The Sun.
London, England, 1853-06-08 00:00:00

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this country is unhappily divided--I mean, when I sap,
classes, the various religious denominations—all agree
that a religious education must be combined with a
secular one, but that such religious education can only
be most advantageously administered and applied
through the medium of those whose religious principles
coincide with the views of those whom they are to in-.
struct. I must do the Protestant Dissenters the justice
to say, that they were the first to point out the apathy
of former times, and to stimulate public attention
to the necessity of religious instruction ; but I am
proud to say, on behalf of that Church of which
I am an humble but an attached member, that
with regard to the efforts in matters of the united secular
and religious education, they stand proudly prominent,.
far above the proportion of their numbers, or even of
their means, far above the proportionate efforts of any
other denomination of Christians in this country. I
have no figures to show this just now, but what I want
to point out to you is, that if it be every man's interest
to promote religious education, it is peculiarly the
object, the interest, the bounden duty of those men who
are attached members of the Church of England to do
their utmost towards the promotion of education in con-
nexion with• the Church, and seek to make the school-
master what--he ought to be, the right hand wed—instru
ment of the clergyman in instructing and educating the
children. (Applause.) But how is this to be done I
We are awaking to a sense of our mutual responsibility,
We are awaking to a sense ofour difficulties. In former
times—l trust, however, that feeling is passing away, •
though the class is not wholly extinct—a man who was
unfitted for everything else, was deemed by himself and
others fitted for the office of a schoolmaster. The
broken-down tradesman, the man who by intemperance
had ruined himself and family--the man of feeble health
—the man who would turn his hand to nothing else,
and who might become a burden to the parish, was
sure to be voted by the ratepayers as fit for schoolmas-
ter, if nothing else. Happily, a better state of things
is rising, and we apprehend more highly the duties, the
responsibility, the awful charge devolving on the school-
master, for if in the absence of parents, and in the un-
avoidable occupation of the time elsewhere of the clergy.
man, who, attending to the spiritual wants of his flock, •
was rendered incapable of giving his perpetual attention
to the school—if it devolves on the schoolmaster to do
that which is the object we have agreed, which is the
sole and principal object of education, to train up the
youthful mind with a tendency to right and an abhor-
rence of evil, with a knowledge, not theoretical, but a
practical knowledge of the revealed Word of God, and
of the duties and responsibilities which it devolves on
each child in after life, in their separate stages, how can
it' be that those who are parents, and those who reflect
for a single moment on the facts, can do other than feel
that it is a matter of the deepest interest into whose
hands they entrust such a task as to training the youth-
ful mind, to bring up the child to execute his duties here
as a man, and after this life to enter on the awful stage
of eternity. (Hear, hear.) But such are the duties. If
such ought to be done, if such ought to be the qualifica-
tions of the schoolmaster, where shall we find men so
qualified and endowed ? We must, before we can hope
to do our work effectively, take care to provide the ne-
cessary instruments for the efficiency of that work. The
power of teaching is itself a thing which has to be
learnt. Many men possessed of the highest amount of
sense and greatest extent of knowledge, have not the
means or hait, have not the facilities of communicating
to others the knowledge which they possess and would
seek to impart. The business of teaching is a business, like
all others, to be learnt, to be studied, and taught ; and it is
foT that purpose, primarily and principally, that this and
various institutions of the same kind have been established
in'the country through the last few years— not so much
for supplying the direct machinery of education, as to
train up those wholare to furnish that education, and to
place in the hands of the country a large and fitting in-
strument for the performance of that which is an impor-
tant national object. You require of the schoolmaster
far more than the mere facilities of conveying the know-
ledge which he possesses. You require that he also be a
man--(if he is to be the right hand of the clergyman)—
instant in diffusing religions instruction among the peo-
ple, and require that he be a man who sets about his
work with a full knowledge of the responsibility, and
enters into it heart and soul—who puts his hand to the
plough with a full determination not to turn bask—who
will work not only for the emoluments of his profession,
but also for that higher and nobler object of doing by his
fellow-creature his duty, paramount important duty, as
in the sight and before the face of that God to whom we
are responsible for the exercise of our several talents.
