spends his time as children do at puppet-shows, and with much the same advantage, in staring and gaping at an amazing variety of strange things; strange indeed to one who is not prepared to the reasons and meanings of them, whilst he should be laying the solid foundation of knowledge in his mind, and furnishing it with just rules to direct his future progress in life, under some skilful master in the art of instruction." Juster views, however, were beginning to be entertained of what constitutes real education, for both Milton and Locke had written on the subject treatises which may even now be read with advantage.

2. COMMENCEMENT OF SCHOOLS FOR THE POORER CLASSES. In the latter part of this period, were laid the foundations of a school system for the poorest class. The Jesuits, in 1687, opened a school in the Savoy, which soon numbered four hundred scholars; to counteract this a charity school was opened at Westminster in 1688, and was followed by others at Lambeth, St. Botolphs, and other places. About the time of the Revolution, the Nonconformists established a charity school in Southwark, in which poor children were taught the elements of learning, and the principles of religion according to the Assembly's catechism. In 1698 was established the Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge, one of its objects being to secure the pious education of the poor, and the circulation of useful and religious books. At the close of this period, it had enrolled nearly eleven hundred poor schools in England and Ireland, containing twenty thousand scholars, all of whom were clothed, and many lodged and fed. For the encouragement of this work, and in aid of the funds, an annual sermon was preached, when all the children in the London schools met and sang, first in 1704 at St. Andrews, Holborn, then at various churches, till in 1782, the gathering settled down at St. Paul's Cathedral.

3. EDUCATION OF FEMALES. Speaking of the education of females, Macaulay remarks, even in the highest ranks, and in those situations which afforded the greatest facilities for mental improvement, the English women of that generation were decidedly worse educated than they have been at any other time since the revival of learning. At an earlier period they had studied the master pieces of ancient genius. . But during the latter part of the seventeenth century, the culture of the female mind seems to have been almost entirely neglected. If a damsel had the least smattering of literature she was regarded as a prodigy. Ladies highly born, highly bred, and naturally quick witted, were unable to write a line in their mother tongue without solecisms and faults of spelling such as a charity girl would now be ashamed to commit. The explanation may easily be found. Extravagant licentiousness, the natural effect of extravagant austerity, was now the mode: and licentiousness had produced its ordinary effect, the moral and intellectual degradation of women."

To the above statements it has been replied with some justice, "English orthography was not settled for years after this period-the orthography of our greatest poets, Shakspeare, Milton, Dryden, was irregular even in their printed editions. We have before us the edition of the "Paradise Lost" 1668, with specimens of misspelling not merely unsettled but grotesque. Let any one turn to any collection of original letters of that period, and he will see that the

best educated persons spelled very ill. The worst orthography, if we may so call it, in Ellis's last letters, is that of two learned bishops. What, therefore, does that prove against the sound education of the ladies in an age that produced Lady Russell (whose admirable letters are very ill-spelled), Lady Fanshawe, Mrs. Hutchinson, Mrs. Godolphin, and so many other ladies of whose accomplishments we have evidence sufficient though less conspicuous? Lady Clarendon, for instance (who was Miss Backhouse, a private gentleman's daughter) complains in 1685, in a lively strain, of "of the many female pens at work manufacturing news in Dublin, to be sent to London, and returned with interest."

Though

4. COMMENCEMENT OF A NEWSPAPER LITERATURE. denied by some writers, there was from the time of James downwards, a growth of intellectual activity, the best proof of which is to be found in the demand for books, pamphlets, diurnals, &c.; a small one it may have been in comparison to that of our own age, yet still a very respectable one for the seventeenth century. Indeed the intense spirit of party which existed, as well in politics as in religion, tended much to sharpen the intelligence of the age, and good autho rity affirms that as a consequence, the English language acquired a precision, copiousness, and power before unknown.

In the shape of "Diurnals", or Newspapers as we now call them, a new and powerful form of literature made its appearance. The first newspapers, as far as we know, were published in the reign of James I. in the form of small quartos, containing news relating to foreign parts. This is indicated by their titles, "News out of Holland", "News from Italy," &c. In 1622, these occasional sheets were converted into a regular weekly publication, entitled "The News of the Present Week". It was between the first meeting of the Long par liament in 1640 and the Restoration, that this form of literature acquired that political importance which it has ever since retained. During this period of twenty years, as many as a hundred were pub lished under the titles of "Diurnals", "Special Passages", "Mercu ries", &c.; and while hostilities were being carried on, so impatient did the people become for early information, that papers were printed twice or thrice a week. So important an auxiliary was the press considered, that each of the rival armies carried a printer with it. After the Restoration, a considerable number of papers continued to be published; one started in 1663, by Roger L'Estrange, called “The Intelligencer" is said to have been superior to anything in that shape, previous to the time of Anne. The first number of what has been continued to the present time as the "London Gazette" was published at Oxford in 1665, the court and parliament being there or account of the plague. It was not till 1709 that a daily paper was issued, "The Daily Courant"; there were then seventeen others published thrice a week, and one twice.

