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    means of books or by instruction communicated in English . You may thus eventually make the acquisition of this language a matter of choice and desire ; an important object indeed , but one which can never be accom plished either by violence or neglect . Some very interesting parti ulars are given of a system of what are called Circulating Schools , originally ntroduced in Wales by Mr . Griffith Jones , and

    since extensively pursued by Mr . Charles , of Bain . A schoolmaster is provided who shall teach the poor to read and write their own language . He is not to reside permanently at any particular place , but to remain for a short period , say from six to twelve months , after which he removes elsewhere . The knowledge that he has come for a limited period naturally excites emulation and diligence , and the anticipation of his removal suggests an earnest desire that the flame which he has kindled should not be permitted

    to die away . Some of the more diligent and attentive of the pupils accordingly are generally found able and willing to conduct an evening school after the teacher has taken his departure , 10 bestow the same benefit upon another district ; and in this manner , in the midst of much poverty and many difficulties , a considerable portion of that elementary knowledge which is the vehicle of religious and moral instruction , has been very widely diffused among the Welsh peasantry at a comparatively very moderate expense .

    And though much remains to be done , the contrast certainly is prodigious betvi een their present condition and the utter destitution , as far as the means of instruction in their vernacular dialect are concerned , of their Irish brethren . Mr . Anderson warmly urges the adoption of a similar system in Ireland . The experiment has been tried with success both in Wales and the Highlands of Scotland ; the field of exertion in the sister island is more than four times as extensive , but , as far at least as Protestants are concerned , has been hitherto almost entirely neglected .

    We have said , as far as Protestants are concerned ; but it must not be overlooked that the native Irish are almost universally Catholics ; a fact which cannot be much wondered at when we consider that to them the Scriptures have ever been not only a sealed , but an inaccessible book , and

    that the instances are very rare in which Protestant ministers of any denomination have even possessed the means of communicating with them in the only medium by which the word either of instruction , admonition , argument or persuasion , can be addressed to them ; the only language in which a

    continued discourse appealing to their understandings , and still more to their hearts , would be intelligible to them . And it is the principal fault we have to find with this book , that it gives us no insight whatever into the measures

    adopted by the Catholic clergy wiih respect to this portion of the people of their own communion . It is mentioned indeed incidentally , that not only is there no teacher of Irish at Trinity College , Dublin , but in the Catholic Seminary of Maynooth no such department was originally contemplated . Perhaps , however , to them it is less necessary , because the probability is , that a large proportion of the Catholic priesthood are derived from that

    portion of the people with whom the Irish language is vernacular . That this circumstance gives them a powerful influence over the lower classes of their countrymen there can be no doubt ; and that this influence is unspeakably promoted by the power which they possess of maintaining a more intimate communication with the people in their own language is highly probable . We could wish to learn more accurately the extent to which they have availed themselves of these opportunities tor promoting the spread of real and substantial improvement . They have been much belied if such advantages

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    Anderson * 8 Historical Sketches of the Native Irish . 253

• Citation
  • Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), April 2, 1831, page 253, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2596/page/37/