THE PRINCIPLES AND METHODS OF HUMAN CULTURE: A SERIES OF LECTURES ADDRESSED TO YOUNG TEACHERS. BY WILLIAM RUSSELL, EDITOR OF THE AMERICAN (BOSTON) JOURNAL OF EDUCATION, 1826 to 1829, AND PRIN- PREFATORY REMARKS. THE series of lectures, of which the following are a part, was addressed, originally, to students pursuing a course of professional study, under the author's direction, in the Merrimack (N. H.) Normal Institute, and in the New England Normal Institute, Lancaster, Massachusetts. The course, as delivered, extended to the subjects of physical, moral, and æsthetic culture; including, under the latter heads, remarks on principle as the foundation of character, and suggestions on the cultivation of taste. In the delivery of the lectures, it was deemed important to avoid the unfavorable influence of formal didactic exposition, in a course of professional lectures to a youthful audience. Equal importance, however, was attached to a strict observance of the systematic connection of topics, and the theoretic unity of the whole subject. The method adopted, therefore, in the routine of the lecture-room, was to treat a given point daily, in a brief oral address on one prominent topic, selected from the notes embodying the plan of the whole course. At the suggestion of Dr. Henry Barnard, the notes, in their connected form, were transcribed for insertion in his Journal; and the lectures on Intellectual Education were selected for this purpose, rather as an experiment, on the part of the author, in his uncertainty how far it might be advisable to present the whole series. But the unexpectedly favorable reception which the course on intellectual education has met from teachers, both at home and abroad, would have induced the writer to transcribe the other portions of the series, had health and time permitted. The subjects here referred to, however, will be introduced, from time to time, as may be practicable, in future numbers of Dr. Barnard's Journal. The thoughts presented in the following pages, the author hopes, may serve to attract the attention of teachers who are so situated as to occupy the ground not merely of instructors but of educators, who have it in their power to control, to some extent, the plan and progress of education; and all teachers of the requisite zeal and thoughtfulness, even in the most limited sphere of responsibility, can do much in this way, by their personal endeavors in instruction. It is not in one department only, or in one stage, that the field of education needs resurveying. |