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It will be found that the ripest knowledge is best qualified to instruct the most complete ignorance. It is a common mistake to suppose that those who know little suffice to inform those who know less; that the master who is but a stage before the pupil can, as well as another, shew him the way; nay, that there may even be an advantage in this near approach between the minds of teacher and of taught; since the recollection of recent difficulties, and the vividness of fresh acquisition, give to the one a more living interest in the progress of the other. Of all educational errors, this is one of the gravest. The approximation required between the mind of teacher and of taught is not that of a common ignorance, but of mutual sympathy; not a partnership in narrowness of understanding, but that thorough insight of the one into the other, that orderly analysis of the tangled skein of thought; that patient and masterly skill in developing conception after conception, with a constant view to a remote result, which can only belong to comprehensive knowledge and prompt affections. With whatever accuracy the recently initiated may give out his new stores, he will rigidly follow the precise method by which he made them his own; and will want that variety and fertility of resource, that command of the several paths of access to a truth, which are given by thorough survey of the whole field on which he stands. The instructor needs to have a full perception, not merely of the internal contents, but also of the external relations, of that which he unfolds; as the astronomer knows but little, if, ignorant of the place and laws of moon and sun, he has examined only their mountains and their spots. The sense of proportion between the different parts and stages of a subject; the appreciation of the size and value of every step; the foresight of the direction and magnitude of the section that remains, are qualities so essential to the teacher, that without them all instruction is but an insult to the learner's understanding. And in virtue of these it is that the most cultivated minds are usually the most patient, most clear, most rationally progressive; most studious of accuracy in details, because not impatiently shut up within them as absolutely limiting the view, but quietly contemplating them from without in their relation to the whole. Neglect and depreciation of intellectual minutiÆ are characteristics of the ill-informed; and where the granular parts of study are thrown away or loosely held, will be found no compact mass of knowledge, solid and clear as crystal, but a sandy accumulation, bound together by no cohesion, and transmitting no light. And above and beyond all the advantages which a higher culture gives in the mere system of communicating knowledge, must be placed that indefinable and mysterious power which a superior mind always puts forth upon an inferior; that living and life-giving action, by which the mental forces are strengthened and developed, and a spirit of intelligence is produced, far transcending in excellence the acquisition of any special ideas. In the task of instruction, so lightly assumed, so unworthily esteemed, no amount of wisdom would be superfluous and lost; and even the child's elementary teaching would be best conducted, were it possible, by Omniscience itself. The more comprehensive the range of intellectual view, and the more minute the perception of its parts, the greater will be the simplicity of conception, the aptitude for exposition, and the directness of access to the open and expectant mind. This adaptation to the humblest wants is the peculiar triumph of the highest spirit of knowledge.—Martineau's Discourses.