The Sun.
London, England, 1862-06-07 00:00:00

cally. In the Second Department, that is, the
Department of Education, for example yesterday,
the Very Rev. the Dean of ST. PAUL'S, the poet,
dramatist, and man of letters, Dr. MILMAN,
opened the proceedings most effectively by the de-
livery of an inaugural address on Education.
Among those who were present upon the occasion
being Lord BWRiGHAM, Sir J. KAY SHUTTLE-
WORTH, Mr. J. G. BOHN, and other distinguished
persons at once recognisable even in that very
numerous audience. In the course of his observa-

tions upon the system of " cramming" for " show
purposes," the very rev. prolocutor remarked,—
" That the ostentatious exhibitions of schools, how-
ever necessary to keep up public interest—which,
after all, was the most vigilant inspection—seamed
to have a tendency to become mischievous. If,"
said Dean MILMAN, " school examinations was
made a spectacle to the neighbourhood which
was to be excited and astonished in order
that its support might be gained, it
was too much to expect that the innate vanity of
the best of men would not be tempted to sacrifice
to the brilliant proficiency of a few the less effective
progress of the many. It inevitably became a
kind of flower show. The rare and beautiful plants
would be selected for exhibition, put in the best

light, and watered up, to the highest perfection,
while the rest were left to pine, and dwindle, and
grow downwards intOskilfully-managed obscurity."
Is it not a grave reminder to us, this, of that truth-
ful but grotesque comment by Mr. DICKENS upon
the "forcing system" in Dr. BLIMBER'S Classical
Academy for young gentlemen ? A system the evil

consequences of which are aptly illustrated in the
person of our old '• young friend," Mr. TooTs, who
there (under Dr. BLThatsER'S fostering care, or rather
under that moral cucumber-frame of his forcing sys-

tem) was made to blow, and blow, and blow, until
he was at last only a stalk! Speaking of the
education anterior to that of the schools Dean MIL-
MAN appeared to be pretty much of the same opinion
with NAPOLEON the Great, who attributed the
manifestation of great intellectual powers in the
man in so considerable a degree to the tender care
of the mother in childhood, Every great man, he
maintaine3, had inevitably a mother in some way
remarkable. Heartily glad are we to note in this
portion of the Dean's oration the particular stress
laid by him upon the necessity of a good sanitary
code for the nursery. " The first duty of national
education," he insisted, "was the health of the
children." According to WORDSWORTH, " the
child is father of the man :" and in the develop-
ment of the intellectual powers both of the child
and the man, the sedulous attention at all times
paid to the preservation of the mens sana in corpore
sano is always of the very first importance, and is
always repaid by the happy results that invariably
and inevitably 'follow it. "A sickly child," the
lecturer argued, "might be very intelligent,
over-intelligent, but in general, quickness of
intelligence would be much affected by

universal spirits, and universal spirits rested on
healthfulness." It is especially noticeable by the
way in regard to many of those who were remark-
able during their after lives, brief or lengthened as
the case might be, that they were at the outset of
their career, especially remarkable for their appa-
rent dullness and stupidity. It is actually recorded
thus by MOORE, in regard to RICHARD BRINSLEY
SHERIDAN, that brilliant and accomplished genius
who succeeded, just to perfection, in so many de-
partments—

" Orator, Dramatist, Statesman, who ran
O'er each string of the lyre—and was master of all ?"
An " incorrigible dunce" he was pronounced to
be by his first schoolmaster : so, at least, we are
assured by his biographer. And, if it be in any
way possible, still more extraordinary is the cir-
cumstance of the like opinion having been expressed
by Ms first schoolmaster upon " the marvellous
boy who perished in his pride"—THOMAS CHATTER-
TON. A fact related by all his biographers alike,
from DAVIS and Dix down to the last of them—
DAVID MASSON. As a contrast to all which evidences
of seeming slowness in the growth of even the most
precocious intellects, there is the evil consequences
resulting from the injudicious encouragement of a
totally opposite manifestation ! There is the

blowing, and blowing, and blowing of the Mr.

TOOTSES " known to fame" for their short interval
of intellectual life and social renown—those per-
fectly intolerable ephemerides (as they may be
called) of celebrity—wretched little imps of
popularity each recognised in turn as a pheno-
menon Who ever heard that the Calculating
Boy was in after life renowned for his skill at
logarithms P It is a matter of absolute notoriety
that Master BETTY, who some seventy years ago
made the town ring with his plaudits under his
histrionic name of glory, " The Young Bosoms,"
grew up to be about the dullest actor anywhere
discoverable, the veriest stick of a used-up walking
gentleman 1 And so on through a deplorable
variety of instances. Perhaps the Infant 'MOZART
being the one exceptional case (the reader but too
well remembers the corollary) justifying by such
exquisite outpourings of his ripened intellect as
the " Magic Flute" and " DON GIOVANNI," the
marvels of his premature improvisations upon
the piano while yet an inhabitant of nursery. No
wonder can it be in any way felt amongst us
that Dean MILMAN, in his admirable address yes.

terday upon Education (an address, by the way,
which was delivered in the Council Chamber at
Guildhall), should deprecate so very earnestly the
exercise of moderation in the efforts made " first
of all," both at home and at school, to develop the
powers of the child's intellect. The Address of
Dean MILMAN yeste,•day, it should be remarked,
had reference, from first to last, exclusively to the
Education of Childhood. And so graceful, so
genial, so enlightened was it throughout that it
eminently well deserved the earnest commendation
pronounced upon it at its close by the venerable
President.

Some of our contemporaries have surely put a
wrong construction on the rejection of the Militia
Ja.whllibehy
laytheae Canadian Parliament, and the consequent
change of
. vitts
Ministry. On the face of the accounts
arrived there were two causes for it—
one, the desire
to unseat a Ministry ; another, a
general opinion
that
a bad one. It
atihaetobibllewboatshicnosmtlay andnyrespeuecmts
l .
brous, and not to make enough of the volunteer
element. In a colony, far more than at home,
volunteers must be a prime reliance ; and if the bill
did not recognise this, it must have been very defec-
tive, indeed. We cannot imagine that the rejection
to do with
of this particular bill has anything more
the rejection of the principle of colonial self.defence,
than had the rejection of Lord RUSSELL'S scheme
for that of Lord PALMERSTON'S, which had also the
effEct of upsetting a Ministry—with the rejection
of the duty -of home defence.

The Canadian press itself adverts to the posai-1
bility of the defeat of the bill being misunderstood
in England, especially as the Lower or French
Canadian members were the greater part of the
majority against it. They advert to the possibility
of the loyalty they showed when the Prince of
WALES was there, and especially when, during the
Trent affair, the French Canadians, with their
ecclesiastics at their head, took the lead in provid-
ing most hospitably for our troops during their