(Applause.) It is for the purpose of producing a class
of men, so qualified and so prepared, to go forth in that
important work, that in the various dioceses of this
country, aided by the liberality of Parliament,—still
more aided by the exertions and local contributions of
those who are impressed with the importance of the ob-
ject, that these institutions have been founded, sending
out an annual supply of well-qualified schoolmasters,
lout I am sorry to say the number thus- sent out is
far inferior to the demand. (Hear, hear.) In the
diocese of Chester. I had the pleasure many years ago
of attending one of the first institutions of this kind. •
It was adopted and largely supported by the clergy and
laity, and I say with satisfaction, that from that period
to this, we have never had occasion to repent of a step
which was then taken. (Applause.) On the contrary,
we have had to congratulate ourselves that in a part of
the!country in which, more than all others, a religious
and moral education was required, there have been pro-
' eluced benefits and advantages exceeding the most san-
guitie anticipations of its promoters. (Loud applause.)
After apologising for detaining the crowd, the noble
earl said, "I regretted to hear from the right rev. pre-
late who preceded me, and who so kindly and flatter-
ingly introduced me to your notice, that this institution,
although advanced to a state of comparative efficiency,
has been checked in its progress by the absence of requi-
site means. I should feel ashamed of myself; knowing
how much more valuable practice is than precept, if I
did not testify substantially the interest I feel in this
work ; therefore, I trust, the right reverend prolate will
permit me to make an offering this day of the sum of
Do/. in aid of this institution—(loud applause)—an in-
stitution in which I feel the deepestinterest—interest, too,
increased by the honour I have attained of being elected
Chancellor of the adjoining University. And I ear-
nestly trust and pray, that that God in whose service
your aid and co-operation will be applied, will bless the
undertaking of your hands, and that you may live to see
the result of this great institution pour down in tenfold
blessings on the heads of your children, and your chil-
dren's children.—(Loud cheers.)
Three cheers were given for Lord Stanley, M. P., nd
" The Ladies," ater which the National Anthem ,as
lung, and the company dispersed.
D/S"'

[PRICE SD.

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remember the first introduction of the
gigantic
.pnrdojinct.
of the late Mr. Palmer, who, in 1783, conceived
troduced the wonderful scheme for tranemitting, the
postal communications of this country by means of daily
mails at the unheard of speed of seven miles an hour.
(Laughter and applause.) Well, now we find it difficult
to realise to ourselves what the country was before these
great inventions ; we find it difficult to • realise to our-
selves what the probable effect these and other great
'changes which were constantly increasing, and which
add to the knowledge of the country, will hereafter pro-
duce ; but that which does concern us h to ascertain'
wliethei• in the country of this 'rapid material progress
which is taking place, affecting as it does all classes of the
country, stimulating communication, facilitating inter-
course, bringing morepersonally into communication with
each other those who could never meet together beffire,
producing concert and collision of mind, increasing anu
stimulating commercial enterprise, adding to the wealth of,
the country, and adding also indirectly to the population of
the country--it is well that we should consider whether
the moral and religious progress of the country has kept
pace with that vast material progress, and with those
immense elements of power, and also of danger, which
are the inseparable concomitants of those great inven-
tions. (Hear, hear.) •No 'doubt that in the mysteries
of nature—infinite as the mysteries of the Author of
naturee—all that science has yet done, and all the suc-
cessful efforts of successive generations have attained to
the knowledge of but little, as compared to that
infinite unknown which lies beyond the reach of human
capacities and human intellects ; yet compared with that
which has been done in former times, trifling as they
are in comparison with those accomplished and unac-
complishable, the strides which these generations have
made in the prosecution and improvement of science,
and in extensian of general knowledge among the people
of this country, may indeed be termed, by comparison,
gigantic, But again, that knowledge, that increase of
science, and that extension of knowledge is beyond—
