The Stourbridge Observer, Cradley Heath, Halesowen & District Chronicle.
Stourbridge, West Midlands, England, 1880-03-20 00:00:00

SMALL-PDX IN LONDON.

In the House of Commons, on Monday evening,
Dr. L. Play fair asked the President of the Local
Government Board whether he had observed that
small•pox was increasing in the metropolis, though
not in the other large towns of the kingdom; and if
he were satisfied that the arrangements for public
vaccination were efficiently carried out in the various
districts of L mdon,
Mr. Sclater•Buoth : It is the case that since the
early part of this year there has been a slight increase
in the number of the eases of smallpox in the Metro.
politan district, but that increase has been reported
from four or five parishes only. At present there is
no increase in the number of eases in the asylum
hospitals, and from the returns of the het three or
four weeks it does not appear that the disease is on
the increase. I should like to refer the right hon.
gentleman to the reports of one of the inspectors of
the metropolis on this question. He enters very care-
fully into the statistics of the last two epidemics of
small-pox, and I think the report throws a good deal of
light on the special circumstances of the spread where
it has taken place. I have no reason whatever to be
dissatisfied with the care and attention which is die.
played in the vaccination arrangements for Linden,
though there is no doubt that they are not so satis-
factory as in the kingdom generally. This, no doubt,
is accounted for by the shifty character of the popu-
lation, but I am making arrangements to see if some
Improvements cannot be made in the arrangements.

Mr. W. E. FORSTER, M. P., on SECULAR
and RELIGIOUS EDUCATION,
On Monday the night Hon. W. Z. Forster, M.P., laid the
memorial stone of la new Sunday School attached to the
Wesleyan Chapel at Tottenham. In the course of his speech
on the occasion, Mr. Forster said—
I am very glad to have had something to do with
the carrying of the Act of Parliament which Mr.
o‘ilvie said, among other advantages, has made Sun-
day-school work less laborious. When I first began
to be interested in education a very large propor•
tion of the working men who were able to read and
write had attained that knowledge in Sunday.
schools. It surprises me now to think how they
could have done it, but such was the case. It must
have been a difficult thing to teach a boy or girl
to read and write in the Sunday-school. Well, it
was a blessing that they were taught, but the
result was that instead of giving them a religious
knowledge, impressing on them the truths of the Bible,
the teachers had to give up their time aotnally to
teaching the alphabet. But now we have managed to
make some progresa in educational work, and in a short
time there will be hardly a boy or a girl in this king-
dom who will not be able to read and write, That is a
great gain, but do not let us overrate its value.
cation, mere secular eduoation, makes men and women
stronger, but it does not make theta better. It gives
them greater power over nature ; it gives them
more power to resist their fellow men if they
wish to tyrannise over them, and it perhaps
diminishes the probability of crime, because it teaches
them how foolish crime is from its immediate
punishment ix this world, But it does not necessarily
make them less vicious, audit does not give them more
power to govern themselves or to resist temptations.
Therefore I have always held that in connection with
secular there ought to be religious education. There
are differences of opinion on that point, and there
are those who have a higher claim to speak on
religions matters than I have who take a different
view from that which I do, and who wish to have the
separation between secular and religious educatien
more completely defined. Well, those wb,o agree
with me, and those who differ from me in this
respect, agree in the immense advantage and, in fact,
the absolute necessity of Sanday-schooli as the com-
plement of secular day schools. (Rear, hear.) I Faye
been speaking of the advantages of Sunday schools to
the scholars. One word as to 610 advantage to the
teachers. All praise is due to them for the sacrifice
that they make. But that sacrifice is Its own reward,
' It teaches many a young man and many a young
woman in their early youth to do something for theft!
fellows and to recognise that one of the greatest
duties they have to perform is to help others in the
best way they can, . . .