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Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.
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Hence the great paradox of society as we associate ; men cold , and hungry , and naked , and houseless , because they are not allowed to feed , and clothe , and shelter their fellows j the loom is silent and the weaver is naked ; the plough stands still , not because there is enough bread and to spare , but because the man who wants bread may not work for it ; the plough stands still and the ploughman starves , because he may not feed his starving brother . And yet nature is rich andjust ; my wealth , she says to
industry , is thine for the sweat of thy brow ; and industry knows that her wage is sure , and comes as a strong man confiding in his strength and its reward , but capital brandishes over him her magic wand , and forces him to sit as it were , spell-bound , beating the air with his hands , in a prison whose crystal walls are clear but impenetrable , through which he sees the prizes he pines for but cannot reach , like a bee which naps its wings against a window , buzzing its life out , wondering , in its vain struggles , why it cannot suck the honey from the flower which it sees .
Thus does trade break its promise ; how , then , can it help it ? how , indeed ! It is easier to declare a duty than to do one , or even to say how it is to be done . The right as it ought to be , and the wrong as it is , are not hard to define . What can be r that is the question . But my puny efforts to solve this question I must postpone , for I have already written more than enough to weary , if not your patience , at least that of our mutual friends , the readers of the Leader . Wishing us all good store of patience , believe me , yours truly , W . E . Fousteu .
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There is no learned man bub will confess he hath much profited by reading controversies , his senses awakened , and hi 3 judgment sharpened . If , then , it be profltablefor him to read , why should it not , at least , be tolerable for Jus adversary to write . —JVI i lton .
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DIPLOMACY , ITS RELATION TO POPULAR FEELING . Oct . 30 , 1850 . Sm , —I have long been convinced that it is high time England did something to rescue herself from the twofold evil of an exclusive press and an occult and irresponsible diplomacy . In no one of the great continental convulsions was the true feeling of English people expressed in the official documents issuing from the Foreign-office . True , the Whigs carried tho day , in the great Palmcrston debate of last session , by the lachete of the so-called Radical party . There was a great deal of splash and froth about
nationality and the principles of progress , though the purblind Liberals failed to sec that Ministers covertly sneered at the one , and denominated the other a " jargon . " Lord Palmerston cares nothing for that unconquerable desire for nationality which was the mainspring of the Hungarian and the Italian revolutions . That is only a card which may make for or against the noble lord in the game of statecraft he is continually playing . While Italy was striving to be free , and Hungary independent , his lordship was protocolling , intermeddling , suggesting transaction * , initiating
contion , the men planted by the diplomatic dibble in the cities of Italy were naturally , with one exception , indisposed , some of them inimical , to the national Italian cause . Mr . Freeborn was that exception . The rest were thick-and-thin diplomatists , or commonplace letter-writers . Yet even their despatches tell in favour of the National party . Lord Minto's promenades were mere sentimental moonshine . Sir George Hamilton , stationed at Florence , was an
Austrian at heart , an aristocrat by system and instinct , a lover of Grand Dukes , and consequently a partizan of absolutism . Lord Napier , located at Naples , was forward , officious , and pragmatical . He told Lord Palmerston that the Neapolitan Radicals were a " lawless faction , " and designated the Jesuits as " unfortunate persons , " fit objects for the care and protection of a British ambassador . Mr . Abercromoy carried out his instructions , and behaved decently , it is true , for a diplomatist ; but even he was not free from the misrepresenting mania ; while Lord Ponsonby , from Vienna , in his despatches on Italian affairs , showed himself openly Austrian ; and Mr . Peel looked down upon Italy with a Conservative eye , and wrote his despatches with a Tory pen . Nearly all the consuls and vice-consuls were either openly reactionary or conveniently dull . Were these gentlemen the fit and proper representatives of English feeling on Italian affairs ? Certainly not . I do not wish to blame them . They were responsible to Lord Palmerston , and doubtless only carried out their instructions .
