very thought is monstrous; and hence my hope of a release-a hope and wish further strengthened by the appearance in the interim of that concise and pithy exposition of Lord Brougham and Vaux's bill, given in pp.457-461 of the last number (cxxii.) of the "Quarterly Review," which makes it difficult now to write one's own previous thoughts without incurring some suspicion of plagiarism. Nevertheless, being prepared to keep my promise, if required, here I am again. Heaven send your readers patience through a dreary wilderness!

But may I here take leave in the outset to interpose some words of preface, "touching" the author of the bill in question?

Perhaps few dicta have given rise to more misapplications or absurdities than that of " Measures, not men.' Sir Robert Peel said wisely of this specious sophism, as applied to a government, what is as true respecting legislators :

*

"I do not agree with the views of some persons, who are disposed to overlook the men who constitute a government, and regard merely the measures they propose, without reference to the heads which conceived, and the hands which are to execute, those measures. In every department of private life, it is upon the confidence we feel in certain individuals that we proceed; it is not this particular act or that, though we may approve its grounds and principles, that insures our confidence in men, but it is our general reliance on their known integrity and honour that induces us to trust them. Without confidence in public men-without confidence in their good intentions-without confidence in their determination to fulfil any promises they may make—without full reliance upon their wish to consult the real and permanent interests of the country, no government can proceed with success."

I take the liberty to add—and no legislator is to be listened to. Believing these to be words of prudence and of truth, I do not scruple to affirm, on the foundation of their doctrine, that any scheme for general education proceeding from the Baron BROUGHAM AND VAUX ought instantaneously to be rejected, for the reason that it does proceed from him. It is not well to run the risk of giving a toostrong political colour to this letter, by any copious induction of facts (ready as they are to hand) from the career and public history of that individual, in justification of this opinion. Two points should be conclusive on the subject. The one is a very delicate question to handle ; but let it be remembered that I am not giving any opinion of my own on the matter when I remind the reader of the notorious fact, that, so strange have been the contradictions and various erratics of his lordship, that there has been no hesitation, either in private society.or in the public journals-nay, none among some men who, at least, call themselves his friends-in recurring to the hypothesis of a disordered intellect for explanation of them. The other point is, that whatever be his share or sum of intellect, or of acquired knowledge, it might, and would, perplex his veriest worshippers to quote from any known production of his lordship a single sentence properly deserving of the name of wisdom, or evidently destined for the acceptance and honour of posterity. If so, his cannot be the mind, be it as versatile or clever as it may, to frame and lead the work of NATIONAL EDUCATION. On such a question, it is not party bias, nor an unjust or ignorant prejudice,

Speech at the Mansion House, Dec. 23rd, 1834.

to shut one's ears beforehand to the reveries of such an individual. Lord Brougham and Vaux himself it is that has (with no small pains and weight of proof) established, in the most convincing manner, his own permanent disqualification as a legislator on any such momentous subject. On this ground alone his bill should properly be scouted, were its details in every part far less objectionable than they are. And now for some detailed instances of the pervading spirit of this assault upon the church and clergy of England.

It may seem almost captious to find fault with a preamble, yet what hypocrisy is even there! The education of the people is there said to be, that "wherein, under PROVIDENCE, doth chiefly consist the safety and happiness of the realm." The xxv. clause deals subsequently with the revealed word of that same "Providence" to the effect already stated! And it is piously ordained in the same preamble, that any three persons" (i.e., believers or unbelievers, Christians or Jews,) may be appointed (under Providence, of course,) "commissioners of education" for Christian England!

"

It must be granted, that this wholly unlimited indulgence survives only to the second clause; still the preamble stands to shew the universal charity of the projector, although so soon supplanted by a spirit of jobbing on his own part. For in the second clause it is proposed, that "one" of these commissioners "at the least shall be-[a clergyman of the established church ?-No. A member of that church ?No; but] a serjeant-at-law, or a barrister, of not less than seven years standing!" One out of three, at least; and perhaps if all, so much the better in his disinterested lordship's estimation! But why a barrister at all? It would be silly to dispute the general ability of barristers, and wrong to cast a word of blind reproach on the profession at large; but it is really impossible to see the peculiar fitness of lawyers to direct the work of national education. Taking them on the highest scale, what usually has been their own past course of discipline, and their experience of human life? If they be men of practice, no doubt they will have known, professionally, too much of all the baser parts of human nature; but our concern is with a barrister, or serjeant-at-law, of not less than seven years standing, who, from his lack of practice, will be found ready to become an educational commissioner; what, then, will have been his probable course? It is to be presumed that he is one who has attained a certain modicum of legal knowledge, though business has not followed in its train. The course of such a one, then, will probably have been, that he has passed from school to college, and from college to the inns of court. There, in his chambers-or, at any rate, in London-has all his subsequent experience of life accrued. Of country habits, and especially of the poor, he has no knowledge but from theory; in schools for the instruction of the lower orders he very probably has never set foot; of human nature, as displayed in all more unsophisticated places, he has made no actual trial; and all the ordinary ways of his profession are anything but ways of tenderness, or kind and comprehensive thoughtfulThe very facts which it is necessary to presume, in order to VOL. XIII.-June, 1838.

