Editorial Department.

- Welcome, Teachers and Pupils, again, to the communion and fellowship of kindred minds, in the mutual labors and pleasures of teaching and being taught! Schools have again commenced, and here and now, we should all keep in view their design. Education is but a means for achieving an end; and that is, the moral and intellectual perfection of man.

Parents should commence the education of children at home-before they go to school. The first lessons should be as to morals—a strict adherence to truth -an exact honesty;-they should be accustomed to prompt and implicit obedience, and to look at their conduct as God regards it.

The lessons as to their intellectual education at this early age, should beEncourage the child to observe and study things, and foster in him a taste for reading. Primary Teachers-those engaged in elementary instruction, who receive the pupil, and make upon him or her the first, and perhaps lasting im pression-must not be discouraged because their work does not show well. Quintillian, the Roman teacher, said long ago, what yet may be truthfully said, "The roofs of buildings are seen by every one, while the foundations escape notice. Things are not to be despised as little, without which great ones cannot be produced." It is not the quantity at first, but the quality of their instruction, and the correctness with which it is impressed upon the mind, that eventually benefits the pupil.

If a Teacher be desirous that a pupil acquire an early habit of correctness in every thing he is afterwards to learn, it must take its rise and date from the hour he begins to learn the rudiments of any particular branch of study; for, the good or bad habits acquired in the first stage of his progress, will, most assuredly, be carried on with him into the other stages, and conveyed from one branch to another, with an almost unchangeable and unalterable effect. Strive, therefore, ye who have the beginners in school, to have them so trained that they not only learn their lessons correctly, but learn the important lesson of acquiring a habit of correctness-to be proficient as they go. Rivet this, then, into the hearts and minds of all-" Do every thing with attention."

We are told that it is not what we earn, but what we save, that makes us rich. It is not what we eat, but what we digest, that makes us fat. It is not what we read, but what we remember, that makes us learn. These are simple statements, yet Teachers who have but small salaries should consider them.

Teachers can make themselves what they want to be. Many of them, who had position and opportunity in schools last year, have lost caste and their pla ces by inefficiency; while humble aspirants, in many cases, by meritorious conduct and earnest discharge of duty, have taken their places.

School Trustees and Directors are sometimes capricious-are mistaken in judgment, but, in the main, the safety of the Teacher lies in himself; worth will win. Make-believe Teachers, those of more show than substance, must give way; while earnest, clear-headed and warm-hearted men and women must take rank.

In Ohio, there is encouragement for the very best Teachers; they are appreciated, and will be rated and paid accordingly. The West has a great work to do; her forests have to be felled-her prairies ploughed and planted-her streams navigated-her workshops filled with educated mechanics. Railroads

are overcoming all barriers, separating her from the East, and all important lines to the Pacific must cross our State; our hills and valleys are to be dotted with the homes of a thriving, laboring population. Good Teachers, the very best, are demanded and required to teach western boys and girls how to develop their native powers, and thus enable them to fill creditably the places they soon must fill. We want economical Teachers, who can save as well as earn; who have digested the meat and bread of learning; who have, practically, their learning at their tongue's tip and finger ends. Hopeful, faith-inspiring Teachers, true missionary zeal glowing in their hearts, are wanting on all the square acres of the fast-growing, and soon to be power-controlling, West.

Township School Boards should constantly keep in view their continuous relations towards the School-house, the Teacher, and the Pupils. If they provide but a half-and-half house, and a half-and-half Teacher, they may expect to have but a fourth-rate school. They should exercise a positive and earnest care as to the facilities and comforts of the building and furniture-as to the character and capacity of Teachers employed; procuring the best possible, exacting much, and paying them well. They should personally visit the schools, encourage the instructors and pupils, and give them a spirited impulse on opening. Trustees should devote their attention, in locating schools, to regard the centralness, the size, the healthfulness, the retirement, and the convenience of the site. School-houses, it has been well said, should be placed where, by mere position, they may have a full and constant supply of clear light, pure air, and every natural element of cheerfulness.

Decency and delicacy require that there should be separate out-houses for boys and girls at school; they should be retired, convenient, and constantly kept clean.

Rooms, in winter, should be heated so as not to have one portion of the children overheated, and the other uncomfortably cold. Two thermometers should be hung in the room, and they will soon indicate any disparity, occasioning the uncomplaining discomfort of the little, patient ones. Heat should be equally diffused, and uniformly so, during hours of school; and pure air, by proper ventilation, should be regularly supplying the place of escaping heated air.

If children eat moderately, of wholesome food-have fresh air within doors, and reasonable and regular exercise without doors, with proper mental training, they will have sound minds in sound bodies.

School Examiners should be just the men for the place. Probate Judges, in selecting them, should emphatically consider that, in this, they are not acting for the dead, but for the living. Examiners should be up to the progress of the age. Certificates should not be granted as a matter of course. American youth should not be trifled with, by being committed to sham or shallow instructors. Are we not going to advance, as a literary people? Is the standard of requirement and acquirement to be merely nominal, and not to be constantly elevated? Some Boards of Examiners drag along and hurry through their duties as tasks, and bring to their discharge no more serious consideration of their importance, than if they were choosing herdsmen for cattle.

Teachers, then, we say, in renewing your labors, we, and all good people, expect of you to extend to your pupils "the kind hand of an assiduous care," that while moulding the mind, you will get at, and impress, their conscience. Be careful to make good impressions on the first day. The future welfare of a pupil may be inseparably associated with his new position and surroundings. -Some men prize women as many women prize books, not for their true, essential worth, but for the beauty of their appearance and adornment.