I have taken the Italian insurrection as the basis of this letter in reference to the state of our diplomacy , because there are official documents to prove the validity of my assertions ; and I have done this mainly with the view of drawing your attention to an important question . Signor Mazzini observes , in the preface to the volume reviewed by you last week , that , " for the honour of England , and for her future , a party should
be formed which should examine things seriously , which should inform itself and the people as to the truth in all national questions , and urge its Government to a path more logical , more virtuous , and more consistent with the principles of England ' s life than that which it has hitherto pursued . " I ask through you , Sir , would it not be possible to form such a party , and endeavour to carry out Signor Mazzini ' s suggestion ? Geokge Hooper .
grosses , and hovering over every movement like the spirit of discoid and dissonance . The triumph of the l * almoi \ stoni : » u policy , whatovri that may be , was his only aim . Fur this ho wove his nets of intrigue in the Foreign-ollico ; and for this ho performed that intellectual ami physical feat" on tho 23 th of Juno last , when ho talked and smiled tho radicals into supporting his policy . How could England be fairly represented by such a genius in unscrupulous tact and insinuating talk r But , I am assured , Aberdeen would have been worse ! So much the bettor . We should have known it , and tho opposition to Aberdeen would have boon but tho stronger .
Open tho " correspondence " published by the Foreign-oflico in reference to tho affairs of Italy , and you will find tlmt , previous to the Lombard iusurroo-
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OUR SCHOOLS . Oct . 29 , 1850 . Sm , —For the sake of brevity I will not allude to the Squeers and Blimber class of schools , already so well and faithfully described by a master hand , but shall restrict myself to an account of the system as it is in most of our middle class schools , where wholesome food and a certain amount of cleanliness may be found , and where there arc opportunities for healthy exercise . In the following observations I speak only of the majority . I know well there are excellent and noble exceptions ; but even in the best of these there is too much time devoted to book learning .
In the ordinary respectable school , us it is termed , the principal is frequently a man who seldom takes much interest in the business of the schoolroom ; he appears there once a day or so , looks upon it as a means of pocketing the parents * money , and , with the exception of occasionally caning a boy , leaves the whole charge of the pupils to assistant masters , of whom he really knows very little , and , perhaps , changes every twelve or six months , or even less . Of such schools it is needless to say any more : nothing is learned but vice ; disorder , idleness , and their attendant evils luxuriate . And yet , perhaps , it is a question whether this or the forcing system is
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Where things are carried on with some pretensions to instruction , about seven or eight hours a-day , on the average , are given to intellectual pursuits , rather less to meals and recreation , and the rest , about eleven hours , to tho dormitory . At least twenty-four hours in the six days of the week arc devoted to the study of language ; and out of those about sixteen are commonly given to the classics , which , in forty weeks , tho average portion of the year spent at school , would amount to sixty-lour days often hours each , or nearly three months . Three months in every vear of the best part of life are thus wasted on tho whichto nineteen
pretence of studying a subject , - twentieths , will * ho of no earthly use , and entirely forgotten after a few years . But it is a fine discipline of the mind say its supporters . Let us examine this question a moment . It is cultivating ono faculty of tho mind to the neglect of all the others ; and so bad is tho method employed that it not only breeds disgust for all learning—that is of little consequencebut is highl y injurious to tho moral sentiments of the child , both in the evil passions that arc excited on tho ono hand and exhibited on the other ; in the injury it inflicts upon his constitution by confining hi in to one posture for so many hours , frequently depriving him of exercise in tho open air , and being in direct oj > position to the dictates of nature , at an age
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A HE FORM AT I ON .
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when the animal spirits are predominant , and require full and free exercise for the healthy development of body and mind . Again , those branches of instruction in which the reasoning faculties might be agreeably and usefully exercised are taught by mere precept and authority , and the directions are mechanically followed without any exercise of reason or judgment , to be forgotten as soon as the practice ceases . " Under such a system the study of geography , history , and even mathematics becomes little else than committing words to memory , and , therefore , merely exercises the faculty of language . Such is the kind of intellectual education given at the generality of our middle-class schools .
