tem. A student who has made choice of his profession, is indeed left to select his instructors and arrange the course of his studies at will; he may also hear as many lectures in other departments as he pleases; but still the certainty of future examinations does not permit him to neglect the studies of his proper course; he must first and at all events make himself acquainted with those branches, on which he is to be examined.* Nor can he do this by mere memory, or by studying the answers to a set of questions. The day has gone by, when a young man could be ground into a state of preparation for an examination made under the authority of government; whatever may still be the case at some of the universities, in regard to an examination merely for a degree. If we look now for a moment at the actual state and character of the German universities, we shall find, along with all their vast and acknowledged advantages, several great and prominent evils, some of which have crept in gradually in practice and are susceptible of correction; while others are inherent in the system itself. Of the former kind, is the want of personal intercourse between the professors and students. As a general fact, most of the professors have no intercourse whatever with their pu this is, that in their hours of relaxation they unbend the mind much more than is usual here. While they are in their studies and lecture rooms, their minds work with intense effort; but when they come out, and especially in society, they are like children let loose from school; their labours and studies are for the time forgotten, and they meet each other not as professors or learned men, but as familiar friends and everyday acquaintances. This is connected, no doubt, with the great feature of European character, which at once strikes Americans, that all ranks and classes there have a far greater enjoyment of the present, than ourselves. Our national character, so far as we have one, consists in a spirit of enterprise, excited by the desire of improving our condition. It may be shortly styled a love of gain,-gain not only of wealth, but also of reputation, of comfort, of happiness,-gain of all that we suppose to be desirable. Our enjoyment consists more in the striving after this gain,-in anticipation, and in the very act of acquiring; theirs, in possession and quiet fruition. * It is not uncommon for a student to spend the first year of his course in idleness, and afterwards give up all amusement and devote himself to severe study. In this case he is said, in their peculiar jargon, to ochsen, i. e. work like an ox. pils except in the lecture rooms. They take no interest in them any further than to induce them, if possible, to attend their own lectures, and thus obtain the fee; but do not take the trouble to inquire whether a young man properly improves his time, nor whether he has chosen the best course of study, or the best means to help him forward in his progress. Any parental interest in a young man, or watch over his moral development, is a thing, generally speaking, entirely unknown. Individual professors do indeed occasionally invite a few of their own particular pupils to their houses, but rather as a matter of ceremony, than out of any regard to their moral or intellectual culture. This evil has doubtless arisen, partly in consequence of the laborious and secluded lives of the professors, and partly from the great number of the students, which renders it impossible to be upon an intimate footing with all. Still the evil might easily be corrected, could the professors become imbued with the proper spirit. A few, like Strauss and Neander at Berlin, and especially Tholuck at Halle, have begun a different course; and in the latter instance, particularly, the results have been highly beneficial. Another evil of the same class, is undoubtedly the present character and conduct of a portion of the students. Left to themselves, without any direct moral or civil restraints, and without inspection on the part of their instructors, it is no wonder that young men should choose an errant course; but it must be borne in mind, that the character which is now attached to the life of a German student, is the inheritance of other days, and was acquired when the indirect restraints were far less than they now are. Until within the last few years, the requisitions of the governments were much less strict than at present; and a mere residence at a university was assumed as a sufficient qualification for office, without further or with slight examination. Under such circumstances, of course, those who entered the universities without any love of study, and merely to while away the requisite number of years, plunged at once into all the temptations and snares to which every assemblage of youth are exposed; and the whole burden of reproaches which the student of the present day must bear, the feats of drinking, smoking, duelling, etc. may be referred back to those earlier periods. But this evil belongs not to the system, any more than it is inherent in our own schools of law and medicine, where the students are in like manner left wholly to themselves. It is in fact di minishing; and in the universities of Berlin and Munich, situated in large cities, duelling and the other peculiar characteristics of a university life are comparatively unknown; and the students have become, in a great measure, assimilated to the ordinary forms of social life. On the other hand, we may also remark two evils, which seem to result from the system itself, and which cannot be corrected without a change in the whole form of education. The first arises from the plan of oral lectures, as at present conducted, where the student writes down the words of the professor. Now where such lectures are treated, as is often the case, simply as a clue to guide the learner's own reading and investigation, there is no plan of study more interesting or profitable; none which excites to greater ardour, or prompts to more persevering effort. But the mass of young men engaged in study are not of this class; they receive what is given them, and rest satisfied with believing it all on the authority of the professor. It cannot be denied, that the tendency of such a state of things is to fill the mind with superficial knowledge, without exciting it to the