299% on sehoolmaster’s salaries. 255 
Literature is thus carried to a very high degree of perfec- 
tion; nor do we hear any complaints of the lownefs of 
the salaries. This example is so applicable to the case in 
question, as to require no farther comment. 
*“ Let us now consider the effects of the alteration pro- 
posed in another light. Would the expence of education, 
in general, be augmented or diminithed thereby ? that is, 
would the teaching fees be more moderate than at present, 
or the reverse? It cannot be supposed that they would be 
lower.—To a poor man, a small matter is an object of 
much greater consequence than to one who is rich. In 
the first case, a man might value a fhi#ling so highly, as to 
think it no inadequate recompence for his care in teaching 
a boy for a quarter of an year; and for fear of losing that 
small emolument, he would do nothing that might justly 
forfeit the esteem of his parents. In the last, it would 
appear such a trifle, as to call forth no exertions on the 
part of the teacher ; so that when such fees were offered, 
the boys would be neglected, and the parents despised; 
and the same care that is now bestowed for a fhilling, 
could ‘not then be commanded, perhaps, for a crown.— 
Instead, therefore, of rendering the acquisition of learning 
more easy than now, 7f the incumbents themselves were to 
teach, it would necefsarily make it become more expen- 
sive ; and thus, would frustrate the avowed intention of 
the petition, that of rendering education in Scotland cheap, 
and bringing learning within the reach of the poor inhabi- 
tants. 
“ The teaching of youth is in all cases a laborious tafk, to 
which none will ever submit, uadefr they find their profits to 
ancrease with their industry. The profits of teaching, there- 
fore, must be, to every one who effectually engages in this 
tafk, an object of great consequence.x—To afk whether. 
a small fee will be an object of greater importance to one 
