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the dark clouds of prejudice, and proved itself a good thing
wherever the people had access to the fountains of learning.
These remarks are applicable to the difficulties which educa-
tion had to encounter in all countries.

When the foundations of our Government were laid, edu-
cation and religion were recognized by the founders, as abso-
lutely essential to its success and the happiness of the people.
But notwithstanding, the lines have fallen to our generation
in pleasant places, and our's is a goodly heritage; there al-
ways were, and still are, strong prejudices against popular
education. In every State there was more or less opposition
to the introduction of a system, which involved the expendi-
ture of considerable sums of money. It is not our purpose
however, to give a history of the progress of popular educa-
tion from its rise to its present state of excellence, our object
is simply to show that human nature is now what it always
has been. Strange as it may seem, we find within the limits
of our State, oppogers to our existing school system, both
among the ignorant and men of intelligence. There are
men of affluence with little or no culture, who for the want
of education, cannot appreciate the influence of our Public
Schools upon society, and hence in view of the taxes which
they must pay, lament that the good old times have passed
away, when men were allowed to rear their children in igno-
rance and had nothing to pay. But it is still more singular
that in communities where the people are generally intelli-
gent, these same prejudices should exist, since any one given
to reflection and observation, can easily perceive that it is far
better to pay even a high tax for the support of schools ia
which children are intellectually and morally educated:
where they are taught the dignity of man and the true ob-
ject of life, where industry, morality and religion are inculca-
ted, both by precept and example; thus preparing our youth
for the various industrial walks of life, than to permit the ri-
sing generation to grow up in ignorance and vice. The
school is a powerful agent in the formation of good men and
good women, who by a virtuous course of life and by their
industrious habits, become producers and not merely consu-
mers, thus adding to the general wealth and prosperity of
the community, by their exertions in lawful and honorable
pursuits, of human activity. Contrast those who grow up in
our schools, with tte same class of children who are desti-
tute of educational advantages, and permitted to grow up in
ignorance, and we shall find the expense incurred by the ed-
ucation of the former, far less than the tax which is paid for
punishing the criminals who mostly spring from the unedu-
cated classes. Even upon such a basis of comparison, the
friends of popular education occupy the vantage ground.
But when we contrast the influence which these several ,clas-
ses exert upon the world, the sublime mission of the one and