Critiques and Addresses

e following pages partake of that nature, will be dispelled, if he reflect that they cannot be published[1] until after the day on which the rate

seemed to him to be the public interest, to send an extract from this article to the newsp

hodman won his wager, but as the stakes were handed over, the challenger wistfully remarked, "I'd great hopes of falling at the third round from the top." And, in view of the work and the worry which awaits the members of t

may not be an actual, colleague, and to others who may be interested in this most important problem-how to get the Education Act to wor

d if so, it would seem that the first step towards this very desirable end is, to obtain a clear notion of what that letter signifies, and what that spirit implies; or, in other words, what the clauses of the Act are intended to

turally be expected, under two heads: the one set relating to the subject-matter of education; the other to

teenth, the sixteenth, and the ninety-seventh. Of these, the seventh, the fourteenth, and the ninety-seventh deal with the subject-matter of education, while the sixteenth defines the nature of the relations which are to exist be

ducation Department may declare the School Board to be, and such Board shall accordingly be deemed to be, a Board in default, and the Education Department may proceed accordingly; and every act, or

in contravention of, or have failed to comply with, the said regulations, the matter

But I am led to believe that the Legislature has, in the present instance, deliberately taken this power out of the hands of the judges and lodged it in those of the Minister of Education, who, in accordance with our method of making Ministers, will necessarily be a political partisan, and who may be a strong theological sectary into the bargain. And I am informed by members of Parliament who watc

er, eminently likely to use these powers justly and wisely, but who also may be quite the reverse. I merely wish to draw attention to the fact that such powers are given to the Ministe

conditions required to be fulfilled by an elementary s

ars from the following clauses

inutes of the Education Department in force for the time being…. Provided that no such minute of the Education Department, not in force at the time

en together; and as it may be assumed, without much risk of error, that a constant pressure will be exerted by the ratepayers on the members who represent them, to get as much out of the Government, and as little out of the rates, as po

e it-and there will be no sort of check upon these revisions and counter-revisions, except the possibility of a Parliamentary debate, when the revised, or added, minutes are laid upon the table. What chance is there that any such debate will take place on a matter of detail relating to element

pearance, but not the reality, of freedom of action, in regard to

certain candidates whose names have never before been heard of in connection with education, and who are either sectarian partisans, or nothing. In my own particular division, a body organized ad hoc is moving heaven and earth to get the seven seats filled by seven gentlemen, four of who

ary which is distinctive of any particular

shonouring to a number of worthy persons, if it had not been for a leading arti

the editor is good enough to deal with a writer who must, in many ways, be so objectionable to him as myself. I quote the following passages from a leading article on a letter of mine, t

ular-intelligible enough, but in the consideration of public opinion simply impossible-and there was the vague impracticable idea, which Mr. Gladstone thoroughly tore to pieces, of enacting that the teaching of all schoolmasters in the new schools should be strictly 'undenominational.' The Cowper-Temple clause was, we repeat, proposed simply to tide over the difficulty. It was to satisfy the Nonconformists and the 'unsectarian,' as distinct from the secular party of the League, by forbidding all distinctive 'catechisms and formularies,' which might have the effect of openly assigning the schools to this or that religious body. It refused, at the same ti

y takes great pains to prove, there is no theological teaching which is not opposed by some sect or other, from Roman Catholicism on the one hand to Unitarianism on the other. It was not, perhaps, hard to see that this difficulty would be started; and to those who, like Professor Huxley, look at it theoretically, without much practical experience of schools, it may appear serious or unanswerable. But there is very little in it practically; when it is faced determinately and handled firmly, it will soon shrink into its true dimensions. The class who are least frightened at it are the school-teachers, simply because they know most about it. It is quite clear that the school-managers must be cautioned against allowing their schools to be made places of proselytism: but when this is done, the case is simple enough

nificance of the opinions expressed in the foregoing extract by th

rovisions of the Act) any religious formulary common to any two denominations anywhere in England to be taught in such schools; and if practically the limit could not be so extended, but would have to be fixed according to the special circumstances of each district, then what degree of general acceptance in a district would exempt such a formulary from the prohibition? The answer to this was as

ngly be so decided by the Education Department in case of dispute, I was informed in explanation that 'their lordships'' letter was intended to convey to me that no general rule, beyond that

yet be in many cases both lawful and expedient

ing, Novemb

but I cannot help thinking that I do not misrepresent him, when I say that he also thinks "that it may yet be, i

oiling so hard for seats in the London School Board have the lively hope of the gentleman from Steyning, that it may be "both lawful and e

view for Nov. 19, 1870, completely justifies this anticipation of the line of action which the

in effect be restored to its original form, and the majority of the ratepayers in

s of the Board, and seems to anticipate "accusations of dishonesty." If any of the members of t

emplations of the violent struggles of so many excellent persons, is cause

the Education Department to settle that dispute? And if so, do they suppose that any Minister of Education, who wants to keep his place, will tighten boundaries which the Legislature has left loose; and will give a "final decision" which shall be offensive to every Unitarian and to every Jew in the House of Commons, besides creating a precedent which will afterwards be used to the injury of every Nonconformist? The edito

ng undenominational must be sternly resisted." There speaks the advocate holding a brief for his party. "Verily," as Trinculo says, "the monster hath two mouths:" the one, the forward mouth, tells us very justly that the teaching cannot "honestly" be "distinctly denominational;" but the other, the backward mouth, asserts that it must by no manner of means be "undenominational." Putting the two utterances together, I can only interpret the

ing will be illegal. "According to a well-known rule of interpreting Acts of Parliament, 'denom

