the absence of this corroboration, is not at all either inexpedient or unnecessary. Few parents, I am sorry to say it, are intimately acquainted with the whole character of their children at the age of 15. Scarcely one in a hundred bestows the attention and the pains necessary to such an intimacy with all their ways and their habits; and being imposed on themselves, it is no wonder they sometimes impose on others.

One thing is certain, we have been imposed on in some instances in the students admitted into our college In no case, however, so far as I remember, when a good certificate came from the Principal of an academy or respectable school, or some third person of known reputation. And, indeed, in some instances where parents alone have testified, we have found them not at all mistaken in the estimate formed either of the capacity or character of their children.

Some, however, it would seem, have either wholly mistaken the character of their sons, or the character and intentions of our Institution. They seem to have regarded it as a sort of Penitentiary institution, to which youth of either doubtful or desperate character may be sent in the hope of reformation. This is a grand mistake of our intentions. An institution of that sort, I have no doubt, is much needed in our country; but we will leave the erection, discipline, and government of it to more experienced hands. We intend a school for the acquisition of learning and science, and for the formation, corroboration, and salvation of moral character.

We need a College for the salvation of the morals of the uncontaminated as much as for the formation of good character. Such a one we are endeavoring to build up; and if sustained by that portion of the community who are, or ought to be, deeply interested in such an undertaking, we doubt not of complete success. But we need their countenance, their prayers, and their encouragement. We have been just passing through a severe ordeal, occasioned, in part, at least, by the want of a strict compliace on the part of some of our patrons in the department of certificates.

In most Colleges there is a reverence for wealth and aristocracy, and hence these are supposed to be a passport not only to the reception of students, but to a connivance at their follies and vices. Hence the corruption of Colleges, like that of society, is owing chiefly to this fruitful source of general contamination. There is no royal, no aristocratic road to intelligence or virtue. No partiality, then, ought to be shown to these influences in seminaries of learning and virtue. Talent, genius, science, and moral excellence are not to be purchased with lordly titles or pretensions-"the boasts of heraldry, or the pomp of power." They could not be secured with the wealth of a Croesus

or a Solomon. The prince and the beneficiary must equally dig in the mines of knowledge, and climb up the hill of science with equal labor, care, and pain.

It is a superlative presumption to calculate on wealth as friendly to education or morals. Equally inconsiderate and presumptuous to rely upon it as a protection from scholastic discipline and censure. Preposterous it would be in the highest degree to make it a passport to collegiate honors, or a palladium against the penalties of transgression.

The passions which it pampers and the habits which it generates are decidedly hostile to the three best things in creation-learning, morals, and religion. We always find even the prospects and the anticipations of it decidedly injurious to study, and by no means favorable to pure morality or elevated piety. Sometimes, indeed, it becomes an instrument of beneficence, a blessing to society; but for once it so happens, a thousand times it proves a snare and a curse to its possessor, and generally involves him in moral ruin and destruc

tion.

We have already had some cases of severe discipline in our infant institution. Two have been recently expelled, some dismissed for the present session, and several rusticated for violations of its by-laws and ordinances. These have been generally of the class on whom fortune smiled most propitiously, whose prospects in life were the brightest and the best; but unfortunately they could not study, and must necessarily do mischief: for it has passed with us into an adage, that an attentive and diligent student is generally moral and respectful in his manners and habits.

These instances have occurred, too, among the sons of our most influential and devoted patrons and friends. We are truly sorry, indeed, that it sheuld have so happened; but reason, remonstrance, and admonition having failed, it became our duty to inflict on them the penalties of our laws. The safety of our Institution demanded a few examples of this sort; and determined that the respectability of connexions, the wealth, high standing, or personal attachments of their parents and friends to us, should not shield them from the penalties which our laws inflict-we give in their case a demonstration, I trust satisfactory to all, that law and good order shall be sustained here at all risks and hazards.

The offences of the highest malignity perpetrated here were imported from the colleges of which some of these transgressors had been members. It is a remarkable fact that our most daring and ungovernable spirits here have all come from one or two colleges. Those who have not been members of other colleges are generally moral and

orderly in their behaviour. This fact commands us with an authority of paramount sanctions to sustain the moral discipline and uphold the laws of this institution.

We have proposed a moral institution as well as a literary and scientific one. It is agreed on all hands that we ought to have at least a few such in our country. Surely there are moral partialities, moral feelings, and conscientiousness enough in our community to sustain us in this great undertaking to raise up one such. We can have it, we must have it, and we shall have it, if our friends and the friends of religion and good order will do their duty, We shall do ours! We will retain none here but those friendly to the genius of our institution. We know what an ordeal we must pass through-what clamors, misrepresentations, and perversions of our actions and motives, we must encounter in such an effort as this. We anticipated it in part, and now realize it. The echo from some points of the compass already fulfils our predictions. Our discipline is too severe-we rise too early-we expect too much-we starve the body to fatten the mindboarding is not what it might be-lodging is not downy-study-rooms are too crowded-we prescribe too large lessons-we are too severe in executing the laws, &c. &c. But who are the complainants Hard students, moral and exemplary members of the institution! or homesick, indulged, pampered, and stall-fed stripplings, whose only prayers and aspirations are, "What shall I eat, and what shall I drink, and wherewithal shall 1 be feasted." I do not wonder at this: for there are many parents who bestow their parental affections on the stomach rather than on either the head or the heart. They will condole with a child for the want of sweetmeats and confectionary, rather than for the lack of conscience, character, or learning.

