Education a National Concern. 565 



tion in societj r , are all subjects worth as much labour and inquiry to that 

 great body, as a little Latin learnt in a very imperfect manner, with some 

 scraps of Greek to boot, the usual stinted course of most of our grammar- 

 schools. Ancient learning is a noble and beautiful temple, but which is not 

 to be profaned by these rude and hasty intrusions. If antiquity is to be 

 studied, let it be in the mind as well as in the words of antiquity. Nor is 

 their religious training much better managed than in the elementary schools. 

 The ' Alphabet learning' of the Sacred Writ, the superstitious preference of 

 letter to spirit, continues to prevail. Of the discipline of some of the higher 

 I forbear to speak. The discipline there pursued, which astonishes other 

 nations, has at last roused ours. High-schools are beginning to appear be- 

 side our great public schools ; not only pointing out the better way, but 

 gradually winning to it, or forcing to it by competition, these public schools 

 themselves. The London University, now University College School, the 

 Proprietary College at Bristol, the High-school of the corporation of London, 

 that about to be opened at Liverpool, with numerous other foundations ema- 

 nating from the same desire, and the same just appreciation of true education, 

 all intimate that the tide is far more advanced than we could calculate, from 

 the old endowments of the country. Nor are these endowments themselves 

 without feeling in some degree the same influences. 



"We have no grounds to dread the future. It is impossible, in this great 

 industrial community, with mind at work in all its modifications around us, 

 that sooner or later every class should not require supply for its own especial 

 necessities in education ; and, having felt the desire, should not seek and soon 

 find the best means which civilisation can furnish for its gratification. 



"But the great defect of English education, to which most of its injurious 

 and inefficient working may be traced, is the total want of a national organ- 

 isation. There is not, as in all Continental countries, a Minister and Council 

 of Instruction ; nor, as in Scotland, a General Assembly ; nor, as in Ireland, 

 a Board of Education. It forms the one great exception to the entire civilised 

 world. The result is not of such a nature as to make us much in love with 

 the cause. It could easily be shown that the voluntary system of public 

 instruction, with no central power to guide, aid, or control, has not only not 

 worked well, but worked nearly as ill as any system well could. Every sort 

 of .antic has been played ; all sorts of empiricism been permitted ; immense 

 waste of time, money, and labour, often, too, of the most admirable zeal 

 and the best intentions, with the most miserable, if not injurious, results. 

 It is not so much funds which are required as knowledge. Twenty or thirty 

 thousand pounds distributed between rival societies will not perform the 

 miracle. If the state is to touch our public schools at all, she must do it 

 through a proper department. No more grants, or a minister and council 

 through which they are to come. But such has been the whole of our legis- 

 lation. We give functions long before we dream of the organisation through 

 which they are to be exercised ; and for every act we start some petty expedi- 

 ent machinery for the day, the worst usually which could be devised. Not a 

 step should be attempted before this be done. Once we have got good in- 

 struments to work with, we can work well. Normal schools, model schools, 

 books, buildings, all should follow, not precede. System is nothing but 

 simplifying the complicated, rendering the difficult easy, extending the 

 restricted, making what we give good, and making the good common to all. 

 Why should it be rejected ? Difficulties there may be, but none which good 

 sense and strong will may not beat down. There is no possible reason why 

 Government, in the case of England, should not act as in the case of Ireland. 

 Is a Home Secretary here, of shorter arm and poorer courage than a Chief 

 Secretary there ? a ' Letter of Instructions' may fairly anticipate an ' Act of 

 Parliament/ What we want is the organisation. We will take it even as an 

 experiment, and for the legislative sanction consent to wait. 



" A Board of Education for England, another for Scotland, a third for Ire- 



