The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1854-04-25 00:00:00

TO THE EDITOR OP THE LIVERPOOL CHRONICLE.

SlR,—Your.leading article in this day's Taper
__concluded as follows

We may here remark, in addition to the three cases stated
by Mr. Jeffery, et the Vestry. Meeting, that Mr. Carne and Mr.
Hutchison have both obtained reductions upon warehouse
parish assessments since MO, the former upon two buildings
in Kay-street, to the extent of £620 ; and the latter upon
four others, situate in Pownall-street, of £312."
This statemont is incorrect, so far as 1 am concerned,
inasmuch as I lave never owned, rented, or occupied any
warehouse, or-other tenement whatever, in Pownall-street or
the neighbourhood.—l am, Sir, yours, trimly,
22nd April,-11144. ROI3T. HUTCHISON.
C Et •Er 'R
•C 'H 'RATES..

-STATE OF THE POLL.
THIRD DAY, MONDAY, APRIL 24.
For the Rate Bl6 Persons. 2044 Votes.
Against do.

Majority against the Rate 470 „

321 „

The Churchwardens, in announcing the result of the Third
Day's Poll, take thi opportunity of informing the Parishioners
of the consequences which must ensue from a rejection of
the Rate.

There are employed, in connexion with the Parish Churches,
2 Clerks, 7 Vergers and Sextons, 2 Organists, 10 Singers, and
21 Bellringers.
Unless the Parishioners provide Funds for paying these, the
whole must be at once discharged—the Organs silenced—the
Bells cease,to be rung—the Clocks stopped—and the Property
allowed to go to-ruin.

It is untrue (as stated in a Local Paper) that the Rectors
are opposed to the Rate.
The Churchwardens trust that the Parishioners will
support them by recordinz their Votes without delay.
.C. FRED. CARNE. llChurchwardens.
ROBERT H UTCH ISON,
N.B.— The Parishioners only pay for Fire Singers in ,each
Church. 411 the-additional assistance rendered to the Choirs
is gratuitous on the part of individuals.

NATIONAL EDUCATION.

THE LIVERPOOL STANDARD, AND GENE RAL COMMERCIAL ADVERTISER.

PRESENT POSITION OF POLITICAL
PARTIES.

THERE is, perhaps, no subject which has occupied
more of public attention, undergone more discus-
sion, and yet with less satisfactory result, than
that of the education of that immense majority of
the rising population who have no other means of
beneficial instruction than what is afforded by the
State, or by the-aid of private beneficence. The
great difficulty appears to be in arriving at any
fixed opinion as to the necessity to be provided
for ; and, in the mean time, while something
should be done—if the generation which will suc-
ceed us is to be in fact, as well 'as in name, a
Christian population—the race is growing up in a
great measure uninstructed. This is not for want
of schools, for they abound in most populous
localities ; but there is an evident deficiency in
the results sought to be obtained, and conflicting
-ideas as to the best means of accomplishing them.
Much of the evil arises from the erroneous esti-
mates as to education, confounding causes with
effects, and attributing good to means which may
produce either good or evil. At the last quarter
-sessions for the county of Somerset, the chairman,
in addressing the 'grand jury, lamented the want
of education, which, he said, was evident in the
number of prisoners to be tried, the greater num-
ber of whom could neither read nor write. This
is a key to the fallacy which generally prevails on
the subject. Ignorance is at once concluded to be
the want of being able to read or write, and the
remedy is, therefore, the instruction in these ele-
mentary branches of knowledge, without any ap-
parent thought that both may be acquired without
any other than evil results, and that a man may
be a good subject and a good Christian, and yet
ignorant of either. In the much maligned times
when a reverence for Church and State was
esteemed a positive duty enjoined by Holy Scrip-
ture, before Whiggery substituted registration of
marriages, births, and deaths for the offices of the
Church, the children of the poor were brought to
be baptised, and their parents enjoined that they
should be instructed in the catechism, and having
been examined as to their knowledge of its truths
by the parish clergyman, should be brought to
the bishop to be confirmed. Here was a simple
machinery for imparting to all a knowledge of
their responsibilities as immortal beings ; and so
long as obedience to such regulations was esteemed
a privilege, there might be less of the refinements
of education, but there was also infinitely less of
practical infidelity. Now, however, the functions
of the Church have been in a great measure super-
seded by Whig concessions to popular clamour for
religious liberty, and the melancholy result is
practical heathenism and, with a multiplication
of schools, an actual increase of ignorance, and
thousands of our population growing up without
any apparent knowledge of the God which male
them, except to profane His name.

