The Sun.
London, England, 1859-11-03 00:00:00

National Education, and of the principle and
machinery, the especial advantages of the newly
inaugurated system of competitive examina-
tions. Mr. DISRAELI wisely conceives that
the best possible means of securing the bene-
fits of National Education is for the people
as much as possible to educate them-
selves. The State may then come in as an aux-
iliary. Aide toi et Dieu t'aidera, says the old pro-
verb, and so might it be reasonably said upon this
matter, in regard to the relations existing between
the powers that be and the general mass of the
population. Help yourselves and the Government
will help you. To: hich end the Mechanics' In-
stitutes afford the happiest means and the most
suitable opportunity. Hitherto the right hon. gen-
tleman frankly declares that those institu-
tions have :not fully realised the general ex-
pectations. And this, in a great measure, from their
isolation one from another, and their consequent

lack of that all-essential gift—Experience. Be-
sides experience, they have heretofore, he argues,
been seriously, wanting in emulation. Added to
which there has been an obv:ous deficiency of
energy in their general organisation. " Within
these few years," however, he goes on to remark,

" a very great change has taken place, and I attri-
bute that change. to the recognition on the part of
the people of this country, that there was a defi-
ciency of those qualities of experience, emulation,
and energy which I have referred to." There-
upon, in vivid illustration of this, he points
attention to the character of the institution
resulting in that very monster meeting at
that moment on Tuesday last addressed by him in
the Free Trade Hall at Manchester. " These,"
said Mr. DISRAELI, " are facts. There are at this
moment more, considerably more, than a hundred
institutions in Lancashire and Cheshire that are in
unity together, and which act in unison with a
central guiding association. They number 22,000
members ; of these 22,000 members, 8,500 are in
habitual attendance upon the evening classes of
these institutions. Of those 8,500 members, up-
wards of 1,200 have voluntarily come forward, and
challenged all difficulties and all the tests of a com-
petitive examination. Those 1,200 have been exa-
mined by a committee of the central association, a
committee of scholars ; they have undergone a legal
examination, an examination in each of the phases of
their particular interest and connection, and out of
this between 400 and 500 have been selected as compe-
tent to encounter an examination, which I sincerely
say, after having examined the papers which were
submitted to them, is an examination which no man
'could have encountered who had not taken great
pains to train his intellect and to acquire consider-
able knowledge." Nor is this enough for his argu-
ment. He gees on immediately to add—" Well,
who are the men who have done this ? What is
the class that has given 8,500 scholars to the even-
ing classes that have supplied this great body of
spontaneous competitors in a severe examination—
that have given the select body of 500 who have
challenged, and one-fifth of whom have gained,
the sanction of men of considerable acquirement
and weight—their sanction as having gone through
a process which none but men of a scholarly feeling
and of considerable strength of character and dis-
position could have encountered ? Can they say
now that they are not working men ? Why,
have looked over the lists of those who have ob-
tained what we may call the first-class certificate in
many of those branches in which they have been
examined. I remember that in algebra, that in
mensuration, that in geography, that in arithmetic,
and in history, first-class certificates have been
obtained after a most severe and scientific exami-
nation, and by whom have they been obtained ?
They have been obtained by boys, by youths, all
of them under 20 years of age. The first-class certi-
ficate in algebra, I observe, is obtained by a boy of
15 years, who obtained, by the bye, a second-class
certificate, I think, in arithmetic—but a boy of 15,
working in a factory for ss. a week. Who are
these men now to whom I am to have the high
honour to•night of offering these recognitions of
their labours and their merit ? Why, they are
factory operatives in all the various classes of that
branch of labour ; there are weavers, there are mill-
minders, and piecers, there is every class of factory
labour represented." These are (indeed) facts—and
theyare facts full of the most heartening, the most in-
spiriting encouragement. The right hon. gentleman,
who enforced the significance of them so powerfully
on Tuesday, at Manchester, had peculiar reason,
it appears to us, in the very act of enforcing them,
to insist upon it that Life is more of a game than of
a lottery, and to warn his hearers that they
should prepare themselves betimes for the opportu-
nity that would assuredly come to each in due sea-
son. It is the thought already nobly ex-
pressed by that all-wise and all-comprehend-
ing SIIAKSPERE—that thought " familiar in
our mouths as household words"— to wit
" There is a tide in the affairs of man which, taken
at the flood, leads on to fortune." It is the "oppor-
tunity" of which Mr. DISRAELI spoke on Tuesday
—the invariable, inevitable opportunity in relation
to which he said whimsically, but with peculiar
force, " I have found that if a man has a head upon
his shoulders, whether he lives in Lancashire or
whether he lives in Buckinghamshire, he generally
gets on in the world." No wonder the monster
meeting on Tuesday, in that Free Trade Hall, at
Manchester, rang, at these words, with mingled
cheers and laughter. For .England contains not
any more striking illustration of the capacity that
seizes the opportunity, than that afforded by the
genius, the career, and the position of the right lion.
gentleman himself—Statesman and man of letters,
orator and administrator, M.P. for Buckingham-
shire, and leader in the house of Commons of her
MAJESTY'S Opposition.

We notice in the Norfolk News an account of
certain clauses to be suggested for adoption in the
forthcoming Government Reform Bill. The un-
questionable and disgraceful bribery at the late
general election in the city, induced the Radicals to
take up the subject of bribery in good earnest, that
party having always in Norwich been decidedly
opposed to it. The Whigs and Tories, it would seem,
for shame's sake, could not refuse to do something,
and hence, we believe, the appointment of a com-
mittee to consider the subject of bribing at both
Parliamentary and municipal elections was agreed
to. In regard to the municipal elections immediate
action was of course necessary ; they were at hand,
and the bribery at them, as in the case of Glou-
cester, is only second to that practised at elections
of members for Parliament. The pror,osal was
that each member of the council prior to the
municipal election should sign a declaration to
abstain not only from all bribery and illegal prac-
tices, but also from canvassing and that he
would abide by the decision of umpires
named in the declaration, as to whether the pledge
had been fairly carried out, engaging to resign
his seat should
.the decision be against him. It
appears that 37 members of the council dared not
agree to the pledge, as implied by their silence ;
.that 16 were willing to take it, and that 7 were
"not content." So ended the attempt at " preven-
tion of corrupt practices" by voluntary agreement.
There can be no doubt that the old Cathedral city,