THE WORKS OF VICESIMUS KNOX, D. D. WITH A BIOGRAPHICAL PREFACE. IN SEVEN VOLUMES. VOL. IV. LONDON: PRINTED FOR J. MAWMAN, LUDGATE STREET, MDCCCXXIV. LIBERAL EDUCATION; OR, A PRACTICAL TREATISE ON THE METHODS OF ACQUIRING USEFUL AND POLITE LEARNING. (CONTINUED.) FUNGAR VICE COTIS. Hor. SECTION X. ON LEARNING THE CLASSICS BY HEART, Pueri, quorum tenacissima memoria est, quamplurima ediscant. Let boys, since their memory is usually very tenacious, learn by heart as much as possible. QUINTILIAN. Ir is agreed on all hands, that no faculty of the mind is capable of more improvement than the memory, and none more in danger of decay by disuse. Every practice which tends to strengthen it, should be encouraged and continued; and it is, therefore, a very judicious institution in our grammar schools, observed from the earliest times, which obliges the scholars to commit large portions of the best classics to memory. I am sorry to observe, that in private education, and in some schools, this task is often neglected as too laborious. The decay of classical knowledge, if it is decayed, must in a great measure be attributed to this cause. The neglect, indeed, originates from the general relaxation of discipline, which in some |