/ 
 
 PHILADELPHIA 
 
 Social Science Association. 
 
 Public Schools in their Relations 
 to the Community. 
 
 PHILADELPHIA SOCIAL 
 
 720 LOCUST STREET 
 
 READ AT A MEETING OF THE ASSOCIATION, APRIL 
 
 —by- 
 
 JAMES S. WHITNEY. 
 
s 
 
 Return this book on or before the 
 Latest Date stamped below. 
 
 SS2SSSS:- 
 
 University of Illinois Library 
 
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 HQ\j 30 196” 
 
 IATI0N. 
 
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 THE FOLLOWING IS A LIST OF THE PAPERS READ .BEFORE THE 
 
 ASSOCIATION. 
 
 I87I. 
 
 1872. 
 
 1873 - 
 
 1874. 
 
 1875 * 
 
 1876. 
 
 1877. 
 
 1878. 
 
 1879. 
 
 1880. 
 
 Compulsory Education. By Lorin Blodget. Out of print. 
 
 Arbitration as a Remedy for Strikes. By Eckley B. Coxe. . 
 
 The Revised Statutes of Pennsylvania. By R. C. McMurtrie. Out of print. 
 Local Taxation. By Thomas Cochran. 
 
 Infant Mortality. By Dr. J. S. Parry. . - 
 
 Statute Law and Common Law , and the Proposed Revision m Pennsylvania. 
 
 By E. Spencer Miller. Out of print. 
 
 Apprenticeship. By James S. Whitney. _ 
 
 The Proposed Amendments to the Constitution of Pennsylvania. By rrancis 
 Jordan. 
 
 Vaccination. By Dr. J. S. Parry. 
 
 The Census. By Lorin Blodget. 
 
 The Tax System of Pennsylvania. By Cyrus Elder. 
 
 The Work of the Constitutional Convention. By A. Sydney Biddle. 
 
 What shall Philadelphia do with its Paupers ? By Dr. Isaac Ray. 
 Proportional Representation. By S. Dana Horton. _ 
 
 Statistics Relating to the Births , Deaths , Marriages , etc., in Philadelphia. By 
 John Stockton-Hough, M.D. 
 
 On the Value of Original Scientific Research. By Dr. Ruschenberger. 
 
 On the Relative Influence of City and Country Life, on Morality, Health, Fe- 
 cundity, Longevity and Mortality . By John Stockton-Hough, M.D. 
 
 The Public School System of Philadelphia. By James S. Whitney. 
 
 The Utility of Government Geological Surveys. By Prof. J. P. Lesley. 
 
 The Law of Partnership. By J. G. Rosengarten. 
 
 Methods of Valuation of Real Estate for Taxation. By Thomas Cochran. 
 
 The Merits of Cremation. By Persifor Frazer, Jr. 
 
 Outlines of Penology . By Joseph R. Chandler. 
 
 Brain Disease, and Modern Living. By Dr. Isaac Ray. . Out of print. 
 Hygiene of the Eye , Considered with Reference to the Children in our Schools. 
 By Dr. F. D. Castle. 
 
 The Relative Morals of City and Country. By Wm. S. Pierce. 
 
 Silk Culture and Home Industry. By Dr. Samuel Chamberlaine. 
 
 Mind Reading, etc. By Persifor Frazer, Jr. 
 
 Legal Status of Married Women in Pennsylvania. By N. D. Miller. 
 
 The Revised Statutes of the United States. By Lorin Blodget. 
 
 Training of Nurses for the Sick. By John H. Packard, M.D. . # 
 
 The Advantages of the Co-operative Feature of Building Associations. By 
 Edmund Wrigley. 
 
 The Operations of our Building Associations. By Joseph I. Doran. 
 
 Wisdom in Charity. By Rev. Charles G. Ames. 
 
 Free Coinage and a Self-Adjusting Ratio. By Thomas Balch. 
 
 Building Systems for Great Cities. By Lorin Blodget. 
 
 Metric System. By Persifor Frazer, Jr. 
 
 Cause and Cure of Hard Times. By R. J. Wright. 
 
 House-Drainage and Sewerage. By George E. Waring, Jr. 
 
 A Ilea for a State Board of Health. By Benjamin Lee, M. D. 
 
 The Germ Theory of Disease, and its Present Bearing upon P ublic and Per- 
 sonal Hygiene. By Joseph G. Richardson, M.D. 
 
 Delusive Methods of Municipal Financiering. By Wm. F. Ford. 
 
 Technical Education. By A. C. Rembaugh, M.D. „ 
 
 The English Methods of Legislation Compared with the American. By 
 Simon Sterne. 
 
 Thoughts on the Labor Question. By Rev. D. O. Kellogg. 
 
 On the Isolation of Persons in Hospitals for the Insane. By Dr. Isaac Ray. 
 Notes on Reform Schools. By J. G. Rosengarten. 
 
