Daily Kennebec journal. [microfilm reel] (Augusta, Me.) 1870-1975, 1904-06-25

| llfnltS OF tnat narrow Circle, each Ai'i
was responsible neither to Pope nor
priest, nor bishop but to his God. He
stood erect, conscious of his divine
origin and his divine mission. Life
was to him a serious matter and only
the essentials warranted his attention.
Stern and rock-bound as the coast on
which he had fixed his habitation,
che eriess and forbidding as the wintry
daE on which the first Pilgrim foot had
to, lched the western shore, yet the
grandeur of his conception and the
fearlessness of his purpose make him
ne of the conspicuous types of history.
That type at the present day is extinct
AS is the quaint speech in which the
Puritan clothed his thoughts, and per-
haps it is better so; each man for his
J. age; but the sturdy strength of his
1 character, the answering integrity OF
l his life and the earnest purposeful fol-
lowing of his ideal, trickling down
through generation after generation are
the saving qualities in New England
manhood and womanhoOd today. Thus
placed externally and thus poised in
ternally, the Puritan moved consistent
| ly and logically on. Out of his theory
of life, the idea of education bloomed
naturally. Ignorance meant Popery
from which he had fled. Education
meant Professionalism which he had ex-
lied himself to establish. Many of the
original cOlOnists were highly educated
men, not a few We're graduates Of the
English university at oxford and
Cambridge. This was especially true
Of the clergy, who constituted the only
profession that was recognized as
4 learned. Medicine was then unknown
as a science and the law was most de-
cidedly under the ban. Virginia III
1915 passed an act forbidding attorneys
to take fees, and that had Il somewhat
naturally depressing effect both upon
the effort and the increase of the pro-
fession. Eighteen years later Massa-
chusetts passed an act excluding them
from membership in the great AMI
general court, and as I have ponderod
over that statute, I have wondered
whether at that remote period there
was third branch in which they could
pleasantly and at the same time,
profitably, pass their exile. This
prejudice continued through the seven
teenth century, but in the early part Of
the eighteenth reaction took place,
the law took rank as one of the learned
professions and Andrew Hamilton,
pleading for the freedom of the press,
James Otis attacking the rights of as
sistants, and Patrick Henry urging the
cause of the Constitutional liberty,
We're not the prescribed outlaws, but
the wOrShipped leaders of the people.
1t was not the clergy, however, that
the early colonists looked upon as the
educated class and they saw that there
Il IF lima Itipys i'm ~
after the original leaders had passed
away, unless immediate end active
measures were taken to prevent it. AS
result, popular education began at
the top and worked downward. Be-
fore the general court recognized lc
need of common schools for the people,
they established by the act of 1886 4
college at Newton which, two years
later received a bequest from John
Harvard and took his name while
with touch of sentiment almost I'M
looked for, Newton became Cambridge
in memory of the seat Of their alma
mater in the homeland. The motto of
this first publcally created ipstitu-
tion was most appropriate :"Christo ct
eCclesiac," For Christ and the
Church" The higher education for
|
deemed necessary. In line with the
same conception was the establishments
of secondary schools which was the
next step downward. The existence of
a college required preparatory schools
and with these in the form of so-called
grammar schools, the Puritan public
school system began. The first school
established in the colony was of this
| IL hac tic n
1886, it was wholly through private
| subscription and was 50 maintained I'M
til 1911, five years after the founding
of Harvard, when it received it's first
public assistance.
This was the predecessor of the
Boston Latin school aud the building
which was situated on the spot now Oc-
cupicd by the statue of Franklin, i'll
front of the present City Hall, is per-
petuatcd in the name of School street.
1t was not until 1912, six years after
the founding of Harvard and one year
after the public recognition of the
Boston grammar school, that the Cen
ersil Court addressed itself to the next
step downward, which was really
step upward, the common school, and
that act simply imposed Il duty upon
each family i'll these words: IF any
do not teach their children and APP
prcntices so much learning as may en-
able them to read perfectly the Eng
Iish language, they shall forfeit twen-
ty shilings." This act, though recog-
niZng the duty of educating the youth,
left it as a matter of private instruc-
ton in the home and by the parent
rather than in the school at public ex-
rense. The year 1Gi7 marked an
epoch in the history of education in
New England, for it was then that the
first act was passed by the general
court along the linc Of compulsory ed
ucation embracing the common and the
grammar schools. The first of these
| grammar schools in the Province OF
Maine was established in the town of
York,s where we find the characteris-
tic vote recorded: "rhat this town
lave Il grammar Schoolmaster for one
year TO teach our children i'll the
| hrnnpd things and to read write and