LITERATURE

5. THE WIDE CIRCULATION OF A PAMPHLET Besides newspapers, the principal political and religious questions of the day were discussed in separate pamphlets, which appear to have been widely distributed. The number issued from the press, withi twenty years from the meeting of the Long parliament, is stated to be near thirty thousand. And when the press was put under re strictions after the Restoration, vast numbers were privately printei

in England, or introduced from Holland, in defiance of the vigilance of the government. To put into circulation this immense variety of pamphlets and other small literature, we learn from an ordinance of the parliament, that "divers vagrant persons of idle conversations, had forsaken their usual callings and accustomed themselves, after the manner of hawkers, to sell and cry about the streets and in other places, pamphlets, books, &c". Baxter also informs us that in his time, pedlars supplied country readers with ballads and small books, and that he himself had sent abroad myriads of tracts, beside broad sheets for pasting on public walls. Just before the close of the Stuart period, a new class of periodical literature made its appearance, consisting of short essays on men and manners, or attacks on the vices and foibles of the age. This enterprise, altogether new, was commenced by Richard Steele in 1709. The "Tatler", as the sheet was called, proposed to appear three times a week, to expose", as the author stated, "the false arts of life, to pull off the disguises of cunning, vanity, and affectation, and to recommend a general simplicity in our dress, our discourse, and our behaviour". The Spectator" followed in 1711, managed conjointly by Steele and Addison, with the assistance of a few other critics; it made its appearance every morn ing, and on some days the demand reached twenty thousand copies. In 1713, the Spectator being temporarily suspended, Steele started another paper of the same character, entitled the "Guardian".

6. RESTRICTIONS ON THE PRESS. During the greater part of this period, the governing powers were extremely jealous of the power of the press, and various acts were passed to keep it within narrow limits. And these acts were not confined to monarchs, the men who professed themselves the champions of liberty, and who overturned both the throne and the altar in pursuit of it, did not hesitate to copy in this respect the tyranny they had_overthrown. "We read," observes Hallam, "the noble apology of Milton [The Areopagitica, or a Speech for the liberty of Unlicensed Printing] for the freedom of the press with admiration; but it had little influence on the parliament to whom it was addressed". The ordinance of 1643 states that very many persons had "taken upon them to set up sundry private printing presses in corners, and to print, vend, publish, and disperse books, pamphlets, and papers in such multitudes, that no industry could be sufficient to discover or bring to punishment all the several absconding delinquents." It was therefore ordered that no books should be henceforth printed, without the license of such person or persons as the parliament should appoint. In a subsequent ordinance it was enacted that no "hawkers shall be any more permitted; and that they and all ballad-singers, wheresoever they are or may be apprehended, shall forfeit all books, pamphlets, ballads, and papers by them exposed to sale, and shall, by such as shall by virtue of this act seize upon them, be conveyed and carried to the House of Correction, there to be whipt as common rogues". These restrictions, with more or less force, were continued till the act to restrain unlicensed printing was allowed to expire in 1694.

Section III. The Social condition of the people. 1. GENERAL CONDITION OF THE LABOR CLASS. In this period

there was a general improvement in the social condition of all classes, but more particularly in that dependent on manual labor. The middle class was now fast rising into comparative opulence, and the poor felt the advantage of it. In evidence of a general material improvement, it has been remarked that the outbreak which overthrew the monarchy, was rather the offspring of plenty than of want, as it was from the beginning not a movement induced by wretchedness, but a war of opinions and principles. The money question was introduced into it, yet in such a way as proved, that even to the lower classes it was a vital question whether the results of their labor could be taken from them at the pleasure of the sovereign. Further, the successive reductions of the interest of money from ten to five per cent. show an amazing increase of spare capital for the employment of labor. This increase of wealth is attributed to the Navigation Act, which gave employment to English shipping in place of foreigners, to the rapid increase of our colonies in America, to the introduction of new manufactures, or the improvement in the manufacturing processes of the old ones, and to the improvements in agriculture.