 Philadelphia Charity Orgcinization. By Rev. Wm. H. Hodge. 
 
 Public Schools in their Relations to the Community. By James S. Whitney. 
 
Reprinted from PENN MONTHL Y for May, 1880. 
 
 PUBLIC SCHOOLS IN THEIR RELATIONS TO THE 
 <o COMMUNITY. 
 
 HE fellowship of interest which the older members of a family 
 
 feel in the school life of the younger, from the first day at school 
 
 to the last, crowned, or hoped to be, with honor, — is a type of that 
 which every community should feel in the Public School education of 
 its children. That such an interest does exist in this city, to some 
 degree, we have evidence in the numerous communications in 
 newspapers, from parents who trust that their grievances are those 
 of many others, and in editorials which assume large and willing 
 audiences. It seems, therefore, that a view of the present condL 
 tion of public education specially in Philadelphia, and generally 
 elsewhere, — to show how far it has come and in what direction it 
 moves, to reaffirm principles that are still called in question, be- 
 cause they are themselves the outgrowth, to the public eye, of the 
 system itself, — and before an audience where many minor discus- 
 sions may be concentrated, may be worthy of public attention ; 
 and it certainly is not foreign to the objects of this Association. 
 For it is to one which, by its title, may be held to have been the 
 ancestor of this, that we owe the existence of our present local 
 school system. It was “ The Society for the Promotion of Public 
 Economy,” under the chairmanship of Roberts Vaux, that in 1818 
 procured the passage of the act, “ to provide,” as its title reads, 
 “ for the education of children at the public expense within the 
 City and County of Philadelphia.” 
 
 It was a dangerous step, or at least would have been thought 
 ^ so then, could its results have been foreseen, when that type of 
 the future Commonwealth, the Society of Friends, established in 
 1698 a school in Philadelphia, “ where all the children and servants 
 I might be taught, and provision made that the poor be taught 
 gratis.” The preamble of the last Charter granted this School 
 y . (still in vigorous existence) in 1711, is as follows: “Whereas the 
 prosperity and welfare of any people depend in a great measure, 
 upon the good education of youth, and their early introduction in 
 principles of true religion and virtue, and qualifying them to serve 
 their country and themselves by breeding them in reading, writ- 
 
 f 
 
4 
 
 ing, and learning of languages and useful arts and sciences, suita- 
 ble to their sex, age, and degree ; which cannot be effected, in any 
 manner, so well as by erecting Public Schools for the purpose 
 aforesaid,” Here, in words that suggest not elementary schools 
 for the poor, but the generous collegiate foundations of old 
 England, is the very basis of a State School system ; and, though 
 this was for more than fifty years the only Public School inr the 
 Province, yet a principle had been stated, and illustrated by its 
 existence. It was reaffirmed in the first Constitution of the State, 
 that of 1776, in the opening turmoil of the Revolution, and again 
 in that of 1790. Both of these require the Legislature “ to pro- 
 vide by law for the establishment of schools in such manner that 
 the poor may be taught,” in 1776 “at low prices, f and in 1790 
 “ gratis.” Such laws were passed, found unsatisfactory, and re- 
 peatedly changed; the last of this series, “ an act to provide for 
 the education of the poor gratis,” bearing date 1809. It aston- 
 ishes us now, or at least it should astonish us, to observe how long 
 a time was required to discover that those words “ the poor” were 
 the obstacle to all these well-meant efforts. While the rich ob- 
 jected to taxation for the expressed benefit of a class, the poor ob- 
 jected to the classification which the benefit involved. It was not 
 until 1818, after long agitation, and clear showing of the evil of 
 class legislation, that the Society for the Promotion of Public 
 Economy procured the passage of the act already mentioned. Until 
 1834, it applied, however, to Philadelphia only. Its preamble 
 reads thus : “ Whereas, the general provisions of the existing 
 laws towards the establishment of schools throughout the State: 
 in such manner that the poor may be taught gratis * * 
 
 have not proved to be a public benefit [within the City and 
 County of Philadelphia] commensurate with the expense incurred i 
 by occasion of the same,” therefore, &c. 
 
 By this act, which is the foundation of our present city sys- 
 tem, all limitations as to the social condition of pupils, and even,, 
 in effect, the range of their studies, were removed. The control- 
 lers were empowered “ to provide such suitable books as they may 
 deem necessary,” and “to establish a model school to qualify 
 
 teachers,” since grown into our Girls’ High and Normal School.:. 
 
