The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1842-05-13 00:00:00

ZOOLOGICAL GARDENS

THE Subscribers to this Establishment, and the Public,
are respectfully informed the
FIRST GRAND OPENING FETE OF THE SEASON
will take place
ON MONDAY NEXT, MAY 16,
with the Novel and Extraordinary Exhibitions, and
PICTORIAL MODEL OF ROME,

the once proud Mistress of the World ; comprising, amongst
its most striking features, the Ancient Bridge and Castle of
St. Angelo, the Vatican, and Pontifical Palace, the Capital
di St. Spirito, and the vast and marvellous edifice-Of St.
Peter's.

This magnificent representation has been constructed from
the most accurate Designs, by the most celebrated Artists of
the day. The delineations are so strictly accurate, and the
proportions so stupendous, as to offer a perfect realization of
those Wonders of Architecture which still render the Eternal
City the most interesting spot in the world.
At dusk, this novel exhibition will be seen under the
aspect which the scene presents during the rejoicing in cele-
bration of Il Giorno di San Pietro, when the whole vast
Edifice of St. Peter's is Illuminated. and every detail of the
glorious Architecture shines forth in lines of resplendent
light. It is on those festive occasions also that the celebra-
ted Girandola, or great FIRE WORKS of ST. ANGELO,
are displayed from the summit of the Castle, beyond all com-
parison the grandest display of Pyrotechnic Art ever invented,
being a fac simile of this GORGEOUS FESTIVAL. With
these will be given Cascades of Fire Fountains of Stars and
tremendous Flights of Rockets, forming a scene of the most
inconceivable magnificence ever attempted out of Italy.
Pyrotechnic Artist, SIGNOR SEMONA.
N.B.—Every possible care has been taken in forming a
first-rate MILITARY BAND, which, under the superin.
tendance of Mr. STUBBS, will perform during the Season.
ADMITTANCE, ONE SHILLING.

TO CORRESPONDENTS

."
Veritas" arrived too late even for perusal

We only decline the letter of " A. B. C." on account of the
improper spirit in which the writer expresses himself.
We are not aware inwhat respect the paragraph in the
STANDARD. on the subject of the late accident on the Bir-
kenhead and Chester Railway, is incorrect, and we have
not either of the papers in which the report of the coroner's
inquest appeared.
" W. C." must write more legibly.

However much we may agree with the sentiments of
" NV. A. H.," his letter is couched in language too offen-
sive for admission into our columns.

Ebe Etberpoot gilanbarti.

FRIDAY MORNING, MAY 13, 1842.

At length the views of Sir Robert Peel's government,
with respect to the Nor Poor-law, are before us; and,
although we can scarcely go the length of our me-
tropolitan contemporaries—the Times and Morning
Herald—in reprobation of the spirit in which they are
conceived, we cannot but admit that sincere and great
disappointment is the feeling with which they have
filled our mind. Relaxations in the stringent working
of the measure there are, indeed, a few, and those not
immaterial ones. The tyranny of Somerset-house is
not in future to lord it with such bitter and uncontrolled
severity as has been its wont. But the principle—
and it is against that which we have ever contended—
upon which the authority of that unconstitutional
power is based—the centralizing principle—is insisted
upon by Sir James Graham with a determination as
fixed as Whiggery itself could display—a determination
which leaves us little to hope with respect to the mode
in which the powers of the Home Office, in his hands,
will be used to check the harsh and unbending system
as administered by the utilitarian trio over whom the
Home Secretary is the only authoritative, controlling
power.

For six years more the poor of England are to be
subject to the tender mercies of this oppressive sys-
tem; for ever, would it not be better to admit ?—for
if the arguments of Sir James Graham are valid for
the continuation of the commission for six or three
years, even, they are good for its permanent establish-
ment. It is distinctly admitted by the Right Hon.
Baronet that uniformity of management is not the
object to attain which the commission is necessary. On
the contrary it is boasted now that such uniformity is
not even attempted,—that it is the study of this cen-
tral power to accommodate the working of the system
to the circumstances of every locality ;—and by this
admission, we contend is swept away at once those
specious arguments with respect to uniformity which
we always regarded as the only plausible excuse for
consigning the powers, which ought to belong to
boards of guardians, to the overriding controul of the
three commissioners.

