XVII TECHNICAL EDUCATION 435 



happy to say, remains, and which I am very proud 

 of is purely honorary ; and, if it appeared to me 

 to be right to criticise that department with mer- 

 ciless severity, the Lord President, if he were in- 

 clined to resent my proceedings, could do nothing 

 more than dismiss me. Therefore you may believe 

 that I speak with absolute impartiality. My im- 

 pression is this, not that it is faultless, nor that it 

 has not various defects, nor that there are not 

 sundry lacunce, which want filling up ; but that, if 

 we consider the conditions under which the depart- 

 ment works, we shall see that certain defects are 

 inseparable from those conditions. People talk of 

 the want of flexibility of the Department, of its 

 being bound by strict rules. Now, will any man 

 of common sense who has had anything to do with 

 the administration of public funds or knows the 

 humour of the House of Commons on these mat- 

 ters will any man who is in the smallest degree 

 acquainted with the practical working of State 

 departments of any kind, imagine that such a 

 department could be other than bound by minutely 

 defined regulations ? Can he imagine that the 

 work of the department should go on fairly and in 

 such a manner as to be free from just criticism, 

 unless it were bound by certain definite and fixed 

 rules ? I cannot imagine it. 



The next objection of importance that I have 

 heard commonly repeated is that the teaching is 

 too theoretical, that there is insufficient practical 

 teaching. I venture to say that there is no one 