 A great step forward had been taken when this law could bet 
 passed,— a law in which “ the poor ” are not reminded of them 
 
5 
 
 poverty, except in necessary reference to previous legislation. 
 And the good effect of the law was so marked, that after extend- 
 ing its operation to the whole State in 1834, in 1836 the control- 
 lers for Philadelphia were authorized “ to establish one Central 
 High School for the full education of such pupils of the Public 
 Schools as may possess the requisite qualifications;” and it was 
 further enacted that “all such provisions (if any) in the * act of 
 1818 and its supplements’ as limit the benefits of the said public 
 schools to the children of indigent parents, * * * 
 
 be and the same are hereby repealed.” The u if any” shows that 
 the intention in 1818 was to abolish this odious distinction, which, 
 we may hope, received its last mention on our Statute book, in 
 the words just quoted; and the establishment of the High School 
 was a guarantee of the good faith of that act. That act, of 1818, 
 did not establish a High School, but it brought the grade of edu- 
 cation so high by not restricting it to the poor, that pupils who 
 had the preparation and the time, (generally from the wealthier, if 
 not the wealthiest classes,) looked naturally to a High School for 
 their “ full education,” so far as any institutions short of a college 
 could give it. The stream had risen to the level of its source ; 
 the spirit that founded Oxford, and Cambridge, and Winchester, 
 and Eton, and a dozen other great endowed schools of England ; 
 which had manifested itself here in the Friends’ School already 
 mentioned, and the “ College and Academy” (now the University) 
 in 1750, — this spirit following the law of its being in the free air 
 of a Republic, had expanded to the full measure of its liberal 
 nature. 
 
 What, therefore, I wish to call attention to, as the first notice- 
 able point in this review, is that our schools were unsuccessful , or, 
 as the preamble already quoted tersely and practically says, 
 “their benefits were not commensurate with their expense,” until 
 they were made schools for all classes , a step which necessitated 
 their reaching to the highest grade . Without precise information 
 as to other localities, I venture to say that this has been the ex- 
 perience everywhere ; and that this point may be considered as 
 one of the “ fixed facts ” in the history of Popular Education.* 
 
 * In 1816 the so-called Poor Schools were attended by 1 — 55th of the whole popu- 
 lation. In 1820, after they had become really Public Schools, the attendance had, 
 more than doubled, and was i-22d of the population. In 1830 it remained stationary, 
 
6 
 
 “ Heaven from all creatures hides the book of Fate,” and it 
 was no doubt well that neither the advocates or the opponents of 
 the constitutional clause of 1776 saw its inevitable result; 
 else it had not been adopted. But to justify that action, 
 
 we must consider what was at that time the extent of 
 an ordinary English education, and how small a portion of the 
 community received it, in the private schools of the day. The 
 classics and the higher mathematics were seldom studied by those 
 not destined for a learned profession or a college course. Natural 
 Science and Political Economy, as branches of popular knowledge, 
 did not exist ; and a very limited acquaintance with Geography 
 and History sufficed for the occasions of most men in those days 
 of little travel and few newspapers. As to Drawing, it was 
 reckoned, with Embroidery and Deportment, as an ornamental 
 accomplishment for the very few young ladies’ schools then exist- 
 ing. The modern languages were learned for immediate use by 
 the few adults who had need of them, and singing, in social even- 
 ing schools, by adolescents. There remained, therefore, really but 
 the instruction in the “ three R’s ” to be considered when popular 
 education was before the Legislature, — Providence thus, according 
 to the promise that we shall not be tempted above that we are 
 able, making the first step an easy one. These wonderful R’s, 
 little clouds like a man’s hand, — they have showered great bless- 
 ings upon us ! Nor is their influence yet spent. The “ promise 
 and potency ” of much to come is in these essential particles of 
 education, to which we must go back again and again that we 
 may better go forward. 
 
 But the increased intellectual activity after the Napoleonic 
 wars, added to human acquisitions not only new facts, but new 
 sciences ; and the elements bf these, with a corresponding de- 
 velopment of the primitive branches, have added largely to 
 the course of studies of the schools. This, in part, made 
 necessary the High School department ; but it has brought 
 
 although the population had increased 40 per cent. In 1840, after the classification 
 of the lower schools, and the establishment of the High Schools, it had quadrupled 
 the figures of 1820 and 1830, and was about i-nth of the population. Since then it 
 has grown steadily in numbers and proportion, being in 1871 i-8th of the population. 
 In 1816, with 2,000 pupils, the cost was $11.50 each. In 1871, with 87,428, pupils, 
 and a greatly extended course of study, it had grown but to $15. 67 per pupil; and in 
 view of the changed value of money, the increase is less than it appears to be. 
 
7 
 
 about also a most comprehensive classification and grading of all 
 departments. 
 
 All this has not been the work of one, but of many years, and 
 has taxed the patient thought of many men and women who 
 would have been famous had they not been simply teachers. The 
 first step in this path in this city was the division into Primary, 
 Secondary and Grammar Departments, in 1837; the next, the es- 
 tablishment of the Senior classes, in 1867, as intermediate between 
 the Grammar and the High Schools ; the last, the revision of 
 1877, in connection with the present course of study then adopted. 
 This makes for each of the three lower departments four grades, 
 and for the Senior, two ; in all, without the High Schools, four- 
 teen grades, numbered continuously from the lowest, and requiring 
 eight years for their completion. 
 
