Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1831,

BY WILLIAM C. WOODBRIDGE,

in the Clerk's Office of the District Court of Massachusetts.

AMERICAN JOURNAL,

AND

ANNALS

OF

EDUCATION AND INSTRUCTION.

NEW SERIES-VOL. I.-NO. VI.

AUGUST, 1830.

EDITOR'S ADDRESS.

THE origin and progress of the United States are without a parallel. Instead of emerging gradually to the light of civilization, we commenced our national existence, as it were, in manhood. A portion of the most excellent and learned men, of the most civilized nation on earth, were removed from all the influence of unjust laws and unwise or oppressive usages. They were brought to a country in which they could enjoy territory without a limit, and liberty without a restraint; and were left, with all the aid to be derived from the experience of ages, to establish a new and more perfect form of government, which should at once secure the freedom and happiness of the people, and serve as a model to other nations. They were sustained in their struggle with the sufferings and dangers of the wilderness. As soon as the arm of oppression was stretched forth to abridge their privileges, it was withered; and their freedom was guaranteed beyond the reach of any power on earth. It would seem as if Divine Providence intended to institute in this country the most important, perhaps the last, experiment, to decide whether the interests of a nation can be safely entrusted to their own management, or whether they need to be controlled by the strong arm of one or a few rulers. Should an experiment, made under such circumstances, fail, the friends of liberty must fold their arms in despair, and endeavor to close their eyes on all the miseries around them, as the inevitable results of human weakness.

In this view, responsibilities of the highest and most peculiar kind devolve upon us. In the language of a writer, contemporary with our revolution

Should the United States escape some dangers, and take proper care to throw themselves open to future improvements, it will be true of them as it was of the people of the Jews, that in them all the families of the earth should be blessed. Perhaps there never existed a people on whose wisdom and virtue more depended, or to whom a station of more importance in the plan of Providence has been assigned'

We have secured to all, the freedom of election and the freedom of the press. It is for us to prove that they will not result in that licentiousness and anarchy which are predicted as their inevitable consequences. We have withdrawn the support of the State from religion. It is for us to prove that pure religion does not need external aid, and that it will not be extinguished for the want of human patronage.

The friends and the enemies of liberal institutions are looking for the result of this experiment with the most intense interest.

On our efforts, under Providence, this result depends, and they must be immediate and vigorous and unremitted. Who that has observed the progress of crime, and the unblushing manner in which the most corrupt principles are publicly avowed, can fail to see that the flood-gate of corruption is opened, and that unless the torrent be arrested, it must sweep away this fabric of liberty and happiness, the result of the labors and sufferings of two centuries? There is a controversy to be maintained with ignorance and prejudice and irreligion and corruption, which demands the united efforts of all who venerate the laws of God and the institutions of our fathers, or desire the happiness of posterity—a controversy of such paramount importance, that we could wish to see all others laid aside, however momentous in themselves, by those who are engaged immediately in this. Let but a spirit go forth like that which animated our fathers in their struggle against political oppression, and lead us to struggle with equal vigor and with equal unanimity against these common enemies which threaten the very foundation of our liberties, and we may hope like them to conquer, and like them to enjoy the fruits of our toils, and transmit them to our descendants. Our country may yet be safe, and the world may yet be convinced that the many can be rendered more capable of governing than the few. But if we slumber over our danger or shrink back from the contest, our country is lost, our institutions must be trampled under foot, and the name of America be inscribed on the broken column which records the weakness and the ruin of republics.

But Enough of this,' we are told- Enough of prophecy and of appeal We know the danger-How shall it be averted?' Not certainly by refusing to examine it in those details which alone can make us feel its extent and magnitude, and thus prepare us to act with energy;-nor yet by folding our arms in despair, and regarding it as the common and inevitable lot of nations. In reference to this great question, no truth is more certain than that the foundation of every free government must be laid in the intelligence and moral principle of the people, which can be produced only by a good education. It is in the diffusion and improvement of education, therefore, that we can find the only security for the preservation of our free institutions. It is the want of this, which has converted the nominally free governments of South America into military despotisms. It was from the same defect, that the effort to establish a free government in France began with lawless licentiousness, and terminated in absolute tyranny. Without education, the electors will have neither the intelligence nor the principle necessary to direct them in discerning the best measures or selecting the best men, or adopting the proper means to accomplish the great ends of government, the prosperity of the country and the happiness of the people. They will be guided by their own selfish passions or narrow views, and left to follow in blind submission, the counsels of a sage, or the seductions of a demagogue, as chance may direct. Such electors could scarcely fail to appoint incompetent