The Stark County Democrat. [volume] (Canton, Ohio) 1833-1912, 1877-06-21

10 LneIl is hllAOhl lIbotNliN ASNo bSihb wv
rouhes per annum (about $lO) In the
district schools, 25 rouDles in the gymna'
Sums, and so roubes at the universities
and special high schools. Moreover, In
nearly all provincial towns which possess
gymnasium private societies are insli-
tuted for the support of such pupils, es.
pecally Of the peasant class, as cannot,
afford to pay for themselves the school
fees. Thus Il may be said, without ex,
aggeration, that in no other country OF
continental Europe, not even in Germany
are such facilities offered to the poorer
classes of the nation for acquiring su'
perior degree Of instruction as in Russia
All the universities have for the last
twenty years been full of students. The
average number, according to the yearly
reports of the university councils,amounts
to above $4,000, of which at least two
thirds belong to the poorer classes, who
arc aided in their studies by the state and
by private societies.
The programme Of studies at the gym
nasiums is now undergoing revolution
which has given rise to very serious
opposition on the part of the most intel
ligent representatives of the Russian
schools and of the press. The present
Minister of Instruction, Count Folstoy, IS
faRatical classicist, who longs to convert
the Russian youth into Eton schoolboys
and Oxford students, and who does not
see that Russia now, as in the time OF
Peter the Great, stands most in need OF
practical, professional learning, of posi-.
tive stndies in history, ethnography and
natural history. But the resistance both
passive and active which Russian society
offers to this untimely revolution is too
strong to allow of its success. At any
rate the course ofstudies in the Russian
gymnasium of the present day is in no
wise inferior to the education offered In
the German middle schools.
As to the universities, they are organ.
lied on the German model, being divided
into several faculties according to the diff
ferent branches of study-law, natural
history, philology, history and mathe'
matics The reCtors and professors are
elected by the University Council, form
ed of all the actual professors Of the uni
versity and acting independently of the
Government. The lectures are likewise
free, and are not subjected to any kind Of
censure. The course of lectures, which
in every faculty lasts four years, ends in
an examination, which the student must
pass successfully in order to occupy any
prominent position whatever IN private
life or in the public service.
This great impulse towards instruction,
which has been constantly growing in
Russia for the last thirty years, has pro
duced remarkable results. Every i'm
partial observer of Russian society ac'
knowledges that its higher and middle
classes are as well educated and instruct
ed as those of other European countries.
If they do not advance in their studies
after leaving the schools, this is easily ex-
planned by the general stagnation of po-
iitical life, by the curse of autoCraCy and
Capitalization, which still presses with
all its weight on the country.
As to the development of real nation
al science, it could not be expected that
Russia should go as far in this direction
as other countries in which science has
gradually grown up for ages under the
vivifying influence of philosophy and
free thought Yet even now the names
of Russian scientific men are known
throughout the whole European world.
Karamzine and Granowsky, the histori.
ans; 0strogradsky, the mathematician
Setchenof, well known by his remarka-
BILE work on the nervous system, which
has been translated into most European
languages, and many 9th RS of less
importance, were all pupils of Russian
schools.
All that we have now said concerns
only the higher and middle classes of SO,
ciety, The village schools which must
provide instruction for the 40000,000 of
peasants who but sixteen years ago were
liberated from serfage are so closely con-
nected with the peculiar organization of
the zem8tvO, or with the local l-self govern
ment now existing in Russia, that with
out a previous sketch of this organization
it would be impossible to understand
their importance or prognosticate their
development-N Y. World, p