The Sun.
London, England, 1853-04-05 00:00:00

MINISTERIAL SCHEME OF EDUCATION.

(From. the Times.)

It was pretty well known before yesterday that
Lord John Russell did not intend to dazzle the eyes
of the public with a magnifioent scheme of oducation.
Such schemes are as easily framed as castles of cards,
but the sole result has hitherto been a general disap-
pointment, and a natural conviction in some quarters
that education was an altogether hopeless and incorri-
gible subject. Lord John Russell has very wisely, as
we think, profited by much recent experience, and dis-
armed opposition by adopting a merely permissive, sug-
gestive, and auxiliary course. That is the course which,
as he showed last night, has answered in the hands of
the Committee of Council, and which has enabled it to
do so much good with so little noise or offence. The
education of towns is the first and foremost part of the
new measure, and what Lord John Russell proposes in
this instance will rather fall short of than exceed ex-
pectation. We have heard it alleged to be a matter of
common law that every corporation might levy a rate
for any reasonable purpose. Instead of this, it is now
proposed that the municipal council of a town may, by
a majority of two-thirds, levy a rate for the assistance
of existing schools, on the sole condition that -such
schools so assisted shall be under the Committee of Coun-
cil, enjoying, of course, the pecuniary and other advan-
tages of that connexion. We know not what objection
can be made to so fair and so moderate a proposition.
The active concurrence of a large majority of the local
government, and the superintendence of the State, con-
stitute as good security for the proper use of an educa-
tion rate as can well be imagined. It is a case
of necessity rather than choice. Private enter-
prise fails to reach the masses. Zeal is apt to
be proselytising, or, at least, eccentric. Any-
how, the people are not properly educated, and
many a generous mind has reflected with pain, after the
payment of a heavy police-rate, or borough-rate for the
maintenance of prisons, how much further this would
have gone in preventing the evils which are now to be
cured at so heavy a cost. Proceeding upon the model
of a municipal rate, similar provisions will be made for
the case of parishes, even the very poorest, levying rates
for the assistance of schools. Secular education, as it
has been called, is given up, and as propagandism is
equally beyond the province of the State, those children
whose parents object to the religion of the schools
assisted under the above provisions will be allowed to
receive the general without the doctrinal instruction.
On the bare mention of a rate it will occur to many
minds that a rate is hardly necessary when there already
exist so many splendid endowments for education. When
there is hardly a parish without a free school, and hardly
a town without many such, sometimes on the most splendid
scale, the very existence of such means, and still more
their neglect and abuse, constitute in themselves insur-
mountable obstacles in the way of improved and extended
education. Everybody of common information can recal
from his local experience instances of noble endowments
squandered, embezzled, and almost forgotten ; while the
only remedy that now sexists is even worse than the
disease, being no other than the fatal process of a
Chancery suit, in which the endowment is certain
to disappear. Considering the discouragement and
prejudice arising from such instances considering
the very natural repugnance that ratepayers will
ever have to pay their quotas of 51. or even ss. a
year for the education of their poorer neighbours,
when they already see wealthy foundations for the
purpose, it is impossible to authorise a school-rate with-
out a corresponding measure for the better manage.
ment of free schools. The first thing to be done is to
decide whether an abuse really exists—that is, whether
there really is a case for interference. This decision
is assigned to the County Courts where the in-
come to be dealt with is less than 331. a year, and where
it is above to the Master of the Rolls. In order, how-
ever, to prevent those wasteful suits, so notorious and
frequent in the annals of our urisprudence, no such
suit is to be instituted without the permission of a
Committee of Council appointed for the purpose. When
it is decided that the existing administration of a free
school is abusive, corrupt, and inadequate—which we
believe to be the case in a vast majority of instances---
then comes in the need of immediate correction and
regular superintendence, matters no longer within the
scope of judicial bodies. This second part is to be as-
signed to the only body competent to the office, viz.,
the above-mentioned Committee of Council, which, if not
identical with that for education, would, of course, be
in perfect harmony with it. Most, if not all, the free
schools, and other public schools of the country, might
be vastly improved by some little elementary teaching
in those arts and sciences which contribute so largely
to the industry and prosperity of this nation. An im-
provement of that kind is to be attempted under the su-
perintendence of the Board of Trade.
A statement of the Ministerial intentions on the sub-
ject of education could not well leave out our two an-
cient Universities. Everybody will ask what is to be
done with the reports of the twin commissions ? Lord
John trusts, with what reason remains to be seen, to
the spirit of self-reform awakened in the Universities,
and likely to be considerably quickened by his observa-
tions last night. He contented himself with reca-
pitulating the private recommendations of the Commis-
sions, and suggested that if the Universities wished to
carry out those recommendations themselves they should
have every facility Parliament could give them for the
purpose ; but that if they showed no such intention, or
fell short of the public expectation, Parliament would step
in and deal with them in a more summary manner. The
particular points specified by Lord John Russell are just
those which have been strongly advocated in these
columns—the concession of some voice in tha govern-
ment of the university to those who are actually engaged
in teaching ; admission to the privileges of the university
without the condition of belonging to any college ; the
removal of restrictions in the election of fellowships and
scholarships, the limitation of those stipends to a certain
period of years; and, in general, the application of the
college revenues more directly and effectually to the pur-
poses of instruction. If Oxford and Cambridge wish to
originate schemes for the promotion of these objects, un-
doubtedly they can do so better than others can do it for
them. Undoubtedly they can do it with less damage to
the traditional feelings , the religio loci, the recollections,
the secret virtues, and power of the place. They know
best how to reform without a positive change of identity.
But their work is marked out for them. They know
what they have to do, and they must do it. Otherwise,
as has happened a thousand times before, strangers will
come in and cut the knot which local authority is too
weak, or too selfish, or too sentimental to untie. There
has not for many years appeared a report which the pub-
lic is more prepared to accept, to back up, and to
carry out, than those of the University Commissions ;
and we can answer for it that they will be carried out
before long, in one form or another. With Lord John
Russell we should much prefer to see it done by the uni-
versities themselves. They are now invited and challenged
to the task, and with the distinct understanding that, if
if they fail, Government will hold itself bound to assume
the initiative, and introduce bills placing the universities
at once and for good under a Parliamentary regime.

