vants, should form a Board, or Committee, for the consideration of all matters affecting the Education of the People.

"For the present it is thought advisable that this Board should consist of

The Lord President of the Council.

The Lord Privy Seal.

The Chancellor of the Exchequer.

The Secretary of State for the Home Department, and

The Master of the Mint.

"It is proposed that the Board should be entrusted with the application of any sums which may be voted by Parliament, for the purposes of Education in England and Wales."

A Committee of Council on Education was accordingly appointed on the 10th April, 1839-and it should be observed that the functions of the Committee are limited to "superintend the application of any sums voted by Parliament for the purpose of promoting public Education:" These functions are therefore precisely similar to those which were exercised by the Treasury in the years 1835, 6, 7, and 8.

The Committee of Council is equally amenable to Parliament, annually, for all its proceedings: the sum confided to it is not greater than that entrusted to the Treasury. As it consists of five responsible Members of the Cabinet, instead of only one, the security for correct administration is augmented, and its proceedings are, in all respects, rendered more open to observation, by their separation from the mass of details with which the Treasury is encumbered, and their transference to a department where they can obtain more constant and deliberate attention from the Executive. In all these respects the change is a great improvement, though it appears to have been the source of much groundless alarm.

But we perceive the Archbishop of Canterbury, in the recent debate in the House of Lords, remarked, "He knew not if there was any objection in principle to the Committee appointed, but he should have thought the Lords of the Treasury were just as competent to judge of these matters as the Noble Lords named."

In his letter to the Lord President of the Council, Lord John Russell proceeds to state, that "among the first objects to which any grant may be applied, will be the establishment of a Normal School. In such a school a body of schoolmasters may be formed, competent to assume the management of similar institutions in all parts of the country. In such a school, likewise, the best modes of teaching may be introduced, and those who wish to improve the schools of their neighbourhood may have an opportunity of observing their results.

"In any Normal or Model School to be established by the Board, four principal objects should be kept in view; namely, religious instruction, general instruction, moral training, and habits of industry. Of these four, I need only allude to the first. With respect to religious instruction, there is, as your Lordship is aware, a wide, or apparently wide difference of opinion among those who have been most forward in promoting education.

"The National Society, supported by the Established Church, contend that the schoolmaster should be invariably a Churchman; that the Church Catechism should be taught in the school to all the scholars, that all should be required to attend church on Sundays, and that the schools should be, in every case, under the superintendence of the clergyman of the parish.

"The British and Foreign School Society, on the other hand, admit Churchmen and Dissenters equally as schoolmasters, require that the Bible should be taught in their schools, but insist that no catechism should be admitted.

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Others, again, contend that secular instruction should be the business of the school, and that the ministers of different persuasions should each instruct separately the children of their own followers.

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In the midst of these conflicting opinions, there is not practically that exclusiveness among the Church societies, nor that indifference to religion among those who exclude dogmatic instruction from the school, which their mutual accusations would lead bystanders to suppose.

"Much, therefore, may be effected by a temperate attention to the fair claims of the Established Church, and the religious freedom sanctioned by law.

"On this subject I need only say, that it is her Majesty's wish that the youth of this kingdom should be religiously brought up, and that the right of conscience should be respected."

The necessity for the immediate establishment of Normal Schools is demonstrated by the account given in the subjoined Table of the number of teachers, (engaged in daily instruction, in various classes of schools,) who had received any previous preparation for their vocation, in the five large northern towns to which we have before referred, and in Westminster.

Number of Teachers of various Classes of Day and Evening Schools, and the number who have received any Education for their Employment, in the undermentioned places :—

Accordingly the minute of the proceedings of the Committee of Privy Council on Education, of the 11th of April, 1839, related chiefly to the plan of a Normal School. This plan was subsequently postponed, in consequence of the difficulty of obtaining a concurrence of public opinion respecting the means to be adopted for the religious instruction of the children and teachers of different religious denominations in that school. We shall only remark here, that "religion" was, in this school," to be combined with the whole matter of instruction, and to regulate the entire system of discipline," as respected the children trained therein; and that "the religious instruction of the candidate teachers" was to form an essential and prominent element of their studies, and no certificate" was "to be granted, unless the authorised religious teacher" had "previously attested his confidence in the character, religious knowledge, and zeal of the candidate whose religious instruction he" had "superintended." The postponement of the establishment of a Normal School, has been represented as the temporary postponement only of this particular plan, which, notwithstanding repeated assurances to the contrary in Parliament, it is contended may still be carried into execution during the recess. A perusal of the clause of the Report of the Committee of Council of the 3rd of June, which announces the postponement of any attempt to create a Normal School, will convince any candid reader that, as the whole proceedings of the Com inittee are annually dependent on the opinion and votes of the House, the Committee could only have referred to the "greater concurrence of opinion," as far as it influenced the decisions of Parliament, or, in other words, to the opinion of Parliament. The postponement of any proceedings respecting the Normal School was announced in the following terms, in the Report of the Committee of Council on the third of June. :

"The Committee are of opinion that the most useful application of any sums voted by Parliament, would consist in the employment of those moneys in the establishment of a Normal School, under the direction of the state, and not placed under

the management of a voluntary Society. The Committee, however, experience so much difficulty in reconciling conflicting views respecting the provisions which they are desirous to make in furtherance of your Majesty's wish, that the children and teachers instructed in this school should be duly trained in the principles of the Christian religion, while the rights of conscience should be respected; that it is not in the power of the Committee to mature a plan for the accomplishment of this design without further consideration; and they therefore postpone taking any steps for this purpose until greater concurrence of opinion is found to prevail."

As the Committee of Council have postponed to another year the establishment of a Normal school, we shall reserve to the close of these remarks our comments on the plan which they submitted to Parliament, and we proceed to point out in what respects the plan, now proposed by the Committee of Council for the appropriation of any sums voted by Parliament for the purpose of promoting public education, differs from that formerly adopted by the Treasury.

1. "The Lords of the Committee recommend that the sum of £10,000., granted by Parliament in 1835, towards the erection of normal or model schools, be given in equal proportions to the National Society, and the British and Foreign School Society.

2. "That the remainder of the subsequent grants of the years 1837 and 1838 yet unappropriated, and any grant which may be voted in the present year, be chiefly applied in aid of subscriptions for building, and, in particular cases, for the support of schools connected with those societies, but that the rule hitherto adopted of making a grant to those places where the largest proportion is subscribed be not invariably adhered to, should application be made from very poor and populous districts, where subscriptions to a sufficient amount cannot be obtained."

Thus far no objection appears to have been raised to the plan. 3. The Committee do not feel themselves precluded from