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ments, we must bring to the task a spirit, not of hatred, but of reverence for the past; not of contempt, but of gratitude towards our predecessors. If we are able to go beyond them, it must be by advancing in their track, not by starting in a different direction. We must continue their line of instruction, and study their academic constitutions. What the vocation of the present age for such legislation may be, I know not. The men of our day will deserve no small admiration if they succeed in framing laws which shall operate as beneficially, and endure as long, as those of our English Colleges have done. And if they are to do this, it must be, not by rejecting and despising, but by adapting and improving the older codes. If, instead of such a Reform of the English Universities, we attempt to remodel those institutions on some foreign or imaginary plan, we shall justly incur the condemnation of all wise men, and shall deserve a sorrowful and indignant remembrance from our

successors.

"Let not England forget her privilege of teaching the nations how to live." This was proudly said; perhaps too proudly, for nations do not always profit by adopting even the better institutions of another nation. But it was said with a patriot pride; and those who administer our institutions in the spirit which this sentence expresses, will hardly fail to refine and elevate the character of their countrymen. Nor is the exhortation without a solid ground; for has England not taught the nations how to live? By an admirable combination of active and original intellect,

with unequalled practical sagacity and force of character, England has constantly impelled the progress of thought and of institutions in Europe, while, at the same time, she has held back from the extravagances and atrocities to which the progressive impulse has urged more unbalanced nations. The bold and vigorous metaphysicians of England first put in action the speculative movement of modern Germany; but England refuses to follow the wild onward whirl of system after system, to which this movement has led. English teachers of political freedom, and the free institutions of England, called up the spirit which has broken the bonds of more than one despotism; but England (thank God!) was never hurried into the democratic madness of her nearest neighbour. England had a Reformation of religion without the abolition of her Church; she had a Revolution of dynasty without the destruction of her Loyalty; she has had a Reform of her Parliament, we trust, without any fatal wrench to her Constitution. We have, therefore, no small reason to confide in the practical sense and fixed sobriety of the English character, and to believe that England may still continue to teach the nations how to live;-how to preserve and how to reform ancient and beneficent institutions. And this she may do, not by new modelling her ancient Universities, the sources of so much benefit, and the objects of so much love; not by an abrogation of the functions, or a revolution of the constitution, of her Colleges; but, when need shall be, by a calm and serious revisal of their laws; above all, by a revival

of their genuine spirit, and a fit estimate of their exceeding importance and value.

This I urge, not in a spirit of inflexible adherence to the past, but of care for and hope in the future. I trust it has appeared in the preceding reflections, as I trust it has appeared also by other indications, that I hold opinions respecting the improvement of our modes of education, which are not dependent upon any recent or external suggestions of the need of reform. And it is because I consider that the right administration of the Universities of the land involves the welfare of countless generations of Englishmen yet unborn, and of centuries of English civilisation yet only in the germ, that I warn all whom it may concern, against attempting this task in a hasty or angry spirit; and remind them that they cannot exercise any wise deliberation concerning the future, without a sober and reverent regard to the past.

So may our mother flourish while the name
Of England holds its proud pre-eminence
Among the nations: in her ancient halls
And venerable cloisters be our youth
Invigorated by salubrious draughts

Of free and fervent thought, and let the mind
Of our great country, like a mighty sea,

Be fed and freshened with perpetual streams
Of pure and virtuous wisdom, from those springs
Gushing unceasingly.

THOUGHTS

ON

THE STUDY OF MATHEMATICS,

AS A PART OF

A LIBERAL EDUCATION.

TO WHICH IS ADDED,

A LETTER TO THE EDITOR OF THE EDINBURGH REVIEW, OCCASIONED BY THE REVIEW OF THE FIRST EDITION

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