 I introduce this statement here in connection with what I have 
 said as to the Public Schools having become schools for all . But 
 I desire to call special attention to it, in answer to a complaint that 
 has been heard of late, and which seems very much like the old 
 opposition to State education, revived under a new form. Within 
 the last seven years, the burden of taxation, under a financial dis- 
 tress unequalled during the generation which has seen the devel- 
 opment of our school system, has drawn public attention to every 
 means of relief. Some of the larger taxpayers, suffering less from 
 the burden, yet more sensible of it than the poor, complain that 
 our schools are too expensive ; that they go too far ; that they 
 teach sciences and ornamental branches, never contemplated by 
 their founders. Those among the complainants who pride them- 
 selves on owing everything to ancestry, urge that the masses, who 
 are, of course, to be working people, need a plain, “ practical ” 
 education only. Those who pride themselves on owing nothing to 
 ancestry say that if any have talents fitting- them for a higher 
 walk, they will reach it without education, “ as we did.” 
 
 But these views, however much they claim to be based on those 
 of the Fathers, are of modern origin. They are due to a more 
 rapid growth of wealth than wisdom, and the rise of a so-called 
 aristocracy, based on wealth. This aristocracy has travelled, if it 
 has thought it worth while to do so ; it has been complacently 
 and publicly unconscious, or painfully and secretly sensible, of its 
 inferiority to its European prototype, refined by generations of 
 
8 
 
 ease and culture, and for the present, at least, still an essential 
 part of the political system. It has seen in foreign countries, if it 
 has cared to look, public education maintained by the State, not 
 to make the people more fit to govern, but more easily governed ; 
 and it brings home the language of those countries when Educa- 
 tion is the topic, as when it speaks of Society and Art. The effect 
 is seen in the freedom with which demagogues disparage the 
 higher education, and cut down salaries of teachers. It will be 
 felt disastrously when such work shall have so lowered the 
 standard of our schools that they shall again be known as Pauper 
 Schools, and a coming generation shall be taught, as a primary 
 lesson, that Public Schools are for the Poor only. 
 
 As already said, the answer to these objections is to be found in the 
 grading and classification that have been mentioned. A very short 
 study of the statistics of this feature of our local system will illus- 
 trate this. At the close of 1878, which was by no means an ex- 
 ceptional year, of our 103,997 pupils, 52,422, or one-half of the 
 whole, were in the Primary Department, and studying, therefore, 
 Spelling, Reading, Writing, Arithmetic, as far as multiplication 
 with four figures, and long division by one figure, Drawing in 
 straight and curved lines, such as are the basis of all mechanical 
 and ornamental design, Object Lessons, or very “ practical ” oral 
 instruction in weights, measures, money, form, color, local geog- 
 raphy, general elementary useful knowledge ; and Music in simple 
 songs. 
 
 Going a little further, we find that 27,022 pupils, being a little 
 over one-fourth of the whole, were in the Secondary Department, 
 where the same studies are reviewed and carried further, — Lan- 
 guage into the beginning of Grammar ; Arithmetic into common 
 fractions ; Drawing, into natural forms (leaves and flowers), and 
 their analysis into typical forms ; Object Lessons including names 
 of trees, and plants in this vicinity, with some knowledge of their 
 habits and uses — the qualities and uses of various familiar materials 
 — and information as to different occupations or trades. Vocal 
 music is continued with two-part songs, and the Geography of 
 North America is added. 
 
 We have now, before reaching the Grammar Department, origi- 
 nally the highest grade, already accounted for 79,444, out of the 103,- 
 997 pupils— that is to say, with those pursuing Primary and Sec- 
 
9 
 
 ondary studies, of the 7,418 in consolidated or unclassified schools, 
 and the 300 in the Practice classes of the Normal School, about 
 four-fifths of the whole. Certainly not much that is unpractical is 
 taught to this point. 
 
 In the Grammar Department proper, there were 15,443, and 
 probably 5,000 more in the consolidated schools. From this should 
 be deducted the senior classes — say 1,800 — making the total num- 
 ber pursuing the studies of this grade, say 18,000, or about one- 
 sixth of the whole. These 18,000 are divided among 64 schools, 
 in a territory of 143 square miles, and certainly cannot form any- 
 where a very dangerous body of over-educated youth. Let us see 
 what they study. Language lessons go into the beginning of Syn- 
 tax ; Arithmetic to percentage and square root, measurement of 
 rectangular surfaces and solids ; Geography becomes universal, and 
 that of the United States is studied in connection with their history. 
 Drawing comprises freehand perspective without shading, and con- 
 ventional ornament. Music teaches the formation of different 
 scales, with three-part exercises and songs ; and Object Lessons 
 are given on the most general classification of animals and plants, 
 further details of their economic uses, the laws of heat and cold, 
 ventilation, respiration, etc. 
 
