The Northern Daily Times.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1853-10-28 00:00:00

STATE OF TRADE IN MANCHESTER.

THURSDAY.—Since Tuesday the market has increased in
dullness, and all descriptions of cloth and yarn are heavy, and
difficult of sale, except at a reduction upon Tuesday's prices.
Buyers are operating only for immediate wants, and their
purchasers are confined to very small parcels. Both for export
and home consumption very little is doing, and even with the
decreased production of yarn and cloth, as stocks are accutnu-
lating in agents' hand; and but for the strike it is quite clear a
much lower range of prices would have taken place. Fine
caps are quoted considerably lower.

Mr. Rowland Hill calculates that the State loses,
by carrying newspapers, £30,000 a-year, while by car-
rying letters it gains £1,000,000 a-year.
A Roman Catholic priest who took part in the
last Sligo election, has been adjudged to pay a bill of £8
15s. for refreshments supplied to voters apparently under
hip duee~ivus. . _

MR. COBDEN ON NATIONAL EDUCATION
AND THE STRIKES IN THE MANU-

FACTURING DISTRICTS,

On Tuesday evening lasViir: Cobden presided at the re-
opening of the Barnsley Mechanics' Institution, and ad-
dressed a numerous and respectable audience.
• The President of the institution, and some other gentle-
men having addressed the meeting,
Mr. COBDEN rose, and was received with loud and long-
continued cheering, and commenced his speech by showing
that mechanics' institutions were originally intended, when
launched under the auspices of Dr. Birkbeck, to supply the
defects of early education to that class who, in former times,
had not had an opportunity of receiving such education.
Such being the case, it was not enough for them to draw
together a large- number of members in their lecture-room
or library, or to collect books, but one of the primary objects
of mechanics' institutions was, to enable young men, feeling
themselves deficient in some branch of knowledge, to join a
society where they could have the opportunity of repairing such
deficiency. They must, therefore, determine that their insti-
tution must be—what all mechanics' institutions w ere intended
to be—a means of instruction to the neglected adult popu-
lation. The hon. gentleman strongly urged the necessity of
the artisans in the manufacturing districts being instructed
in drawing and the art of designing, and therefore they
must connect with their institution a class for drawing.
Referring to the general question of education, the hon.
member said :—lf, in consequence of the advice given by our
friend Mr. Wilderspin, twenty years ago, there had been an
infant school established in every village, you would not
have wanted customers for your mechanics' institutions;
they would have grown up around you. And this brings me
to the question—leaving for a moment this institution—
what were these institutions established for ? Not as a
system of education, but to supplement the want of educa-
tion, and we want the education still which we wanted when
these institutions were founded. I know that it is made a
vexed question, and to some extent a party question. I
never regarded it as a party question. I don't care through
what it comes. Give me voluntary education, or State
education—but education I want. (Loud applause.) I
cannot accept statistics to prove the number of people who
attend schools—to prove that the people are educated, because
I cannot shut my eyes to what is evident to my senses,—that
the people are not educated,—that they are not being
educated. (Renewed applause.) I was talking only yester-
day. with a merchant in Manchester, who told me that he
had attended at the swearing in of the militia in one of the
largest manufacturing towns of England, and that not one-
half of those sworn in could read, and not one-third could
sign their names. (Hear, hear.) Now, without wishing to
utter any fanatical opinion with regard to the peace ques-
tion, I must say, with all sincerity, I think it would have
been much better to hand these young men over to the
schoolmaster, rather than to the drill-sergeant. (Hear, hear,
and laughter.) For I think the safety of this country would
be more promoted by teaching them to read and write, than
by teaching them to face about right rightly. (Laughter.)
I was talking this subject over to an old friend of mine at
Preston, and he said, I attended the coroner one day last
week at an inquest. There were 13 jurymen; five signed
their names, and eight made their mark." Can I shut my
eyes to what is going on around us ? I cannot, and there-
fore I say, we are not an educated people; and I say it is
our duty, and our safety calls upon us, to see that the
people are educated ; and I know of no place more
fitting to discuss this subject than in such a meet-
ing as this, because, I take it for granted, you are
all interested in it. You all admit the deficiency
of juvenile instruction, or you would not have attended
to the defective adult education. (Hear, hear.) We
are not an educated people, and I have no hesitation in
asserting that, in point of school learning, the mass of the
English people are the least instructed of any Protestant
community in the world. (" Shame !") I say that delibe-
rately. I remember quite well at the time of the Hungarian
emigration into this country after the revolution a very
distinguished minister or religious teacher of Hungary was
talking to me on the subject of our education, and I told him
a large portion of our people could neither read nor write.
He could not believe it, and said, " If it is true a large pro-
portion of your people can neither read nor write, how do
you maintain your constitutional franchises and your poli-
tical liberties ? Why, it is evident to me that your institu-
tions are rather ahead of your people, and that this self-
government is only a habit with you." It is a habit, and
we will cling to it and hold it ; hut I want a safer
foundation. I want to have our self-government a habit
of appreciation—something our people will be proud of,
and not simply a habit ; and there is no security unless it