(From the Morning Herald.)
The Ministerial measure on education contains one of
the many ingredients either of which, it was prognosti-
cated, would probably be fatal to it. It has, on one
point boldness ; but it is at least questionable whether
the move made in advance will not have to be retracted
before a fortnight shall have elapsed.
Lord John Russell proposes to establish by law the
principle and the nse of a borough educational rate.
This will be a new thing, and an important thing, if
adopted. But the success of the Government in this
proposal is at least very problematical.
We confess that, looking at the Cabinet, and seeing it
composed of so many dissonant elements, expectedina
measure full of compromise—a measure less decided
its character than that which was last night described by
the leader of the House of Commons. But in so calcu-
lating we had overlooked the fact, that, amidst all the
varieties which are to be found in the Cabinet, there is
not in the Government one real and proper representa-
tive of the dissenting bodies. And thus it comes to pass
that the wishes and prejudices of Mr. Baines, of Leeds,
and of all who think and act with him, are wholly for-
gotten or disregarded in the Ministerial measure.
But hence will arise this plain and immediate difficulty
that the party to which we allude will be, unless we
greatly mistake, unanimously and vehemently opposed
to the Government measure. And the probable result
is equally obvious,—that either the measure must be
passed in spite of dissenting agitation, or else, that its
most prominent feature will be surrendered out of defer-
'ence to that agitation.

It is true that great pains have been taken to render
the enactment of an educational rate as inoffensive as
possible. The assent of two-thirds of the town council
must be obtained before such a rate can be granted. This

will probably secure Mr. Baines and his friends in
Leeds, Manchester, Bradford, &c., from any immediate
visitation of this kind. The influence in the large manu-
facturing towns will, no doubt, suffice to prevent, for
some time to come, the adoption of a rate by any such
majority. But this present security will hardly satisfy
them ; for if the principle be once established, its appli-
cation universally will only be a question of time. We
cannot think that Mr. Baines' attachment to Lord John
Russell and -Lord Lansdowne will overcome his repug-
nance to any sort of a rate—in short, to any infringe-
ment of the " voluntary principle."
Nor cgs we determine, at first sight, how the pro-
posal may be relished in the opposite quarter. Whether
Churchmen will be better satisfied with the adoption of
the rating principle than Dissenters, is a question which
cannot be answered in a moment. The power and duty
of a rate is to be given to the town councils. Of these
a considerable number are under Radical and Dissenting
influence. It is true, indeed, that these will be the last
to wake use of the power so given to them. But whether
Churchmen will be well pleased to have this new power
conferred on bodies which sometimes are, and which at
any time may be, inimical to the Church, is a matter
which will require much consideration and discussion.
On the whole, we are inclined to doubt the final suc-
cess of the Ministerial scheme. The probabilities of
opposition and of failure are greater than those of ac-
complishment. The Ministerial forces will be in some
degree disunited on this question ; and the success of
the Government must mainly depend on the support
given to the measure by the Conservative party.
The most satisfactory part of Lord John's speech was
—as is not unusual with him—the negative part. We
mean his lOrdship's disclaimers, and his statements of
what he did not mean to do. His lordship leaves, at
least for the present, the universities untouched. This
is the most decent, as well as the most prudent, course.
He disclaims, too, most warmly and energetically, all
leanings towards what is called " the secular system"—
i.e., the system which treats the child as an intelligent
animal merely, and " ignores," to use the modern
phrase, the fact of his having a soul. It is well to have
his lordship's explicit and resolute rejection of this
theory—a rejection which elicited the lamentations of

