Burlington weekly free press. [volume] (Burlington, Vt.) 1866-1928, 1879-07-25
NUMBER 4.


The latest addition to the long list of ill.,
dustries devised and carried on by Yankee
ingenuity is an establishment for the manu-
facture of philosophers, where in five weeks
time the raw material is converted into a
sage fit to assume the mantle of Solomon and
to walk in the groves of the academy with
Plato. The originator of this scheme is Mr..
\. Bronson Alcott and the factory is located
at his residence in the historic town of Con
cord, Mass. The plan includes five courses
of lectures, of ten lectures each-two lee
lures eachtrom four special lecturers, and
each from Ralph Waldo Emerson and c. A.
Bartol. The five regular lecturers are called
the faculty, and these are Mr.. Alcott, Mrs.
Ednah ID. Cheney the Hon. William T.
Harris of st. Louis, DIR. H. X, Jones of
Jacksonville, Ill. and ID. A. Wasson. These
will talk-AIr. Alcott on Christian Theism."
Mrs. Cheney on THE History ,tid Moral in
Art, Prof. Harris ON Speculative Philoso-
phy," DIR. Jones on ''Plato," and Mr. Was
son on Political Philosophy" The special
lecturers are 10 be T. W. Higginson, Prof.
Benjamin Pierce, Thomas Davidson and +.
B. Sanborn. In foul weather the feast of
sacred precincts Of Mr. Alcott's
house and in fair, divine philosophy
will be wooed in grove, where the stirring
mosquito and the industrious ant may be de-
pended upon to keep the embryo philoso-
pliers in state of lively attention. In this
simple manner alone-the apotheosis of OBJ
philosophy may be taught which is not in
culcated in the schools. Theory and practice
will thus be united, and the result can not
fail of being very gratifying. With such
board of instructors and in SO. long time
as five weeks the person who didn't know
more about philosophy than Sir William
Hamilton or Dugald Stewart would be dis
grace to the nineteenth century; and any
graduate probably could following the fash
ion of an elder day tack his thesis to the
chapel door of Harvard College and success
fully challenge dons and ungraduates to con-
trovert it.
Boston-which liberal geography holds
to include Concord and parts thereto
adjacent-has hitherto evolved some
curious ideas, and the present is one
of her most notable of recent under
takings. 1t is said that large proportion of
the students are from the West-a part of
the country where philosophy was not sup
posed to greatly flourish-and this tribute of
the BGotians is as gratifying as it is remark
able. Boston has for some time furnished
baked beans for the West and now the diet
of the Pilgrims is followed by their philoso-
ply. Whether the nutritious esculent named
precise connection between beans and wis
dom, furnishes an interesting train of
thought, which, however, We can not follow
out to-day. Well may Boston exclaim, l
care not who makes the laws of IL nation if |
can manufacture its beans; and for a brainy
diet the world may well abandon the tradi-
tional fish and fly TO the succulent vegetable.
Another soothing thought is that of
listening 10 professional conversa-
tionalist" (may their tribe decrease, as Mr..
Alcott describes himself, elucidate theism of
any kind with the thermometer at 90, or of
hearing Jones on Plato or Wasson on that
fiery topic, political philosophy, in the dog
days. Yet even here would he a compensa-
tion, for we may readily imagine the Platoon
lists ready and willing to die long before the
philosophic faucet was turned, and thus the
great end of all philosophy would be attain
ed. 1t certainly seems that as Il reconcilia-
ton to the. last great change-the final
plunge from off this bank and shoal of
time"-this Summer school would he un-
eulallru