 About 1,800 pupils, as already stated, are in the Senior grades, 
 where the High School course really begins, and, for most of the 
 students, ends. Here Grammar is finished ; Geometry, Mensura- 
 tion and Algebra are begun , Geography becomes Physical, instead 
 of Political ; and History, in the form of reading lessons, is that of 
 the United States, with those of England, France, and Spain (the 
 three most nearly connected with ours), and of the most important 
 nations of antiquity. Drawing is both freehand and instrumental, 
 for constructive and decorative purposes ; Vocal Music, now mainly, 
 of course, for the girls, goes into higher detail ; and the Object 
 Lessons, by charts and lectures, are on elementary Natural Philoso- 
 phy, Physiology and the laws of health. The study of the Consti- 
 tution of the United States is added, with oral instruction on our 
 city government. 
 
 In all the departments, exercises conducive to physical devel- 
 opment and discipline, are required to be taught ; and the oral in- 
 struction, in addition to what has been mentioned, is directed to 
 the “ habits and conduct ”, becoming, in the hands of a competent 
 teacher, a far-reaching moral agency. 
 
10 
 
 Concluding our analysis with the two High Schools (Boys’ and 
 Girls’) we find that they contained in all, at the close of 1878, 1,392 
 pupils, making, with the 1,800 in the Senior classes, about one- 
 thirty-third of the whole number. The studies of the Boys’ High 
 School in the English Language and Literature, Mathematics, 
 Latin, Mental Science, History and Political Economy, and Natural 
 Science, are nearly if not quite the same as in the Department of 
 Arts at the University of Pennsylvania, while they include Mechan- 
 ical Drawing, which the latter does not, and do not include Greek 
 and French, which the latter does. 
 
 The studies of the Girls’ High School have been adapted chiefly 
 to the requirements of those who are to become teachers in the 
 lower schools, and therefore omit, among others, Latin, German, 
 Political Science, and some branches of Mathematics. As the pre- 
 paration for teaching, however, has recently been made a special 
 course, it will not probably be long before that for general pupils 
 will be as liberal as the “ full education ” of women demands. 
 
 It will be seen, then, that in the year 1878 there were but F3 
 of the Public Scholars enjoying High School instruction, if we in- 
 clude the Senior classes of the Grammar Schools ; without them, 
 but y 1 ^- ; that but -1- are in the other grammar grades, and the re- 
 mainder, nearly are in the lowest grades, where are taught 
 Reading, Writing, Arithmetic, and American Geography, and 
 nothing else but the very practical subjects, involving no text- 
 books, of Drawing, Singing, Physical Exercises and Good Behavior. 
 The records of at least the last eight years show very slight varia- 
 tion in these proportions, which may be taken, therefore, as those 
 of the children in the different grades of our Public Schools at any 
 one time. It does not seem, then, that the masses of our children 
 are being taught too much, or that our municipal legislators have 
 reason to fear that their future constituents are outgrowing them 
 in learning. The latter fact is to be regretted, but, as it is a fact, it 
 should be quoted on the right side. That the 104,000 public 
 school children represent this future constituency very largely will 
 be evident when we remember that the total number of children 
 of school age in this city is about 150,000, exclusive of those at 
 work, and that the course and methods of the Public Schools 
 direct very much those of all others. 
 
 As to the “ undue expensiveness ” of all this, I am sorry to say 
 
II 
 
 that the city of Philadelphia pays only about $15 per annum for 
 the instruction of each of its public scholars. This includes not 
 only teachers’ salaries, but books, fuel, furniture, repairs and in- 
 surance ; in fact, everything except new buildings. The Boys’ 
 High School, an institution whose use many fail to see, notwith- 
 standing its collegiate powers, since it “ does not even make 
 teachers,” costs the enormous sum of $75 per annum — less than 
 half the cost of a University year — for each of its 600 pupils. 
 This, however, is assessed upon a capital of $200,000,000, and has 
 given to the community possessing that capital, during the last 
 forty years, hundreds of its leading and most useful men, who for 
 want of that seventy-five dollars yearly would have had no higher 
 preparation for life than the Grammar School course. 
 
 There also are facts to be regretted : it is possible that if we 
 gave more to our schools, we should receive more from them, and 
 criticism find fewer occasions. 
 