is based upOi; a wider' intelligence of the people than we
meet with at the present moment. It meets us let every
turn—you can't do anything in social reform but you are
met with the question of education. Take the question of
sanitary reform. Why do people live in bad cellars, sur-
rounded by filth and disease ? Your may say it is their po-
verty; but their poverty ',comes as much from their igno-
rance as their vices; and their vices often spring from their
ignorance. (Applause.) The great mass of the people don't
know what the sanitary laws are ; they dont know that
ventilation is good, for health; they don't know that the
miasma of an wascavenged street or impure ally is productive
of cholera and Raise.... If they did know these things
people- would take care they Inhabited better houses uud
if people were only more careful in their habits than they
are, and husbanded their means, they might get into better
houses. (Hear, hear). And when I hear persons advocate
temperance, which I as one of the most temperate men in
the world, always like to hear advocated, I say the best way
is to afford them some other occupation or recreation than
that which is derived only through their senses—the best
way is to give them education. If the working man is
deprived of those recreations which consist of the intellectual
and moral enjoyments that education and good training
give,
indni gheneeen, naturally falls
into h
excitement
all
le excitement of
must
sensual
usf
thave.
(Hear, hear). Therefore, when you wish to make them
more temperate, and secure moral and sanitary and social
improvements among the working classes, education, depend
upon it, mast be at the bottom of it all. Gentlemen, I see
in different parts of the country a great social movement
going on between different classes of the community. For
instance, in the town of Preston you have 20,000 to 30,000
persons out of work, and there is in that place not a chimney
but is cold and cheerless—neither smoke nor steam cheering
your eyes. Look at the destitution and misery caused by
leaving a town in this state for a month or six weeks. Why
is this ? I answer it springs from ignoranCe. (Hear, hear).
Not ignorance confined to one party in the dispute. (Ap-
plause.) It is ignorance on both sides, and deplorable in its
result. But do you suppose that when the world becomes
more enlightened you will have such a scene as this, of a
whole community stopping its labours for a month or six
weeks, and creating misery, immorality, and destitution that
may not be removed for five or six years to come ? (Hear,
hear. When masters and men understand the prin-
ciples upon which the rate of wages and profits depend, they
will settle their matters and arrange their differences in a
less bungling way than that which now brings so much
Misery upon all parties to the quarrel. (Applause.) Even
now, however, we see great progress in this respect. I re-
member the time when the cessation of labour by 25,000
persons whould have led to riot & disturbanco, and the calling
out of the military. This is not to he seen now. (Hear, hear.)
We see passive resistance and firmness to an extent which,
if they had policy and propriety at their back, would be
highly desirable and most commendable. (Hear, hear.) But,
gentlemen, we shall probably live to see the time when
another step will be taken onward. You will live to see the
time when men will settle these matters, not by resorting
to blind passion, by vituperation, and counter-vituperation
—when the question of wages will be left to the master and
man to arrange according to their own interest—when the
whole question of wages and the rate of wages will be
settled just as quietly as you now see the price of any article
fixed in the public market. (Hear, hear.) They did not
find that people who went to market with cattle, potatoes, or
anything else, struck against the buyers of those cattle or
potatoes,. They did not find that the seller of the
cattle struck against the seller of the potatoes, and that
the buyers and the eaters of the potatoes stood quietly
by and sta. ma while the potatoes rotted. They
did not find men doing such things; but they found that it
was by the higgling of the market that they tranquilly
decided its price ; they thus fixed the price of the day, and
the whole thing was quietly settled without that irritation
and waste of property, without that misery and suffering,
which I consider most painful, and, as a sign of the
intelligence of the day, the most discreditable that
struggle between master and workpeople which is passing
in our time. (Applause.) I am not saying one word
of the merits of either side upon this question. Both
parties think themselves right, and -both are, no doubt,
right in attempting to get the best price they can, the one
for his labour, and the other for his capital ; but if there
were more intelligence upon this question—if the laws were
better understood which decide finally and inexorable the
relative value of labour as well as everything else, these
matters would be settled without that hideous amount of
suffering which I deplore to see accompanying these strikes
and troubles in the manufacturing. districts. (Applause.)
And when I say, gentlemen, that intelligence will put an
end to these things, I am only saying that will be done here
which has already been done in America. (Hear, hear.)
You cannot point to an instance in America, where people
have more education than they have here, of the total
cessation from labour of a whole community, of an entire
town :given over as a prey to destitution. (Hear, hear.)
You cannot point out such an instance in America ; neither
will you see it in England when that intelligence and
enlightenment which those institutions are intended to pro-
mote shall be spread throughout our country. (Loud ap
plause.) Well, gentlemen, this brings me back again to the
point that we want schools—schools to teach people these
principles— schools to teach people from their youth to take
a calm and reasoning view of the things which affect their
interest, and so to educate them that they shall not allow
others to lead them away by appeals to their passions.
(Applause.) We shall never be safe as a manufacturing
and mining community until a school invariably grows up
along with every manufactory, and at the mouth of every
pit and mine in the kingdom. (Loud applause.) Now,
gentlemen, I must here again allude to America, 'When /
came through Manchester the other day I found many of the
most influential manufacturing capitalists talking very
gravely upon a report which had reached them from a gne-
tleman who was selected by the Government to go out to
America to make a report upon the Great Exhibition in-New

