Essay on a Course of Liberal Education for Civil and Active Life
Essay on a Course of Liberal Education for Civil and Active Life (1765) is an educational treatise by the 18th-century British polymath Joseph Priestley.[1]
Contents
Dedicated to the governing board of
constitution and laws of England. He believed that these topics would prepare his students for the commercial middle-class life that most of them would live; he did not believe that the poor people should receive this same education, arguing "it could be of no service to their country, and often a real detriment to themselves."[2]
Impact
The board was convinced and in 1766 Warrington Academy replaced its classical curriculum with Priestley's
liberal arts model.[3]
Some scholars of education have argued that this work and Priestley's later Miscellaneous Observations relating to Education (1778) (often reprinted with the Essay on Education)[4] made Priestley the "most considerable English writer on educational philosophy" between the 17th-century John Locke and the 19th-century Herbert Spencer.[5]
Notes
- ^ Priestley, Joseph. Essay on a Course of Liberal Education for Civil and Active Life. London: Printed for C. Henderson under the Royal Exchange; T. Becket and De Hondt in the Strand; and by J. Johnson and Davenport, in Pater-Noster-Row, 1765.
- ^ Qtd. in Sheps, 137.
- ^ Thorpe, 52-4; Schofield, 124-5; Watts, 95-7; Sheps, 136.
- ^ Priestley, Joseph. Miscellaneous Observations relating to Education. More especially, as it respects the conduct of the mind. Bath: Printed by R. Cruttwell; London: J. Johnson, 1778.
- ^ Schofield, 121; see also Watts, 92.
Bibliography
- Schofield, Robert E. The Enlightenment of Joseph Priestley: A Study of his Life and Work from 1733 to 1773. University Park: Pennsylvania State University Press, 1997. ISBN 0-271-01662-0.
- Sheps, Arthur. "Joseph Priestley's Time Charts: The Use and Teaching of History by Rational Dissent in late Eighteenth-Century England." Lumen 18 (1999): 135–154.
- Thorpe, T.E. Joseph Priestley. London: J. M. Dent, 1906.
- Watts, R. "Joseph Priestley and education." Enlightenment and Dissent 2 (1983): 83–100.
External links
- Full text of the essay Archived 2019-01-31 at the Wayback Machine
- Joseph Priestley, Biography by Britannica
- Lectures on History and General Policy; to Which is Prefixed, an Essay on a Course of Liberal Education for Civil and Active Life
- Online books by Joseph Priestley, provided by the Library of University of Pennsylvania
- Organizing Your Social Sciences Research Paper: Reviewing Collected Essays, by libguides Archived 2019-01-31 at the Wayback Machine
- Organizing Your Social Sciences Research Paper: Writing a Speech, by ultius
- People: Joseph Priestley – facts, information, pictures, by encyclopedia
