of exhibiting the actual increase of schools, and of
pupils throughout the state; for, in 1798, there were
in all but twenty-three counties organized, and
therefore only seven which did not report. But, in
1828, there were fifty-five counties, divided into seven
hundred and forty-two towns and wards, and eight
thousand two hundred and ninety-eight school dis-
tricts, containing four hundred and forty-one thou-
sand eight hundred and fifty-six children. It is true,
there are other causes besides the inherent efficacy of
the system, which should be regarded in accounting
for the rapid increase of schools and pupils. The
new counties formed subsequently to 1798, were set-
tled chiefly by emigrants from New-England, who
brought with them, as an essential part of their
existence, a habit of regarding universal education in
common public schools, as among the primary objects
for which laws are to be enacted. And when the
system had been once established, it is easy to see
that its operation upon the minds of new companies
of such emigrants, must be to determine them to select
the state which had made this munificent provision
for that, which they consider as one of the first wants
of their nature, to be their permanent abode, in pre-
ference to another, where no such allurement was
held out, whatever might otherwise be the physical
superiority of the latter. Thus we see, that the sys-
tem of common schools has reacted, in turn, in favour
of population, and consequently in favour of wealth
and of power. physical, moral, and political.