108 A LIBERAL EDUCATION; rv 



If I am justified in my conception of the ideal 

 of a liberal education ; and if what I have said 

 about the existing educational institutions of the 

 country is also true, it is clear that the two have 

 no sort of relation to one another ; that the best of 

 our schools and the most complete of our uni- 

 versity trainings give but a narrow, one-sided, and 

 essentially illiberal education while the w6rst give 

 what is really next to no education at all. The 

 South London Working-Men's College could not 

 copy any of these institutions if it would ; I am 

 bold enough to express the conviction that it ought 

 not if it could. 



For what is wanted is the reality and not the 

 mere name of a liberal education ; and this College 

 must steadily set before itself the ambition to be 

 able to give that education sooner or later. At 

 present we are but beginning, sharpening our 

 educational tools, as it were, and, except a 

 modicum of physical science, we are not able to 

 offer much more than is to be found in an ordinary 

 school. 



Moral and social science one of the greatest 

 and most fruitful of our future classes, I hope at 

 present lacks only one thing in our programme, 

 and that is a teacher. A considerable want, no 

 doubt ; but it must be recollected that it is much 

 better to want a teacher than to want the desire to 

 learn. 



Further, we need what, for want of a better 