rmulary which is distinctive of any par

gree upon among themselves, forced into the elementary schools; while the other has obtained a formal declaration from the Education Department that any such attempt will contravene the Act of Pa

s being referred to him:-"I have the fullest confidence that in the reading and explaining of the Bible, what the children will be taught will be the great truths of Christian life and condu

f influence. And, from many circumstances, this is especially likely to be the case with the London School Board, which, if it conducts itself wisely, may become a true educational parliament, as subordinate in authority to the Minister of Education, theoretically, as the Le

ve to every child under its influence, and for which it should try to obtain the aid of the Parliamentary

rill, as part of the regul

odged, badly housed, badly fed, and live from one year's end to another in bad air, without chance of a change. They have no play-grounds; they amuse themselves with marbles and chuck-farthing, instead of cricket or hare-a

ls; and a year or two ago, when I had an opportunity of inspecting these schools, I was greatly struck with the effect of such training upon the poor little waif

d. Parliament has already done something in this direction, by declining to be an accomplice in the asphyxiation of school children. It refuses to make any grant to a school in which the cubical contents of the school-room are inadequate to allow of proper respiration. I should like to see it make another step in the same directi

o is to catch him and get him quietly to face his trainer; to know his voice and bear his hand; to learn that colts have something else to do with their heels than to kick them up whenever they feel s

mare, has been always tender over him, and never came home drunk and kicked him in her life; while the man-colt is inspired by that very real devil, perverted manhood, and his mother may have

ally of girls, in the elements of household work and of domestic economy; in the fi

t a poor Frenchwoman would make the money which the wife of a poor Englishman spends in food go twice as far, and at the same time turn out twice as palatable a dinner. Why Englishmen, who are so notoriously fond of good living, should be so h

ts of decency and order; and it is a mercy if she does not turn up her nose at anything like the mention of an honest and proper economy. Thousands of young girls are said to starve, or worse, ye

end to a state of things which is demoralizing the poor, while it is

ture life, to fit himself into that organization, or be crushed by it. To this end it is surely needful, not only that they should be made acquainted with the elementary laws of conduct, but that their affections should be trained

favour of that particular kind of conduct which we call good, seems to me to be something quite beyond mere science. And I cannot but think that it, together with the awe and reverence, which have

n, religion; so do I conceive it to be a most lamentable and mischievous error, that the scienc

falsely so called;" though I may be permitted to express the belief that if the Apostle to whom that much misapplied phrase is due could make

ecially to mankind, are capable of being ascertained, either inductively or deductively, or by both processes. A

eal defined by moral science would claim equal if not superior rights. For suppose theology established the existence of an evil deity-and some theologies, even Christian ones, have come very near this,-is the religiou

on the one hand and that of theology on the other. But I believe it to be altogether true, and very needful, at th

hing on the other. And both parties seem to me to be not only hopelessly wrong, but in such a position that if either succeeded comple

name of religion; while the "secularists" have unwisely and wrongfully admitted the assumption of their opponents, and demand the

t has become of the original of that description, and there is no need to increase the number of those who imitate him successfully without being aided by the rates. And if I were compelled to choose for one of my own children, between a school in which real religious instruction is given, and one without it, I should prefer the former, e

hat it was intended that such Bible-reading should be permitted, unless good cause for prohibiting it could be shown, I do not see what reason there is for opposing that wish. Certainly, I, individually, could with no shadow of consistency oppose the teaching of the children of other people to do that

as a sensible lay-teacher would do, if left to himself, all that it is not desirable for children to occupy themselves with; and there still remains in this old literature a vast residuum of moral beauty and grandeur. And then consider the great historical fact that, for three centuries, this book has been woven into the life of all that is best and noblest in English history; that it has become the national epic of Britain, and is as familiar to noble and simple, from John-o'-Groat's House to Land's End, as Dante and Tasso once were to the Italians; that it is written in the noblest and purest English, and abounds in exquisite beauties of

what this is, the teacher would do well not to go beyond the precise words of the Bible; for if he does, he will, in the first place, undertake a task beyond his strength, seeing that all the Jewish and Christian sects have been at work upon that subject for more than

reading, writing, and arithmetic; and it will be a great matter to teach reading so completely that the act shall have become easy and pleasant. If reading remains "

already exists. The Science and Art Department, the operations of which have already attained considerable magnitude, not only offers to examine and pay the results of such examination in elementary science and art, but it provides what is still more important, viz. a means of giving children of high natural ability, who are just as abundant among the poor as among the rich, a helping hand. A good old proverb tells us that "One should not take a razor to cut a block:" the razor is soon spoiled, and the block is not so well cut as it would be with a hatchet. But it is worse economy to prevent a possible Watt fro

effected in the time during which the children will remain at school; and,

science and art no one can doubt who has tried the experiment properly. And if Bible-reading is not accompanied by constraint and solemnity, as if it were a sacramental operation, I do not believe there is anything in which children take more pleasure. At least I know that some of the pleasantest recollections of my childhood are connected with the voluntary study of an ancient Bible which belonged to my grandmother. There were splendid pictures in it, to be sure; but I recollect little or nothing about them save a portrait of the high pr

own devices, may be deeply interested in the Bible, and draw sound moral sustenance from it. And I rejoice that I was left to deal with the Bible alone; for if I had had some theological "explainer" at my side, he might have tried, as such do, to

ng that science and art teaching is already provided for; and, secondly, that if they are not, it may be well for the educational parliament to

at which may be so applied given to help the poor, who cannot pay for education, or does it virtually subsidize the comparatively rich, who can? How are Christ's Hospital and Alleyn's foundation securing their right purposes, or how far are they perverted into