nay, it is a very different thing from—the increase of
education. Nay more, I would say that the more that
knowledge is extended and diffused, the more it is
necessary to extend also and diffuse alike the blessings
of that education by which alone that knowledge can be
purified and sanctified, and led to a higher end than the
.mere attainment of worldly advantages. According
as that knowledge is applied, it depends whether the great
society of whom we are members is composed of men
farmed after the image of God, and in his likeness; and
purified by his Holy Spirit, or whether society imbued
with knowledge not so sanctified, and not so purified, is
not like unto that monster Frankenstein—a monster of
incredible beauty and power, but whoie beauty and
power are only the more terrible because unguided and
unsanctified by a holier power and spirit. Its beauty,
ills abilities, its strength, and its power, lead, or make
itself only the more fitting instrument of bringing de-
struction on itself and those around. (Hear, hear, and
applause.) Again, in early times the wisdom of our
forefathers, according to the lights and acquirements of
their ages, made great and liberal provision for the dif-
fusion of such education as was then obtainable. I need
not point to the noble university with which I have now
the honour of being connected—l need not point to the
sister University of Cambridge, to the various halls and
colleges, to the schools of royal and noble foundation at
Eton, Winchester, and Westminster—but throughout
the land, for the humbler as well as the higher classes of
the community, there were established, chiefly under the
control and direction of the national clergy, a vast amount
of educational establishments, partaking all of them of
the religious, and, in some degree, eleemosynary charac-
ter, for the purpose of training upin the fear of God, and
in such literature as the times allowed, the children
alike of the higher, the middle, and the lower classes ;
and through the medium of these institutions—though
many of them have been perverted from their original
purpose—l say, yet through the medium of these insti-
tutions, in the universities there is many an instance of
persons in an humble position of life—persons in whom
but for them, to use the words of the poet—
" Chill penury repressed their noble rage
To thrill the genial current of their souls;"
but who, introduced by these institutions into places
where they had the best opportunities of acquiring the
best aids of science, and applying to them laborious and
self-denying diligence, have found their rich reward in
taking their place' amongst the master spirits of the age
—the places due more especially to those who combine
with genius, early self-exertion, and indefatigable self-
denial, and who knew that no great object can be at-
tained without study and persevering exertion ; and who
have sought, and nobly succeeded in availing themselves
to the utmost, of those advantages which the piety and
wisdom of our forefathers had placed at their disposal.
(Applause.) But these institutions, as I have stated,
were most suited for the advancement of the age' in
which education, 'properly Speaking, was confined to
those who were destined for the service of the Church,
or those few who intended to devote themselves exclu-
sively to literary studies. For a very considerable time
after the Reformation, and even to a comparatively recent
period, there were many who held that it was dangerous
to educate the humbler classes of this country, and all that
they required was to be able to read so as to enable them,
without difficulty, to spell out a chapter in the Bible.
Gentlemen, I am afraid that we cannot conceal from
ourselves that during the last century, especially that
period, all classes of the community—and I am afraid I
cannot except from them the clergy of the Church of
England--had sunk into a state of considerable apathy
with regard to the discharge of those duties which ap-
pertained to the education of the people. In those days,
the population of the rural parishes confined by the ab-
sence of all facilities for locomotion within the narrow
spaces in which they were born, and in which they died,
successive generations were born and vegetated, and
died in contented ignorance, little cared for by the care-
less and apathetic discharge of a very small portion of
clerical duties ; but, unhappily, as was sure to be the
case, " while men slept the enemy sowed tares," and in
the country parishes infidelity and vice were the sure
and certain progeny of spiritual and of intellectual
ignorance. But besides them rose up a new element,
beyond, perhaps, the power even of a body more de-
voted to their duties than at that day. (Hear, hear.)
