opulation; and we may venture so far, in just eulogy, as to
attribute to it the united advantages of city and country, without a
large share of the privations of the one, or the vices of the other. Of
the four Normal Schools, this is, unquestionably, the most fortunate in
its position and surroundings. We, therefore, ask for the concurrence of
the public in the judgment which has established it in this city. If it
shall be the fortune of the government to assemble a body of instructors
qualified for their stations, there will then remain no reason why these
accommodations and advantages should not be fully enjoyed.

The Normal School differs from all other seminaries of learning, and
only because it is an auxiliary to the common schools can it be deemed
their inferior in importance. The academy and college take young men
from the district and high schools, and furnish them with additional
aids for the business of life; but the Normal School is truly the helper
of the common schools. It receives its pupils from them, fits these
pupils for teachers, and sends them back to superintend where a few
months before they were scholars. The Normal Schools are sustained by
the common schools; and these latter, in return, draw their best
nutriment from the former. This institution stands with the common
school; it is as truly popular, as really democratic in a just sense,
and its claim for support rests upon the same foundation.

In Massachusetts we have abandoned the idea, never, I think, general,
that instruction in the art of teaching is unnecessary.

The Normal School is, with us, a necessity; for it furnishes that
tuition which neither the common school, academy, nor college can. These
institutions were once better adapted to this service than now. There
has been a continual increase of academic studies, until it has become
necessary to establish institutions for special purposes; and of these
the Normal School is one. Its object is definite. The _true_ Normal
School instructs only in the art of teaching; and, in this respect, it
must be confessed we have failed, sadly failed, to realize the ideal of
the system. It is not a substitute for the common school, academy, or
college, though many pupils, and in some degree the public, have been
inclined thus to treat it. There should be no instruction in the
departments of learning, high or low, except what is incidental to the
main business of the institution; yet some have gone so