1- 



SCHOOLS. 



sciIOOIA 



314 



uixUr mxtrr. The dif]naing pownr then which the court hu often 

 amnvd. aa shown in ome instances above mentioned, remains u it 

 WM; that U, it doe* not exist at all. 



n a grammar-school shall hare been nude into another kind of 

 school under the provisions of thin act, it U till to be coiwidered a 

 gnmuiar-tchool. and subject to the jurisdiction uf the ordinary an 

 heretofore. 



In case there shall be in any city, town, or place, any grammar- 

 school or grammar-school* with insufficient revenues, they may be 

 united, with the consent of the visitor, patron, and governor of evcry_ 

 school to be affected thereby. The legal meaning of city and town 

 (township) is sufficiently precise, but " place " baa no legal meaning, 

 and the framers of the act have forgotten to give it one in their -.'tli 

 section, which treats of the construction of terms in that act. 



The court U also empowered ( 14) to enlarge the powers of those 

 who have " authority by way of visitation or otherwise in respect of 

 the disclipine of any grammar-school ; " and where no authority by 

 way of visitation is vested in any known person, the bishop of the 

 dioone may apply to the Court of Chancery, stating the facts, and the 

 court may, if it so think fit, give the bishop liberty to visit and regu- 

 late the said school in respect of the discipline, but not otherwise. 

 This provision, for various reasons, will prove completely inoperative. 



The act gives a summary remedy against masters who hold the 

 premises of any grammar-school after dismissal, or after ceasing to be 

 masters. Such masters are to bn turned out in like manner aa is pro- 

 vided in the case of other persons holding over, by the Act of the 1 & 

 2 Viet., entitled " An Act to facilitate the Recovery of Possession of 

 Tenements after due Determination of the Tenancy." 



All applications to the court under this act may be (not mittt) made 

 by petition only, and such petitions are to be presented, heard, and 

 determined according to the provisions of the 52 Geo. III. c. 101. 



The act saves the rights of the ordinary. It is also declared not to 

 extend " to the universities of Oxford or Cambridge, or to any college 

 ft ball within the same, or to the university of London, or to any 

 colleges connected therewith, or to the university of Durham, or to the 

 colleges of St. David's or St. Bees, or the grammar-schools of West- 

 minster, Kton. Winchester, Harrow, Charter-House, Rugby, Merchant 

 Tailors', St. Paul's, Christ's Hospital, Birmingham, Manchester, or 

 Macclesfield, or Lor, th, or such schools as form port of any cathedral 

 or collegiate church." But the exemption does not extend to the 

 grammar-schools of which the universities of Oxford or Cambridge, or 

 the colleges and halls within the same, are trustees, though these 

 schools were exoepted from the Commissioners' inquiry by the 5 & 6 

 Wm. IV. c. 71. 



It appears from the rules of many grammar-schools that religious 

 instruction according to the principles of the Church of Eng! 

 established at the l'i formation, is a part of the instruction which the 

 founder contemplated ; and when nothing is said about religious 

 instruction, it is probable that it wag always the practice to give such 

 instruction in grammar-schools. That it was part of the discipline of 

 such schools before the Reformation cannot be doubted, and there is 

 no reason why it should have ceased to be so after the Reformation, as 

 v, ill presently appear. It is generally asserted that in every grammar- 

 school religious instruction uL-lit to be given, and according to the 

 tenet* of the Church of England ; and that no person can undertake 

 the office of schoolmaster in a grammar-school without the licence of 

 the ordinary. This latter question was argued in the cose of Rex r. 

 the Archbishop of York. (6 ' T. R.,' 400.) A mandamus was directed 

 to the archbishop directing him to license R. \V. to teach in the 

 grammar-school at Skipton, in the county of York. The return of 

 the archbishop was that the licensing of schoolmasters belongs to the 

 archbishops and bishops of England ; that R. W. had refused to be 

 examined ; and he relied as well on the ancient canon law aa upon the 

 canons confirmed in 1603 by James I. (' The Constitutions and Canons 

 Ecclesiastical,' " Schoolmaster," 77, 78, 79.) The return was allowed ; 

 and consequently it was determined that the ordinary has power to 

 license all schoolmasters, and not merely masters of grammar-schools. 

 As to schoolmasters generally, the practice is discontinued, and 

 probably it is not always observed in the case of masters of grammar- 

 schools. 



From the terms of this licence it appears that the master of every 

 school who U licensed by the ordinary must be a member of the 

 Church of England, and mutt take the oath and make the subscriptions 

 and declarations which are recited in the licence. 



It is a common notion that the master of a grammar-school must be 

 a graduate of Oxford or Cambridge, and in holy orders, and such is the 

 present practice ; but it is by no means always the case that the rules 

 of endowed schools require the master to be in holy orders. The 

 founders seem generally to have considered this a matter of indif- 

 ference ; but many of them provided that if the master was in orders, 

 or took orders, he should not at least encumber himself with the cure 

 of souls. The principle clearly was, that the master of a grammar- 

 school should devote himself solely to that work ; and it was a good 

 principle. The Court of Chancery has in various cases ordered that 

 the master should be a clergyman, where the founder has not BO 

 ordered. Dean Colet, the founder of St. Paul's School, London, 

 ordered by his statute* that neither of the masters of that school, if in 

 orders, nor the chaplain, shall have any benefice with cure or 



which may hinder the business of the school. He appointed a chaplain, 

 to the school, thereby appearing to intend that the religious instruction 

 nhould not be given by the masters of grammar, who would be fully 

 employed otherwise. 



