The Sun.
London, England, 1870-04-01 00:00:00

LAW REFOR3L

Lord Westbury delivered the inaugural address at
the anniversary meeting of the Juridical Society.
Among other things, his lordship said, as the Society
was well aware, a commission had been issued two
or three years ago for the purpose of inquiring into
the expediency of preparing a digest of the
law. That commission reported that it was
a thing practicable, a thing most expe-
dient, and calculated to be most useful to
the community. Unfortunately, they accompanied
that statement with others which had a backward
tendency, and the matter remained now, to his great
regret, in a position in which the whole work had yet
to be begun and performed. Ile was glad, however,
to be able to add that he had heard the Chancellor of
the Exchequer not long ago state that he thought no
public money could b 3 better expendel than in the
production of a digest of the law, and he trusted the
work might, with these encouraging words to look
to, in time be accomplished. So tax as the condition
of our law was concerned, we stood completely
alone in the civilised world. Then was not a
nation 'in Europe that had not made in that respect
greater progress. And why was it, he would ask,
that with all our knowledge and the treasures of our
experience for 300 years embodied in reports, we
coted not extract the gold out of the dust, cast away,
all the dirt by which it was encompassed, and embody
it in a code which would remain to our credit, with-
out having the trouble to delve and dig •for it in
QOM masses of rubbish which were callod repqtd.

ROYALTY AT A MIDDLE-CLASS SCHOOL.
The Prince and the Princess ofWales have visited the
Middle-class Schools in the City-road, London. The
intention of the visitors was to see the schools in
their everyday working order. They were accompanied
by the Right. Hon. G. Goschen, M.P., Dean Stanley,
and others. Sir W. Titez the treasurer, ex-
plained the position and object of this important
educational movement. The buildinc, in the City-
road was erected at a cost of £40,000, with the
object of fitting the sons of clerks and other persons
of the middle classes in London and its suburbs, for
industrial and commercial work, by an education of
a practical character. Fifty thousand pounds were
soon subscribed towards the work, and the pupils
now pay merely a fee of one guinea a
quarter. Latin and Greek are not taught,
and therefore greater completeness in the other
subjects may be attained. The subjects taught are
English, reading, writing, arithmetic, algebra, geo-
metry, history, geography, French, drawing, physical
science, music, physiology, book-keeping, and
botany. The pupils can buy a good dinner every day
on the spot for sixpence a head, and the system of
the whole concern really seems to be most advan-
tageous to the great class of clerks and others who
labour under the unavoidable grievance of large
families and small fixed incomes. A. similar
school is proposed to be established for girls.
THE PRINCE OP WALES AND MASONRY.

His Royal Highness the Prince of Wales took the
chair at the seventy-second anniversary festival of
the Royal Masonic Institution. In proposing
" Success to the Royal Masonic Institution for
Boys," the Prince said all freely admitted
that Freemasons felt a deep interest on the subject of
education, which had largely occupied the public
mind. As they were aware, the institute was
founded in 1798, when six boys were admitted,
educated, and provided for near home. In 1810,
when the jubilee was celebrated, the number was
increased to 150. In subsequent years, when the
Duke of Sussex became patron, the number was
largely increased. In 1852 the Queen became its
patron, and in 1857 an institution was founded in
Wood Green, which was rebuilt and opened
in 1805. At the present time there were 110
in the building and there would be accommodation
for 135 if the institution were out of debt. His Royal
Highness said the boys were instructed in French,
mathematics, Latin, and drawing, and that at the
last half-yearly local examination nineteen boys were
sent, of whom two received honours, and eleven,
certificates. During the evening hid Royal Highness
announced a donation of £lOO from the Queen.

LORD SHAFTESBURY ON PENNY LITERATURE.
In an address at the annual meeting of the East
London Sunday School Union, the Earl of Shaftes-
bury touched on the subject of penny literature.
The noble Earl observed that there was no danger
so portentous, because so insinuating, as the vile, the
pernicious, the pestilential, the deadly character of
the penny literature of the day. In the present day
a sheet could be produced for a penny, the compOsi-
tion of which was distinguished by scholarship,
and .which was admirably illustrated with
attractive engravings. These were circulated among
the people by thousands and tens of thousands, and
the appetite for them appeared to be almost unap-
peasable. Young and old were induced to read them,
and were all unconscious of the mischief until the
poison had entered their minds. These productions,
he saidi were cunningly written so as to defy the
operation of the law in their suppression. In fact no
legislation, in his opinion,would avail to counteract this
pernicious literature. It could be effected only by the
influence of a deep, solemn, holy public opinion—bv
imbuing the children with a sense of what was right,
according to the teaching of the Gospel; so that they
might be guided to a judgment between the two
classes of literature, and that their own tastes and
feelings might lead them to repel and reject those
pestilential productions.
DANCING SALOONS.

. The Liverpool Magistrates lately appointed a com-
mittee to frame a clause of local legislation to sup-
press the assemblage of women of ill-fame in dancwg
saloons in that town. This committee has now sent
in its report, in which it states that there
is no present opportunity of incorporating
such a clause in a local bill ; but having
considered the law available, and the decisions
bearing on the sufgeet, it draws the attention of the
head constable to the statutes for the punishment of
such offences generally, but particularly to the 251st
section of the Local Police Act of 1842, which, in
the committee's opinion, provides a remedy applicable
in many instances for the suppression of the evils
complained of.

THE RELIGIOUS DIFFICULTY.
Two letters appear in the Times on the subject a
the religious difficulty in the Education Bill. On'
is from a "Hertfordshire Incumbent," ant
the other from a "Shropshire Rector." The forme,
thinks that the amendment advocated by Lord Rus•
sell and Mr. Vernon Harcourt, though it may coin•
mend itself on the first blush of the matter, cannot
bear examination. The letters assume, says the
writer, that proselytism can only proceed from mem.
bers of the Established Church. The experience of the
last few years does not confirm this idea. The ether
writer says that Mr. Vernon Harcourt has truthfully
described the probable ellect of making the national
schoolroom the battle-ground between rival sects, but
the remedy propo&rsi, he considers to be little, if at all,
removed from pure secularism. That remedy is con•
tained in the words :—"No religious instruction shall
be given, or religious observance practised, other
than the reading of the Scriptures."

THE ATIIANASIAN CREED.
The Rev. C. W. Sandford, chaplain to the Arch-
bishop of Canterbury, has been desired by the
Primate to make an intimation to the public
through the Times. The Archbishop has
received a petition, addressed to himself
and the Archbishop of York on the sub-
qhc
e
t of
petitionthe Cis re estilo.ned commonly
byl 5
1,150 laymen and
calleda
e"Athan
clergy.
It sets forth that the petitioners understand their
Graces to have invited a more general expression of
opinion on the subject of a recent petition for
"relief" (so called) to certain clergymen in the use of
the Athanasian Creed. Their opinion is that "either to
use the creed less frequently in the Church Service
than at present-, or to render its use in any cad°
optional, or to omit the mis-termed damnatory
clauses, would be fraught with danger to the best
interests of the Church." Any of thse expedients
would be a grave injury, they say, to the maintenance
of the dormatic principle in the Church of England
in its relation to the most central truths of faith.