Mr. Hume and Mr. Fox. We may uow hope that we
have heard the last in Parliament of this monstrous idea.
But while Lord John Russell thus rejects and affronts
the prejudices of more than one class of his supporters,
the quebtiull remains, whether, without their aid, he can
carry his measure. We feel no doubt whatever that he
can only succeed in this by obtaining the aid of the Con-
servative party ; and whether this aid will be given is a
point which will certainly require more than an hour or
two's consideration.

(From the Daily News.)
Disentangled from the historical and explanatory re-
marks of Lori John Russell, the Government proposi-
tion about education may be described in very few words.
In the first place, it is not a plan for National Educa-
tion, but only a scheme for patching here, and improving
there, the school systems now hi operation. It is a plan
that will require an additional vote of money from the
taxes, and that promises in some degree to render the
many local endowments of the country more available
for educational purposes than heretofore but it makes
no attempt to give education to every child born into a
community, in which such child is sure to be either a
benefit or a nuisance in proportion to his good or evil
training. Following, to some extent, the view that has
been put forward in these columns—in reference to local
management and the adaptation of local funds to really
educational uses—Lord John Russell proposes to give
Town Councils the power of levying a rate in aid ofvolun-
tary school pyments. The recognition of the principle
of an educational rate is, perhaps, the most valuable
part of the plan ; and, together with the proposition for
reforming the endowed schools, gives the scheme some
claim to support as an acceptable instalment of Educa-
tional Reform. This rate is only to be available where
voluntary effort is active, and where the children them-
selves are enabled to contribute their "pence ;" whilst all
the schools so assisted by a rate will be to some extent
under the control of the Committee of Council
of Education,. by having accredited masters. Thus
far this is only giving to local bodies a power of self-
taxation in something like the same cases, and in about
the same proportion, that aid was heretofore obtainable
on application to the Privy Council from their fund.
The rates, when raised, are to be distributed by a com-
mittee of the Town Council to schools of different de-
nominations whilst in places where there is no Town
Council to do this work of self-taxation and distribution
—aid is to be still obtainable from the Privy Council.
In other words, the towns are to be allowed to tax
themselves, whilst the poor in rural places—the tenants
and labourers of the squires—will be provided with
schoolmasters out of the general taxation of the country;
this system all the while being in no sense truly national,
but merely an extension, with some improvements, of
the present sectional and bectarian arrangements. The
part of the scheme that proposes to deal with local
charities will meet general approval. Every one will
agree with Lord John Russell when be speaks of the
uselessness of many local charities—such as distributing
six loaves of bread at Christmas, and so on. Yet, on
these now wasted gifts is frittered away a large total
sum of money that may be very much better spent in
giving to youth the food of learning, than to sturdy
beggars the bread of idleness. Besides the sum de-
rivable from useless charities, no less than 312,0001.
a year has been bequeathed by benevolent and pious
persons for purposes of education. Again and again,
for years past, has the Daily News exposed the
plunder and waste of this important national fund ;
and with great satisfaction, therefore, we now find at
last a Minister proposing to deal with the abuse, and
intending to turn to purely educational uses funds be-
queathed for national benefit. The Committee of the
Privy Council are to be vested with power for securing
the reform of these educational endowments, and they
may win a large and noble share of public gratitude if
they deal with the great work in a large, wise, and cou-
rageous spirit.
So far, then, as the partial concession to localities of
power to levy a rate is concerned, and so far also as the
proposition goes for reforming the educational and
special charitable endowments, the Government are en-
titled to distinct commendation. But how small this
concession is—when compared with the greatness of the
need—we only see when we compare what is to be done
with what is to be left undone. We ask for industrial
training for those thousands of human waifs and strays
of our towns and villages, who, when left to themselves,
ripen into " dangerous classes." We ask educational
training for classes specially needing it, and are offered
a mere extension of present defective plans—in which
these thousands are ignored. We need really national
instruction that shall include all—we are to get a
School of Science and Art. W 6 want realities, and
are offered makeshifts and ornaments. It reminds
us of the ploughmen, who, when starving for lack
of bread, were advised by a Duke to try curry-
powder. And hereon hinges another recollection.
The surplus fund of the Great Exhibition was parasiti-
cally voted by those who held it that a royal whim might
be tickled by the establishment of a Valhalla at Ken-
sington. This doom of the surplus gave an excuse to
Mr. Disraeli to get another large sum from the House
of Commons to be devoted to the Kensington scheme—
and now, when we ask for education for the people, we
find this Valhalla School of Art starting up again, to .be
woven into any plan that Parliament may sanction as an
instalment of public education. Schools for teaching
every child to read and write and cypher are not to be
had because the Coalition Ministry are afraid to grapple
with sectarian objections ; but in offering science for
those who are denied the knowledge of A B C—there
is no difficulty. The outcasts may still be outcasts—but
we shall see that Belgravia will get its Kensington Val-
halla. Good old stories are always finding new illustra-
csso, m‘ ‘ h
dews say
illustra-
tions. When the groans of a starving nation were
said
cakes a pitying
S o P ri
willa
es heard through the very windows of a palace, and the
wail was still, "Bread, bread, or we die," "If
theo n y,t
of Lord John Russell's Educational speech. The
can't
ly
get
live bread,"
on pound
wail is for the bread of learning, for those utterly
destitute—for mental food to lift our Pariahs into the
ranks of intelligent men, and Lord John says, " Let
them thrive on science and art at Marlborough-house."
Science and art are both admirable things—but what we
want first is National Education. Give all the children
in the land the weapons of learning, and you will have
men of Science and of Art springing, more abundant than
ever, from the ranks, just as Brindley, Arkwright, Fara-
day, Hogarth, sprung without the aid of Royal Com-
missions.