It has sometimes been doubted whether a master of a grammar- 

 school could hold ecclesiastical preferment with it If the founder 

 has not forbidden this, there is no rule of law whic !> pre\ mta him. If 

 the holding of the two offices should cause him to neglect the duties 

 of either, the remedy is just the same as if he neglected either of his 

 offices for any other cause. 



Many grammar-schools are only free to the children of a particular 

 parish, or of some particular parishes; but this privilege has occa- 

 sionally been extended to a greater surface, as in the case of Tnnbridge 

 -.!,.-!.' Some ore free to all persons, which is the case with some of 

 King Edward VI.'s endowments. Sometimes the number of free boys 

 is limited, but the master U allowed to take pay scholars, either by 

 usage or by the founder's rules. At present the practice is for masters 

 of grammar-schools to take boarders if they choose, but in some cases 

 the number is limited. Abuses undoubtedly have arisen from the 

 practice of the master taking boarders, and the children of the parish 

 or township for which the school was intended have been neglected or 

 led to quit the school sometimes in consequence of the head master 

 being solely intent on having a profitable boarding school. But in 

 most cases the school has benefited by the master taking boarders ; 

 and this has frequently been the only means by which the school has 

 been able to maintain itself as a grammar-school. When the situation 

 has been a good one, an able master has often been found willing to 

 take a grammar-school with a house, and a small salary attached to it, 

 in the hope of making up a competent income by boarders. As this 

 can only be effected by the master's care and diligence in teaching, a 

 small neighbourhood has thus frequently enjoyed the advantage of its 

 grammar-school, which otherwise would have been lost. 



Endowments for education are probably nearly as old as endowments 

 for the support of the church. Before the Reformation there were 

 schools connected with many religious foundations, and then U.TO 

 also many private endowments for education. Perhaps one of the 

 oldest schools of which anything is known is the school of Canterbury. 

 Theodore, who was consecrated archbishop of Canterbury in t>68 (ac- 

 cording to some authorities), founded a school or college by licence 

 from the pope. This school certainly existed for a long time ; and 

 there is a record of a suit before the Archbishop of Canterbury in 

 1321, between the rector of the grammar-schools of the city (supposed 

 to be Theodore's school or its representative) and the rector of St. 

 Martin's, who kept a school in right of the church. The object of the 

 Hiiit was to limit the rector of St. Martin's in the number of his 

 scholars. This school probably existed till the Reformation, at least 

 this is the time when the present King's school at Canterbury was 

 established by Henry VIII. , and probably on the ruiun of the old 

 school. Before the Reformation schools were also romnrtcd with 

 chantries, and it was the duty of the priest to teach the children 

 grammar and singing. There are still various indications of this con- 

 nection between schools and religious foundations in the fact that some 

 schools are still, or were till lately, kept in the church, or in a building 

 which was port of it. There are many schools still in existence which 

 were founded before the Reformation, but a very great number were 

 founded immediately after that event, and one professed object of 

 king Edward VI. in dissolving the chantries and other religious founda- 

 tions then existing was for the purpose of establishing grammar schools, 

 as appears from the recital of the act for that purpose (1 Ed. VI. 

 c. 14.) [CHANTRY.] 



Though the act was much abused, the king did found a considerable 

 number of schools, now commonly called King Edward's Schools, out 

 of tithes that formerly belonged to religious houses or chantry lands ; 

 and many of these schools, owing to the improved value of their pro- 

 perty, are now among the richest foundations of the kind in England. 

 In these, as in many other grammar-schools, a certain number of per- 

 sons were incorporated as trustees and governors, and provision was 

 made for a master and usher. At that time the endowments varied 

 in annual value from twenty to thirty and forty pounds per annum. 



A large proportion of the grammar-schools were founded iu the 

 reigns of Edward VI. and Elizabeth, and there is no doubt that the 

 desire to give complete ascendancy to the tenets of the Reformed 

 Church was a motive which weighed strongly with many of the 

 founders. Since the reign of Elizabeth we find grammar-schools occa- 

 sionally established, but less frequently, while endowments for schools 

 not grammar-schools have gradually increased so as to be much more 

 numerous than the old school*. Foundations of the latter kind are 

 Mill made by the bounty of individuals froui time to time ; and an 

 Act of Parliament (2 & 3 Wm. IV. c. 115) bos made it lawful to give 

 money by will for the establishing of Roman Catholic schools. By the 

 23 Viet, c. 11, passed in 1860, the trustees of grammar-schools in 

 England and Wales are empowered (except those mentioned in the 

 3 & 4 Viet., c. 77, those in connection with the National Society, those 

 maintained by private subscription, and those where the endowment 

 does not expressly demand conformity to certain religious doctrines) to 

 frame orders for securing the admission of children whose parent* are 

 not in communion with the denomination or sect of which the doc- 

 re taught in the school. The statute of the 9th Geo. II. c. 36, 



