Page:Notes on the State of Virginia (1802).djvu/219

Rh attainment of ſcience. But that time is not loſt which is employed in providing tools for future operation: more eſpecially as in this caſe the books put into the hands of the youth for this purpoſe may be ſuch as will at the ſame time impreſs their minds with uſeful facts and good principles. If this period be ſuffered to paſs in idleneſs, the mind becomes lethargic and impotent, as would the body it inhabits if unexerciſed during the ſame time. The ſympathy between body and mind during their riſe, progreſs and decline, is too ſtrict and obvious to endanger our being miſled while we reaſon from the one to the other.—As ſoon as they are of ſufficient age, it is ſuppoſed they will be ſent on from the grammar ſchools to the univerſity, which conſtitutes our third and laſt ſtage, there to ſtudy thoſe ſciences which may be adapted to their views.—By that part of our plan which preſcribes the ſelection of the youths of genius from among the claſſes of the poor, we hope to avail the ſtate of thoſe talents which nature has ſown as liberally among the poor as the rich, but which periſh without uſe, if not fought for and cultivated. But of the views of this law none is more important, none more legitimate, than that of rendering the people the ſafe, as they are the ultimate guardians of their own liberty. For this purpoſe the reading in the firſt ſtage, where they will receive their whole education, is propoſed, as has been ſaid, to be chiefly hiſtorical. Hiſtory by appriſing them of the paſt will enable them to judge of the future; it will avail them of the experience of other times and other nations; it will qualify them as judges of the actions and deſigns of men; it will enable them to know ambition