God be praised, the case is very different now of pa-
rochial clergymen of the Established Church. (Ap-
plause.) Great towns begin to rise into importance,
and populations brought together have more opportu-
nities of comparing mind with mind, and of discussion,
and of reason, and shrewd, hard-headed, hard-working,
intelligent, ambitious workmen, anxious to place them-
selves forward in life, have outgrown the parochial sys-
tem, and, consequently, in their ignorance of higher and
spiritual things, but have little desire except that of ob-
taining for themselves and for their children, that amount
of knowledge which they say would be powerful to theirad-
vanaement in the material concerns of every-day life,
but their knowledge does not extend beyond that. (Hear
and applause.) There arose also in the towns another
and an inferior class—a class labouring for their daily
bread, or perhaps earning it by less creditable means,
having little care beyond the mere satisfaction of gratify.
ing their animal passions where they had the means of
gratifying the sottish intemperate habits of their nature
wherever an opportunity presents. God forbid, gentle-
men, that this is a general picture—an universal picture
of the great towns and of the great manufacturing dis-
tricts of this country. God forbid that what I say shall
still further make this a corect description of the moral
population of this great empire ; but I fear that, in the
'great towns, and the rural villages also, there are too
many of our population who answer to the melancholy
description which I have given, and who are creating a
plague and canker in the whole of our social system.
(Hear, hear.) Again, the feelings of the country are
aroused, and extensively excited ; but I doubt whether
the country is equally aroused, and equally sensible of
the danger—which I hold to be not less than the danger
of brutal ignorance—l mean the danger of instructed
and enlightened infidelity. (Hear.) And it is against
both these that, if we would save our common country
from the inevitable consequences of two such concurrent
plagues, it is against these that our efforts are to be di-
rected. We all know that the virtues, the morals, as well as
the knowledge of a people, are the surest safeguards for the
welfare of a country, and that without it no country can
prosper, and no country in the face and in the absence
of God, can hope to prosper. Gentlemen, by whom
then is it that the efforts are to be made to encounter
these gigantic evils ? How are we to apply ourselves to
deal with that which, if not checked, not controlled, not
remedied, must lead to consequences day by day more
pernicious, more destructive. On whom then does the
duty devolve ? It devolves on you—it devolves on me
—it devolves upon all those who have a human heart in
their bosom—it devolves upon all those who can feel for
the sufferings of their neighbours and of their country.
men, and can feel for their distresses and calamities, and
that feel also that there can be no distress and no cala-
mity which should demand so much of pity, which should
look so much for aid, as the combined evils of infidelity
and ignorance. (Applause.) Gentlemen, another duty,
the universal demand for knowledge, the universal desire
for instruction, has led to the formation of many estab-
lishments, and many means of promoting the instruction
of the middle classes ; popular lectures, mechanics' in-
stitutions, and various appliances of science, in order to
give an easy high road to science. These are popular
among the middle classes—these are what many of them
most desire, and the demand has regulated and procured
the supply. But that for which there is not the same
amount of demand, because unhappily it is a portion of
our nature, that there where we least feel our wants
there will not be the same demand—is the provision of
a well-ordered, religious, moral education. (A p-
plause.) I believe that there is a great portion of this
country, I am happy to believe that the vast majority
of this country in opposition to a small section of it, are
of opinion that no education is in itself desirable or
valuable which elees not combipe religious with fieeular
instruction. (Applause.) lam certain upon that prin-
ciple the great majority in Parliament is disposed to
PP E9O? and I believe that Parliament represents tii sense of the great majority of the oogotry. liarl
has become sensible of the evils and the danoel4eiosurnfrileb,
we have incurred from the laxity and erro, '',." '-
whist“
fat4pro i ma within recent years, p.01441;4
thp I,e,gialat
1 is ha
gran ve been Oer94
—but r hQ ur,
' ffo4ttel.feaBorilitnhge
purpose of superseaing— yoa forbid !
pose of aiding, stimulating, and exe'v
147 l4lioßT, l:Iy aid, by Ague amonl 11:g oai elivalions,
PQmniWiltir 14 sul3Pckt Qf eetricii g'3 •
all classes of the
. y religious education.
But, gentlemen, anl9ng the vamouN clones WO WhiOil

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