 A French writer has compared a well-arranged plan of public 
 education “ to a railway system, with its main line, stations, 
 junctions and branch lines. * * * Just as passengers on a rail- 
 way get out at the different stations, so the children, who, from 
 pecuniary necessity or social position, are compelled to earn their 
 livelihood at an earlier age, leave school at any point of this 
 course, * * * all, according to the amount of knowledge they 
 have acquired, able to take their place in the social stratification.” 
 As it is the duty and interest of railway managers to give facilities 
 for all classes of passengers, so it is the duty and interest of the 
 State to provide for all who travel the road to learning, leaving to 
 the operation of natural laws, in both cases, the fixing of the pro- 
 portion of way and through fares. The necessities of a vast 
 manufacturing population prevent the greater part of the pupils 
 from reaching the Grammar department ; and the unique con- 
 struction of our city, which brings the poorest classes into close 
 neighborhood with the wealthier, has the effect to restrict the 
 children of the latter very largely to the Grammar Department 
 and the High Schools, particularly the Boys’. The objection 
 sometimes made, that the whole course of study contemplates, 
 nevertheless, the entrance of each Primary pupil into a High 
 School, will be met by what has been and what will be said. 
 Certainly, to return to our illustration, our road, no matter with 
 how many stations, must have a terminus also. 
 
12 
 
 But there is a real danger in the extension of the course of 
 studies, — a danger somewhat opposite to that which our friends 
 (of whom we have just spoken) have feared, and yet, perhaps, the 
 one that they should have felt. It is not that our pupils may be 
 learning too much, but that they may be educated too little. 
 Learning, as the acquiring of information, is one thing; Educa- 
 tion, the development of the human forces, is another. I do not 
 say that we are at present committing this error; but there 
 always has been, and will be, a tendency to it, that must be care- 
 fully watched and checked. Public schools owe their origin to a 
 desire to open to the illiterate that field of knowledge whose gate 
 is the art of reading. It was natural, therefore, that the next 
 step should be the imparting of knowledge. And yet the mere 
 giving of knowledge, for its own sake, or for its commercial uses, 
 I take to be not at all the function of State schools, or, indeed, of 
 any but special schools. This audience will not misunderstand 
 me, but may even wonder that I should call attention to this as 
 the other prominent point in a public school system, besides its 
 comprehensiveness, namely, that State education must be es- 
 sentially a training , not essentially an informing process. But 
 a beacon, though centuries old, is useless the moment a fog 
 hides it, and you will allow me, therefore, a few words on this 
 point of which we often lose sight. 
 
 For the principle I have mentioned,. applied to education gener- 
 ally, is older than our Teachers’ Institutes, older than Pestalozzi, 
 older than Comenius. Displayed first probably by the Greeks, 
 what the leaders in teaching have since done, has been to recall, 
 from time to time, by its light, the course of their comrades as they 
 have strayed from the true path into the bogs of pedantic rote, or 
 the thickets of universal knowledge. The human being is always 
 the same, and what must always be done for him is, to bring out 
 his powers by the proper use of his accidental circumstances. All 
 knowledge is but a means ; all life but a process of education ; and 
 that fraction of each that belongs to the school time of youth, is 
 best used when it follows this course. It is true that so far as the 
 education of the mind is concerned, the acquisition of knowledge 
 is the first and almost the last step, but after all, it is no more the 
 end than the partaking of food is the end of eating, though this be a 
 performance indispensable first, last, and always, toourgrowth and 
 maintenance. “ For life,” in all its forms, “ is more than meat.” 
 
13 
 
 Among barbarous peoples, the development of the physical 
 powers is the most important part of education. As civilization 
 increases, the intellectual faculties require and receive more atten- 
 tion, and where civilization is, like ours, based on Christianity, the 
 duty of educating the moral faculties is recognized. Each of these 
 should be an addition, not a substitution. The highest civilization 
 should produce men of physical beauty equal to the classic models, 
 of strength, endurance, and acuteness of sense of the nomad or 
 hunter ; ©f the highest degree of mental perception, reten- 
 tion, and analysis, and with spiritual graces that, so far at least, have 
 been found inseparable from Christianity. All this seems visionary, 
 but I am pointing forward to a goal, not to the roadside we are 
 passing ; and if we wish to know our way, we must ask where it 
 leads. ' 
 
 So the most important question for us, now and always, is, Is 
 our course of public education well designed theoretically, to bring 
 on their way to this highest plane, in the few steps of one 
 generation, the people of this city? I think it is. Our very 
 general review has shown that while more time is, properly, 
 occupied with the mental training, yet the physical and moral are 
 not neglected. Much of the first involves the second. The use of 
 charts, and objects, to teach color and form, the study of drawing 
 and singing, of geography by map drawing, the regulated use of 
 physical exercises, in addition to the usual recess, all are 
 calculated to aid in the development of the organs of the 
 senses, and the general bodily vigor. And since, historically and 
 actually, the highest form of religion is based on manhood, certainly 
 the moral instruction required in our schools, is, in connection with 
 the mental and bodily, at least a preparative for something higher. 
 