ness.

4 s

suppose him one of competent repute for his appointment, make the foregoing likelihoods but little less than sure. Why fix on such a class to furnish "one, at least, of three" commissioners of education? Speaking only generally, is such the natural or fitting course of preparation, to lead to a calm and sound consideration of the whole destiny of man, stretching its view habitually to both worlds?

"But a barrister may be particularly serviceable in guiding all the legal steps of the commission." If so, there should be, at least, one such (or a serjeant-at-law) in every commission of three. But if a Cambrian squire, a navy captain, and a clergyman, may be sufficient to compete with all the intricacies of the Tithe Commission, it surely cannot well be argued, in consistency, that the still newer joint-stock company will all go wrong without the presence of a wig or coif? For certainly this educational commission would find itself perplexed by fewer technicalities, or legal difficulties, than any other that can readily be named, seeing that its constitution supersedes no ancient code of laws, but comes forth into life at once full grown, a very realization of Minerva from the head of Jupiter! I grant that this is quite a point of minor consequence, and not essential to the scheme itself; but is it not peculiarly illustrative both of the genius and the design of the schemer? And consequently, is it not well calculated to put us upon jealous guard against contrivances issuing from such a source?

Remembering this, and bearing constantly in mind, also, that (as the "Quarterly Review" expresses it) "the very name of incumbent, or churchwarden, does not once occur in the length or breadth of Lord Brougham's bill," let us proceed to specifications, confining them, however, chiefly to three general points-viz., the evident OBJECT of the projected innovation, the MEANS suggested for its insidious accomplishment, and the POWERS proposed to be vested in the new functionaries. These two last points will run into each other, more or less; but, for distinctness' sake, the above order shall be observed as far as possible, with here and there an incidental hint, as to the social and religious bearings of the scheme, as they shall force themselves in sight.

1. As to the object, a very few words may suffice. This has, in fact, been stated already in the first of these letters, when speaking of the certain tendencies of the proposed scheme; for how can objects be so well inferred as from inevitable tendencies, in measures where some temporary policy, or other cautious reason, forbids a fair and frank avowal of the real ultimate design? It is an error to impute motives unwarrantably, or in haste; but in such matters as the present, unless we are prepared to think that legislators act extensively without

* And not only so, but in clause xvii. express provision is made for tacitly excluding clergymen from their accustomed and acknowledged privilege of chairmanship, ex officio, at vestry meetings. For the school-committee meetings are vestry meetings to all practical intents and purposes; yet it is provided, that these meetings "shall appoint some one of those present to preside as chairman by a majority of votes, the overseer, or senior overseer, having a casting vote in case of equality." There is no mistaking this.

motives, how is it possible to judge them blind to the most palpable and sure consequences? Once more, to borrow the language of the "Quarterly Review," with which I shall content myself on this first head:

"The spirit in which the cause of education is taken up, and the party by whom it is pressed, are guidances enough in so conspicuously clear a case. The only practical result that could prove satisfactory to the framers of this bill, or such bills as this, would be, that the clergy, to be sure, would be rendered helpless in their own parishes; the sympathy, such as it is, (not over much even now in agricultural districts) on the subject of education between rich and poor, of which they are the medium, paralyzed; their best opportunity of getting a thorough insight into the characters of their parishioners, and the abuses as well as the virtues that prevail amongst them taken away; the principal channel through which they communicate with the rising generation closed; the chief means of training up a more intelligent body of hearers for the preacher to act upon, lost and gone; and all this derangement purchased at the price" [qu. introduced for the sake?] "of establishing a rickety school for writing, accounts, and very small philosophy, which the upper classes would loathe, because they would be taxed to support it; which the clergyman of the parish would do nothing to promote, because it confounded him in all his functions; and which the dissenters, and the dissenters only, would rejoice in, because it would be another thorn in the side of the church, and another step in the march towards a republic. And yet (the writer stringently adds) the party which would thus strip the clergy of the powers by which they are enabled to be effective in their cures, is the very same which clamours beyond every other for laws to enforce their residence. Surely, there is a strange anomaly in thus confessing how important are their services, and then trying how best to defeat them! WHY all this idle jealousy of the church, which is at the bottom of these education projects ?" Aye, WHY? Let those look to it in particular who (as the reviewer justly concludes) "Seem to think they can have the monarchical principle in state, and the republican principle in church, and no loosening of the commonwealth. They may as well think that twisting the same rope different ways at different ends would not dissolve its continuity."

