ecome
prosperous and happy. We may then very properly inquire after the means
to be put in requisition in order to render the blessings of education
universal among us. To the consideration of this subject we shall devote
the remainder of this work. My first remark is, that

_A correct public opinion should be formed._ In the language of Bishop
Potter, "Our people have absolutely the control over the whole subject
of education, not only as it respects their own families, but, to a
great extent, in schools and seminaries of learning. If, then, the
people were fully awake to its importance and true nature, we should
soon have a perfect system, and we should witness results from it for
which we now look in vain."

The formation of a correct public opinion is of the utmost importance,
for the primary cause of all the defects complained of in education, and
the source of all the evils that afflict the community in consequence of
its neglect, is _popular indifference_. From this we have more to fear
than from all other causes combined. Opposition elicits discussion; and
discussion, judiciously conducted, evolves truth; and educational truths
brought clearly before the mind of any community will ultimately induce
right action. Men may at first be influenced by a comparatively low
class of motives, but one which they can appreciate. As they witness the
beneficial effects of reform, their motives will gradually become more
elevated, and their efforts at improvement more constant; but no
important advance can be made without popular enlightenment.

When the majority of the individuals that compose any community come to
value education as they ought; when they duly estimate its importance in
the various points of view already considered, then will their public
servants take more pains to co-operate with them in rendering its
blessings universal. Good laws are important as a means of improving our
systems of public instruction; but good laws, unsustained by a correct
public opinion, will be of no avail. Before any considerable advance can
be made either in improving our schools or in causing the attendance
upon them to become more general, a good common education--one that
shall give us sound minds in sound bodies; one that bestows much
attention upon intellectual culture, but more upon the culture of the
heart--must come to be ranked among the _necessaries of life_.

_Conventions of the friends of education_ have already done m