are private undertakings, entered upon by individuals as a means of providing for themselves and their families. There is now no restriction upon the exercise of the business of a schoolmaster, and no inquiry made as to his qualifications: the old provision which rendered it unlawful for any man to teach without obtaining a licence from the bishop of the diocese, has naturally and necessarily fallen into disuse; and as the government for the last century has thought it right to leave the moral and religious interests of the people pretty nearly to themselves, an impracticable restriction was suffered to become obsolete, but nothing was done to substitute in its place one that should be at once practicable and beneficial.

Now, in schools conducted by the clergy, the parents have this security, that the man to whom they commit their children has been at least regularly educated, and generally speaking, that he must be a man of decent life. And, if I mistake not, it is merely the prevalence of the feeling that this is so, which has in point of fact given to the clergy nearly the whole education of the richer classes. A man who was not in orders might open a school for the sons of rich parents, if he chose, but he would find it very difficult to get pupils. This state of things has been converted into an accusation against the clergy, by some pretended liberal writers; but it is evidently a most honourable tribute to that union of intellectual and moral qualifications, which, in spite of individual exceptions, still distinguishes the clergy as a body. A layman, who had obtained academical distinctions, would have the same testimony to his intellectual fitness, that a clergyman could boast of, but these distinctions prove nothing as to a man's moral character, whereas, it is felt, and felt justly, that the profession of a clergyman affords to a great extent an evidence of moral fitness also: not certainly as implying any high pitch of positive virtue, but ensuring at least, in common cases, the absence of gross vice; as affording a presumption in short that a

man is disposed to be good, and that his faults will be rather those of deficient practice than of habitual carelessness of principle.

But the masters of our English or commercial schools labour under this double disadvantage, that not only their moral but their intellectual fitness must be taken upon trust. I do not mean that this is at all their fault; still less do I say, that they are not fit actually for the discharge of their important duties: but still it is a disadvantage to them that their fitness can only be known after trial, they have no evidence of it to offer beforehand. They feel this inconvenience themselves, and their pupils feel it also; opportunities for making known their proficiency are wanting alike to both. It has long been the reproach of our law, that it has no efficient secondary punishments: it is no less true that we have no regular system of secondary education. The classical schools throughout the country have Universities to look to: distinction at school prepares the way for distinction at college; and distinction at college is again the road to distinction and emolument as a teacher; it is a passport with which a young man enters life with advantage, either as a tutor or as a schoolmaster. But anything like local Universities, any so much as local distinction or advancement in life held out to encourage exertion at a commercial school, it is as yet vain to look for. Thus the business of education is degraded; for a schoolmaster of a commercial school having no means of acquiring a general celebrity, is rendered dependent on the inhabitants of his own immediate neighbourhood;-if he offends them, he is ruined. This greatly interferes with the maintenance of discipline: the boys are well aware of their parents' power, and complain to them against the exercise of their master's authority; nor is it always that the parents themselves can resist the temptation of showing their own importance, and giving the master to under

stand that he must be careful how he ventures to displease them.

It is manifest that this disadvantage cannot be overcome by the mere efforts of those on whom it presses: the remedy required must be on a larger scale. That the evil occasioned by it is considerable, I can assert with confidence. Submission and diligence are so naturally unwelcome to a boy, that they whose business it is to enforce them have need of a vantage ground to stand upon: they should command the respect of their scholars, not only by their personal qualities but by their position in society; they should be able to encourage diligence, by pointing out some distinct and desirable reward to which it may attain. For this the interference of Government seems to me indispensable, in order to create a national and systematic course of proceeding, instead of the mere feeble efforts of individuals; to provide for the middling classes something analogous to the advantages afforded to the richer classes by our great public schools and Universities. Meanwhile it may not be amiss to consider what is the course of education actually followed in the generality of commercial schools, and what are the improvements of which it is susceptible. If you, Sir, or your readers, agree with me in the importance of the subject, you will allow me, perhaps, to resume it in a future letter.

EDUCATION OF THE MIDDLE CLASSES.

LETTER II.

May 4, 1832.

SIR, I propose in this letter to pursue the subject of commercial schools, and to state what is the course of study actually pursued in them. And I shall not be sorry to call the attention of your readers to certain general

truths connected with education, which, though very obvious and very important, are yet very apt to be neglected.

I believe it often happens, that boys in the lowest form of a commercial school require absolutely to be taught to read. They have been neglected at home in their earliest years, till, when they come to eleven or twelve years of age, their friends find themselves obliged to send them to school; forgetting, however, that owing to their own neglect, what ought to be the work of seven or eight years has now to be completed as it can within three or four. But supposing a boy able to read and write, his education, properly so called, then commences. He receives instruction in arithmetic, history, and geography; in English grammar, and in composition. The rudiments of physical science, carried on to a greater or less degree of advancement, are also taught him; and with a view to his particular business in life, he learns land surveying, if he is to be brought up to agricultural pursuits; or bookkeeping, if he is intended for trade. His religious instruction varies probably more than any thing else, according to the personal character of his instructor, the line of study here being much less clearly marked out except to a man who is himself in earnest as to its importance. Sometimes the boys are required to analyse grammatically any sentence in an English book, and to give the derivations of the several words in it, just as boys at classical schools are called upon to do in Greek and Latin. And doubtless there may be many commercial schools, especially in the manufacturing districts, where the course of study far surpasses what is here given, and where the instruction on scientific subjects, in chemistry, and in mechanics, is carried to a high degree of proficiency.

But I confess that this is not the point upon which I feel much anxiety. I have little doubt that boys will be sufficiently taught all that they require for their particular calling; and scientific knowledge is so generally valued, and confers a power so immediately felt, that I think its

diffusion may safely be reckoned on. This, however, has nothing to do with the knowledge which the Reform Bill calls for. A man may be ever so good a chemist, or ever so good a mechanic, or ever so good an engineer, and yet not at all the fitter to enjoy the elective franchise. And if we call a people educated who possess only scientific or physical knowlege, we practically misapply the term; for though such knowledge be a very good education, as far as a man's trade or livelihood is concerned, yet in a political sense, and as a qualification for the exercise of political power, it is no education at all. The distinction requires to be stated more fully.

Every man, from the highest to the lowest, has two businesses; the one his own particular profession or calling, be it what it will, whether that of soldier, seaman, farmer, lawyer, mechanic, labourer, &c.-the other his general calling, which he has in common with all his neighbours, namely, the calling of a citizen and a man. The education which fits him for the first of these two businesses, is called professional; that which fits him for the second is called liberal. But because every man must do this second business, whether he does it well or ill, so people are accustomed to think that it is learnt. more easily. A man who has learnt it indifferently seems, notwithstanding, to get through life with tolerable comfort; he may be thought not to be very wise or very agreeable, yet he manages to get married, and to bring up a family, and to mix in society with his friends and neighbours. Whereas, a man who has learnt his other business indifferently, I mean, his particular trade or calling, is in some danger of starving outright. People will not employ an indifferent workman when good ones are to be had in plenty; and, therefore, if he has learnt his particular business badly, it is likely that he will not be able to practise it at all.

Thus it is that while ignorance of a man's special business is instantly detected, ignorance of his great business