 As to a more detailed examination of the course, this is not the 
 place, even were there time, for it. Let me only say, as to its mental 
 department, that as the acquiring of information is a means to the 
 training of the mind, so it was justly thought that a scheme of 
 study which followed the most natural order of learning should 
 be the best. Naturalness is followed in grouping the 
 studies under their generic names, and taking them up in proper 
 order; and the seven branches, mathematics, writing, drawing, 
 music, natural science, history — which might be again condensed 
 into the three primitive orders of Pestalozzi, speech, form, number, 
 
14 
 
 (the “ three R.’s ” again)— comprehend all that man can know, un- 
 der titles that are carried through all the grades. Thoroughness 
 in elementary principles, rather than the covering of large fields 
 thinly, has been kept in view, and, therefore, children are kept 
 longer in the early stages of language and number than formerly. 
 The study of language is made more prominent, and that of num- 
 ber less, than formerly in the Primary Department. The lessons 
 are divided among the different grades more minutely, and without 
 reference to any special text-book. The instruction in drawing is 
 made obligatory, at least so far as the requirement of examinations 
 can make it so. Political geography and history are taught to- 
 gether, as they should always be, and, in fact, the whole course 
 shows a more scientific structure, as a training system, than its 
 predecessor. This may be said without disparagement of the labors 
 of those who prepared that course, for some of them have been the 
 most active in the arrangement or introduction of the present. 
 And if long experience and observation of that -course, if acknowl- 
 edged skill as teachers, if months of patient, unpaid labor, done 
 in hours which the workman might justly claim as his own, if care- 
 ful study and readiness to avail of the experience of other cities ; 
 if all these are not a guarantee that the Committee of Principals to 
 whom this city owes her present course of study, have made the 
 best one possible, they at least guarantee the probability that no 
 better could have been made, and that they and those they repre- 
 sent are ready to amend whatever use may prove defective. 
 
 The direction in which improvements will be made hereafter, 
 will, I think, be in the apportionment of time among the different 
 branches according to their relative value. Thus it may be a 
 question whether too much detail be not allowed in Geography 
 and History, at the expense of studies which have a greater value 
 in training viz : Literature, Mathematics, and form in some of its 
 varieties. The man of one book is famous as a man of power. 
 While the practice of a single manual art dwarfs the mind, study 
 of a si ngle branch comprehending these subjects expands it. Intro- 
 ductory or in addition to drawing, modeling might be practiced in the 
 lower schools, and the representation of tools and appliances of 
 the arts made a part of the drawing lessons of the higher. 
 
 The Boys’ High School would doubtless give a more valuable 
 degree, if its studies were so far elective that pupils could carry 
 
i5 
 
 either a general or a scientific course to a full collegiate standard ; 
 or if it should confine itself entirely to one or the other. 
 
 It is a failure to note the distinction between training and 
 informing, which gives rise to much of the objection to the 
 higher grades of public education. If the business of the 
 schools be to give information, one may well feel alarmed, 
 lest, in an age where the field of knowledge is continually 
 widening, that there will be no limit to the curriculum ; and de- 
 cide it the safest course to stop all instruction but the most ele- 
 mentary. But if our educators keep this point in view, that the 
 State, having no right to legislate for special classes, ought not to 
 make encyclopedists any more than lawyers, physicians, account- 
 ants, telegraphers, machinists, farmers, etc., but that she ought 
 to make men, they will know their path and its end, and will 
 soon find themselves unmolested in it. 
 
 For men are what the State always needs, while the necessity 
 for artisans of any type or degree changes with the market. In a 
 Commonwealth, above all, where the pupils “ are the State,” not 
 its subjects, should the higher education, which makes the leaders 
 among men, be easily accessible, because it raises the standard of 
 general intelligence. The highest mountains rise from elevated 
 regions, and the leading minds of the Nation come now from those 
 parts of our country where State education is most thorough and 
 general. At the risk of being offensive, I call attention to this : 
 the two conditions are inseparable, and that the gradation 
 hitherto seems to be downward from the higher parallels of lati- 
 * tude. In England the class from which the governing minds 
 arise is well educated. Here that class should be co-extensive 
 with the country. That all cannot reach the highest grades of 
 training, is a reason why every opportunity should be given to 
 those who can: It is the way of nature that the rising sun does 
 
 not fill the landscape with light till after he has illuminated the 
 highest pe&ks. 
 
 Much has been said lately of the necessity of industrial train- 
 ing in our Public Schools. So far as this means a preparation for 
 an industrious, useful life, it is exactly what has been maintained 
 in the preceding pages. But those who seriously propose to in- 
 troduce special manual employments, which, by a restriction in 
 language, seems to be all that come under the head of industry, 
 
i6 
 
 now-a-days, must give the subject very careful consideration.* 
 I have suggested how much is to be done for every child besides 
 teaching it a trade ; and if it be well done, in those first years 
 when it ought not to be confined to labor, the learning' of trades, 
 under their present and prospective division into specialties, ‘ and 
 in technical schools which are replacing apprenticeship, becomes 
 an easy matter. Only let our course of study keep in view such 
 a balance between its departments, — such an equal opening of the 
 doors to each of the three directions of human effort, — towards 
 facility in language, towards aptness in mathematical combinations, 
 towards readiness in distinguishing form, that each pupil, instead 
 of being fitted for nothing, with a consequent leaning towards a 
 clerkship or a cheap literary occupation, will find the path in 
 which he or she can work best, and the State at least need not 
 trouble itself about him or her thereafter. 
 