The existence of this unconstitutional body we may,
therefore, now conclude, so far as the present Govern-
ment is concerned, is to be perpetual. The dietaries—
the regulations by which the poor of England are to
be fed and managed—are still to be dictated under the
hands and seals of the Somerset House authorities.
The workhouse test, slightly modified only, is still to
Ibe applied to our suffering and deserving poor. The
separation of man and wife—of parents and children
--is still to be enforced. The union of parishes, and
the erection of pauper prisons over the land are still to
be persisted in. *We are to have, moreover, a system
of general education, combined with pauperism, con-
ducted upon the "universal" principle, as to religion;
and we have only to thank a conservative government
for the paltry boon of a few remissions in a system of
tyranny which was fast growing too hideous and de-
basing to be tolerated in the bosom of a free country.
We shall return to this subject on an early occasion
—when, perhaps, we may be able to examine it with
less emotion than we now feel. At present, we must
confess, our disappointment and regrets are too poignant
to allow us to treat it with proper calmness and delibe-
ration.

The judgment delivered by Mr. Knight Bruce in
the Vice-Chancellor's Court, (which we reported in our
last publication,) laying down the system of education
to be pursued in the schools of Bury St. Edmunds,
is too important to be passed over with the brief no-
tice which we were then able to bestow upon it. In
every point that judgment must be held as deciding the
law of the question at issue between the Conservative
and " Liberal " parties in the Corporation of Liver-
pool; and it is therefore desirable that the require-
ments of that law should, in every future discussion
of the proceedings, and of the system itself, of the
Education Committee, be clearly understood, and, if
possible, acted upon.
The parity of the cases of the schools of Bury St.

Edmunds, and those of the corporation of Liverpoo:

is perfect. In both cases there is a fund to which all
classes of the community have an equal right—that of
Bury St. Edmunds derived from charitable bequests,
the sale of church plate, &c., and that of Liverpool
from the dues of the town and the rents of the corpo-
ration. In both cases a surplus portion of that fund
is appropriated to the purposes of education—to the
education of all classes of the community, who have
an equal right to the funds by which it is provided.
The question then at issue, in both cases, is with re-
spect to the kind of education which it is incumbent
upon those who have the disposal of such funds to
provide for the community's use.
" If there be any education," says the new Vice-

"it must clearly be accompanied by in-
struction in religion ; for, without religion, education
would be a byeword and a complete mockery." And
again—" I can very well understand the argument,
that no part of the funds of the charity ought to be
applied to the purposes of education ; that is perfectly
intelligible ; but it would be worse than mockery to say
that there should be education without religious instruc-

Chancellor,

Lion." Here then we find it distinctly laid down that
any education provided for the public use from sources
similar to those referred to must be a religious educa-

tion. But of what description ? it may be asked.
The system in use in these very schools was, like that
in our own corporation schools, to a certain extent, of
a religious character. It embraced the daily reading
of the scriptural extracts prepared for the use of the
Irish national schools, and the authorised version of
the scriptures, or " such part thereof as the trustees
shall think proper." It approximated, moreover, more
nearly to our ideas of a scriptural education than the
system of the late Education Committee, for it provided
that "no other religious instruction besides the Select
Extracts and the authorised version of the Bible"—no
Douay version—no breviaries or missals—" should be
introduced into the schools."

And yet this cutting down of religion into shreds—
this substitution of an unreal, unsubstantial, cold ab-
straction for the vital and lifelike presence of religious
teaching—is not what the law requires to fulfil its in-
terpretation of that which ought to be entwined with
any system of education provided for public use from
public funds. Such a system is defective—to use the
expression of the Vice-Chancellor--" not because it
does not provide for religious instruction, according to
the doctrines and practice of the Church of England;
but because it does not provide at all, for what he can
call religious instruction !" The law says there must be
" exposition of the scriptures "—that "religion can-

not be taught without interpretation" ! There must too
be "a standard" somewhere ; and it is urged by the
Vice-Chancellor—" what standard can the court have,
or with propriety adopt, other than the established
religion of the country ?" The education, then, must
he a religions education ; it must be a scriptural edu-
cation ; and, more than that, it must he education in
the scriptures as interpreted by the Church of Eng-
land. To no other system will the law give its sanc-
tion ; and upon this system, if appealed to, the law
will insist.