The Bill of Fare, by the way, at the Steward's Inn, is, as far as I have witnessed, and as far as reported by the senior Students and Professors, as variegated and plentiful as the laws of the Institution command. The Bill of Fare is that of the University of Virginia, as far as the diversities of climate and soil will permit. And that no fond parent may be affrighted by complaints of this sort, we have appointed a standing committee of twelve Students to report to the Faculty weekly, or when called upon, on the whole subject of the table and its provisions.

We are thankful to those parents and friends of the institution who have given information here of those idle and mischievous reports. They may, however, rely upon the attention of the Faculty to every thing that is reasonable or right in this affair. Few of those spirits who neglect their studies and dislike a strict supervision, will write

to their friends informing them that they dislike their studies and a system of training and superveilance that takes cognizance of their whole behaviour both by night and by day. Desirous of escape from such restraints they will seize every incident and every occasion for imputing to other causes than the real one the reasons of their discon

tent.

But a few such reports, and all from one or two neighborhoods, have returned to us; and I doubt not that in consequence of some recent cases of discipline here, they will soon cease to annoy us either at home or abroad. We have a very excellent and worthy class of Students in this Institution, who are well disposed to sustain good order and to observe tts laws and enactments. To them we look for aid in the preservation of good order, and in the accomplishment of the high destinies to which we aspire in the erection and supervision of this College.

Under the present system of domestic government, as correctly and laconically detailed in the accompanying extracts from Mr. Peabody's late Thanksgiving Sermon, it will be exceedingly difficult to secure that subordination to authority, and that orderly deportment in Students indispensable to their intellectual and moral improvement, unless sustained by the unyielding authority of parents and guardians. If parents have not confidence in the capacity, fidelity, and integrity of teachers, they ought not to place their children under their tuition and management; but when placed under them, they ought to exercise an absolute and paramount control over their whole behaviour. In this way only can intelligent and conscientious Professors become responsible for the education of a Student,

Parents do not always know their children in matters of morality and education so well as their instructors do, especially in such an Institution as this, in which they are under the supervision of Profes so:s out of classes as well as in them. We do not come to this conclusion simply from the fact that we have found some parents entirely mistaken in some important attributes in the character given us cf their sons, but from years of past observation and experience. The fondness of parental affection generally exaggerates every virtue and diminishes every frailty of their children.

No institution, literary, civil, or religious, can be long kept pure without strict supervision. I never knew a school or college succeed well destitute of a steady, firm, and scrutinizing discipline. Parents, then, must not hear the complaints of boys-they must not yield to their clamors; but, having confidence in those to whom they are entrusted, they must aid them in carrying cut a system of education

commensurate with their views and desires. I do not think that all the Students now with us will endure that government and attention to studies essential to either literary or moral eminence. We will have good scholars and good characters, if possible; and those who send us bad materials may expect disappointment, and perhaps the vexation of having them sent home in a few weeks. If the community will not sustain and patronize such an institution, then we are released from our engagements; but of this determination we cannot admit a doubt. There are hundreds-nay, thousands who desire good learning, good morals, and good health, as the richest inheritance of their children! In pursuance of such wishes and desires we are going on to enlarge our buildings and to increase our means of accommodation. We expect to get into our College Proper in April. At that time we can receive some forty students more. We wish those who have been talking to us and writing on the subject indefinitely to apply forthwith for places in April or May. And be it observed most emphatically, that should any student be sent here unworthy of the institution, they shall be soon returned to their homes. What supineness or indifference has seized the churches, that they do not send some of their promising youth as offerings to the Lord, to be instructed in that learning and science so essential to extended usefulness in the world? May the Lord open thetr hearts and strengthen our hands to further the progress of light and knowledge in the land, and to extend the triumps of redemption over the ruins of sin and Satan over our fallen and degraded race! And to his name be all the glory forever and ever! Amen! A. C.

From the Christian Herald.

DISOBEDIENCE TO PARENTS.

AN ancient Apostle predicted that in the last days children would be disobedient to the counsel and dictation of their parents. And has not that season arrived when there is a wide-spread unwillingness on the part of the son to observe the mandates of the father, or the daughter to be swayed by the gentle instruction and mild reproof of the interested mother? Truly, we are called on to deplore the evil which has and must follow the reckless regard which is evinced by the young to the right and safe path pointed out by the aged or those of riper years. Says a worthy eminent preacher, A. P. Peabody, in his Thanksgiving Sermon, "It seems to me that even within my remembrance there has been in this respect a very great change for the worse. The commandment used to be taught, 'Honor thy father and mother,' and 'Children, obey your parents in the Lord.' But now, from what I witness frequently of the mutual relation of children and parents, I should almost imagine that it had been written, 'Honor thy son and thy daughter,' and Parents, obey your children.'