2. Next for the means suggested for the accomplishment of this same object, or (if the phrase be thought more charitable) sure to conduct to this same end.

Here my Lord Brougham and Vaux-having, in his oration introductory,+"laid it down as a general rule, that there should be no power given to the government to educate the people, that was to say, that their interference should be excluded beyond what was absolutely necessary, with much more to the same purpose-coolly begins with proposing the appointment of a board of Commissioners, "of whom two shall be the lord president of the council, and one of the principal secretaries of state for the time being;" and the other three, "ANY persons (as before noticed) appointed under the sign manual of her Majesty." That is to say, a board of five persons, of whom two shall be actual members of the excluded government, (and these, as will be seen, possessed of a despotic control) and the other three their most obedient humble servants aud thorough-going crea

It is material to notice here what seems as yet to be very far from sufficiently perceived or considered-the manner and extent in and to which the operation of the new Poor Law has already injuriously affected both the knowledge of their people by the clergy, in agricultural districts, and much of previously sust ained interest in them, as connected with a fuller and less interrupted knowledge. It is to be wished that the effects of this may not be found uncomfortably by and by.

+ See a very elaborate report of his speech in the Standard newspaper of Dec. 2, 1837.

tures! The sham securities and provisos set up, to give a colour of independence to these three life commissioners, are something worse than mockery: they offer an outrageous insult to common understanding.

Dismissing the stale point of patronage, as too political for notice here, these three commissioners, created thus by the breath of the existing government, are at once to have full power (subject only to the consent of one or other of their ministerial colleagues and supervisors) to receive all applications for aid, or advice, and otherwise to exercise control, touching the four classes of schools which follow :1. All schools and seminaries, concerning which the late charity commissioners were authorized to inquire.

2. All which, after the passing of this act, shall receive any any grant of public money.

aid by

3. All which shall be established or aided with any money, or otherwise, under this act.

4. All which shall have been, or be enrolled under the provisions of the act.

It cannot fail to be seen that the insidious aim is, to absorb all schools, sooner or later, into the same vortex. Other schools than the foregoing are graciously allowed a respite, and are only permitted to apply to the commissioners for the high privilege of being placed under their inspection; but with these four classes just enumerated under its protection, the new intellectual rail-road is to be opened. Over all these is the most independent triumvirate, (with consent as aforesaid) to appoint ANY persons to be inspectors, at salaries to be adjudged by any three lords of the treasury.

These still more independent "eyes" of the concern, (the inspectors) bound only not to be more than ten at any one time, (nine, answering to the muses, would have been a more appropriate number,) are to be removable at pleasure.* They may examine all schools whatsoever, with consent of the superintendents, but are in course of duty to inspect and to report on all that are enrolled, cum privilegiohaving power to examine into their state, condition, and conduct. After receipt of which report, "the said commissioners are authorized and empowered to communicate to the persons having the care and superintendence of such schools and seminaries their opinion and advice touching the conducting of the same;" and masters refusing to allow such inspection are to be liable, under vexatious process of Queen's Bench or Exchequer, to 201. fine, of which payment may be enforced summarily-a pleasant contingent result of the high favour of enrolment.

Such-ludicrous and scarcely credible as it may appear-is the apparatus and the original freight with which it is proposed to start

Taking the whole clause vi. together, it does not quite appear at whose pleasure, or whether direct ministerial consent is necessary both for appointment and removal, or for the first only. Here are the words, probably left designedly ambiguous,-"The said life commissioners, or any two of them, shall have power, with the consent of one of the two first named commissioners, to appoint from time to time......inspectors, and at THEIR pleasure to remove such inspectors."