It is no answer to our observations to say, that our greatest orators have been bred at the universities, and that the system cannot be very faulty which has produced Pitt and Fox, Chatham and Burke, Peel and Stanley. Supposing that all these orators had devoted themselves, at college, to classical verses, instead of compositions in their own tongue--which was by no means the case--still, that would by no means prove that the system of education in which they were bred was not eminently defective. They became great speakers, not from having been proficients in "longs and shorts" at Oxford, or in the differential calculus at Cambridge, but in spite of these acquirements. They learned the art of speaking in the forum, as Wellington's soldiers learned the art of war in the field, by practice, in presence of the enemy. Doubtless a great deal may be done, by able and energetic men, in this way; but does it follow from this that education is to go for nothing, and that the old system of sending out officers to begin a campaign and besiege towns without knowing a ravelin from a bastion, was advisable, or likely to insure success in the military art? If you have two or three thousand young men, comprising the élite of the nation, at certain seminaries, _you cannot help finding your leading statesmen and orators there_, whatever they learn at them. They would be found there, though they were taught at them nothing but riding, music, and dancing. The whole rulers of Persia were found at its schools, though they learned nothing at them but to ride, to shoot with the bow, and speak the truth. But it would be rather dangerous to hold that this proves that seminaries, where nothing else was taught, were the ones best suited to secure the first place in society for their scholars, or the blessings of good government to the state.