On such a subject it may appear strange to look
for example to the people of China, and yet the
system pursued in that empire affords many points
worthy of deep and attentive consideration. In
Blackwood's _Magazine for January last is an
article ou The Past and Fixture of China," which
affords some highly interesting information on this
subject. There the education of the people has
been from the earliest times under the especial care
of the State ; and a work written before the Chris-
tian era (says Mr. DAVIS, who has long been
familiar with China) speaks of " the ancient system
of instruction," which required that every town
and village, down to only a few families, should
have a common school. On this all-important
matter of education, the Chinese hare followed a
system different from all other nations. The great
aim both in Europe ,and America has been to
-enlarge the intellect of man, to impart to him a
knowledge of the physical world and the marvels
•of science, and to exalt the human intellect by
developing its varied powers. No such educa-
tional system found favour with the practical mind
of China. The system which has there existed has
been eminently utilitarian ; but it is utilitarianism
in its best form. It is not of that sort which
exhibits itself in those schools among ourselves
which are styled " commercial," whose object is to
impart merely those branches of knowledge which
are calculated to advance one's material interests,
and which may be used against one's fellows as
much as for them. On the contrary, Chinese
education, contemplates man even less as an indivi-
dual than as a member of society, and enjoins upon
him, by line upon line and precept upon precept,
the manifold duties of humanity and court( sy
which he owes to his fellow-men. The object of
all European systems is to enlarge man's intellect ;
but that of the Chinese is to mould his habits and
affections. The teaching of their great philoso-
pher CoNnycius was, to use the words of one of
his disciples, "to possess rectitude of heart, and
to love one's neighbour as one's self." With us
the great object of education is knowledge—with
the Chinese it is morality. The moral and social
lessons which with us are left to be taught in
private, or to' be acquired by experience of actual
life, are made the first step and fundamental prin-
ciple of training in China. They prepare the
youth for being a good man and a good member of
society, and place science only in a secondary rank.
It is much to be lamented that, in a nation like
ours, enjoying the pure light of Revelation, and
having advantages such as the Chinese never pos-
sessed, we should be so far behind them in appre-
ciating the real object of education. The first and
prominent duty should be the inculcation of those
religious truths which far surpass all secular know-
ledge, while the latter should be merely subsidiary,
and used simply as a means to an end. Bdt so
long as national schools are made the vehicles-for
intellectual advancement, irrespective or secondary
only to moral teaching, we can expect no other
results than those which are evident around us—
one part of the population acquiring ideas far
beyond their worldly circumstances, and the other
with no instruction at all, filling our gaols and
swelling the calendars at assize courts and quarter
sessions.

vation of our constitutional privileges and their
legitimate representation in the House of Com-
mons, would place political principles once more
on an intelligible footing ; would revive almost
despairing hopes, encourage the timid, sustain the
wavering, give practical efficiency to the efforts of
the bold, and, under the blessing of Providence,
rescue the National Faith from the insidious de-
signs of Rome. The opportunity for action cannot
much longer be delayed ; but the most prudent
course is to be prepared, and, while all admit that
union is strength, its application was never more
important than in helping to secure the blessings
of a Constitutional Government.

