So much having been already written on the subject of education, we did not expect
to meet with novelty in this little work; yet we think we have met with something
that borders on this said novelty. Mr. Routh recommends a new method of teaching les langues étrangéres; il
faut convenir, (he says,) que pour tout autre
age que l'enfance, rien n'est plus fastidieux que l'étude
seche et froide de la grammaire: ce seroit donc rendre un service réel aux jeunes
gens qui defirent apprendre une langue vivante autre que la leur, de faire
disparoitre de cette étude la secheresse des rudiments; c'est folie de vouloir
s'entreter a escalader en droite ligne une montagne escarpée, quand par des
sentiers adoucis on peut arriver plutot à son
sommet.²

We differ from Mr. R. on this point; the grammatical mountain must be ascended; and
the traveller had better exert himself, with all his strength, to reach the summit
by
the old rugged path, than waste his precious time by sauntering carelessly in a
smoother one, toward which we think he will by no means find the shortest way. We
are
likewise of opinion, that if this intricate study of grammar were omitted till the
pupil were able to apply its rules by his own
understanding, he would make a more rapid progress in the knowledge of a language,
than children can do by the ordinary method of instruction, by which they learn
grammar by rote, and comprehend [Page 463] no more of it than the parrot does of
the colloquial learning that he has been taught.

It has ever been allowed, that the docile mind of infancy receives and imbibes these
rudiments with greater facility, than when they are obtained in a more advanced
period; and it may be so: but as they must be laid by till they can be brought into
practice, may not this premature knowlege be compared to the buying cloaths for a
child, that are so much too large for his present size, that he must wait till he
is
a man before he can make any use of them?