changes of late. There is a distinct tendency to make it as elastic as possible, with the obvious aim of encouraging variety in the schools and in the methods of teaching.

For an example of this tendency one need only compare the present conditions attaching to the payment of the principal grant to infant schools with those that were in force a few years ago. The higher grant was formerly given if the scholars were taught under a certificated teacher, or under a teacher not less than eighteen years of age, approved by the inspector, and in a room properly constructed and furnished for the instruction of infants. There was also a proviso that the infants should be taught 'suitably to their age.' The new code contains the following regulation:

'A principal grant of 17s. or 16s. is made to infant schools and classes. The Board shall decide which, if either, of these grants shall be paid after considering the report and recommendation of the inspector upon each of the following four points: (a) The suitability of the instruction to the circumstances of the children and the neighbourhood; (b) the thoroughness and intelligence with which the instruction is given; (c) the sufficiency and suitability of the staff; (d) the discipline and organization.'

Working in this spirit, the Board of Education is able to mitigate some of the evils of a State system. But it cannot attack them at the roots without initiating a complete revolution. Out and out reforms of this kind are only politically practicable when they are demanded by the irresistible voice of a strong public opinion. The public are misled as to the true issues by the intrigues of political parties. The conflict is narrowed down by party politicians, who have particular interests to serve, to a mere squabble about school boards, voluntary schools, local authorities, and religious instruction.

The consequence is that these side issues have come to be regarded as the great education question of the day. It is not easy to stir up any deep feeling about the comparative merits of the two classes of elementary schools. Most people do not care a jot whether their children go to one or the other. It is not the masses who agitate about denominational or secular teaching, but those limited classes who have some direct interest in matters affecting religion.

But who would not cast aside their lethargy, if they were made to understand that the question to be decided is not whether this or that type of school should be supported, but whether the present system of education should be entirely discarded in favour of an altogether new plan? that behind all these petty controversies lie great issues, affecting the fundamental principles of education, which must be pushed to the front unless the degeneration of the race—an inevitable result of the present educational method—is to be continued indefinitely?

Let people consider for a moment what is effected by the present system. The child, as we have seen, is taken by the State at an early age and subjected, for the most part, to a careful drilling in the three elementary subjects. There is no harm in knowing how to read and write; it is a very necessary accomplishment. A little arithmetic is also indispensable to the fulfilment of many of the commonest duties of everyday life. But, apart from the iniquity of cramming or forcing the brain in a particular direction, it must be recollected that by imposing certain subjects upon the undeveloped mind of a child, others are necessarily excluded. The process therefore, when rigidly carried out, has very serious and far-reaching effects. It prevents the development of the mind in any direction but that which is being enforced.

The harm done to the individual child by this means is incalculable. On the very threshold of the development of its faculties according to natural instincts this development is violently arrested by an artificial operation. Nor does the evil end here. This interference with Nature is carried on throughout the whole school career of the child, and the tradition flourishes in a modified form in the colleges and universities. It is, in fact, the vital principle of modern education.

These schools in which the children of the people are taught are nothing more than factories for turning out a uniformly-patterned article. They do not succeed in their object of conferring what is called an education upon their pupils, but they contrive to drive out all original ideas without implanting any useful knowledge in their place. The general result of this wholesale manufacture of dummies will be dealt with directly. The intention here is merely to point out that the practical working of the machinery of State education is to check the natural development of the mind, and to unfit those whom it has victimized, not only for one, but for all occupations that demand manual dexterity or practical intelligence.

CHAPTER V

THE GREATEST MISERY OF THE GREATEST NUMBER

It is now time to consider the effect of this system of compulsory education upon the masses of the people. In the first two chapters an attempt was made to sketch some of the anomalies brought about by the educational methods of our public schools and universities, and by the pernicious system of public competitive examinations. We will now turn our attention exclusively to the masses, and endeavour to see what national instruction does for them.

The common people labour under the delusion that children who have passed the standards of an elementary school are educated. They have been fitted, according to the popular belief, for a superior station in life. The first ambition of parents is, therefore, for their child to obtain a post suitable to its supposed scholarship.

Of course, the truth is, as we all know, that the product of the public elementary school is utterly useless, and generally wanting in intelligence. But these facts are only discovered by the victims themselves after years of bitter experience. Totally unfitted for any station in life, many of them leave school full of self-confidence in the belief that their superior education will secure them a good opening. Despising all manual labour, they seek situations as clerks, shop-assistants, and such-like. The result is, of course, an over-supply of candidates for employment of this kind. In consequence, the girls have to fall back upon domestic service; while the boys swell the ranks of unskilled labourers and unemployed loafers, or, worse still, betake themselves to a life of dishonesty.

Nowhere are the evil effects of this education system more strikingly illustrated than in the country districts. The children of agricultural labourers and small farmers are given instruction which will be of no earthly use to them in the occupation for which they are naturally fitted. Instead of being prepared for country pursuits, they are given an inferior type of all-round education which is equally useless everywhere. When they leave school they can read, write, add, subtract, divide, and multiply—after a fashion; they can mispronounce a few French words, without being able to construct a single grammatical sentence or understand a syllable that is said to them; they know enough shorthand to write down simple words at one half the speed of ordinary handwriting; and they have acquired by rote a few dry facts from history and geography, all of which will be totally obliterated from their memories within a space of twelve months.

Shorthand is not a very promising preparation for the plough; and French and mathematics are equally valueless accomplishments for the carting of manure.