e discussion of Prof. OLNEY's paper was opened by Dr. D. B. HAGAR,
e State Normal School, Salem, Mass. He said the country-school
em presented different aspects in the different States. He dissented
the position of the lecturer upon the proposition that young men in
to enjoy the right of suffrage should pass an examination in the com-
school branches. The establishment of a uniform system would be
cticable. He was not clear that any system of graduating diplomas
the lower schools can be devised that will universally admit to the
er schools. He recommended not town schools but a head master for
hools of the town.

RICHARD EDWARDS, of Illinois, believed that the people would man-
heir own schools; and they must be educated to apprehend and de-
he best appliances and best methods. The drift of MR. EDWARDS's re-
s was against centralization. The Hon. J. H. SMART, of Indiana, favor-
ore centralization. He pointed out, some of the evils of having the
Is controlled by the people. WM. E. CROSBY, of Iowa, said we have
ly solved the problem of centralization in city schools. He had not
the politicians when properly approached, jealous of the school-
r. He said the laws of Iowa require a four-weeks' institute to be
annually in each county. The entire point is the permanence of
ers. He thought much could be done by the action of this Asso-
n and the State Association. The HON. R. D. SHANNON, of Mo.,
he one thing necessary in Missouri to place the State in a front
is efficient Supervision. The people are so grounded in their love
ucation that they will let nothing stand in the way of their pro-
Supervision was also needed over the public funds. Millions
been squandered. We are somewhat jealous of centralization. MR.
, of Illinois, a county Superintendent, said country schools cannot
ried on in the same manner as village or city schools. The chief
in the country is the permanent employment of the teacher.
A. BELL said he did not believe a word of what the last gentleman
but he did believe all that the others had said, except retiring
rs on half-pay. C. C. ROUNDS said :-It was idle to talk of the pro-
of teaching when schools are in session three months in a year.
ers cannot live on three-months' pay. Z. RICHARDS favored agita-
nd discussion.

HON. W. H. RUFFNER was excused by request from reading the
ing paper on

THE MORAL ELEMENT IN PRIMARY EDUCATION.

rly thirty years ago an eminent English philosopher proposed to he laws of character into a science, and to call it Ethology. I do now that the idea has been developed, except in the speculations renologists, sociologists, and expounders of heredity. But unedly we shall one day have a special science treating of the laws regulate the formation of character. No one doubts that every s what he is as the result of the operation of laws; and however e may be human characters, they have all been formed under the All systematic training of children is a recognition of this

WS.

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principle. And, as DR. CHALMERS has shown in his Instit ogy, such statements are not invalidated by the fact that Go be one of the factors in the operation; for that spirit uses, dispense with, the laws of man's mental constitution.

It is not easy to construct this science, or it would have be ago; but the clue is in hand when we see that its formati lie in the domain of psychology, and that the work to be d commodation of these principles to this special subject.

Hence the doctrines of Ethology have been recognized principles" (the axiomata media of Lord Bacon); principle Bacon observes, constitute the chief value of every scienc them science becomes exact and useful.

Ethology will lead us to study the origin and sources qualities in human beings, whose assemblage makes up character, and its object is "to determine from the general combined with the general position of our species in the un actual or possible combinations of circumstances are capabl ing or preventing the production of those qualities" (J. S. I Logically, the evolution of this science should precede t ology; because, in learning the laws under which individu is formed, we have the master principles on which society And whilst the salient points of society tempt bold students and SPENCER to plunge directly into the tangled wilderness the cautious thinker, who measures his task before he u will see that he who undertakes sociology, before the differ Ethology, will die like BUCKLE in the wilderness, exclai Book, my Book!"

