should not be considered so much, even by those who highly
value accomplishments, as the power, the energy, that is excited in
the pupil's mind, from which future progress is ensured. The writing
and drawing automaton performs its advertised wonders to the
satisfaction of the spectators; but the machine is not "_instinct with
spirit_;" you cannot expect from its pencil the sketch of a Raphael,
or from its pen the thoughts of a Shakespeare. It is easy to guide the
hand, but who can transfuse a soul into the image?

It is not an uncommon thing to hear young people, who have been long
under the tuition of masters, complain of their own want of genius.
They are sensible that they have not made any great progress in any of
the accomplishments which they have endeavoured to learn; they see
others, who have not, perhaps, had what they call such _opportunities_
and _advantages_ in their education, suddenly surpass them; this they
attribute to natural genius, and they say to themselves in despair,
"Certainly I have no taste for drawing; I have no genius for music; I
have learned so many years, I have had so many lessons from the best
masters, and yet here is such and such a one, who has had no master,
who has taught herself, and, perhaps, did not begin till late in life,
has got before me, because she has a natural genius for these things.
She must have a natural taste for them, because she can sit whole
hours at these things for her own pleasure. Now I never would take a
pencil in my hand from my own choice; and I am glad, at all events,
that the time for lessons and masters is over. My education is
finished, for I am of age."

The disgust and despair, which are thus induced by an injudicious
education, absolutely defeat its own trivial purposes. So that,
whatever may be the views of parents, whether they consider ornamental
accomplishments as essential to their daughter's _success_ in the
world, or whether they value them rather as secondary objects,
subordinate to her happiness; whether they wish their daughter
actually to excel in any particular accomplishment, or to have the
power of excelling in any to which circumstances may direct her, it is
in all cases advisable to cultivate the general power of the pupil's
understanding, instead of confining her to technical practices and
precepts, under the eye of any master who does not possess that which
is the _soul_ of every art.

We do not mean any illiberal attack upon maste