But even further than this (and the point is worthy
of the serious attention of the Education Committee)
the law will go ; and in its anxiety for the efficient
working of the system which it prescribes, it requires.
that " the masters and mistresses " of such schools
"must be members of the Church of England." For
" suppose the schoolmaster to be a conscientious ana-
baptist—what then ? Is there to be no exposition of
the scriptures ? If there were to be, then the parties
must look out for some gentleman professing all the
tolerated religions in the country. A master, not be-
lieving in the doctrine of the Trinity, may be called on
to interpret such portions of the scripture as relate to
that doctrine, and he may do that which is too general
with regard to the Bible, namely, skip those parts which
present the difficulty." And again—without a stand-
ard of teaching anti a test with respect to teachers,
" the varieties of religions taught would be as infinite
as the changes of dissent are perpetual !" In every
similar school, therefore, the religious teaching must be
not only in the tenets of the Church of England, but
the law insists that it must be under the direction of
masters and mistresses belonging to that church.
The concluding remarks of the Vice-Chancellor in
giving this judgment are very striking, and not a little
startling. The case before us, it must be borne in
mind,' was ultimately disposed of by agreement of all
parties in favour of a modified system, to be conducted
by Church of England teachers and upon Church of
England principles—of a system, in fact, closely re-
sembling that adopted in our own town by the present
Education Committee. "In my opinion," says Mr.
Knight Bruce, " every party in the town is equally
entitled to the benefit of the charity,"—(as in Liverpool,
it is justly contended that the surplus income of the
Corporation Estate should be so expended as to con-
duce to the advantage of all classes and parties in the
community ;)—" and I only sanction this scheme, on
the clear understanding at the bar, that all parties agree
to it in its present modified shape." The children of
Dissenters were not entitled, of right, to any remission
of the attendances at the Church of England services
and teachings, which was permitted under the agree-
ment, which, for the sake of peace, he was unwilling
to disturb. " Had not all parties agreed," he con-
tinues,—and we would here earnestly call the
attention of those gentlemen in the council, and
particularly of Mr. G. H. Lawrence, Mr. Alderman
Turner, and others, who favour a further relaxation
of the present system, to let in the children of Ro-
man Catholics and Dissenters, to the significant lan-
guage made use of,—" had not all parties agreed, I
should have entertained great difficulty in directing
education at all ; but I think they have exercised a
sound discretion in giving a portion of the town the
benefits of education, restricted in the way directed,
rather than in withholding all benefit of education from
the community of Bury." The fact is here distinctly
before us, and before those who contend for a further
dilution of the principle of scriptural education to pro-
pitiate popery and dissent, that even our present modi-
fied system is only tolerated by the law ; that we have
no choice, legally, between a strict Church of England
system of education in our schools and no education
derived from any public funds. The present sys-
tem, even, would, in all probability, be upset upon an
application to a court of law; and with certainty this
would be the case, if a more lax and "liberal" sys-

tern—we- presume we must term it—were permitted to
he introduced.

Unquestionably education, even of a portion of its
humbler classes, must be a benefit to any community.
We wish, as earnestly as the most "liberal" of the
council, to extend as widely as we can to the industri-
ous population of Liverpool that benefit. 'We cannot,
however, on principle, consent to the introduction of
any system of education which is not based upon a
faithful teaching of the truths of Scripture ; and we
here put it to those who are more disposed to bend
upon this point than we are, that in real fact the law
itself will not sanction such a departure from the prin-
ciple of scriptural, or even Church of England educa-
tion. Every obstacle thrown in the way of the modi-
fied system at present in operation, by friends or by
opponents, is in reality an obstacle thrown in the way
of any education being offered by the Corporate Estate
to our destitute fellow-townsmen ; for, weaken the
present system by the adoption of ad captandum re-
laxations of the religious teaching which is combined
with it, and the law will step in and say that you shall
either adhere strictly to all its requirements, or resign
the duty of education altogether.
Surely there is no party in the council, or in the,
borough, who can contemplate with satisfaction a re-
sult so fraught with evil as would be the breaking up
of our schools, and the abandonment of our rising
generation to absolute ignorance ! And yet such, we
repeat, must be the result of a continued obstruction
of the working of the present system. We leave the
subject here to the serious consideration of both par-
ties in the council.

Our amusing and sweet-tempered friend of the
Times, we are happy to observe, has at length arrived
at the useful knowledge of his own exceeding liability
to blunder.

" Aliquando dorrnitat bonus Hornerus."

Even the sage of Castle-street nods sometimes, and
confuses his wondering readers, although he may not
exactly " shake Olympus," or even disturb the gra-
vity with which the statue of Britannia turns her back
upon " the flags " of our Exchange and " the lads "
thereof.

