nd
is astonished to find the lathe standing still, and the boys gathered
round the republican turner, who is telling them stories of the tyranny
of kings, the happiness of republicans, and the glory of war. The parent
remonstrates. The mechanic defends himself.

"I am a republican," he says, "upon principle, and wherever I go, I must
exert all the influence in my power, to promote free principles, and to
expose the usurpations and the tyranny of kings."

To this the Frenchman might very properly reply,

"In your efforts to promote your principles, you are limited, or you
ought to be limited to modes that are proper and honorable. I employ you
for a distinct and specific purpose, which has nothing to do with
questions of government; and you ought not to allow your love of
republican principles, to lead you to take advantage of the position in
which I place you, and interfere with my plans for the political
education of my children."

Now for the parallel case. A member of a Congregational Society, is
employed to teach a school, in a district, occupied exclusively by
Quakers,--a case not uncommon. He is employed there, not as a religious
teacher, but for another specific and well-defined object. It is for the
purpose of teaching the children of that district, _reading_, _writing_,
and _calculation_, and for such other purposes, analogous to this, as
the law, providing for the establishment of district schools,
contemplated. Now when he is placed in such a situation, with such a
trust confided to him, and such duties to discharge, it is not right for
him, to make use of the influence, which this official station gives
him, over the minds of the children committed to his care, for the
accomplishment of _any other purposes whatever_, which the parents would
disapprove. It would not be considered right, by men of the world, to
attempt to accomplish any other purposes, in such a case; and are the
pure and holy principles of piety, to be extended by methods more
exceptionable, than those by which political and party contests are
managed?

There is a very great and obvious distinction between the general
influence which the teacher exerts as a member of the community, and
that which he can employ in his school room as teacher. He has
unquestionably a right to exert _upon the community, by such means as he
shares in common with every other citizen_, as much influence as he can
command, for the dissemination of his own polit