As soon as Ethology takes the scientific form, it will be used as the foundation of pædeutics, and be adopted as branch in Normal study. In this science, and in its deduc education, will appear, as a prominent branch, the Laws Conduct; and this is nothing more or less than Ethics, pure Ethics is, philosophically, a branch of Ethology, just as E branch of Psychology. Ethics proper, does not include ju politics, or the law of etiquette, just as Ethology does not inclu or national character. Ethics deals only with the individu him how he ought to behave himself. So that those few which remembered that there was something worth teaching six primaries, and added "Good Behaviour" as a thing to the schools, really struck upon exactly the right word-be requiring the teacher to put Ethics into his programme, wi an alarming word. Ethics will soon cast off those endless about the Freedom of the Will and the Nature of the Moral hand them over to Psychology, where they properly belong is the Will, but the mind determining what it will do? Conscience, but the mind acting on moral subjects? Co tinction be broadly drawn between Ethics proper and Ethic gy, and then could the grounds of ethical obligation be second in every ethical treatise, it would be found that th thing in Ethics which a boy can understand before he rea nior class of a college course.

Unload Ethics of its foreign matter, and it becomes simply Rules of onduct. Its elements are simpler than the four rules of Arithmetic, or ther than the two fundamental principles, adding and subtracting, out which grow all arithmetical operations, and which become complited only when applied to complicated problems. Such is Ethics-few simple rules of conduct which any child can learn, but which beme difficult of application when applied to complicated questions. otorious as moral philosophers are for their debates on incidental estions, they are remarkably agreed on what constitutes the ethical de. They will debate as to why men ought to do right, but not as to at is right. And even the differences as to the ground of moral oblition seem to be nearing an adjustment.

There will always be men in every department of science who will nore the Author of Nature, chiefly because they regard science as aling only with second causes; and in Ethics such men are satisfied, hen they find that moral actions have their roots in man's nature and lations; but the idea is gaining even with that class of thinkers, that t only is it illogical and irreverent to leave out of view the will of e Ruler of the Universe, but that as a matter of moral dynamics, onger motives are needed than those of Egoism, Hedonism, or Utiliianism, in order to make any of these systems operative.

But educators need not hesitate as to the propriety of appealing to e will of God as the ultimate authority in matters of conduct, alDugh they may not always feel at liberty to determine for their pupils w that will is to be ascertained. There is perhaps no question in the oral world on which mankind are and always have been so nearly animous as this, viz: that God's will is absolute authority in moral tters. Deference for eccentricities of religious opinion will have beme an intolerable vice when any school teacher hesitates to acknowlge the existence or the authority of the blessed God and Father of all.

In the prosecution of our idea, the first work needed is the codifying the moral doctrines of the country-and that in various forms, and th various depths of fulness, suited to schools of various grades, ted also to family use, and to the wants of the grown man who rarely sses a day in which some difficult question of morals does not arise. uch life where you will, you touch a moral nerve; and yet often the ral principle involved is so subtle and so ramified with others that, e the aching nerve of the bodily system, you may feel the pain but not detect the seat of your trouble.

Ethics must begin with the "Categorical Imperatives," as KANT calls em, and follow with the simple applications thereof; and gradually wance into the region of complex and conflicting motives and principles, ere the subtle vices of society reside, and are covered beneath the -face of a high respectability.

Now and then only these respectable vices bring down a fair name, and e world is astonished as it is when some well-conditioned bodily frame suddenly prostrated by a hidden disease which had hung out no sign its fatal mining.

All pervaded as society is by moral evils of every grade, h that society should be without a moral code, without a s without a moral Blackstone or Kent.

You are perhaps startled at this statement, but if there book known to society, name it, name it. The Bible, you the Bible a code? No, no more than it is a body of divinit chism. The Bible is a collection of sacred books written b thors, scattered along the track of fifteen centuries. It moral principles, but they are scattered like physical facts of Nature. And like the scattered parts of a tangram th brought together before they are seen to be a symmetrical w bers too are staring us in the face always, but numbers beco only when made into arithmetic. There is a grammar in speech-there is geographic truth in every foot of the eart but before geography and grammar can be taught properly ciples and facts must be systematized. And so, abundan materials of ethics, we need the systematic moral code as the of effective moral teaching.