Tim Easter recess has, as usual, caused a lull
in the political world ; and, even without this
pause in the business of legislation, it would be
difficult to point to any one great question which
occupies public attention, except it be the all-
absorbing subject of the impending war. It would
seem, indeed, as though the coalition of opposing
factions had afflicted the public mind with apathy,
and that the spirit which is sometimes aroused at
a contested election had been quenched in listless
indifference. If our institutions were assailed with
the definite attacks of any one of the various
phases assumed by Liberalism for party objects,
we could imagine that the true Conservative spirit
which animates every honest and intelligent man
might be awakened into vigorous activity ; but the
conglomeration of political opinions which consti-
tute the present Administration have neutralised
each other, and the Conservative public appear to
have concluded that such a fusion, though inca-
pable of doing any good, is powerless to do harm.
We have not yet recovered from the excitement
which struggled so manfully for ascendancy at the
last election, and was rendered futile through
Peelite treachery ; but it is almost time that the
country was once more aroused to the importance
of the cause at issue, with the advantage of all the
experience which has since been acquired. There
should no longer be a compromise between duty
and inclination, or any foolish reliance on specious
promises of Conservative tendencies. The ground
of difference should be the intelligible one of ad-
herence to the Constitutional principles avowed by
the supporters of the Earl of DERBY, as opposed
to any support of the present Ministry. The
Peelites laid claim to the dignity of being Con-
servatives in all but their adherence to the doc-
trines of Free Trade, but their claim should on no
account be admitted. All the value of their pre-
vious services has been cancelled, their professions
have been proved to be false and utterly worthless,
and in future they ought to be ranked with the
ultra-Radicals, with whom they have chosen to
ally themselves. Indeed, in estimating the title
to public confidence of any representative when he
shall again seek the suffrages of his constituents,
the surest test should be the support or opposition
which he has afforded to the Coalition Cabinet in
their, fortunately, unsUccessful attempts to revo-
lutionise the country by concessions to democracy.
We are by no means premature in directing at-
tention to the necessity of being prepared for
another appeal to the country. The Ministry are
inherently weak ; and, however ingenious they
may be in patching up their quarrels and conceal-
ing their defects, they have already shown many
unmistakeable signs of speedy decay. Scarcely had
they been formed, when three of their Romanist
allies tendered their resignation, because Lord J.
RUSSELL had given vent to one of his occasional fits
of Protestantism ; the mysterious resignation and
resumption of office by Lord PALMERSTON has not
yet been explained, except on an hypothesis which
no one believes, however probable may be its truth ;
a similar course by the President of the Poor-law
Board, and its injurious consequence in the with-
drawal of the bill for the alteration of the Law of
Settlement, has not been without a damaging
effect.; and only recently, the loss of their principal
man in the House of Commons has been with
difficulty avoided by allowing him to give vent to
his mortification in a flood of tears. It may be
thought impossible that any Ministry, however
strong their tenacity for office, can long endure
such assaults.; and though their cautious craft has
enabledthemto steer clear of shipwreck, by literally
doing nothing—postponing every measure, suc-
cumbing to every reverse, and falsifying every
promise—it is a course which cannot long put off
the day of reckoning. They have also had their
share of fortuitous circumstances on which to
found a claim for the forbearance of their oppo-
nents, and the suspension of popular indignation
for their multiplied failings. In 1851 the Great
Exhibition served as a convenient excuse to enable
Lord JOHN RUSSELL to hold office for another
year without precipitating his own downfal ; and,
I now, bad management, treachery, or something
worse, have involved the country in an expensive
war, which is made to serve a similar office for that
legislative trifling which consists in proposing
measures which no one cordially approves—mere
compromises between Whiggery, Peelism, and
Radicalism—and afterwards withdrawing them
when their discussion becomes dangerous. The
war, however, is not without its inconveniences,
the worst of which have yet to come. It may suit
the complacency of Mr. GLADSTONE, whose career
as a Chancellor of the Exchequer has been a series
of financial blunders, to talk of not drawing on
posterity for the cost of the war, and providing for
the expenses of the first expedition by an issue of
a million and three quarters of Exchequer Bills ;
and subsequently by a proposal for the issue
of six millions of Exchequer Bonds, to be
repaid out of the anticipated surplus ; but long
before another Session of Parliament the coun-
try must be called upon to burden itself with
new taxes, if we are to expect that success to our
arms for which we are called upon to-morrow to
offer our prayers to the Majesty of Heaven. The
demand upon the national resources must be made,
despite the shuffling off which the question has yet
received from Peelite insincerity, and the discus-
sion may prove more dangerous to Ministerial
stability than even the dreaded infliction of that
democratic abortion, the Reform Bill.

With such prospects of political changes before
us, where are the preparations for the coming
struggle, which cannot be indefinitely postponed ?
What associations are formed to collect the
scattered elements of Conservative strength, and,
by union, to present a fair front in defence of the
great principles of Church and State, endangered
by hostility from without, and treachery from
within ? Where is the rallying point where the
standard should be reared, and from whence the
trumpet should sound to call England to its duty,
and, mindful of its former glory, to ensure victory
abroad by loyalty and fidelity at home ? Alas, it
would seem that the incubus of Whiggery has
paralysed our noblest energies, and that, having
been defeated in one contest, we hesitate to engage
in another. We should not need to be *minded
of former triumphs, but let us not forget that
Liverpool led the van en the last occasion, and to
Liverpool the country will again look for an en-
couraging example when political principles are
once more tried in the balance. The metropolis
has lost its prestige in its huge parliamentary
boroughs given over to the short-sighted selfish-
ness of the ten-pound householders in the hack
streets ; and Liverpool, the great head of British
commerce, should justify its well-earned reputation
by proving also the great centre of Conservative
principles. Manchester, to carry out its Free-
trade policy, inoculated the whole country with
its dogmas, and did not relax its 'exertions till it
had achieved its object. Liverpool should take
example from its earnestness, and redouble its
exertions for a far worthier cause ; and who dare
doubt of its success ? There is ample Conservative
feeling throughout the country for the call to be
cordially responded to, and all that is required is
for a nucleus to be formed, which would rapidly
bring within its influence the electoral resources of
the Empire. An association of a purely national
character, with the avowed object of uniting all
CoriOgiViltiVeS in one comm-on bond for the preser.