Practical Essays

The present volume is in great part a reprint of articles contributed to Reviews. The principal bond of union among them is their practical character. Beyond that, there is litt...

A third fact, less on the surface, but no less certain, is, that the men of cheerful and buoyant temperament, as a rule, sit easy to the cares and obligations of life. They are...

There may be disinterested motives in our constitution; but Appetite is not in any sense one of these. We may have instincts answering to the traditional phrase used in defining...

The votary, we shall say, of alcoholic liquor is found fault with, and makes the excuse, he cannot help it--he cannot resist the temptation. So far, the language may pass. But w...

Among the various ways, proposed in the seventeenth century, of solving the difficulty of the mutual action of the heterogeneous agencies--matter and mind--one was a mode of Div...

Up to the year 1853, the appointing of Civil Servants lay wholly in the hands of patrons. In 1853, patronage was severely condemned and competitive examination officially recomm...

Under Mathematics (pure and mixed) the Commissioners (in their Scheme of 1875), include mathematics, properly so called, and those departments of natural philosophy that are mat...

In the first place, there are certain avocations where a foreign language must be known, because it has to be used in actual business. Such are the Indian spoken languages. Now,...

Another objection to replacing classics by modern languages is the necessity of importing foreigners as teachers. Now, although there are plenty of Frenchmen and Germans that ca...

[Footnote 8: "The academical establishments of some parts of Europe are not without their use to the historian of the human mind. Immovably moored to the same station by the str...

Sociology is usually studied in its own special field, and nowhere else; that is to say, the sociologist employs himself in observing and comparing the operations of societies u...

A debating society that includes logic in its sphere should cultivate the methods of debate; setting an example to other societies and to mankind in general. The "Topica" of Ari...

The pupils could not, as a rule, possess the text of Aristotle. The teacher read and expounded the text for them; but a very large portion of the time was always occupied in dic...

Of hackneyed subjects, a foremost place may be assigned to the Art of Study. Allied to the theory and practice of Education generally, it has still a field of its own, although...

One way is exemplified in Milton's Tractate, already referred to. His method of teaching any subject would appear to have been to take, the received authors, and to read them on...

There is a memory in _extension_ that holds a long string of words and ideas together. Its value is to get readily at anything occurring in a certain train, as in a given book....

Moreover, as the persuasive art is exemplified in men that have never been public speakers, the oratorical pupil will make a selection from the most influential of this class. H...

The foregoing remarks may appear somewhat desultory, as well as too brief for the extent of the theme. They must be accepted, however, as an introduction to a more limited topic...

It has not escaped attention, that the honours paid to the illustrious Darwin, are an admission that our received Christianity is open to revision. In consequence of a few conci...

If it were necessary to listen to the debates in order to know how to vote, the messages of the whips would take a different form. The members on each side would be warned of th...

Among the innovations that are justified by the principle of avoiding at all points hurried decisions, there is nothing that would appear more defensible than to give an interva...

Down to 1824, new pastors indicated their adherence to the Confession of Faith by signature. In 1824, however, signature was replaced by a solemn promise. "Since that time diffe...