would immediately induce the parties to bring their funds into action; convinced that if they omit to correct what is amiss, they might soon be reminded of their duty by THE LORD Chancellor. BEFORE I quit my subject, I cannot help wishing to place before the The situation of the view of the reader the situa- uneducated labourer tion of the uneducated labourer, in the different periods of life; requesting him to consider how far the condition of such an individual is, or is not, favourable to the permanency of civil society.-In childhood, his mind is vacant, unoccupied, and exposed to every baneful impression and noxious "in danger of being lost, or rendered very difficult to be "recovered."-It also appears by the Report, that the rental of those estates, that consisted of land only, without the personal funds, amounted to above 210,000l. a year at that time, being now twenty years ago. The Report concludes with observing that "this is a matter "of such magnitude, as to call for the SERIOUS AND "SPEEDY ATTENTION of Parliament."-Twenty years have since passed,-twice the period of the Trojan war, without this serious and speedy attention of Parliament, having as yet been given. example. In mature age, the want of mental and domestic resources is supplied by the society of the alehouse, and by pugilistic sports and in declining life, when, the body becomes languid and stiff, and the powers of active labour cease,-when, in the other classes of life, intellectual pleasure supplies, or should supply, the place of sensual gratification, the poor sufferer drags on a weary and comfortless existence; and totters to the confines of an eternity, for which he has had no means of preparation. Look to his hours of rest from daily labour, or to the weekly return of his Sabbath, you will find that those intervals, which might have been so happily employed in the instruction of his children, and in domestic intercourse, in contemplating the great scheme of redemption,* in preparing the One of my great objects has always been to place THE BIBLE in the hands of every poor man, and to enable him to read it.-Upon this subject, I have real pleasure in quoting the authority of BISHOP WARBURTON, in his seventeenth Letter to BISHOP HURD: "Take" (says he) "a plain man, with an honest heart; I give him his BIBLE, and make him conversant in it, "and I will engage for him, he will never be at a loss to 61 minds of others for the same contemplation, --and in supplying sources of meditation for his solitary hours,-have been to him dark, -comfortless, and disastrous; from the cheerful ways of men Cut off, and for the book of knowledge fair, IN settled times, the power of the law and the dread of punish ment, may to a certain de In time of commotion. gree, deter from crimes.* But in political commotions, the uneducated pauper has neither principle nor motive, to induce him to respect or defend that state of society, the benefits whereof he has not been taught to appreciate. He is prepared for any alteration in the state of things, fearless of change, and indifferent as to consequences. WHEN I add that this description does Want of education not entirely apply to the present state of England, in Ireland. "know how to act, agreeably to his duty, in every circum"stance of life." I wish it were in my power to say as much of Ireland. But, all our danger from that quarter, all the evils which we have suffered, and all that we have to apprehend, all the miseries under which that country has laboured, and all the impediments to its improvement, are occasioned by our not having made any proper and effectual provision* for the instruction and civilization of the Irish poor. Efects of it in IN the Reports + of the Society, an example has been offered of a nation purified and cor Scotland. rected by the single remedy of education. Infested by mendicity, and by all the evils * Nothing would so effectually contribute to the improvement, if not to the conversion of the Irish Roman Catholics, as the general diffusion of moral and religious instruction among them. An enlightened and virtuous Christian can never be a bigotted papiste-With regard to the Charter-schools in Ireland, I have been very much misinformed, if the impolitic and intolerant condition, on which education in them is given to the catholic poor, contributes so much to conversion, as to violent and bitter prejudice against the established church. + Sce Report, No. CXXVIII. An extract from it will be inserted in a subsequent part of this volume: and vices which appertain to the association of thousands of mendicants, defying the laws of God and man, because hopeless of benefit under them,-a single Act of the Parliament of Scotland, providing instruction for all the children of the poor, did in the lapse of a few passing years, administer a perfect and lasting remedy for the greatest political evil, by which a community can be afflicted. The national disease was not only cured; but from the period of the operation of that act, the peasantry in Scotland has stood on higher ground, and has possessed a more elevated scale of character, than in any other part of the world. In contradiction, however, to the effects which have been ascribed Objections to the to the universality of educa- account. ' tion in Scotland, it has been observed that, in this country, simplicity of character, and purity of morals have not gone hand in hand with the progress of education. It has been stated that, though more has been done during the last ten years, towards forming E |