Alexandria Daily Gazette, Commercial & Political

Education of Youth.—The great Locke, who was a most curious and critical observer of mankind, asserts that nine tenths of the people are, what they are, good or bad, by education. Admirably to this purpose speaks the celebrated M. De Vattel, in his Law of Nature and Nations. "In the tender years of infancy we easily receive the seeds of good and evil. Hence the education of youth in one of the most important affairs that deserves the attention of government. It is not to be entirely left to fathers. For the most certain way of forming good citizens is to found useful establishments for public education; to provide able masters, to give them wise directions, and to take such mild and prudent measures that the citizens will not neglect to take advantage of them. How admirable was the education of the Romans in the flourishing ages of that republic, and how admirably was it calculated to form great men! The young men put themselves under the patronage of some illustrious person; they waited upon him at his house, accompanied him wherever he went, and equally improved by his instruction and his example: Their very sports and amusements were exercises proper to form soldiers. We see the same at Sparta, and this was one of the wise institutions of Lycurgus. That legislator and philosopher entered into the particulars of the good education of youth, being persuaded that on that depended the prosperity and glory of his republic."