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FOR THE

General Education

OF

CHILDREN AND YOUTH,

FOR

USEFULNESS, HONOR, AND HAPPINESS,
IN THE HOME SCHOOL OR COMMON SCHOOL.

Including

ALL THAT IS REQUISITE FOR PRIMARY BOOKS

IN READING, SPELLING, ENGLISH GRAMMAR, GOOD MANNERS, SOUND AND
RATIONAL MORALS, PERSONAL, SOCIAL, AND SACRED; IN WORLDLY
WISDOM, AND A JUST AND HONORABLE SECULAR ECON-
OMY AND GENERAL MANAGEMENT.

In which is found

AN AMERICAN PLAN

FOR REFORMING THOROUGHLY THE WRITING & PRINTING
OF OUR LANGUAGE, FOR COMMON USE;
With Ten Progressive Reading Lessons in the New Dress.

ALSO, SOME ACCOUNT OF

A NEW SYSTEM OF GENERAL AND LIBERAL EDUCATION
For both Sexes, at an early age; built much on Domestic
and Self-supporting Principles. With some

Odes and other important Matters, for Young and Old.

BY EZEKIEL RICH,

A Minister of the Gospel and an Educator; now
residing in the City of Rochester, N. Y.

ROCHESTER:

PRINTED AND SOLD BY W. HEUGHES,

Corner of Main and Water Streets, just east of Center Bridge.
Price 25 Cents.

KC 11398

DEDICATION OF THIS LITTLE BOOK.

TO ALL AFFECTIONATE PARENTS,

AND THOSE WHO KINDLY ASSIST THEM IN THE GENERAL EDUCATION OF THEIR CHILDREN FOR REAL PERMANENT WORTH AND ENJOYMENT,

IN THE INFANT AND PRIMARY STAGES.

THE YOUNG of our race, you know, have very stirring, lively, and social natures, and are fond of familiar conversation, and free and easy verbal communications. Confinement, then, especially to hard dry book study, and often in bad air, is to them very tiresome and disgusting, and shuts up their little minds, and excites their strong feelings, against school, school-books, and all book learning.

Much Oral, Pictural, Model, and Sample Instruction, then, plea sant and simple, with little confinement, and with proper handicraft if you please, is the sort required by nature, and loudly called for, after all, especially in the early stages of education. Begin with na ture, and then in due season proceed into art, and artificial literature, and book study, by slow degrees, as wisdom shall dictate and occa sion demand. Teach children oral language much in nature's own way, or by much good use of it in your own free and interesting con versations with them, and your much familiar oral instruction. But do not, I beg, fatigue, disgust, and discourage them with irksome confinement to artificial literature, and unknown language.

Sensible of the difficulty and vast weight of your charge, I have, with great concern and labor, prepared for you this little book, to assist you in your very arduous and responsible parental and educational duties. It could help you as a text-book, in testing the power and importance of much more proper oral instruction than has been usual, with or without work at the same time ;-but if you wish to put into the hands of your children a book on any of these subjects, to be studied and learned in the old way, in a greater or less degree, you will probably find this, by its plainness and easiness, to serve that purpose AS WELL, at least, as any other, and much cheaper withal. I therefore cheerfully dedicate it to you; desiring and expecting that neither you nor your dear children will have occasion to regret its existence, or its falling into your hands.

With all due consideration, I am your friend,

EZEKIEL RICH.

Entered according to Act of Congress, in 1847,

BY EZEKIEL RICH,

In the Clerk's Office, at the District Court of the Northern District of New York.

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1. A new method of teaching the letters of our alphabet, and their sounds.

2. A thoroughly Reformed Alphabet,' and a new method of spelling, of American origin, with ten reading lessons in the new dress.

3. All that the author deems necessary in primary reading-books, as such; containing 30 progressive lessons in the old dress; embracing a third edition of the author's 36 rules of good manners, worldly wis dom, and Christian morals.-(After these lessons are well and sufficiently used by the pupils in learning to read, let other papers and books that come to hand, as in common life, be employed for this purpose. Such a method would better prepare them for general reading.)

4. All that the author deems necessary for primary spelling-books, as such. After the pupils have learned to spell all the words in this book, let them continue to learn to spell during life, as occasion allows and requires, by their reading, writing, composition, and use of the dictionary. The only object of learning to spell, is writing. Set children early at composition, and they will be awakened by the spur of neces

sity to learn not only spelling, but also grammar, the meaning of words, and rhetoric, more rapidly and to much greater advantage.

5. A Primary Grammar, short, simple, and easy to be understood, formed from the present good and authorized English, and not from old authorities; containing much that is new and important in this science, prepared to assist you in teaching grammar to your children orally, while engaged at proper work, or otherwise. This, and all the other reading in the book, should be used for the purpose of learning to read.

6. An abridgment of the author's Memorial to Congress, early in 1844, on the subject of reforming the writing of our language, which was received, read, and printed.

7. Five odes, by the author, on various subjects. 8. A new and improved table of abbreviations. 9. The outlines of the author's new system of education, general and liberal, for both sexes, built much on domestic and self-supporting principles.

10. The author's exhibition of the old alphabet and orthography. Some agricultural, and various other articles.

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THE ALPHABET; OR, A, B, C.

MY DEAR CHILD,

LESSON 1.

You have learned to say many words by hearing me and others talk, and you know their meaning, so that you can talk a little with us. When I say "You may go and play," you know what I mean by the words I speak. But you know that folks write words, by making marks on paper or on something else, and print them in books. Come here, now, and look in this little book. These marks stand for sounds and words. Now, all who learn to read can think and say words from these marks, the same as you can now think and say words by my speaking them to you from my mouth.

You are now old enough, and you understand words enough by hearing and talking, to begin to learn to read "speaking paper" as the Indian called it, and to get knowledge and pretty stories yourself from writings and books, as well as from oral or mouth instructions, or from hearing others talk to you. I love you, as you well know, and am your friend, and wish you, for your own good, to learn to read, and I will help you all I can; and you must be good, and diligent, and patient, and try to learn, and you will probably accomplish or do this very important work as quick and as well as others have done, who are older than you. One thing I must tell you on starting or begin

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