cultivation of its own energies; and it would not perhaps be too much to say, that while the real scholars of Germany are in advance of any thing that we can boast, the great mass of her clergy and civilians, while they know accurately that which they have learned, are less trained to habits of independent thought and the application of their knowledge to practical purposes, than the corresponding classes in our own land. Another and more serious evil arises from the exclusive devotion to particular studies, which constitutes one prominent trait of the German plan of education. Indeed, the system of a division of labour is here carried to as high a point in regard to intellectual employment, as it is in England in respect to manual Occupations. One theological professor devotes himself exclusively to the literature of the Old Testament; another to that of the New; a third, to systematic theology; a fourth, to the history of the church; a fifth, to practical theology. The same holds true in all other departments; and the consequence is, that while they become radically acquainted with all that relates to their particular branch of study, they cultivate less thoroughly the other departments connected with it; and leave entirely untouched many kinds of knowledge, which belong still more to the practical and ordinary course of human life. The result of all this is a want of general practical information, which is a mark ed characteristic of the educated men of Germany. They will overwhelm you with stores of argument and illustration on all topics of religion, morals, philosophy, and classical or oriental philology; but if asked a question relative to the ordinary affairs of life, or in general history, or in geography, they are often compelled to be silent. It may probably be truly said of the character of the German mind, that, as a nation, they delight more than any other in abstraction, in pushing their reasonings to the utmost limits, regardless of consequences; and hence have speculated oftener and wider beyond the limits of the human faculties, than any other people. Nothing is more true than that, in the words of their own Jean Paul, they hold the empire of the air,' and have had more strange conceits and fancies than any other nation. The general causes of this state of things seem to have been, in part at least, the condition of society and the system of education among them, by which so many are trained up remote from the active duties of life, and thus lose all relish for practical objects. Of the 15,000 pupils at the universities, the greater part can never have the opportunity of becoming practical men; while they yet are taught to think, and their intellectual powers are urged to a high state of cultivation. In this way they are compelled to build their speculations, without any foundation of experience and practical common sense. What wonder, then, that these speculations should often prove baseless; the mere dreams of busy intellect, without the guidance of practical wisdom. In closing this first part of the present article, we may properly recur again for a moment to the question alluded to in the early part of it: Whether it would be practicable or advisable, in our country, to establish institutions on the German plan. After the facts already spread before him, the reader will be able to form a judgement on this question for himself. Institutions of a similar kind might no doubt be established here; but could they be expected to flourish, with any degree of success corresponding to those of Germany? Where are our preparatory schools, which shall furnish students for such institutions? We have none but our colleges; and will our young men, after having spent four years at one of these, and received its honours, as a general rule, repair voluntarily to an university? The avenues to influence and reputation and emolument are, with us, too many and too easy of access, to permit us to indulge this expectation. Where then is the power, either in our states or in our general government, that can compel them to such a step? that can make the tenor of office, or of professional employment, depend on a residence at any university? Where too is the individual, or the state, or the congress, that will annually appropriate fifty thousand dollars, or the moiety of that sum, for the support of such an institution? In this land of civil freedom, we can use no legal force to compel young men to obtain an education. We can bring only a moral influence to bear; and when this shall have been long enough employed; when the moral wants of community shall demand other institutions; they will no doubt spring into existence, of a rank and nature adapted to the exigencies of the case. In the mean time, the safety of our nation, the security of our civil rights, and the duration of our free government, depend upon the exertions which shall be made, to diffuse the blessings of knowledge and religion among the people. It is here that the duties of the Christian and the patriot meet together; and the momentous question is thus brought home to the business and bosoms' of the present generation of the American churches, Whether they will gird themselves for the work of the Lord, and by their exertions secure the permanence of our free institutions; or whether, by their inactivity, they will suffer vice and irreligion to become triumphant; knowing that when that time shall come, the light of liberty, which has so long beamed upon us and scattered its rays on distant climes, must, in all probability, go down in darkness and be quenched in blood. ART. II. INTERPRETATION OF PSALM XVI. By M. Stuart, Professor of Sacred Literature in the Theological Seminary at Andover. It has been said, as characteristic of the commentaries on the Scriptures of the Old Testament by Cocceius and Grotius, that the former found Christ everywhere in them, and the latter nowhere. This is not, indeed, literally true; nor was it intended to be so understood. But the substance of what is asserted in this often repeated declaration, is correct. Cocceius was a strenuous advocate of the double sense of Scripture. In other words, he believed that a multitude of texts and passages in the Old Testament were intended to convey a literal sense, as their primary and obvious meaning; while at the same time |