We must give the world the benefit of our contem-
porary's confession. Referring to the statements in a
paragraph, which we sheaved last week contained al-
most as many blunders as lines, our humbled philoso-
pher remarks—

" There was one mistake in our paragraph we allow, for
We took it for granted, after the clear demonstration given
of the injustice which might be inflicted by the operation of
the schedules, and after Sir ROBERT Nees admission in
the following paragraph," (which by the way contains no
admission at all as we read it,) " that this attempt to extort
the tax on income, from men not possessed of an income.
would have been abandoned ; but in this it seems we were
mistaken."

ONE mistake—excellent sage ! And what, pray,
might be that one mistake ? Why this, says the
." We took it for granted" (!) that a certain
proposition in the Income-tax Bill " would be Jaban-
doned." Sublime of journalists ! You took for

Times :—'

granted that a thing would be, and wrote that it had

been. You drew upon your own small stock of dis-
cernment, and foisted your bad bill upon the world as
sterling coin. Carry out this excellent principle of
journalism, and we shall have the Times some of these
days " taking it for granted " that the equestrian sta-
tue of George the Third in Monument-place has trot-
ted down to the Times-office to make a call ; and be
furnished with an imaginary report of an imaginary
conversation of the monarch (or his steed) with its
imaginative editor !

But is it true that the Times only committed one
mistake in the paragraph in question ? The " lit era
scripta Inanet," and the can therefore examine again.
The income-tax, wrote the Times, " progresses, if not
very fast, at least fast enough." At the time that this
was written, it had not progressed at all, fast or even
" fast enough." It only " progressed " on the Mon-
day night, about the time when our contemporary goes
to press; and he was here only—taking it for granted !
Again : " All its most grinding clauses have been
agreed to, with the single exception of that which
compelled a man engaged in two businesses, one pro-
fitable and the other losing, to pay on the profits of

the one without any allowance for the losses of the
other." The passing of " all the most grinding
clauses" is here again "taken for granted." Yet up to
the conclusion of Monday night--after our contem-
porary had gone to press, and perhaps to sleep (if
such a sage ever sleeps)—the House had only got to
the 88th clause of a bill which contains one hundred
and eighty-eight clauses !
profitable and the other losing," our contemporary
Again : with respect to the "two businesses, one

paid that the clause, which prevented the loss by one
to be set off against the profit from another, had been
" with much difficulty" given up by ministers. Tl'e,
wonderfully wise, as the Times very justly terms us,
denied the existence of any such clause, or such pro-
posed clause. What says our contemporary to this ?
Why, that, unless such denial is " a mere quibble on
the word business, by which farming, mining, joint-
stock banking, and other businesses, are excluded,.the
assertion is untrue." We can assure our contempo-
rary, however, that there was on our part no quibbling
at all. A man in every " business "—a perfect jack-
of-all-trades—is by this bill allowed, and was always al-
lowed, to set his losses against his gains, and to pay upon
nett income

No concession was, therefore, made, and
none was needed here. The case put by our contem-

porary, in which a man deriving gain from property
in one schedule, and losing from a business in another,
is not allowed to pay upon his nett income, unjust
though we contend that clause to be, has been passed
and stands part of the bill. There is no need, more-
over, for quibbling upon mere words with such an op-
ponent as the Times, for with a happy talent peculiar
to himself, our contemporary has contrived to blunder
doubly, and is equally wrong whichever signification of
the term " business" we adopt !
With respect to this—his one admitted blunder—the
Times thus amusingly accounts for it :

"We really thought too well of Sir RottEr,T PEEL to be-
lieve that a scheme of extortion, which even so unscrupulous
a partizan as the editor of the Standard admits to be unjust,
would be persisted in by him ; but we are corrected, and
we will take care not to fall into any such mistake again."

In other words, the Times drew upon his exceeding
discernment and his draft was dishonoured;—he " took
for granted" that "what the editor of TILE STANDARD
admits to be unjust, would not be persisted in by Sir
Robert Peel ;" and the result has proved that our in-
fluence over the determination of the Premier is not

so great as he gave us credit for. He is "corrected"
however, and as he promises " not to fall into any such
mistake again"—not to " take for granted" again—we
must give him another trial. Would he but go to
school for a few months what a philosopher he might
become ! Or would he,—as he recommends us to

do,'—bEfore writing upon any subject, endeavour to
know something about it, with what pleasure would we
ourselves, in common with all the world, turn weekly
to his lucubrations, the good sense of which would
then eqUal, perhaps, the good taste and gentlemanly
character of the language in which they are conveyed !