The services of the Church in this direction are not forgo dervalued. To her society is chiefly indebted for its ger soundness and growth. But the teaching of casuistry is onl to the mission of the Church, which is to fill men with th the world to come. A pure life on earth is of course requir broad principles by which that life is to be regulated are and insisted upon; but the carrying of ethical principles i nutiae of life was not only not enjoined upon the Church, bu ple of Christ and his apostles shows that the Church was avoid that very thing. It was thus only that the Church co cosmopolitan-thus only that she could win all men to Chri herself from endless persecution. And such was her mod until she allied herself with the State, and assumed a sort o directorship in regard to human affairs, for which she had sion from her Lord and Master. And the whole of Christen suffers in many ways from the effects of this union of Church -and one of the evils is just this which we are consid Church having in past ages undertaken to be the casuistical of the world, society has been left without a moral code. M religion have points of close contact, but they are as differen trial gravitation from solar attraction. The one is terrestria is celestial; and the glory of the terrestrial is one, but the g celestial is another. The Church has nobler work than to be the rate of interest a man may get for his money. The Chur -ought to say with the voice of an angel-be honest, and tr pure, and gentle--but she cannot follow those grand principle ramifications. If she does she will weaken her hold upon will obscure the awful light of eternity. Moreover, she wi and often make herself ridiculous, as did Pope Calixtus II solemnly issued his bulls against the comet, as she has many when dabbling in things not written. As long as she has a

e Lord" at her back, men will bow in reverence, but when she comes >wn to little criticisms and casuistries about which there is no "Thus ith the Lord," and there is room for differences of opinion, she soils er skirts, and sacrifices her prestige.

Let the Church give men right principles, and let the schools system-
ize them, and develop for themselves and for society those details
hich shall inform and guide men in their daily life and be made a
art of the scheme under which the young are educated.

It is not forgotten that much is wanted in moral training besides a
xt-book—a good mother, a good pastor, a good teacher, a good disci-
ine, favoring circumstances, "line upon line, precept upon precept,
›re a little and there a little," and all that. Moreover, mental train-
g is moral training to a certain extent; and the failure to recognize
is has occasioned much needless concern among good people, especially
reference to public schools. Though there may be no special moral
religious training, the ordinary exercises of a well-conducted school
e highly ethical in their influence. And when the teacher is high-
ned, his personal influence is elevating upon his pupils. And there
a great deal of miscellaneous moral instruction given in every school
well as in every good home. It is only proposed in this paper to do
stematically what is now done unsystematically, and hence incom-
etely; to accept ethics as a study. It is claimed that the subject is
least as important and susceptible of school-room treatment as geog-
phy or arithmetic. And that, for the same reason that a child ought
t to be left to pick up his arithmetic as he may, he ought not to be
Et to pick up his morals as he may. It is, of course, desirable that
rents should look after their children's improvement, both morally
d intellectually, but parents may be incompetent or neglectful. More-
er, the idea of education is, that all its teachings shall be systematic;
at it shall include the whole nature, moral, physical, and intellectual;
d that it shall leave nothing to chance. If the teacher is expected to
rn out an ethical character, he must have the ethical feature in his
ogramme. He is not to be satisfied with incidental effects and incom-
ete results, or with occasional efforts. Children must understand that
ey are expected to behave themselves, not simply that they may not
ague the master and disturb the school, but because behaviour is the
eat thing of all the things they have to learn; that morals are not sub-
lary to scholarship, but the reverse; that what a boy learns is not as
■portant as what he does; and that, at the outcome of his school life.
hat he knows is not as important as what he is; that what he can do is
small consequence compared with what he is inclined to do and

hat he does.

The details of this moral work on the pupil are for consideration and periment. As to the systematically-didactic part it should be both al and textual. With advancing maturity the simplicities of elemeny teachings may properly pass into the more complex conditions of e, where sound principles conflict with each other, and difficult probns beset every pathway. To a child nothing is more mysterious than e moral complications of life-nothing more impossible than the

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