208 BOSTON. CHAP. XIII. CHAPTER XIII. Meeting of Association of American Geologists at Boston.-Popular Libraries in New England.-Large Sale of Literary Works ir the United States.-American Universities.-Harvard College. near Boston.-English Universities.-Peculiarities of their System.-Historical Sketch of the Causes of these Peculiarities not of Medieval Origin.-Collegiate Corporations.-Their altered Relation to the English Universities after the Reformation.—Constitution given to Oxford by Leicester and Laud.-System of Public Teaching, how superseded by the Collegiate. Effects of the Change.-Oxford Examination Statute of 1800.—Its subsequent Modification and Results.-Rise of Private Tutors at Oxford and Cambridge. Consequences of this Innovation.—Struggle at Oxford in 1839 to restore the Professorial System.-Causes of its Rejection. Tractarianism.—Supremacy of Ecclesiastics.—Youthful Examiners.-Cambridge.—Advocacy of the System followed there.-Influence of the English Academical Plan on the Cultivation of the Physical Sciences, and all Branches of Progressive Knowledge.-Remedies and Reforms. April 25.-I returned to Boston to attend the third annual meeting of the Association of American Geologists, who had held their previous meetings of 1840 and 1841 at Philadelphia. On the present occasion Dr. Morton took the chair, and in the course of the week papers were read and freely discussed on a variety of scientific questions by many of the leading American geologists, some of whom had come from distant parts of the Union. The patronage afforded by the state surveys has created a numerous class both of practised observers and able writers. Among those engaged in these government undertakings, who took part in these proceedings, I may mention Professor Hitchcock, of Massachusetts, Professor W. B. Rogers, of Virginia, Professor H. D. Rogers, of Pennsylvania, Mr. Vanuxem, Dr. Emmons, Mr. Hall, and Dr. Beck -all engaged on the survey of New York; Dr. Jackson, who has surveyed Rhode Island, New Hampshire, and Maine; and Dr. Locke, of Ohio. There were also present Professor Silliman and his son, Messrs. Nicollet, Redfield, Gould, Bailey, Dana, Couthouy, Haldeman, Hubbard, J. L. Hayes, and others, all known as authors or contributors to scientific publications. The structure of the Alleghany Hills, and of the coal-fields of America, the origin of coral reefs, the glacial theory, the effects of icebergs, the nature of the foot-marks in the red sandstone of Connecticut valley, and other subjects, were debated upon during the week, in an animated but most amicable style. The citizens of Boston, learning that means were wanting for the publication of a series of valuable memoirs, read at this and former meetings of the association, came forward with their usual liberality, and supplied funds, by aid of which a volume entitled "Transactions of the Association of American Geologists for 1840-42,” a work reflecting the highest credit on the cultivators of geology and its kindred sciences in America, made its appearance soon afterwards. Munificent bequests and donations for public purposes, whether charitable or educational, form a striking feature in the modern history of the United States, and especially of New England. Not only is it common for rich capitalists to leave by will a portion of their fortune towards the endowment of national institutions, but individuals during their lifetime make 210 SALE OF BOOKS. CHAP. XIII magnificent grants of money for the same objects. There is here no compulsory law for the equal partition of property among children, as in France, and, on the other hand, no custom of entail or primogeniture, as in England, so that the affluent feel themselves at liberty to share their wealth between their kindred and the public; it being impossible to found a family, and parents having frequently the happiness of seeing all their children well provided for and independent long before their death. I have seen a list of bequests and donations made during the last thirty years, for the benefit of religious, charitable, and literary institutions, in the State of Massachusetts alone, and they amounted to no less a sum than six millions of dollars, or more than a million sterling. There are popular libraries in almost every village of Massachusetts, and a growing taste for the reading of good books is attested by the sale of large editions of such works as Herschel's Natural Philosophy, Washington Irving's Columbus, and Plutarch's Lives. Of each of these, from five to twenty thousand copies have been sold. It will seem still more remarkable, that no less than sixteen thousand copies have been purchased of Johnes's Translation of Froissart's Chronicles, illustrated by wood-engravings, and twelve thousand of Liebig's Animal Chemistry. These editions were very cheap, as there was no author's copyright; but it is still more surprising, that about four thousand copies of Prescott's Mexico should have been sold in one year in the U. S. at the price of six dollars, or about twentysix shillings. When, in addition to these signs of the times, we remember the grants before alluded to, of the New England and other states in behalf of public schools and scientific surveys, we may indulge very sanguine hopes of the future progress of this country towards a high standard of general civilization. The universities of the United States are annually increasing in number, and their discipline in New England (to which my inquiries on this head were chiefly confined) is very strict; a full staff of professors, with their assistants or tutors, superintending at once the moral conduct and intellectual culture of the students. In each university, there is a divinity-school, appropriated to some particular religious denomination, which is Presbyterian or Independent at New Haven, in Connecticut, where there are about six hundred students; and Unitarian at Harvard College, near Boston, where there are about four hundred. But youths belonging to various sects resort indifferently to New Haven, Harvard, and other colleges, to pursue their ordinary academical studies. After obtaining their first degree, they enter, if intended for the ministry, some theological faculty established in the same or in another university, or constituting a separate institution for the professional training of future divines. The Episcopalians have a flourishing college of this kind in the State of New York. The Independents, or Congregationalists, have one at Andover in Massachusetts, where a distinguished professor of biblical learning has been known to draw Episcopalians and students of other sects to his lectures, no persons being excluded, by subscription to articles of religion, from entering and studying in any college. The multiplication of academical establishments, in consequence of every State, and every sect of Christians in each State, being ambitious of having schools 212 UNIVERSITIES IN SCOTLAND. CHAP. XIII. of their own, is an evil, but one which would be greatly aggravated were the general as well as the theological education in the universities alike sectarian; or if students of classical literature, mathematics, law, and medicine, all required teachers who agreed with them in every article of faith. It has been remarked, by a living satirist, that the force of sectarian animosity, like that of gravity, increases inversely as the squares of the distance; but, in spite of the occasional ebullition in recent times of an intolerant spirit on both sides of the Atlantic, there are many auspicious signs of the approach of an era when differences of religious opinion will less interfere with national systems of education, both in schools and colleges. The present state of academical affairs in Scotland will perhaps be thought inconsistent with this view, where one party has been endeavouring to expel from the universities all professors who favour "free church" opinions, while the seceders from the establishment, not satisfied with a new divinity-school, have aimed at a new university for general instruction. There is now reason, however, to hope that the last-mentioned project will fail. There are already too many academical institutions in Scotland, in proportion to the means of adequately remunerating the professors; and their farther impoverishment, by the withdrawal of students from them to a new college, would be an injury to science and civilisation. The policy of the government in 1836, when an attempt was made to unite King's and Marischal Colleges at Aberdeen, was wise and statesmanlike, but it was baffled by the local jealousies of the two ancient rivals. Every effort should now be made to confine the new academical foundation to the faculty of theol |