In speaking of those advocates for National Education
who see in the sectarian element the one great difficulty
blocking the road of progress, Lord John Russell did not
behave quite fairly. They are advocates of Education
because they know it to be the help and mainstay of mo-
rality and of religious purity and elevation. They merely
demand, for the sake of society, and of the individuals
composing it, that every child should be rescued from
ignorance. The tolerant men who would educate all are
the best friends of morals and of true faith. And with
this protest we may repeat that the Government scheme
can be only accepted as an instalment which we verily
believe might have been much better worth taking had
we had in this matter to deal only with Lord John Rus-
sell, and not with a Coalition Whig-Peelite Cabinet.

(From the Morning Post.)
Those who looked for, from Lord John Russell, in the
matter of education, as was expected from Mr. Disraeli
in the matter of finance, a revision of the entire system
in existence, and the substitution of something new and
untried on a large scale in lieu of all that he finds &tab-
lished and in actual activity, will doubtless receive with
disappointment and dissatisfaction the statement of the
policyband scheme of the Government made last night
by the noble lord in the House of Commons. But those
who feel as we do—that whatever may be the faults, the
deficiencies, or the shortcomings of the modes of educa-
tion now in operation, they not only contain within
them a sound principle, and the germ, capable of exten-
sion and maturity, of a noble system of the best and
highest influences, but that they actually have, during
the period of their experiment, sensibly and materially
advanced the education of the intellect and of the heart
of the people—will rejoice with us that the noble lord
and the Government have not yielded to the temptation
of creating a sensation, and have wisely determined to
extend, instead of destroying, and to limit their attempts,
in the first instance, to rendering better and more avail-
able to the general public the machinery which they
find at work.

So far as we are informed upon them at present, we
see no objection to Lord John's propositions, which are
exclusively financial m their character for the extension
of education to increased numbers of the working classes.
It is true that what is offered are rather facilities than
positive and absolute provisions, but in this country,
where the greater portion of the funds for education are

