and arithmetic, by himself or assistant, on the same terms as in the ordinary schools. With existing masters it would be voluntary, so that vested interests were not to be touched. But on all masters hereafter appointed it was to be binding. But the dignity of the master would be saved, by allowing him to teach inferior branches by an assistant; and the expressed object of the foundation would be effected by the master teaching the same branches that were now taught in grammar-schools. The second declaratory enactment was to enable trustees to make the number of children, now limited, and not confined to grammar, unlimited, and to limit or prohibit the taking of boarders. Here it appeared strikingly true, as stated by Lord Kenyon, how shamefully the intentions of founders were perverted. In many instances the master did nothing but receive the salary, so far as the foundation was concerned, while he kept 50 boarders at 100%. each. The salary, in many instances, was no more than 100%., and he would willingly give it to the poor if they pleased, his wish being only to have the situation of master of the endowed school and the house. In some places there were but 201. for a library given to the master, but then the sum was unlimited for repairs. In one instance, where only 101. were paid for rent, 4017. were paid for repairs and taxes. At the same time the object was to drive away, as much as possible, the poor from the benefit intended for them. The master was quite ready to teach them, but he was bound only to teach Latin and Greek, and nothing else. "My school," he would say, " is open; but then I can teach you only Latin, Greek, and, if you please, Hebrew." The children of paupers and beadsmen might thus be taught Hebrew roots, and the paulo post futu rum in Greek, but they could not be taught reading, writing, or arithmetic. The schoolmaster gained all the benefit. Let him have the benefit of boarders, and gain 5,000l. a-year elsewhere, but let him not occupy the situation of another, who should be bound to teach English: or let him retain the name and the place, but let his ostiarius, or usher, teach the inferior branches, while he teaches Latin, Greek, and Hebrew. In many cases those grammar-schools were expressly founded for paupers. But paupers were said to be persons in easy circumstances. (A laugh.) He would not enter into any discussion respecting the universities, that multum vexata quæstio. But when the poor were mentioned, every man at once saw that men of easy fortunes were meant. (A laugh.) It was, indeed, less obvious, that poorest meant the same class of persons; but when it was recollected that poor meant affluent, it might then be inferred that poorest meant the most affluent. (General laughter.) But when, as at Lewisham, the children of persons in almshouses, which were not the resort of the rich, and not generally un

derstood to be the palaces of the wealthy (laughter)-when mention was made of persons of mean estate, low degree, overwhelmed with painful labour, and hardly possessing the means of subsistence---it would be allowed, that these at least were not the terms best calcu lated for conjuring up to our idea the affluent, and those abounding in every luxury, and clothed in purple and cloth of gold. (Hear, hear, hear.) In the times when those endowments had been made, the poor were to be taught Latin, but not in the sense now attached to that part of education; they were taught Latin for the church service. This was well known to have been necessary in Catholic times; for the priests were taken from the lowest orders of the people. It was true there were then barons, fortified three deep in castles; whose daughters were almost royal, for often they were married to sovereigns; while they sent their eldest sons to the army, and designed their youngest sons for the church. The avowed reason was, that they might pray for their sins; but another consideration was, that they could give them a good income of 10,0001. a-year. Thus was one branch of the church supplied; but another branch was supplied from the order of almsmen and beadsmen, who were taught Latin in endowed schools. Had the pious founders of those schools foreseen the light of the reformation which was afterwards to dawn upon the world, they would indeed have hated it, because they were ignorant of its advantages; but, had they foreseen and understood that greatest revolution which ever blessed mankind, they would not have confined their endowments to the teaching of Latin, but would have required the English to be taught as the language in which religion could be taught, To his mind it was conclusive, that they would not have neglected the language in which church service was to be performed twice every week. Let it not be said that grammar-schools would thus be degraded into parish schools; he held in his hand a list of 200 endowments, with calculations of what they actually did, and what they really could do, by the improvements proposed. Here again he was obliged to have recourse, for illustrations, to the north. In Cumberland there were 8 schools, of 500 boys each, at an annual expense of 2921. In 16 other counties there were 101 children, educated at an expense of 3,1231.; the average in the first case being 11 shillings and sixpence for each child, and, in the others, 301. 19s. for each. Thus 5,246 children could be taught in these schools, on the Cumberland average. Economy was with him but a secondary consideration in the proposed bill; but if they regulated well the funds already provided, they would introduce much economy into the system of education. Another great advantage of this improvement, of making the master a gentleman in his circumstances, and devolving upon the usher