York. That gentleman was one of the most eminent of
of tue mechanicians and machine-makers of Manchester,
employing a very large number of workpeople, renowned
for the quality of his productions, and known in the scien•
tific world, and whose scientific attainments were appre-
ciated from the Astronomer Royal downwards. He has
been over to New York to report upon the progress of me-
chanics and mechanical arts in the United States. Well,
he has returned. No report from him to the Government
has, as yet, been published, and what he has to say specifi-
cally upon the subject will not be known until that
report has been so made and published to the country.
But it has oozed out in Manchester amongst his neigh-
bours, that he has found in America a degree of
intelligence among the manufacturing operatives and a
state of things in the mechanical arts which have con-
vinced him that, if we are to hold our own—if we are
not to fall back in the rear in the race of nations—we
must educate:oar people so as to put them upon a level with
the more educated artisans of the United States. (Applause).
We shall all have an opportunity of judging of this matter
when that report is issued ; but sufficient has already oozed
out among his neighbours to excite a great interest, and,
I may say, some alarm. Well, I am delighted to find an
intelligent man has been selected for this duty, for all the
world will approve of the selection made, because the gentle-
man alluded to was fully competent to the task ; and he has
come back to tell us it is necessary to educate the people.
(Hear. hear). I went to that country 20 years ago, and I
published a record of my opinions. That was written in
1835, and I stated that England would be brought to the
consciousness that it was to that country she would have to
look with apprehension as to manufacturing rivalry ; and
now I am delighted that it should turn out as I have stated,
that it has come from a quarter—from a person so well
qualified to procure correct information that no one will
question the truth of his report when it comes out. I
say I am delighted, because I want England to know
her danger, if there is one. (Hear, hear). Napoleon used
to say to those in communication with him, "If you have
any bad news to tell me, awake me at any hour of the night,
for good news will keep, but bad news I cannot know too
soon." (Hear, hear.) I say. then, I am delighted with this,
but let but Englishmen know of a danger to face, and of a
difficulty to surmount, and there is nothing within the com-
pass of human capacity which they will not accomplish; but
the great misfortune is, that Englishmen are too much
given up to and incrusted with their insular pride and
prejudice —a sort of Chinese notion of superiority,—that
they will not awaken up and use their eyes as to what
is going on in other countries until it is too late. (Hear,
hear.) lam glad, therefore, that this question is to be
brought forward ; but why should America be better
educated than England? Do you think that a new country
which has the wilderness to cultivate, primeval forests
to level, roads to make, and every bridge and church to
erect,—do you think that such a country is in a position
to rival an old country, if that country will only do
its duty to its people ? (Hear, hear.) No, an old
country has greater advantages and facilities at com-
mand than a new one ; and if you find a new country
beating an old one in this matter, depend upon it, it is
because of some fault in the old one. (Hear, hear.) We
don't read in ancient Greece, when she sent forth her colo-
nies, that they became the teachers of the mother country.
No ; Athens always remained the teacher of the whole
world. And it is a shame if a new people, sent out from us
only yesterday, is to be held up for our admiration and ex-
ample, and this too in the matter of education. (Hear,
hear.) Now, I hope that it won't be said that there is any-
thin.- in these remarks which is out of place in an assembly
