16 REPORT—1885. 
knowledge. Professional faculties are absolutely essential to the existence 
of universities in poor countries like Scotland and Ireland. This has 
been the case from the early days of the Bologna University up to the 
present time. Originally universities arose not by mere bulls of popes, 
but as a response to the strong desire of the professional classes to dignify 
their crafts by real knowledge. If their education had been limited to 
mere technical schools like the Medical School of Salerno which flourished 
in the eleventh century, length but not breadth would have been given to 
education. So the universities wisely joined culture to the professional 
sciences. Poor countries like Scotland and Ireland must have their 
academic systems based on the professional faculties, although wealthy 
universities like Oxford and Cambridge may continue to have them as 
mere supplements to a more general education. A greater liberality 
of support on the part of the State in the establishment of chairs of 
science, for the sake of science and not merely for the teaching of the 
professions, would enable the poorer universities to take their part in the 
advancement of knowledge. 
T have already alluded to the foundation of new colleges in different 
parts of the kingdom. Owens College has worthily developed into the 
Victoria University. Formerly she depended for degrees on the 
University of London. No longer will she be like a moon reflecting cold 
and sickly rays from a distant ]uminary, for in future she will be a sun, 
a centre of intelligence, warming and illuminating the regions around her. 
The other colleges which have formed themselves in large manufacturing 
districts are remarkable expressions from them that science must be 
promoted. Including the colleges of a high class, such as University 
College and King’s College in London, and the three Queen’s Colleges in 
Ireland, the aggregate attendance of students in colleges without university 
rank is between nine and ten thousand, while that of the universities is 
fifteen thousand. No doubt some of the provincial colleges require 
considerable improvement in their teaching methods; sometimes they 
unwisely aim ata full university curriculum when it would be better for 
them to act as faculties. Still they are all growing in the spirit of self- 
help, and some of them are destined, like Owens College, to develop into 
nniversities. This is not a subject of alarm to lovers of education, 
while it is one of hope and encouragement to the great centres of 
industry. There are too few autonomous universities in England in 
proportion to its population. While Scotland, with a population 
of 33 millions, has four universities with 6,500 students, England, 
with 26 millions of people, has only the same number of teaching 
universities with 6,000 students. Unless English colleges have such 
ambition, they may be turned into mere mills to grind out material for 
examinations and competitions. Higher colleges should always hold 
before their students that knowledge, for its own sake, is the only object 
worthy of reverence. Beyond college life there is a land of research 
flowing with milk and honey for those who know how to cultivate it. 