-On visiting the office of the Ohio Board of Agriculture, in the State Capitol, recently, we were shown by the Cor. Secretary, Mr. Klippart, several portfolioseach a Herbarium-of grasses and flowering plants, in the neatest and com. pletest good order, gathered by school children near the Alps, classified and neatly attached, by pasted slips of paper on to white sheets placed in book form, cheaply covered.

Why might not Teachers of every school in Ohio, arrange to receive from their pupils, daily, specimens of plants, flowers, insects, minerals, fossils, etc., and systematize their collection and preservation, so as to secure samples of a portion of the Natural History of each locality of the State? What more desirable habit to implant in youth than the habit of observing and studying nature of preserving what they see-a pursuit calculated to develop their nat ural relish and eminent fitness for Natural Science? Why might not each school have its Herbarium, its Cabinets, and its Exchanges, and Teachers make expla nations and instruct pupils in minor details? Museums might be accumulated in each district, and samples, from surplus, sent to fill a case in the Museum Room of the Agricultural Board, in the State Capitol. Which School District will be the Pioneer in this move? The Editor suggested, at one of the meetings of the State Teachers' Association, the propriety of Teachers encouraging pupils to observe, and report daily, the phenomena of the weather, the temperature, etc. It is highly important that in youth the habit of observation is commenced, for, as a habit, it will determine the future usefulness of the man or woman.

- Those who read discussions in the Legislature, petitions to the General Assembly of the State, and editorials of certain newspapers, have become acquainted with a class of carpers, of different grades of ability and mischief, who are spe cially censorious on the school system-on an esprit de corps of Teachers-on Libraries, and education of the school room. They seek to tear down, but not build up; they suggest doubts, originate suspicion, cloud the sunny prospect of our landscape, but never so much as have practical plans of their own. They assail, they complain; they, with ability often, satirize valiant educational men-pioneers, who do rare work at great disadvantage-the Manns and Rickoffs of the profession; they theorize, dispute, and demonstrate with plausible airs, the defects and deficiencies in present schemes of education, brought to the ele vation they have attained by self-sacrificing, practical men.

One of much influence, deprecatingly or disparagingly asks, “Who is able to decide whether the balance of benefit is in favor of education, or against it?— who can affirm that men, alleged to have become eminently good or great by the schooling they have received, have not obtained their eminence in spite of their schooling, rather than through its assistance ?" These men, and such like, no doubt in the wise arrangement of Providence, are instruments of good, to keep in check exuberant energies, and ill-directed but well-meant effort.

The agitation of these subjects, the ground and ocean-swell of popular com. plaint, merits, and should receive, the attention of educational men. We should study to mind our ways, from the hints given by our critics. Teachers, as Editors, have much to learn; Teachers and Editors who complain much but perfect little, should let the lamps that guide their feet in future, be the lamps of experience.

Turn in with the professional Teachers of the State, Messrs. Censors of the Press; we like your boldness, but not your bitterness, and, together, good work in concert may be done for the physical, social and mental culture of the youth of Ohio.

TRIFLES.

A correspondent truthfully says: "Each event, act, thought, in the life of man, has a cause, relations, consequences. If any event, act or thought, then, is of small moment, in the great chain of which it forms a part-is, in common parlance, a trifle, who shall pronounce which can rightly thus be called? How often has every man experienced that that, which, as it passed, was esteemed trivial, in after years, was discernible as a turning-point, a very crisis, in his life. Can the Teacher say that any habit, word, or glance of his, is a trifle? His habits of thought, action, and expression, teach, unconsciously it may be, but none the less surely and efficiently. They will be reproduced in future years, and will guide when his precepts shall be forgotten. What noble impulses, what generous enthusiasm, what rigid resolution, may be spoken into life by his words! His glance may quicken, or may strangle bright, high hopes, persevering exertion, the elements of exalted character.

And in each little act of a little child, forming its character, learning its responsibilities, becoming aware of its powers, is aught trivial? A propensity unchecked, a habit allowed to form, a word unheeded and unforbidden, may be the source of lasting sorrow to his Teacher, and shame to him. No, fellowTeachers, in our work, both with reference to ourselves and our pupils, there are no trifles.

G."

-We are requested to state that Mr. John H. Rolf has changed his residence from Cincinnati to Chicago, in order to be more centrally located in his field of operations. Any person wishing to procure Pelton's Outline Maps and Keys, Lippincott's Pronouncing Geography of the World, Holbrook's School Apparatus, etc., etc., will address him at the latter place.

Mr. Rolf will continue, for a while longer, the offer of a valuable premium to any one who will secure him the sale of a set of the Maps, and Teachers and school officers will do well to secure them while they can do so on such favorable terms.

– Mr. Reemelin, the active Commissioner of the Reform School, favors the adoption of a rule in its government, by which pupils may receive rewards, in the shape of choice books, for meritorious conduct and special personal efforts, in labor and study-the principle urged being, that if Teachers are worthy of being paid for teaching, pupils who teach themselves should have a portion, also, of the tuition fund.

-The Second Annual Catalogue and Circular of the McNeely Normal School of Ohio, Hopedale, Harrison county, has been printed. It contains, at its close, a spirited appeal, from the pen of Dr. Lord, Secretary of the Board, to subscribers to the Endowment Fund, to pay up their installments promptly, and urging those who have not subscribed to contribute liberally, in order that the title to the property may be secured.

- That our Advertising Department may be conducted with more vigor, and that its receipts may be increased, the Editor and Executive Committee have arranged with the Printers of the Ohio Journal of Education, Messrs. Follett, Foster & Co., Columbus, to manage the same, and to contract at the rates on second page of cover. Booksellers and others wishing to have their cards in serted, and publications advertised in this Journal, will please communicate with Messrs. Follett, Foster & Co.