derived from the exertions of religious societies or pri-
vate companies and individuals, it would scarcely be
possible to adopt any of those continental modes of a
more compulsory character, which have been so much
insisted upon by many of our own writers on the sub-
ject, without interfering very prejudiciously, if not de-
structively, with the principle of our existing educational
policy, and with the spirit which animates those by whom
its vitality is supported and its activity maintained.
As will be seen by our Parliamentary report, Lord
John simply proposes, by the bill which he is to lay upon
the table of the house, to give, in the case of corporate
towns, a power of imposing an educational rate to mu-
nicipal councils, in instances where not less than two-
thirds of them are agreed upon the policy of such a mea-
sure ; and in the case of agricultural districts and popu-
lations not under municipal government, he proposes,
through the medium of the Committee of Privy Council,
the distribution of a grant of money of so much per
head for each child attending the schools of respective
denominations as in each instance may be deemed re-
quisite. As regards the government, the management,
and the inspection of schools, the arrangements now in
force remain unaltered and the position of the Church
in respect to each of them undergoes no change. There
will scarcely, we imagine, be any difference of opinion as
to the expediency of the course adopted by Lord John
in keeping, at all events out of this bill, any provisions
affecting either of these matters, and he will probably be
supported by the greater weight of public opinion in his
resolve not to attempt, looking to the present and actual
condition of the educational institutions of the kingdom,
to combine, in one school and under one schoolmaster,
the teaching and training of families of differing religious
persuasions.
The most defective part of the noble lord's speech,
and which, we confess, we heard with much disap-
pointment, was his review of the present condition of
our institutions for the education of the people, and of
the means at hand for its extension. It was unques-
tionably meagre and deficient, and we were surprised
that he should have confined himself exclusively to
the consideration of the provisions for educating the
highest and the lowest classes of society, omitting alto-
gether any reference to what it appears to us are not a
whit less important, and which are assuredly the most
defective, and the most ill-devised of all, viz., those
available for the education of their children, to the far-
mer and the tradesman, and to what are generally de-
scribed as the middle classes. There is no part of the
population of England so ill supplied with schools and
with teachers as these, and there is no part of the popu-
lation whose sound religious education and intellectual
advancement is of higher importance to the ultimate
progress of the country, and to the lasting security of
its institutions. We believe that the children of these,
and of the artisan or working class of a certain degree,
might be educated in combination in the schools under
the superintendence of the Committee of Privy Coun-
cil, to the material benefit of both socially, to the great
advantage of the community, as well as to the
sensible lightening of the burden on the funds applicable
for educational purposes. The noble lord, to our sur-
prise, too, entirely omitted to make any reference to our
workhouse schools, which, beyond question, have a part,
and that no inconsiderable one, in the training and
bringing up of the children of the labouring classes, and
which, although limited at present to actual paupers,
might, we are satisfied, be made beneficially available
to a very general extent for the education of the general
body of the poor.
In the wide field of discussion and legislation which
was thus barely entered on by the Government last
night, so much remains to be developed that we shall
content ourselves with directing attention thus generally
to a few of the points of importance upon which Lord
John touched, or omitted to touch, and shall, as the
work proceeds, apply ourselves vigilantly and actively,
from time to time, to the task of discussing with more
of particularity, the various aspects and bearings of this
important object.

SPORTING INTELLIGENCE.

SPORTING- NOTES.—No. CCCCV.
CROXTON PARK MEETING.

The first race on the card for to-morrow is for the
Croxton Park Plate, the entries for which, although
they closed last night, have not yet come to hand.
The second race will be for the Belvoir Castle Stakes
of 15 sovs. each, 10 ft., with 80 added ; over the mile
course. Ethelbert is not expected to put in an appear-
ance, or he would have won for a certainty. In his
absence GRAPESHOT will be first, and Lord Chesterfield's
colt by the Emperor out of Begum second.
The Sweepstakes of 10 sovs. each, with 50 added, for
two-years-old (half a mile), will be contested by Con-
tender, The Marquis of Sevign4, Little Kitty, and the
colt by the Hero, dam by Touchstone out of Pet.
Marsyas, I believe, stops at home ; and Nightshade, it
is said, is to be reserved for Epsom. LITTLE KITTY,
according to my view of the matter, ought to be No. 1.

The Ciip of 80 sovs. in specie, added to a Handicap
Sweepstakes of 20 sovs. each, h. ft., &c. (two miles), ob-
tained twenty-four nominations, ten of whom figure on
the acceptance list. The race at the finish will be con-
fined, in my opinion, to Harp, Caurire, and Gladiole ;
and as the running of the last named is much superior
to that of the others, I shall look no further for the
winner, but expect to see Lord Wilton on GLADIOLE in
the premier position.
The Farmers' Handicap Plate, which closes this even-
ing, brings the meeting to a conclusion.
CHELTENHAM GRAND ANNUAL STEEPLECHASE.—A
tolerable field will go to the post for this stake to-morrow,
consisting of the following :—Peter Simple, Sir Peter
Laurie, Vainhope, Miss Mowbray, Bourton, Oscar,
Maurice Daley, Friendless, and Dearest Mae. The
starting of Leporello and Gulnare is very dubious.
Oscar seems to be the fancy horse, and he or old Sir
Peter ought to win.

The Hurdle Race looks very like a certainty for Tom
Gurney.

I hive already given my opinion of the probable
destiny of the Great Metropolitan and sCity and Subur-
ban Handicaps. I shall enter in full particulars con-
cerning the whole meeting to-morrow.
THE SPIRIT OF THE TURF.