state of modern society with apprehension, but even give clamorous utterance to their misgivings, it is not unreasonable to expect from them at least some vigilance in the timely pro vision of remedies. Do they acknowledge and accept this responsibility? If, for example, they happen to have the supervision of a school in which there is an active intellectual life, do they make any attempt to satisfy the new wants which such a school is sure to call into being? If, to narrow the question still further, they employ the services of pupil-teachers, have they given any aid towards the prudent direction of their studies, warned them against the dangers which they profess to see so clearly, or furnished them with rules for avoiding them? Have they even supplied them,--I will not say with a library, but-with so much as one good and useful book? One thing is certain, that pupil-teachers will read, and do read, and not unfrequently works of very doubtful utility. We are deluged with a literature, within the reach of almost every one, to travel through which is by no means always a safe journey upon solid ground, but sometimes conducts one over very dangerous places, soft and yielding to the foot, not very agreeable to the eye, and emitting all sorts of evil odours. Let those who fear the effects of secular instruction not disdain to act as signposts in these doubtful regions. They will generally have docile travellers to guide, for whom a word or a look of caution will suffice. But let them not affect to tremble at dangers which they neither know themselves, nor take any pains to make known to others. The other want arising out of the present order of instruction is of a still graver kind, and I should be venturing upon forbidden ground if I did more than allude to it. Whether it be good or not to educate as we are now educating, which will probably continue to be a subject of dispute, at least it is undeniable that if we cultivate the mind and teach secular subjects scientifically, we must teach religious ones in the same spirit. We must not be accurate and precise in the one, loose and superficial in the other. There is a danger lest our pupils should come to discern so strange a contrast, and, since we have qualified them to do so, should permit themselves to reason upon it. The teacher who is minute and laborious in his lessons on grammar or history, but leaves religion to be learned by the listless recitation of the bare words of the catechism, is doing a work which certainly requires very stringent supervision. Let more time, by all means, be given to religious instruction, if it has anywhere been deficient, but let it not be augmented in quantity only. It is a sight to rejoice the heart, I am speaking of what I have often witnessed,-when the higher order of education, which now prevails in so many of our schools, is used as an instrument to impress deeper and more searching views of divine things; and it is the eminent merit of no small number of those schools, that this is precisely what they are now effecting, and with a fulness of success which cannot be witnessed without admiration and gratitude. The experience of each additional year only satisfies me more and more completely, that wise and solid instruction is the first step to effective education, and that the latter cannot be brought to mature development where the former is defective and unsubstantial. I am desirous, in concluding this report, to notice two points to which I have been requested to invite the attention of the Committee of Council; the one, the inconvenience and embarrassment experienced by school managers from the want of a digest of their Lordships' Minutes, the various modifications of which during successive years can only be harmonized by laborious references, for which many persons have neither time nor opportunity; the other, the expedience of adopting some mode of giving information to teachers generally on the new scheme of examination, which comes into operation for the first time during the present year. To the Right Honorable I have the honor to be, &c. T. W. M. MARSHALL. The Lords of the Committee of Council on Education. Under seven. 26.71 SUMMARIES OF TABULATED REPORTS, FOR 1853-4, ON SCHOOLS INSPECTED BY T. W. M. MARSHALL, ESQ. 1.1 0.66 0.74 4.86 14 15 28°48 53.97 66.0 8.53 6.84 7.28 5.54 7.25 33.12 15.06 12.4 12:11 9.37 7:06 4.92 3.13 2.83 2.71 2.83 6.06 11 79 34.85 The amount of accommodation in square feet, divided by 8, will give the number of children who can be properly accommodated. Calculations of area in school-rooms, as compared with the average attendance of scholars, should be made upon this basis. At the date of closing this return. These per-centages are confined to boys' and girls' schools, and do not include infants. SUMMARY B. Aggregate Annual Income, as stated by Managers, of 59 of the Schools General Report, for the Year 1854, by Her Majesty's Inspector of Schools, SCOTT NASMYTH STOKES, Esq., B.A., Barristerat-Law, on the Roman Catholic Schools inspected by him in Great Britain. MY LORDS, Southport, December 1854. IN the report submitted to your Lordships at the close of the year 1853, I ventured to estimate the number of Roman Catholic Schools within my district, and the number of children receiving instruction in them. The results arrived at were as follow: In Scotland 35 schools, with room for 5,250 children. In England and Wales (within my district) 153 schools, with room for 29,112 children. Tables in reference to the existing educational establishments in England and Wales, and the number of scholars actually under instruction upon the 31st of March 1851, have subsequently been issued from the Census Office, following upon similar tables already published for Scotland. In examining the returns relative to the schools visited by me, I observe that, whether from difficulty in collecting information of a novel character, or from peculiar circumstances attaching to the day selected, from whatever cause, the omission of some considerable establishments commonly at work is unquestionably discoverable. For, to mention the most conspicuous instances, Salford, Sunderland, and Lancaster, appear in the returns as having no Roman Catholic Schools. Making some allowance for such omissions, and a far larger allowance for the increase of schools between March 1851 and October 1853, I am of opinion that the Census Returns support the substantial accuracy of my estimate. These returns show In Scotland 32 schools with an attendance of 5,673 children. In England and Wales (within my district) 118 schools, with an attendance of 17,882 children. Referring, as an additional check, to the number of schools actually inspected, and of children examined by me in the year ended 30th September 1853, I find that I visited within that period 14,364 دو In Scotland 20 day schools, attended by 3,802 children. In England 87 There are still, in Liverpool, two schools for boys and one for girls; in Preston, one for boys; in Blackburn, two for girls; in Manchester, one for boys and two for girls; in Glasgow, one for boys and girls; and in smaller places many schools for both sexes, which have not attempted to derive benefit from the Parliamentary grant; and I am of opinion |