I would fain draw a veil over the rest ; but in a matter of such high import there must be no concealment . I will , therefore , in all soberness and Christian charity , but with fearlessness and truth , endeavour to disclose the evils of the S 3 stem for the moral training of the young . The principal means employed are precept and advice , aided by punishment for a breach of rule . There is besides in most schools a sort of supervision or inspection by one or more of the assistant masters , who , in many instances , has to watch the boys like a policeman during their hours of recreation . I know one man
who made it a rule with his assistants that they should never speak to the boys except on business , for fear of losing their authority . This person may be a most excellent man in many respects ( though too frequently the case is far otherwise ) , but is most probably not at all suited to be a guide to young persons in their amusements , since he has been chosen for his classical and mathematical learning , and without respect to his capabilities as a moral educator ; yet he is the person under whose charge they are placed at the times they most require judicious guidance .
In numerous instances that I could name the principal knows little about his assistant masters except that they are willing for a paltry salary to submit to be treated like common servants . Indeed , so negligently is this part of the system conducted that it is a fact the situation of assistant-master has frequently been the last resource of the most profligate characters , who , having received what is called a gentlemanly education , and wasted their prospects in debauchery , offer themselves as instructors of youth .
But , perhaps , these men are not much worse guides than the regular bookworm—the Mr . Feeders B . A . The means supplied to boys for healthy out-of-doors occupation consist generally in a play-ground enclosed by walls , in which they are left to amuse themselves as best they may . They have besides a field for occasionally playing cricket in summer , and in winter a monotonous walk is the substitute . Some few schools have a small piece of garden ground in
which the boys grow mustard and cress , radishes , &c . The consequence of such a laisser-faire system is that the greater number spend half their leisure in listless idleness or in planning schemes of folly and wickedness ; while at many of the foundation schools they are allowed to run about the town with no other control than the necessity of being in at a certain hour . What manly deeds are performed under such a system may be easily imagined .
The public opinion that grows up amongst boys thus left to themselves is of the lowest character , and most tyrannical in its influence . It has been already alluded to by your correspondent . The boy who ventures to oppose this public opinion will have to endure an amount of ridicule that few boys can withstand . Many of their absurd ideas , it is true , they have brought from home , and especially that of looking upon their studies with the eye of a shopman : " Of what use will it be to me ? Will it bring me in a larger income ?"_
Such is a very brief outline of some features of our wretched system of education , the results of which may be seen in the evils and follies of society ; and through ignorance and depravity perpetuates itself indefinitely . For if any individual , unless of uncommon talents , influence , and capital , set himself to introduce a better , he will find that he has brought a commodity into tho market which is not required , and will be left without a customer . It is not , then , so much from any dereliction of duty on the part of schoolmasters , as from the ignorance and folly of parents , that such a system has prevailed , and , in spite of the endeavours of most worthy and excellent men , still continues to prevail . How , then , to change this state of things is the question , on which I will throw out some hints in my next letter . J . G .
S Gy +* Udffilt Udnitlinl Vj'-Pv ** W****»«-V«.W
( iDtrra Cmntril .
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11 He that is not with mo is against me . "—Matt . xii . 30 .
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October ai , 1850 . Sin , —I take this opportunity of firmly and positively asserting , in reply to the observations of your very able correspondent , the Rev . E . It . Lark en , that I have thoroughly and seriously reconsidered my reasons for assuming the frightful title of Antichrist . And in addition to the scriptural evidence I
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782 3 Tf ) 0 3 LeaiieV + [ Saturday ,
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[ In this department , as ai / l opinions , however kxtreme , are allowed an expression , the editor meckssauily holds himself resi'onsihle for none . j
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Leader (1850-1860), Nov. 9, 1850, page 782, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/vm2-ncseproduct1858/page/14/
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