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able, 'the blessed word' Technical, though its meaning was only very imperfectly understood, touched the imagination of the House of Commons and the country; and in this way a sum of nearly £1,000,000 per annum was definitely secured for distribution among the County Councils of England and Wales, in proportion to the several populations. The share of this sum accruing to the London County Council is upwards of £185,000 a year, and this sum has been most judiciously devoted to the encouragement of scientific instruction in schools, to apprenticeship and scholarships for promising scholars, to manual training, and in many ways to the improvement of the intelligence and skill of young artizans of both sexes. Fortunately the Act of Parliament gives a very elastic meaning to the word 'technical,' and it is becoming daily more evident that preparation for a skilled handicraft alone would prove very unsatisfactory except as a part of a wider and more general curriculum of a secondary type, in which the claims of language, literature, and the 'humanities' generally shall be duly co-ordinated with physical science and manual industry.

The other windfall which has come into the possession of the public recently is derived from the City Parochial Charities. Mr Bryce, in 1883, succeeded in drawing attention to the large sums available in the City parishes, from ancient endowments, which were once useful when the citizens of London resided in their places of business, but which had become obsolete, and were indeed mischievously wasted. The Commissioners found that large local charities for doles, for apprenticing, for pensions and Christmas gifts had ceased to be of use, partly because no worthy recipients were to be found, and partly because the value of the estates had in many cases increased out of all proportion to any conceivable local requirements. So, after devoting £155,000 to the purchase of open spaces and an equal sum for erecting Polytechnic institutions in the suburbs of London, an annual revenue of about £50,000 was secured for the maintenance of those institutions, and otherwise for placing

within reach of the young artizans of London, trade laboratories, classes and special instruction adapted to the industrial needs of the Metropolis. The London School Board, also, by means of its continuation schools, is strenuously exerting itself to afford additional means of advanced and appropriate instruction to scholars who have passed through the primary school course.

It need hardly be said here that finality has not been reached. There are grave problems yet unsolved, which will call for the exercise of all the experience and wisdom of the new Board of Education, even when aided by its Consultative Committee. There is first of all the question of the training of teachers. After all that has been said of the urgent importance of this question, it is a little humiliating to reflect that one half of the schoolmasters and mistresses who enter the profession each year have received no regular training, and have had no means of obtaining it. Last year about 4400 new recruits obtained certificates-scarcely enough to supply the yearly waste in an army of 60,000 fully qualified teachers, and of these only 2200 proceeded from Training Colleges, 1400 being from denominational institutions-Anglican, Roman Catholic, or Wesleyan and 800 from undenominational colleges, including the day students from the normal departments of the great provincial Colleges of University rank. The rest—amounting to about one-half of the total number-are assistant teachers and others who have qualified by passing the certificate examination, but are untrained. It is evident that we need more normal or training institutions. Yet the Government does not establish them; the School Boards have no legal power to do so; and from the first the Government has relied mainly on the provision for training which has been furnished by the Churches. Nobody has better reason than I have to know how much faithful and valuable work has been done in the denominational Colleges and what devoted teachers they have succeeded in producing. But there are inevitable limitations to the usefulness of close

professional seminaries, founded mainly with a view to strengthen the religious influence of particular sections of Christians. And though there are honourable exceptions, yet as a rule the intellectual aims and the consciousness of national as distinguished from denominational requirements are not so high as in colleges of another type. Hence I do not think it desirable that the nation should depend mainly for augmenting our supply of trained teachers on any increase in the proportion of training colleges under ecclesiastical influence, although these colleges have undoubted value and appropriateness for certain classes of students.

In the near future it will become more necessary both in regard to Training Colleges and to Elementary Schools to revise the relations between the Government and the religious bodies, and to consider the conditions under which the Government can continue to avail itself of the cooperation of those bodies. The truth is that the State cannot make itself more denominational, but the denominations can make themselves more national. They can continue to cooperate beneficially with the Government without parting with the religious instruction, to which they naturally attach high importance: and they can do this in two ways, (1) by determining that the schools and colleges controlled by the Churches shall not be content with a lower ideal either of educational efficiency in the schools, or of professional qualification for the teachers, than that which is accepted by purely educational and nonsectarian bodies; and (2) by accepting and indeed welcoming the representatives of the public, in the management of the denominational institutions. They will be able to strengthen their position by a more cordial recognition of the great public and social aims which should dominate a national system. But they will not secure it by advancing new claims for denominational influence over the training of teachers or for denominational teaching in the public schools. There is for example no demand on the part of parents for a separation of the children

for religious instruction according to the tenets of their respective sects; that demand comes wholly from the clerical and other supporters of those sects, and if ever complied with it would dislocate the internal arrangements even of good schools, and would introduce among the children sectarian distinctions which would neither be intelligible to them, nor appropriate to their childish needs. It is not likely, however, that the English Legislature will ever consent to try this new and most serious experiment.

In fact the relation at present subsisting between the State and the religious bodies may be described as one of unstable equilibrium. Consider how the conditions have altered during the last 30 years. At the time of Mr Forster's Act it was computed that one-third of the whole cost of elementary education was contributed by the State, one-third from the fees paid by parents, and one-third from voluntary subscriptions. To-day the total annual cost of primary instruction in England and Wales is eleven millions, of which more than ten millions are derived either from the public treasury or from local taxation, hardly three-quarters of a million or one-sixteenth of the whole from voluntary contributions; the total of all such contributions including church collections and some share of local endowments being £603,241 in Church of England schools. The liberal grants from the Central Department have little by little reduced the necessity for voluntary aid. Even in 1894 before the special aid grant of 5s. per head to voluntary schools was added to all former grants to managers, a Parliamentary return showed that there were 1061 voluntary schools with no subscriptions whatever, 674 in which the subscriptions amounted to less than a shilling per head, 1095 with more than 1s. and less than 2s. 6d., and 1967 with more than 2s. 6d. and less than 55. When it is considered that since that time voluntary schools have been exempted from the payment of local rates, and have thus received an enforced contribution from the ratepayers, it is obvious that there will

be an increasing number, probably many thousands of schools, chiefly rural, managed wholly by private and self-appointed persons, who neither contribute anything to the funds nor represent contributors, and who yet are free to obtain for themselves and for the schools whatever denominational advantage the exclusive management of a school can give.

But the readjustment of the relations between the State and the religious bodies is only one part of the larger problem which awaits the statesmen of the future. How far can any effort on the part of a central authority towards the unifying and coordination of local agencies be effective, without discouraging individual and corporate initiative, or doing something to weaken the independence, the enterprise, the inventiveness, and the personal enthusiasm, which are among the most valuable factors, in this country at least, of a system of national education? We want legislation and a central authority it is true, but we must not expect too much from it. The gravest problems which lie before us cannot all be solved from Whitehall. There are better methods of teaching to be discovered than any which have been yet devised. We want a clearer perception of the true relation between primary and secondary instruction, and we may well dread the creation of an arbitrary line of demarcation between them. We need also in all our places of education, from the Infant School to the University, more definite views as to the relative values of those studies which have a visible bearing on commercial and professional success, and are helpful in getting a 'livelihood,' and those other studies which shall help the man or woman to live an intelligent, honourable, and interesting life. We have to devise means whereby schools shall be made instrumental in preparing our children for the duties of citizenship, and for rendering to the State unpaid and willing service. Schools can do much to cultivate patriotism, not by seeking to introduce rifle clubs and military drill into schools, still less by encouraging that boastful and rather theatrical patriotism which expresses itself in waving the Union Jack and singing Rule

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