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The increase of wealth and a fall in the value of silver, led to a general advance, both of wages and the cost of the necessaries of life. The following figures referring to wages are to be taken only as approximations, for as Adam Smith remarks, the price of labor cannot be ascertained very accurately anywhere, different prices being often paid at the same place and for the same sort of labor, not only according to the different abilities of the workmen, but according to the easiness and hardness of the masters". During this period fourfifths of the labor class were employed in farm work receiving a wage of about eight pence a day in the reign of James I., and in the reign of Anne about double that sum. Artizan's wages in the same period rose from one shilling to two and upwards; Defoe speaks of having paid some workmen as much as twenty-five and even thirty shillings a week. Macaulay states that wages generally at the time of the Revolution were about half what is now paid, and this, taking into account the rather uncertain account of the records, appears a fair estimate. Wheat considered now the main staple of food, sold during the Tudor period at an average of about twenty-six shillings the quarter, but the average during the Stuarts was forty-six, showing an increase of twenty shillings. In some years the price of wheat was very high, in 1648 it rose to eighty-five shillings, and it was repeatedly above sixty.

Comparing the increase of wages with the increase in the cost of wheat, a little advantage appears on the side of the former, that is, it would take six days less to earn a quarter of wheat. But the comparison is imperfect, for the lower classes except in the southern counties rarely ate wheaten bread, and what was the price of the inferior bread corns, as rye, barley, and oats, does not appear. We know, however, that the poor fared better than they had done before, and complaints were made that what had satisfied their forefathers, was not thought good enough for their descendants. Meat was much cheaper than now, all through the period it sold for two or three pence the pound, in particular years even lower than that. Beer also, the common beverage of the people, was low in price; but sugar, salt, soap, and many articles of clothing were dearer than at present.

It was to the advantage of this class, that garden vegetables towards the end of the period found their way into the poor man's plot.

2. THE GROWTH OF PAUPERISM. From causes not very clearly understood, there grew up, side by side with the general improvement, a mass of pauperism which imposed on the nation a tax greater than any other. While the bulk of the people was improving in their material condition, a considerable fraction was sinking down into habits of improvidence and dependence. This monster difficulty had pressed heavily on the nation during the Tudors, and though Henry VIII. hung the vagrants off at the rate of sixteen hundred a year, and his daughter Elizabeth, four hundred a year, the evil was not subdued. There had always been a certain amount of vagrancy, but when an end was put to the feudal relation, a larger amount of free labor was thrown into the market than could be employed. Rather than lie down and die, which by law they ought to have done, the unemployed poor wandered from their homes in the hope of bettering their condition, and under the pressure of hunger, no doubt many of them pilfered. This led to severe laws being enacted by legislators who understood not the real nature of the case. Flogging, mutilation, branding, and hanging were all tried in vain. After the failure of several efforts to provide a fund for the maintenance of paupers, the general poor-law of 43rd of Elizabeth passed, making it compulsory on every parish to support its own poor.

Coming now into the Stuart period, we find that in many places, no rates were levied for twenty, and in some cases for forty years after the act of 1601, and when they were actually levied, they were so inadequate, that numbers perished of want. Such a state of things could not fail to lead to vagrancy and crime, and the more so as it was as yet undetermined who were to be considered as the poor of a given parish. To determine the question of settlement, laws were passed which well-nigh reduced the laboring population of England to the ancient condition of ascripti glebæ, by making a man's parish his prison, besides entailing an enormous expense on parishes, first in proving the legal parish and then in removing the pauper to it. The first of these acts, passed in 1663, provided that the overseers of the poor might forcibly remove, within forty days, any new-comer back to his legal parish, unless he could give security that he would not become chargeable. (This law continued in force till 1795, after which time persons could be removed only when they actually became burdensome). James II. made the law more stringent, by obliging a new resident to give formal notice to the authorities, of his abode and the number of his family. And to complete the scheme, it was enacted in the 3rd of William III. that the forty days' residence should only be accounted from the publication of such notice in writing on Sunday in the church, immediately after divine service.

These acts, while they lessened the number of vagrants, increased the class they were intended to keep under. Every parish was bound to find employment for those who could not otherwise obtain it, a plan which Richard Dinning, a writer on the management of the poor, in 1698, states the result to be, that "Persons once receiving parish pay, presently become idle, alleging that the parish is bound to maintain them, and that in case they should work, it would onl