 What now has risen up before us in this review ? Not an elee- 
 mosynary system, offspring of benevolence and self-interest, for the 
 protection of the rich by the least possible aiding of the poor ; not 
 a meagre course of elementary learning, a mere gate to let unbred 
 animals into common, forest, or garden at their own will ; but a 
 thoughtfully planned course of training, physical, mental, and 
 moral, reaching from the Kindergarten to the University, and af- 
 fecting the children of the day laborer and the capitalist — in its 
 night schools, even the laborer himself. It is not, we admit, the 
 system established by the fathers ; we are glad — and they would 
 be — that it is not. Great, indeed, were the foresight, or small the 
 
 *To look at this question as a practical one, — out of about nine hundred distinct 
 occupations in the Philadelphia City Business Directory for 1880, about one hundred 
 separate manual arts or trades may be distinguished. To give an elementary know- 
 ledge of each of these, an immense expense (besides time) is required in buildings, 
 materials, tools, and instructors, which must be increased with the progress of the 
 arts, changed with the changing demand, or allowed to become worthless or obselete. 
 It will be impossible to teach each to every pupil, and discrimination, at so early an 
 age, must be made quite in the dark. What then, can be done for “ industrial” edu- 
 cation, more than to try to develop such mental aptness and manual dexterity as will 
 make easy the learning of the most suitable trade when necessary ? This will not ex- 
 clude all useful work from schools, any more than the same rule in other studies ex- 
 cludes all useful learning. It only restricts the teaching to such employments, 
 whether prospectively remunerative in themselves or not, as are best for these train- 
 ing purposes. Not many are required ; drawing and modeling have been already 
 mentioned, and plain sewing doubtless might be added. 
 
1 7 
 
 advance, of a nation if such could be the case. We are instru- 
 ments only, even in our plans, of a greater planner, and no more 
 conscious of the final result, than is the acorn of the oak. The 
 Nation that would enter upon a Public School System, must 
 
 “ Drink deep, or taste not that Pierian spring.” 
 
 Do we realize the growing influence of this institution, 
 already affecting the whole Nation, and second in power to 
 the Church ( only? Those who have always enjoyed its ben- 
 efits regard it as a matter of course, like the breath they draw ; 
 but those who have not been its friends, see more distinctly its 
 power and promise. The most prominent newspaper of one of the 
 most influential religious bodies, a body which largely favors its 
 separate schools, says recently, referring to the connection of pub- 
 lic libraries with the schools, “We have entered, in our school 
 system, upon the organization of modern society ; we cannot stop 
 half-way.” 
 
 That we do not thus fail depends upon an agency of which no 
 mention has yet been made. That agency is the teacher. I have 
 thought that a consideration of the methods and importance of 
 the work would better prepare us to speak of the workwoman or 
 workman ; and I hope in so doing I have made it necessary to say very 
 little. Do we not need for this work, growing more and more in- 
 dependent of text-books and routine, the finest qualities of mind 
 and heart ? We have teachers possessing these, but if they can- 
 not be retained, if more cannot be had, our well planned course is 
 a dead form with no spirit of life : a rigid method with no adapta- 
 bility to its subjects. And if they cannot be had for other consid- 
 erations, we must, with the present pecuniary rewards, wait long 
 for them. 
 
 As the work rests upon the teacher, so the teacher rests upon 
 those who qualify and appoint her, who prescribe her duties, who 
 select books, who plan and erect buildings. These again, so far as 
 money is needed, rest upon the legislators, and these upon the 
 pie. A zealous discrimination in the voter, a wise liberalityAn the 
 councilman, a just and strong supervision in controllers^.nd direc- 
 tors, are the most urgent needs of this whole animated structure. 
 
 If the people are not sensible enough of their responsibilities in 
 this regard, cannot they become so through the agency by which 
 

 im 
 
 3 0112 062023764 
 
 18 
 
 other political benefits have been realized — through an organiza- 
 tion working outside of state and civic bodies, an observing, sug- 
 gesting, counseling, strengthening, force ? Perhaps the mission of 
 the Society for the Promotion of Public Economy is not yet ended, 
 — that what may be called its “ scattered members,” in this Asso- 
 ciation and the new Charity Organization, may be revivified un- 
 der the old name, a more comprehensive one than either of the 
 others, and the Society renew its youth in its labors in this direc- 
 tion. Here is a field for those who would serve the body politic, 
 yet fear to be “ in politics.” They would find true the converse of 
 the ancient saying ; and that they who would serve among men 
 shall be accounted great. 
 
 1 2 e & 127 NORTH SEVENTxTERN & CO., 
 
 3 -^REET, PHILA.