NOTICE.-Numbers returned from Agents have completed a few additional sets of the Annals, which may be obtained from the Publisher.

SCHOOL BOOKS.

WILLIAM D. TICKNOR,-Corner of Washington and School Streets, has Constantly for sale, School Books of all kinds. Teachers from the country, are respectfully invited to call and examine.

HIGH SCHOOL READER, designed for a First Class Reader, consisting of extracts in Prose and Poetry.

BOOK OF COMMERCE, by Sea and Land, with Maps and Engravings.

GOOD'S BOOK OF NATURE, Abridged, with Questions. Illustrated.

GEOGRAPHY FOR CHILDREN. By H. A. BRINSMADE. With Maps and Cuts. GEOGRAPHY OF THE HEAVENS. By E. H. BURRILL. With an Atlas.

CHILD'S BOOK OF COMMON THINGS. By H. L. BARNUM.

EMERSON'S PROGRESSIVE PRIMER.

SMITH'S CLASS BOOK OF ANATOMY.

SERIES OF FRENCH READING BOOKS, comprising Easy Lessons, selected from the most approved authors.

TALES IN FRENCH. By Madame GUIZOT.

CAROLINE, a Tale. By Madame GUIZOT.

WILLIAM D. TICKNOR

PUBLISHES

THE MEDICAL MAGAZINE.

It has already arrived at the close of its second year of publication. But as it is about to appear under new auspices, we take the liberty to present its claims again for your patronage. The conduct of the Magazine is under the control of thirty physicians of Boston and vicinity, under the name of prorprietors, who choose its Editors, and feel themselves pledged to contribute for its support. It is now under the editorial care of Dr. J. B. FLINT, of Boston, Dr. E. BARTLETT, of Lowell, and Drs. A. A. GOULD and E. G. DAVIS, of Boston. To ensure valuable communications, the publisher offers one dollar a page for all original matter approved by the Editors. With such prospects of an interesting and well conducted Journal, we confidently solicit the patronage of the Public.

TERMS:-Published on the 1st and 15th of every month, at $4,00 per annum, payable on delivery of the third number.

ROBBINS' ANCIENT AND MODERN HISTORY,

FOR THE USE OF ACADEMIES AND THE HIGHER SCHOOLS.

Just published, a new and improved edition of ROBBINS' OUTLINES OF ANCIENT AND MODERN HISTORY; containing, besides other additions, an extensive series of Questions, and illustrated by numerous neatly executed engravings, several of which were designed expressly for the work.

This is the most recent elementary work on Universal History before the public, and it has been introduced into many of the first seminaries in the country. It is recommended by Rev. D. Matthews, Chancellor of the University of New York, Prof. Anthon of Columbia College, Mr. Bostwick, Prof. of History in the New York University, Mr. Wm. Forrest, of the Collegiate School, Mr. Wm. A. Taylor, of the Lafayette Institute, Messrs. R. Mana and T. A. Nash, Classical Teachers, Mr. Thomas W. Porter, of the Washington Institute, and John Griscom, L. L. D., all of New York. Rev. Wilbur Fisk, of the Wesleyan University, Middleton Ct., Prof. Kingsley of Yale College, Mr. J. P. Brace, present Principal, and Miss C. E. Beecher, late Principal of the Hartford Female Seminary, Rev. Heman Humphrey, Pres. of Amherst College, Mass., Mr. A. Crittenton, Principal of the Albany Female Academy, the Messrs. Van Dorcas, late of the Brooklyn (N. Y.) Collegiate Institute, and many others.

For sale by WM. D. TICKNOR.

AMERICAN

ANNALS OF EDUCATION

AND INSTRUCTION.

SEPTEMBER, 1835.

ON THE ART OF PAINTING IN THE UNITED STATES.

Extract from An Essay on the Condition and Prospects of the art of Painting in the United States of America. Written at the request of the Executive Committee of the American Lyceum. By CHARLES FRASER, of Charleston, South Carolina.'

INDEPENDENT of the intrinsic recommendations that accompany the Fine Arts, and which always ensure them a welcome with the refined and the intelligent, there are moral associations interwoven in their existence and success, that endear them to the patriot and the philanthropist. Whilst the former regards them as the source of pure and elevated enjoyment, directing the mind, like literature and science, to pursuits of endless variety; to the latter, they are peculiarly interesting as the evidences of social improvement and national prosperity.

While therefore the United States are daily multiplying their resources, and the enterprise of their citizens is directed to the improvement of useful pursuits and profitable objects, every lover of his country must be gratified to observe, that a taste for the liberal arts is also cultivated, and that they are every day becoming more and more an object of enlightened attention. Institutions have been established in several of our cities, for the express purpose of promoting them; and if some of these have failed, and none of them have led to the results that might have been wished, it is because the zeal in which they originated was in advance of

386

Genius may be left to its own Energies.

that state of public taste, and those means of encouragement, which could alone prosper the experiment, and crown it with

success.

Indeed it has been questioned whether such institutions are calculated to have a permanently useful effect, either in encouraging a taste for the fine arts, or in advancing their improvement; and whether it would not be better to leave genius to its own energies, to struggle with, and overcome the difficulties in its way, with nature before it as the standard of beauty in proportion, of harmony in coloring, and of grace in action, than to offer it instruction under the name, and with the forms of an academy, without placing in its reach the best models of art, and the most approved means of instruction.

If these views are correct, would it not be better in our comparatively young country, and with our yet limited resources, to consider the cause of the liberal arts as best, though incidentally promoted, with the general advancement of all mental cultivation ? For after all, this is the only solid basis upon which they can hope to rest. Circumstances foreign or accidental may sometimes favor the growth, and encourage the progress of the fine arts; but the atmosphere in which alone they can be expected to attain their full maturity and development, is that produced by the genial influence of sentiment, taste and intelligence.

Without these to regulate the use of the one, and to encourage and appreciate the claims of the other, genius and wealth are unavailing. Forests may disappear from the land,-the garb of cultivation may be spread over our fields,-cities may enliven our plains, rivers may open new channels of trade, and steam may give a double value to time, by the rapidity it imparts to motion; yet if the wealth which both produce, and which results from these happy prospects, is to be considered as the end of all enterprise and exertion, and not as a means of still further improvement, in shedding over the whole the charm that mind, and mind alone, bestows, our lot will not be that of national greatness, and nature will in vain have lavished upon us the means of attaining it.

Those nations of antiquity were not the most favored in their physical resources, whose fame we most delight to cherish. What of Greece do we remember with more delight than its philosophy, its sculpture, its painting and its literature? True, it was the land of Cecrops, and boasted the gifts of Ceres; but it was also that of Pericles, Plato and Xenophon,-the land of the Apollo, the Laocoon and the Parthenon.

Far be it from the writer of this essay to say one word that would discourage the establishment of schools of instruction in any branch of art or science; for these are the boast and the evidence