, 1865-08-18


Will the Superintendent tell US where and
when ? [ have carefully read the very
elaborate articles which have appeared in
the principal British Reviews, and News
papers, on the "Report of the Committee
of Council on Education, presented to both
houses of Parliament, by command OF Her
Majesty, in 1859" as we'll as on that of the
commissioners appointed to enquire into
the State Of Popular Education in England,
in 1861 )" and nowhere, either i'll these
Articles, or yet in the able, and full Parlia-
mentary Debates on these Reports, have
| found, among the many and various I'M
provements suggested by the most compe-
tent men, the most distant ~allusion to,
much less any recommendation Of, the
Phonetical system; or any mention even
made of the very "superior SYSTEM" of Mr..
ID. Stow, or his enthusiastic, devoted, but
solitary disciple, the Royd. J. Gardin.
This, MIR. Editor, we know, is an age of adj
yancemcnt, when every proposed improve
mcnt is given a fair trial, and, if found sue
c%esstuI, is unhesjtatingIy adopted at any
sacrifice of expense, or trouble. We doubt
not therefore that the Government did, at
first, encourage the trial of this system, on
a small scale, in order fairly to test the SUI
periority claimed for it but even if this
were so what are we to conclude from the
fact Of its not haui0g been subsequently
aIopted III any Of tie Government Schools,
and haring been passed over, an silence, by
the a6Oue mentioned G0UerAMeRt COmmiAeeS
on popuiur edHcuti0n? Why precisely
what we would conclude, if, after a formal
trial, by Government Agents, of any sup
posed improvement in the manufacture of
Ordnance, or the building Of iron-clad
ships, the advocated improvement were
not adopted-i.e.-that the experiment had
conclusiycly sheWn, that the fancied I'M
provement existed only in the imagination
of the inventor, and could not be adopted
with advantage in short, TO an absolute
rejection, and condemnation, of the suppos-
ed improvement. 1t seems to me perfect
ly plain then that if the British Govern
ment ever did encourage the trial of the
PhoneticaI system, as Mr.. Gardin so vague
ly asserts, and afterwards abandoned it, or
declined to adopt it, which, in this case,
is the same thing, then they, in reality, re-
jected and condemaed IL, uRd that, after due
trial IF lis merits. Can there be a stronger
dl 9ulIlCtlC against lbSddOptlOu III our OCLOOlS,
than this, furnished by the Superintendent
himself?
But, urges he again, under the old sys-
tenn some of our children were seen read
ing with their books upside down, the new
system is therefore more thorough; and
the Teachers, too, and not the Governor,
then pointed out the pieces to be read at
the examinations. Now surely the Super
intendent does not attribute these little
eccentricities on the part of Children,
and Teachers, to the defects Of tile oM sys-
tenn The whole English world-nay, I
might say the whole world, has learned to
read under that system, and I am not
aware that the general result has been, ell
Their that they can read only particular Sc
l~ections, or that they hold their books up
side down. The defects alleged against
the Phonetical system have been such as
are attributable directly to the peculiari-
ties of that system; but surely this is not
the case here, with the superintendent
objections against the old method. We
will be justified, I think, in attributing
these superficial results rather to the man