We

their offspring-bearing in mind, as they ought to do, that a period of life is fixed by act of Parliament, under which labour, as well in factories as in mines, is prohibited-what a moral revolution would be produced among the masses, reaching in its effects to generations yet unborn. If our country is ever to be morally raised, it must be by directing strong and united efforts to the training of the young. would here, therefore, call the attention of legislators, clergymen, and teachers, to the important fact, which all the statistics of crime-all the experience of the most devoted philanthropists prove-viz., that in proportion as you morally and religiously train the youth of a country, you are laying still firmer the basis of national prosperity, and bringing into operation an engine for effecting the greatest good, exercis-ing as they do, a reflex influence on their parents and relations at home. We trust the day is not far distant when the Legislature of our country will interfere, and stem the tide of infidelity, vice, and crime, by the endowment of institutions throughout the land, to be conducted on such principles as we have endeavoured to explain in this section on BIBLE TRAIN

ING.

CHAP. XV.

SECULAR TRAINING LESSONS-ELEMENTS OF SCIENCE

-ARTS-MANUFACTURES.

BIBLE training lessons, we have seen, are made the basis of moral culture. Secular training lessons to a certain extent elucidate Scripture emblems, on which most important moral lessons rest; at the same time their direct object is to fit the future man better for the duties of social life in the particular sphere in which God may be pleased to place him. To girls as well as to boys they are found to be not only practically useful but highly elevating in an intellectual point of view.

We would recommend that at least one training lesson be given in the gallery each day, upon some point of science, applicable to the purposes of real life; for whilst this is particularly valuable to persons in the humbler walks of society, in fitting them for manual and other labour, it is also valuable as the foundation of a more thorough knowledge of science, to those whose circumstances may enable them to prosecute their researches still farther. To the former, these school exercises may be all the theoretical knowledge they can acquire in life. To the latter, a thoroughly analyzed or pictured out training lesson,

day by day, will be found an elementary exercise greatly superior to the ordinary mode of mere reading lessons, even when accompanied by explanation.

As we have already stated under a former head, when objects are within our reach we make use of them in conducting the lessons as a sort of text, or starting point; but whether within reach or not, our principle is to picture out the whole lesson, and every point of the subject matter of which it is composed. Facts are stated by the master-the lesson being then drawn from, and given at the time by the children themselves. Their ability to do so, as we have already said, under the head of Bible Training, is the test whether the subject has been properly pictured out or not-for if so, they must understand what they mentally see-keeping in view that we do not know a thing until we see it with our bodily or mental eye. For example, if separate lessons have been previously given upon the properties of heat, and water, and steam, and air, and the condensing influence of cold, and the screw, and the pulley, and the inclined plane, and the lever, and the centrifugal force, and if all these and other forces be pictured out, as combined in one machine, the children will readily form a steamengine in their minds, and tell the trainer the combined effect upon a shaft which may move spinning machinery, raise water, or propel a steam-vessel, or railway train.

This is a fundamental part of the training system, and a knowledge of secular subjects, particularly what is termed natural science, as we have already said,

also enables the Bible trainer more easily to elucidate the lessons of Scripture.

The introduction of daily secular gallery lessons, on the simultaneous principle, which is new in popular education, is, next to Bible training, the most direct mode of exercising the mind of the pupils. These scientific and secular lessons give a decided tone of intelligent observation and reflection in the ordinary intercourse of everyday life. Such is the uniform experience of every one of our students who have been permitted to conduct secular gallery lessons in their own schools.

Visitors sometimes say, What have the children of the poor to do with science? let them learn to read their Bibles, and repeat their Catechism. Science, however, is valuable alike to the mechanic and the man of business, in promoting the arts of life, so indispensable to the wealth and comfort of all ranks of society. If the bold and clear outlines of science be given to all ranks, each may maintain his proper place in the scale of its ascension. The poor man, if he chooses, may advance beyond the limited period of his elementary school education, and the man of leisure and scientific research may rise as high as he pleases; while the genius, of whatever grade, acquires enough to enable him to prosecute his studies, and take his just place in society. But we rise a little higher in our gallery training lessons, and use scientific terms, expressive of scientific principles, such as are used by lecturers on natural philosophy. In consequence of which, it is still urged by some, WHY TEACH

SCIENCE to children in an elementary school? What can they understand of latent heat, the radii of a circle, centrifugal and centripetal forces, gravitation, electric fluids, and innumerable other more complex terms? Now, we have to say, that all such terms can be simplified, and when reduced to simple terms, they can be understood by children of a few years old. Having these outlines clearly analyzed by familiar illustrations, they can be made to understand the most complex terms, expressive of the most complex movements and conditions. For example, the motion of a child round the circular swinging-pole in the play-ground, may illustrate, in some measure, how the moon keeps in its orbit round the earth, and the latter, or any other planet, round the sun; in other words, what is meant by the centrifugal and centripetal forces. The proper course of education in science has too generally been reversed: and the reason why so many adults stop short in their progress, and cannot educate themselves (for education ought only to close with life), is, that they have committed to memory technical terms, which, not having been pictured out and illustrated, are not understood; and also that the minute points of science have been given before the great outlines were drawn.

The philosophic terms which a public lecturer finds it necessary to use, are not understood by the youth; they have not been explained, far less pictured out to his mind's eye. He does not therefore see the bearing of each point of the premises laid down, or the conclusions to which the lecturer arrives, and at the close