a large number of pupils to the school, from the section visited, the ensuing term. The State Superintendent was accustomed to say "that he needed only to look at the catalogue of the Normal School, to tell where Mr. Page had spent his vacations." 66 Before four years had passed, the school had ceased to be an experiment"; it was too firmly rooted in the hearts of the people to be abandoned, and the opposition, which had at first been so formidable, had dwindled into insignificance. But the toil requisite to accomplish this had been too arduous for any constitution, however vigorous, to endure. The autumnal term of 1847 found him cheerful and hopeful as ever, but with waning physical strength; he sought (an unusual thing for him) the aid of his colleagues in the performance of duties he had usually undertaken alone, and at length consented to take a vacation of a week or two during the Christmas holidays. Alas! the relaxation came too late; the evening before he was to leave, there was a meeting of the faculty at his residence; he was cheerful, but complained of slight indisposition, and retired early. With the night, however, came violent fever and restlessness, and by the morning light the physicians in attendance pronounced the disease pneumonia. At first, the attack excited little alarm, but it soon became evident that his overtasked vital powers had not the ability to resist the violence of the disorder. On the fourth day, he expressed to a friend his conviction that he should not recover. The severity of the disease soon increased, and, on the morning of January 1, 1848, he passed away. Six months before his death, he had, in company with one of his colleagues, made a brief visit to his former home, at Newburyport; and, while visiting the beautiful cemetery there, he stopped suddenly near a shady spot, and said, "Here is where I desire to be buried." The sad funeral train which bore the clay that once had been his earthly habitation from Albany to Newburyport, laid it sadly, yet hopefully, in that quiet nook, to repose till the archangel's trump shall be heard, and the dead be raised. His life had been short, as men count time; he lacked six months of completing his thirty-eighth year when he was summoned to the better land; but, if life be reckoned by what is accomplished, then had his life been longer far than that of the antediluvian patriarchs. Of the hundreds of teachers who were under his care at Albany, there was not one who did not look up to him with admiration and love; not one who did not bear, to some extent, at least, the impress of his character and influence. Men who were trained under him at Albany are occupying high positions in the cause of education in several of the Western States; and gifted women, who, under his teachings, were moved to consecrate themselves to the holy duty of training the young, are now at the head of seminaries and female schools of high order, extending his influence in widening circles over the boundless prairies of the West. Our brief narrative exhibits, we think, clearly what were the marked traits of Mr. Page's character-industry, perseverance, decision, energy, great executive ability, ready tact, and conscientious adherence to what he regarded as duty. But no language can describe the fascination of his manner, the attraction of his presence, his skill in what he was accustomed to call the drawing-out process, or his tact in making all his knowledge available. His familiar lectures to his pupils on subjects connected with the teacher's life and duties, could they be published, would form an invaluable hand-book for teachers. He possessed, beyond most men, the happy talent of always saying the right thing at the right time. In personal appearance, Mr. Page was more than ordinarily prepossessingof good height, and fine form, erect, and dignified in manner, scrupulously neat in person, and easy in address, he was a living model to his pupils of what a teacher should be. Aside from a few lectures, published at different times, to some of which we have already alluded, Mr. Page left but one published work-"The Theory and Practice of Teaching," a work which has had a large circulation, and one which no teacher can afford to be without. THEORY AND PRACTICE OF TEACHING. CHAPTER I. FITNESS FOR TEACHING. HE history of education shows that there THE ive stages of opinion with respect to fitness for teaching. During the earlier and the greater part of the historic period, when learning was monopolized by the few, all scholars were necessarily teachers, and it was an easy step to the inference that all who were learned could teach. At a much later period, when a general diffusion of knowledge had taken place, and the number of schools had greatly increased, it was observed that some scholars had high teaching power, while others had little or none of this gift. As this difference could not be attributed to differences in scholarship, nor wholly to differences in natural ability, it was ascribed to high and low degrees of skill, and so the question of method was called into prominence. This step necessarily led to a comparison of methods, and finally to a search for some criterion by which they could be tested. This criterion turned out to be some gen Three phases of opinion. eral principle or law of psychology, physiology, or ethics. In this way there began to appear a science of teaching. If we arrange these three conceptions of fitness for teaching in the order of their historical sequence, they will stand as follows: 1. Scholarship. 2. Scholarship and Method. 3. Scholarship, Method, and Science. In which stratum of thought are we living today? In all three. The first is represented in the laws regulating the granting of licenses to teach; the second, speaking generally, in normal schools; and the third, in universities where the study of education has been made a part of the curriculum. The conservatism of law is well known, and in prescribing scholarship as the main, if not the only test of fitness to teach, it has preserved the primitive conception of competence for the teaching office. In the main, the distinctive feature of the normal school is that it instructs its pupils in the best methods of doing the various work of the school, at the same time that it carries forward their academic training. This instruction in methods is either given out of books or by lecture, or in observing the work done in model schools, or by doing actual teaching work in practice schools. In this country, the professional instruction of teachers in universities is of recent date, and consists chiefly in communicating the cardinal doctrines of education and Natural ability.-Study.-Experience. teaching, on the hypothesis that students who have been liberally trained will be able, on the occasion of experience, to draw a rational art of teaching out of a science of teaching. The current of the educational thought of to-day may be interpreted as follows: True fitness for teaching, so far as it can be gained from instruction, consists first of all in a liberal scholarship, then in a knowledge of the best methods of doing the work of the school, and of the principles that underlie these methods. Many, perhaps the most, of those who are to teach for a long time to come, will fall short of these attainments; but this is a reasonable ideal toward which all should aspire. The professional education of two teachers may be the very same in kind and amount, and yet their actual teaching power may be very unequal; and this inequality we ascribe to differences in ability. Some are born with a predisposition to this kind of labor, and for others it is more or less unnatural. How are natural ability, study, and experience related to each other? This has never been more forcibly or more truly stated than by Lord Bacon in these terms: "To spend too much Time in Studies, is Sloth; To use them too much for Ornament, is Affectation; To make Judgement wholly by their Rules is the Humour of a Scholler. They perfect Nature, and are perfected by Experience: For Naturall Abilities, are like Naturall Plants, that need Proyning by Study: |