consumed there in preliminary education.[3] It will be manifest, that the objections to the system of classification are not so numerous or so weighty in those colleges into which mere boys are received. It has been repeatedly urged, that by such a system they are compelled to study subjects foreign to their inclinations and capacities; but, until the age of sixteen or seventeen, the mind cannot, perhaps, be better employed than in the acquirement of such knowledge as forms part of the course prescribed in the generality of our universities. The great objection is, that those of all ages are subjected to the same restrictions. The opposite course, as it at present prevails at the University of Virginia, is also liable to animadversion; the less, however, as the students are not received under sixteen years of age. It will most generally happen, that neither the youth, nor his parent nor guardian, is sufficiently acquainted with the course he ought to adopt with the view of being well educated; and if the youth be left solely to the exercise of his own discretion, which is often a negative quantity, he will be apt to select those schools that require the least application, and are the most interesting, to the exclusion of more severe and elementary subjects. The best system is that which turns out the greatest number of well instructed individuals, or which holds out the greatest amount of incentives to regular study. This cannot be accomplished by any plan which leaves the student, or the parent or guardian--often less competent than the student--to be the sole judge of what should be the course of instruction in all cases. The University of Virginia, which admits this system to the full extent--in no wise controlling the choice of the student--affords us some elucidation of the comparative value attached to different subjects of university instruction, by the student, or by parents and guardians, and of the disadvantages of this unrestricted plan. From the report of the rector and visiters of that university for 1830, we find that there were attending the School of Ancient Languages 52 Mathematics 60 Natural Philosophy 47 Moral Philosophy 16