movement in behalf of a more thorough development of the patriotic sentiment among the American people. The words of Robert C. McGinn, of Maryland, to Mr. Randall's song, serve to introduce utterances which inspire patriotic sentiment in the training of youth. MY MARYLAND. The public schools are scattered o'er, Diffusing wide their treasured lore,— Oh, may they rise, to fall no more, Hark to thy children's young appeal, Our mother State, to thee we kneel, For us, our mother, ever feel, Thy sacred love for us reveal, Thou wilt not let thine offspring die, Our souls for knowledge loudly cry, My Maryland. Oh, hie thee, mother, quickly hie, To thee, for help, to thee we fly, My Maryland. We hear thee in the distance call, My Maryland, To statesmen, lawyers, patriots, all, My Maryland, Save ye my children from the gall By educating one and all, My Maryland. God bless our State, for what is done, God bless her people, every one, My Maryland! May Freedom's bright and cheering sun, My Maryland! ROBERT COOPER MCGINN. FREE SCHOOLS INSPIRE LOYALTY TO COUNTRY. (From the last interview of General Horry with General Marion in 1795.) ISRAEL of old, you know, was destroyed for lack of knowledge; and all nations, all individuals, have come to naught from the same cause. Happiness signifies nothing, if it be not known and properly valued. Satan, we are told, was once an angel of light; but for want of considering his glorious state, he rebelled, and lost all. And so it is, most exactly, with nations. We fought for self-government; and God hath pleased to give us one, better calculated, perhaps, to protect our rights, to foster our virtues, to call forth our energies, and to advance our condition nearer to perfection and happiness, than any government that was ever framed under the sun. But what signifies even this government, divine as it is, if it be not known and prized as it deserves? This is best done by free schools. Men will always fight for their government according to their sense of its value. To value it aright, they must understand it. This they cannot do, without education. And as a large portion of the citizens are poor, and can never attain that inestimable blessing without the aid of government, it is plainly the first duty of government to bestow it freely upon them. The more perfect the government, the greater the duty to make it well known. Selfish and oppressive governments, indeed, as Christ observes, must "hate the light, and fear to come to it, because their deeds are evil.” But a fair and cheap government, like our Republic, "longs for the light, and rejoices to come to the light, that it may be manifested to be from God," and well worth all the vigilance and valor that an enlightened nation can rally for its defence. God knows, a good government can hardly ever be half anxious enough to give its citizens a thorough knowledge of its own excellencies. For as some of the most valuable truths, for lack of careful promulgation, have been lost, so the best government on earth, if not duly known and prized, may be subverted. Ambitious demagogues will rise, and the people, through ignorance and love of change, will follow them. Look at the people of New England. From Britain, their fathers had fled to America for religion's sake. Religion had taught them that God created men, to be happy; that to be happy they must have virtue; that virtue is not to be attained without knowledge, nor knowledge without instruction, nor public instruction without free schools, nor free schools without legislative order. Among a free people, who fear God, the knowledge of duty is the same as doing it. With minds well informed of their rights, and hearts glowing with love for themselves and posterity, when war broke out, they rose up against the enemy, firm and united, and gave glorious proof how men will fight when they know that their all is at stake. FRANCIS MARION. THE AMERICAN SCHOOL SYSTEM OF THE FUTURE. -CHARACTER AND PATRIOTISM TO BE INCULCATED. (From Address before the National Educational Association at Chicago, July, 1887, and by permission edited for the "Patriotic Reader.") A BEAUTIFUL vine which grows by my study window has given me a thought. Its delicate tendrils floating in the breeze touch the strings stretched for the climbing of the vine. Sensitive to the touch, they instantly coil and by spiral contraction draw the vine to its support. Other tendrils appear, which, by contact and coiling, spread the vine, and soon the veranda will be covered with a delicate and soothing shade of green. So have I seen for more than forty years the outstretching of our educational work, until the five Northwestern States, developed under the Ordinance of 1787, have already a school-population one-third greater than the entire population of the United States one hundred years ago. The school system of the future must have life in itself; no dead forms will suffice. It must be American, in its deepest significance, liberty-loving, liberty-promoting. As a friend to true liberty, it must encourage industry, sobriety, impartiality. It must inculcate love of order and respect for law. Its course must widen in the principles of government, the theory of politics, the resources of the people, questions of economy in industries and in finance, the responsibilities of office-holding, with more patriotic and less personal ends in view, the sacredness of the ballot, the emblem of a freeman's power and the pledge of a freeman's honor. The school of the future must impress upon the pupil the value of American citizenship in all political and economic relations. "Intelligence is essential to good government," declared the Ordinance of 1787. Every day the words of John Stuart Mill become more applicable to the American people: “The province of government is to increase to the utmost the pleasures, and to diminish to the utmost the pains, which men derive from each other." The school of the future must emphasize character. This is but a recurrence to the principles of our fathers. The tendency of the times is towards the worship of the human intellect, the enthronement of reason, and to put aside all religious sanctions and restraints. Admitting the convenience of moral lives, the tendency is to sever morality and religion, to look for the fruit when the stock has been cut off at the root. Washington foresaw his country's danger, when he said, "Let us with caution indulge the supposition that morality can be maintained without religion." Jefferson wrote, “In our early struggles for liberty, religious freedom"-not freedom from religion, but religious freedom-" could not fail to become a primary object." To the formation of character our schools must address themselves, or our boasted liberties will become unbridled license, and our property and lives be at the mercy of the incendiary and the bombthrower. Instruction in our duties to our God and our fellowmen should never degenerate into the inculcation of opinions as to minor and non-essential points of belief or polity. No one questions the right of the State to enforce the positive duty of patriotism; nor is the right less sacred, or the duty less pressing, because he who is to exercise the one, or to enforce the other, has certain views which will make him a partisan in his acts. What patriotism is to partisanship, religion is to sectarianism. Each is the whole, in its spirit and essence, universally received ; while the form may vary with the individual. The genius of our government forbids only the spirit of the proselyter, the trade of the partisan. It favors the life of the patriot, the influence of the man who goes forth in the spirit of that religion which is drawn not from the theories of men, but from the precepts of the Sacred Scriptures. The religion I would emphasize, as an integral part of school-instruction, is that which recognizes man's right to freedom, man's right to rule, subject only to the "immanence of God in society." The spirit of the school of the future must be catholic in its literal significance,-universal, general; and, in the derived sense, tolerant, sedate, complaisant, but never too easily compliant. Were the men who passed the Ordinance of 1787 to return to earth and journey in a palace-car from New York to Chicago, with but a single night upon their journey, it seems to me that they would say, "Progress as you have begun; be tolerant; but in God's name, in Freedom's name, in humanity's name, as patriots good and true, we bid you make good character the end of your highest efforts, and put into your schools whatever will build up a virtuous character.” JOSIAH LITTLE PICKARD. OUR EDUCATION MUST BE AMERICAN. (For the "Patriotic Reader.") AMERICA, alone, of all the great nations of the earth, is dependent upon the intelligence and loyalty of her humblest classes |