snch as this. It appears to me that if there can be a meet-
ing at which such a subject as this should be discussed it is
just such a meeting as this. (Hear, hear.) We are all
here, at all events, presumed to feel a great interest in the
subject of education, and therefore anxious to promote it.
(Hear, hear.) And I dont despair even now. I should
not despair of this country, if the people of this country
would only resolve to do it, surpassing all the world
in education in a generation or two. (" Hear, hear,"
and applause.) But we must not refuse to adopt the
improved machinery of other countries. (Hear, hear.)
We must not be like the Chinese with their junks, who
refuse to build their ships after our improved model; we
must not refuse to adopt what we see in other countries if
better than our own. If we see the Americans beating us
in their spinning-jennies and in their sailing-boats, we
adopt their improvements ; if they send over a yacht
which beats ours, we send over and build one which will
beat them : if a man comes over and picks our locks, we
may wonder how it is he makes better locks than we do, but
we buy them ; and so it is in other matters of this kind. But
on the question of education, they have in the United States
adopted a system which we in this country have not adopted,
except in Scotland to some extent ; and what is so natural as
that we should follow the same rule in this matter as we do in
the manufacture of our machines for spinning cotton, and in
the construction of our ships. (Hear, hear.) I take it that,
the result being in favour of American education, it proves
that they have adopted better means than we have, and, if we
would rival them, we must not be ashamed to adopt their plan,
if better than our own. (Hear, hear, and applause.) There
is not any party, I believe, now opposed to education, none
who do not think that there is more danger from irnoranre in
our present artinclal state th:in in education. Whatever our
political predilections, there is not one who will not say—what-
ever we are doomed to undergo, whether proceeding from a
straitening of circumstances, from a decline of our commerce,
or from difficulties of a strictly political character—whatever
there may be in store for us of troubles and distresses—there
is nobody but will say we had better have an educated people
to meet them than have to encounter them with masses of
ignorance and untrained passion ; for, after all, the masses of
people do govern in this country—they are called on in the
last resort (Hear, hear.) Every one must admit it is better
to have an arbitrator who is trained to discuss reasons, and to
deduce facts from evidence—it is better to have minds of this
sort to settle great national questions, than to refer such mighty
interests to the arbitrament of ignorance and passion. (Hear,
hear, and applause.) Now, ladies and gentlemen, if I have
said too much on this subject to you, and to those elsewhere
who may read what we are now saying, I must tell you that I
feel so strongly upon it that, when among a body of men met
together in favour of education, I cannot be responsible for
withholding my opinions in reference to the want of juvenile
education, for it is not possible to compensate for the want of
juvenile education by means of such institutions as this. We
ray by such means improve the education of the people, but
we can't have a really educated and safe community unless we
begin at the beginning, by training the young. Our friend
who will follow me, will deal with that subject better. I can
only say, whether you look at this question of education in the
interest of morality or religion, as affecting the happiness, in-
terest, or the welfare of society—in whatever way you regard
this question, you may depend upon it, the very highest
interests, the dignity, honour, and happiness of the people, are
bound up with it. (Loud and continued applause, during
which the hon. member resumed his seat.)