the part of teaching the inferior and more laborious branches, they offered a prospect to the parish schoolmaster of improving his situation beyond measure, and of raising his class and description in society. It would be an advantage analogous to that which existed in the church. Many objected that one should have 20,0001. a-year, while another laboured for 501. a-year: but weweighed the good within the bad, and found this good in the disparity of income, that by how much 20,000l. was superior to 501. you improved the character and raised the class and description of the persons who had only 501., but who had a prospect of obtaining 20,0001. Mr. Burke had said of this variety of orders in the church, he begged pardon for referring to a writer whose very words he could not recollect, but from whose words no variation could be made without loss to the force and illustration of his meaning-but Mr. Burke had said, that the church ought to rear her mitred front in courts and palaces; and this, he said, was necessary, not for the sake of the mitred heads, but for the sake of the people; the poorest of whom were interested in the character and talent of the clergy of all orders. For the same reason he was for granting that principle with respect to schools. No means could be so effectual in raising the character of parish schoolmasters as to make it common property between a parish-school and a grammarschool. This was the kind of reform which Mr. Burke had recommended as the most useful and the wisest; as tending at once to preserve and to improve: so he (Mr. Brougham) was for rejecting only what was bad in the present system, and for improving what was good; and thus to obtain with the life and vigor of a new institution, the sanctity and veneration of the old. With this view he proposed an enacting clause, respecting trusts where children were boarded, to enable the trustees to confine the trust to teaching, when the funds were inadequate to feeding and clothing as well as teaching. There was no worse charity than that for clothing and boarding. It was a premium for the neglect of prudence and frugality. The town of Bedford was an instance: for 30,000l. a-year were so employed there, and yet Bedford was overwhelmed with paupers. It was infinitely better to let children be fed and clothed by their parents. Hospitals for children were but nurseries for population, and contributed, more than any other means, to derange the regular course of population, and render it the greatest evil to society. The next provision in this department was for enabling trustees to treat with the ministers and parish officers, or two justices of the peace, for having the children permanently taught in the parish school, where the founder had designed that they should be taught in other schools, but that design having been frustrated by the inadequacy of the funds. Another part of this provision was, that where no

school was found, the funds should be applied in aid of the parish school. In both these cases, the founder's name was to be placed conpicuously on the outside and on the inside of the school-house. If all parties agreed that an endowment school should be put on the same footing with the parish school, no objection could be made to that arrangement; and the master might be rejected in such a case, who was not approved by the parson. The last head of all was that where there was a failure of the objects of the trust. This failure was in many cases total: in others it was partial. There were now 4,5001. a-year given to the Tunbridge-school, and a decree had been made to that effect; but 5001. a-year was twice as much as was wanted for that school. The remaining 4000l., would endow as many as were now in the whole of that county. In order to remedy all such failures of the objects, he proposed to give power to trustees to appeal to the commissioners of charitable abuses. He had now gone through the plan he had proposed, and had he feared, fatigued the attention of the house. (General cheers.) Its merits must rest on itself, and on the views which he had now unfolded. But he trusted that he had now redeemed the pledge he given two years ago. Before he concluded, he was anxious to do justice to those meritorious individuals who had assisted him in this task. He had never known individuals who had been so diligent in a labour new to them, and therefore the more difficult, and so skilful as they had proved themselves. (Cheers.) If this inquiry should be extended to Ireland; if statistical researches were generally pursued---a pursuit so honorable and so useful, so honorable as a matter of science, so calculated to distinguish us among the nations of Europe, and so useful in promoting our morality and security; if other statistical inquiries should be instituted, those who had assisted him on this occasion would be better qualified for it than any others, and than they, as well as he, had been for this inquiry. He had been able to apply the summer and part of his vacation to the task; they had applied the whole year. He was precluded from mentioning their names, but he should not have done justice if he had not mentioned their merits. (Cheers.) The mere progress of education was not all he expected as the result, if this plan were cautiously and steadily acted upon. He anticipated that dame-schools would get into better hands, and be better conducted. One school of that most interesting class was but a short walk from where he now stood. If a child was neglected till 6 of years age, no education afterwards could recover it. If to that it was brought up in dissipation and ignorance-in all the baseness of brutal habits, and in that vacancy of mind which such habits created-it was in vain after 6 to reclaim it (hear, hear, hear,) by teaching reading and writing. They might teach afterwards, but

they could not prevent the first formation of habits; they taught in vain. But if dame-schools were better regulated, and adapted to the example of the school in Westminster, and the examples of Fellenberg and Lanark, he would not say that there would not be a pauper or a criminal in England, but he could say that Scotland or Switzerland would not have fewer than England, even in seaport-towns. (Cheers.) An infant was in a state of perpetual enjoyment from the intensity of curiosity. There was no one thing which it did not learn sooner and better than at any other period, and without any burden to himself or the teacher. But learning was not all, nor the principal consideration-moral habits were acquired; they were kept out of nurseries of obscenity, vulgarity, vice, and blasphemy. The ages at which they attended, at Westminster, were 8, 4, and 5, to 7. Nothing was required in such a school but a steady, sober, and even temper. Whether they learnt less or more was of little consequence; the moral discipline was the great consideration. The great objection made by his friend, M. Fellenberg, to the Lancaster and Bell systems of education, was, that children learnt too rapidly-that they became machines. There were one hundred of the children in the school at Westminster who did little more than attend to the discipline of the School, and even by this much good was done. Their mothers were able to attend to such work as they happened to be engaged in, and while they thus gained Ss. or 4s. a-week, grudged not 1s. of it for assisting their education. He would be exceedingly glad of contributions from any gentleman who had heard him, but the contributions he had mentioned proved the utility of the Institution. Who could deny, that children thus educated were prepared, though not, perhaps, fully prepared, to defy the shocks and buffetings of the world infinitely better than they whose progress was more showy but who became only educated machines? He had almost forgotten to state the expenses of carrying his plan into effect. In Devonshire, which was the country least provided with schools, the expense would be for building of new schools, purchasing of ground, &c. &c., 850,0001. But taking the average with Cumberland, which was only 400,000l., he could state the expense, on a liberal average, to to be only from 500,000l. to 600,0001. These were not times in which any sums could be spoken of as unimportant; at other times those sums would have been thought little. The annual average, upon the Devonshire scale, would be 150,0001. ; on the Cumberland scale, 100,000l. Once more he apologised (loud cheers), and moved for leave to bring in a bill for the education of the poor in England and Wales.