State journal. [volume] (Montpelier, Vt.) 1831-1836, 1836-10-11
For the State Journal.
REMARKS ON TIE STATE OF A.
MEXICAN EDUCATION. MOI.

whose importance cannot have escaped
the most superficial observation. So vari
Gus, however, are the principles and cir
cumstances entering into its consideration
that volumes, rather than paragraphs, are
required for the full exposition of its com
plicated character.
Notwithstanding human life, in its en-
tire revolution, presents, nearly, n regular
series of progression and repression, it has
been, long since, arbitrarily divided into
several distinct periods, denominated, by
the dramatic wizard, the seven ages of man
nor is the arrangement void of conven-
icnce to the essayist upon human educa-
ton: yet with the four first of (which, only,
is he particularly concerned; nor does the
subject of school instruction legitimately
include more than childhood and youth /;
those of infancy and manhood being the
one, anterior, and the otherposterior, to the
period of its appropriate definition. The
dissimilarity in the quality of human intel
lect and in the period of its developenent
presents, by its multiplied exceptions, no
inconsiderable embarrassment to the spec
ulative inquirer, who should not, however,
relinquish the advantage of generalization,
whenever it is available.
Convenient &C requires that infancy should
include period from birth to the age at
which public instruction may advanta-
geously supercede that of parental--and, if
this period will admit of general consiruc-
ton, it may, perhaps, not Inconsistency, be
supposed TO terminate with the completion
of the fifth year-or, at least, until the sub
iect of physical education is better under
stood than, hitherto, it seems to have been.
This arrangement, it is true, subjects the
parent TO unaccustomed responsibility and
presupposes the possession of maternal
qualification to which ! most heartily wish
there were fewer exceptions.
There is, most certainly, in the life of
every individual, n period during which,
regular mental discipline is, altogether,
incompatible with successful tuition. Ply
steal organization must, indispensably, pre-
cede intellectual as we'll as every other
functional developemeni Hence, its Incl
pient progress which requires the most
judicious cultivation, should be accompa-
nied by every erratic indulgence compatible
with Innocence and safety: and still it may
be characterized, under proper manage
J ment, by no inconsderabe improvement.
} The superintendent cfthis period will be,
however, cheeriully consigned to maternal
direction, upon which and its concontant
qualifications, ] may have occasion, hereaf-
ter, to comment somewha; more difiusey.
The second period, or that extending
from the termination of the former to the
commencement of the thirteenth year in
females, and ofthe fifteenth in males, claims
consideration no less momentous than
, that cf the entire future character of the
individual; whose whole social and moral
= being will bear the impress of its acquisi.
: tons and the tone of its inspirations. Upon
this subject, then, proliXity can be scarcely
censurable.
This is period, in the life of man, il
, which the predominancy of no single pas
-, sion, inhexibly, ressts the plastic in1u.
ence of education, nor in which the
onlnipotency of habit effectually defies the
authority of conviction and the seductive.
ness Of example; but in whose miscellane-
Gus susceptibility we possess mean OF
eflectual modification which, in its agency
is little less wonderful than creation, itself
The question, is here presented, in wha
manner shall we most successfully avail
=, ourselves of the benefits of this organic
feasibility in the project of intellectual i'm,
:, proyement:
am aware that this question, like scores
ofothers, is much easier asked than answer
> ed, especially in the few paragraphs which
must inevitably terminate the present num-
Der.
The commencement of the period o
childhood is marked by no transition dis
tinguishing it from the termination Of the
former. Therefore the modes of communi
cation, by the presentation of sensible
objects, and by apologize or fable, so ex
clusvely adapted to the period of infancy
is, likewise, indispensable to some portion
> of the succeeding one. Children, then, Sc
far as it is practicable, should be presented
with the objects, or their visible representa-
tives, of which it is wished that an accurat,
u cOncpDfion Shoul1 ha cnrn,nd. rho ohiactc