXI Psalm. Driving Home the Cows, Kate P. Osgood; and I Psalm. The City of the Living, Margaret E. Sangster; and XIII of 1 Corinthians. A Psalm of Life, H. W. Longfellow. The Touchstone, Wm. Allingham; and the North American Indians, Charles Sprague. The Closing Year, George D. Prentice; and Patriotism, Sir Walter Scott. Ring Out, Wild Bells, Alfred Tennyson; and The Beatitudes. Do the boys get great good out of it? Many do, to whom it will be increasing good through all their lives. Anything of which this can be said deserves to be rated essential. Our boys who go to college soon find reason to congratulate themselves upon knowing so many choice things in English literature. And boys who go higher than college! In our last year's class there was a youth of clear brain and steady purpose, who would have entered college this year with better preparation than any of his fellows. He was taken ill some months before the close of the term, and was confined to the house until his death a few weeks since. When I called to see him a day or two before he died, his voice had sunk to a whisper and he was quietly awaiting the end, glad to think it so near. As I sat on the side of his bed and talked with him of familiar things, I recalled his having learned the ninetieth Psalm, and said, "You know the grand old verse, 'Lord, thou hast been our dwelling-place in all generations."" With a glad smile, "Oh, yes!" he whispered, for he could no longer speak above his breath, and went on with the verses that follow, adding eagerly, in a whisper, when he had ended, "Oh, how good many of those sweet and noble things that we learned in the High School have been to me when I have been kept in the house all these long months! What pleasure it has been to think them over and over again!" He was dying, but these things out of his school life he recalled with rare gratification even then. Not mathematics or science or Latin or Greek-and he was foremost in all of these studies-only this! Is it good to do such work? I think so. The Chairman of the Executive Committee of the Lancaster School Board, Hon. John B. Warfel, is much interested in this work, and commits some of these things to memory in giving assistance at home to his little grandson. In Europe on a recent visit. while in Scotland, it was a great satisfaction to him to be able to recall page after page of Scott's Lady of the Lake, in the localities which Sir Walter has made the scene of this favorite poem. He committed these things to memory in his younger days, and commends this work to the boys as one of the very best things in the school. We go a little farther than Mr. Warfel, and think it altogether the best thing, for its influence in opening blind eyes to see those things that give the best culture, and in quickening the sensibilities to feel and appreciate the best things in the world; after that we put our music, vocal and instrumental; after that, perhaps, Latin and Greek, history and botany; then mathematics, natural science, etc. All would not agree to this, but it is the order of importance in which we would name these subjects in our own experience. The New York Tribune tells a pleasant story of a little girl of four years old, who, with her nurse, was walking at the seaside. They came to an inlet, and the nurse decided to row across, shortening the walk home. When the boat reached the opposite side she put the child ashore, knowing she was but a short distance from home, and rowed the borrowed boat back. The distance was short, but very rough and difficult for a little girl of four. She struggled on through the coarse grass and sand, climbing hillocks and walking throngh depths. At last her mother saw her coming and hurried to meet her. She exclaimed, "Were you frightened, my sweet?" "I felt very lost," was the reply, "but I sang 'Lead, Kindly Light,' to myself all the way." What a strong argument this for teaching little children hymns and poetry that have thought in them? The pity of it, that the minds of children are filled so often with nonsense, when it would require no greater effort to give them the inspiration of good literature! Nonsense rhymes are good enough in their time and place; but let the everlasting things be taught as well. Can an hour or more be spent to better purpose than in committing this beautiful poem to memory? It was written by John Henry Newman in 1833. Lead, kindly Light amid th' encircling gloom, Lead Thou me ou; The night is dark, and I am far from home, Keep Thou my feet; I do not ask to see I was not ever thus, nor prayed that Thou I loved to choose and see my path; but now I loved the garish day; and, spite of fears, So long Thy power hath blest me, sure it still O'er moor and fen, o'er crag and torrent, till And with the morn those angel faces smile, Do we as teachers hesitate to begin so good a work because it involves unusual effort? Let us rather think of the end; for, like good St. Christopher, we "labor for eternal life"-for them and for ourselves. In the Heart of Midlothian, when Jeanie Deans makes her touching appeal to Queen Caroline for the life of her sister, she says-and the heart of the world has felt that appeal: "When the hour of death comes, that comes to high and low-lang and late may it be yours!-oh, my lady, then it is not what we have done for ourselves, but what we have done for others, that we think on most pleasantly." Mr. McCaskey then gave the teachers a very simple and ready method of learning, or teaching a class or school, a poem in a very short time, and of knowing and placing the stanzas in their proper order. Longfellow's Birthday Poem to Agassiz was selected. A key-word or phrase was taken from the first line of each verse, as italicized in the poem given below, and numbered on the fingers or in the air, and upon these eight words the Institute was drilled rapidly so as to recall them promptly, then the line, then the entire verse, backwards and forwards in the order of the lines. until finally the whole poem was learned in a short time. It was an interesting, and very suggestive and helpful exercise. He does not have much respect for any system of mnemonics, but regards the matter of memorizing as so much work to be done, taking advantage of any helps that may be had from words or phrases, or rhymes, or length of lines, in the poem itself. THE FIFTIETH BIRTHDAY OF AGASSIZ MAY 28, 1857. IT was fifty years ago In the pleasant month of May And nature, the old nurse, took Thy Father has written for thee." So she keeps him still a child, Though at times he hears in his dreams And the rush of mountain streams And the mother at home says "Hark! It is growing late and dark, |