The amount of instruction which will be given by a thoroughly qualified teacher, will greatly exceed that which is given by a person of inferior qualifications, even where very young children are concerned, and the time of the pupil, and the money of the parent, will be saved by the employment of such teachers.

In this view of the proper qualifications of teachers, we need only inquire what is the character of those who are usually employed, to discover the great deficiency which exists on this subject. The common schools of the country are extensively taught, in the winter season, by a set of intelligent and enterprising young men, who, in the summer season, are engaged in agricultural or other employments, not connected with literature; or in the neighborhood of colleges, in some instances, by young men who are in them receiving an education, and who resort to this means to help them to sustain the expenses which they necessarily incur. Far be it from the writer to speak lightly of those farmers' sons who have more taste for literature than the generality of their fellows, and have better improved the advantages which they have enjoyed, and who aspire to the office of teachers; or of those young men in colleges, who are conflicting with the disadvantages of poverty, and by diligence and perseverance, are raising themselves to usefulness, and perhaps to fame. Many a man, who has been an honor to his country, and sustained with reputation the higher offices of the state, has been, in early life, a teacher of a common school. The academies of the country have hitherto been chiefly taught by young men, who have completed a collegiate course, and having exhausted their patrimony, have resorted to this means to provide themselves with the funds necessary for the study of a profession. Before they have had time to become thoroughly acquainted with their business, they have relinquished it for another employment. In a large proportion of instances, the teachers of schools have labored under the disadvantages of youth and inexperience, and to a great extent, of a contracted education.

In the summer season, the common schools of the country have been chiefly taught by a fine collection of amiable, virtuous, and intelligent females, in many respects well adapted to the instruction of those younger children who, at that busy period, are alone extensively found in common schools. But these teachers have generally labored under the disadvantage of a very limited education.

In the cities, teaching has been more extensively a profession, and has received a more liberal patronage; and from these circumstances, it might be expected that the schools of the cities would have risen to a highly respectable standing. This has been, in some instances, true, but is by no means a general fact. Mere pretension and display, on the part of a teacher, often command more patronage than solid and unostentatious merit. The advertisements of teachers, of almost every description, in the cities, will be found to contain a catalogue of studies nearly sufficient for a collegiate course; studies, many of which some of these teachers do not thoroughly, if at all, understand. And in order that illiterate parents may have a high idea of the proficiency of their children, they are hurried through this course with a most unprofitable rapidity. The hurry and bustle and thousand diversions of a city are not favorable to mental cultivation. Show extensively occupies the place of substance; and even an intelligent teacher will often be found sacrificing his own better judgment to a perverted public taste. Fashionable accomplishments, particularly in the education of females, have been suffered to throw into the back-ground those intellectual pursuits, which can alone raise the mind to its proper dignity, and produce a full development of its powers. If most of the teachers of the cities would pretend to less, and attempt less, they would accomplish more, in the substantial business of education. Like some farmers in the country, they should cultivate a less extent of ground, and they would produce greater crops.

The interests of schools imperiously require that something effectual should be done, to raise up a different generation of teachers from those who have hitherto held in their hands the destinies of American youth. In order to do this, teaching must become more extensively a permanent profession; and such must be the support afforded to teachers, that it shall constitute a sufficient inducement to them not only to devote themselves to this employment, but to undertake the labor and expense of acquiring the requisite qualifications for this important trust; and the community must learn to distinguish between the well-furnished teacher and the mere pretender to literature and science.

Suppose, for a moment, that the mechanic arts were learned and practised as the profession of teaching has extensively been. Let us take the trade of a shoe-maker, for example. Let us suppose that farmers' sons, of a strong mechanical turn, during the leisure of the winter season, should begin with mending their own shoes, and, pleased with the efforts of their untaught ingenuity, should take in hand the shoes of the rest of the family; and having gained a little skill by practice, should set up as cobblers for their neighbors. What kind of shoes, can it be thought, would be worn by the community, if such were the common shoe-makers of the land? And does it require less education to become a competent teacher of youth, than a good shoe-maker? That person must think very highly of his feet, and very meanly of his head, who can entertain such an idea.

The community have, in some measure, yet to learn, that they will never practice a true economy in the business of education, until they are willing, at a reasonable expense, to secure the services of a thoroughly-furnished instructor. It must come to be considered, that a little smattering of information is not sufficient to prepare a person for a teacher of a common school. A collegiate education is not essential to this purpose, because many of the branches taught in a college will not be required to be taught in common schools. But in those branches which are taught, the education should not be less thorough than that which is acquired within the walls of a college.

The academies of the country are, at present, the seminaries in which the great body of teachers for common schools must be prepared; and in order that the academies should become suitable seminaries for teachers, they must be universally taught by able and experienced men, and the business of conducting them should no longer be made by young men a stepping stone to some other employment. These institutions should be, especially, under the charge of men who make teaching a permanent profession. But something beyond this is necessary, that a supply of competent teachers of common schools should be raised up. Seminaries should be instituted for the express purpose of preparing teachers. Such institutions, established on a broad foundation, and sustained by a liberal endowment, would be of incalculable importance to the interests of common schools. The instruction given in them, being specially directed to this object, would be more appropriate and more effectual. Connected with such institutions, should be model-schools, in which the most approved methods of instruction may be exemplified, and in conducting which, those educating for teachers should occasionally bear a part. The clerical, the legal, and the medical professions have been most essentially benefitted, and their character has been greatly elevated, by the establishment of institutions expressly for the preparation of young men for these professions; and the same result might be expected from a similar course in regard to the preparation of teachers.

In a subsequent number, we shall