given by teachers who are members of the Church of England, and should therefore be satisfactory to church

men.

These arguments are, no doubt, self-contradictory; but even if the contention as to the character of board school teaching stood alone it would not meet the case.

Firstly, it proceeds on the assumption that the Church of England is the only religious denomination interested in the matter. There were in the year 1900 no less than 1,045 Roman Catholic schools and 438 Wesleyan schools, besides the 11,777 Church of England schools. This shows that the desire for denominational teaching is not confined to the Church of England, and that if teaching satisfactory to English churchmen is given in board schools the law is not observed, and the teaching cannot satisfy other members who may attend the school.

Doubtless many board school teachers are members of the Church of England, and can give teaching satisfactory to members of that Church, but this is largely due to the fact that the majority of the training colleges are now denominational and Anglican. This state of things may not last, nor is it desirable that so important a department of our educational system should be left, to so large an extent, in the hands of any religious denomination. Hereafter the trained teacher may have passed through an undenominational college, and may not possess either the training or the inclination to give the denominational teaching which is now given by some board school teachers in such satisfactory measure and quality.

But no attempt has been made to meet the most serious objection which may be brought against the Cowper Temple clause. This enactment does not merely affect the character of the religious teaching which may be given: it clearly admits of an education from which all religious teaching is omitted. And this is an objection which is felt by many who may not care to press the claims of one denomination against another, but who do not desire to see education become wholly secular. In fact, the objectors to the present form of settlement may be ranged in three groups-first, those who desire, generally, that religious teaching should form a part of education; next, those who hold more definitely that every child should be brought up in the faith of his parents; and, lastly, those who desire to see the clergy of the Church of England retain their control over the elementary education of the country.

To these last the Bill of 1902 offers little attraction. Its proposals would appear to proceed on this broad and reasonable line of argument, that to allow the voluntary schools to struggle on under their present conditions would for a long time to come maintain differences of staff, of equipment, of standard, which destroy the uniform quality of our elementary education; that to replace them by universal board schools would throw a heavy burden on the ratepayer or the taxpayer; while to secularise all schools would offend the convictions of very many who, without desiring to clericalise education, are unwilling that it should be divorced from the religious life of the community.

The terms proposed in the Bill are sure to be sharply criticised, but they seem to offer at least the basis of a fair compromise. The managers of a voluntary school are to provide the building, to keep it in repair, and, if required, are to make alterations and improvements; they are to admit a representation of the local authority amounting to one-third of their number; they are to be subject to a veto, on secular grounds, to their appointment of teachers, and to any direction which the local authority may give as to the secular instruction in the school. This last provision would empower the local authority to require the dismissal, on secular grounds, of an incompetent teacher. In return the school will be maintained and kept efficient by the local authority out of the rates.

Such, in outline, is the proposed solution of the difficulty as regards the maintenance of existing schools. But there is a further concession to the voluntary principle.

To understand this it must be borne in mind that a new school is not recognised by the Education Department for the purpose of the Parliamentary grant unless there is an existing deficiency of school places in the area. Hence a Church school may exist as the only school in a district, maintained by voluntary effort, although a large majority of the scholars may be children of nonconformist parents. While it exists, and affords an adequate supply of school places, no other school can be recognised by the Board of Education. The Bill proposes to correct this hardship, not by allowing the required religious instruction to be given in the existing school, but by enabling any denomination, or the local authority, to give notice that it proposes to build a school. An appeal is to lie to the Board of Education by the local authority, by the managers of any existing school, or by any ten ratepayers within the area, on the ground that

the school is not required, or that an existing school is better suited to meet the wants of the district. The board is to decide, having regard to the interests of secular education, to the wishes of the parents as to the education of their children, and to the economy of the rates.

This part of the scheme is open to criticism on several grounds. It does not help those who are not wealthy enough to provide a school; and it burdens the area with two schools where, in many cases, for all purposes of secular instruction, one would suffice. Moreover, since voluntary schools under the Act of 1897 obtain a grant of five shillings per child, the Bill, as framed, gave a preference to such schools in the event of an appeal-a preference based on the economy of the rates.*

Such is the solution of the religious difficulty proposed by the Government in substitution of the present arrangement, whereby denominational teaching is given in voluntary schools subject to a conscience clause, while in board schools no denominational teaching may be given, and no religious teaching need be given.

Another suggested solution is the repeal of the Cowper Temple clause. This would leave to those who had the control and management of the schools the decision whether there should be any, and what, religious teaching. Every child would be protected by the conscience clause; no child would receive teaching of which its parents disapproved; but the board or managers with the whole range of denominations to choose from would make their selection, or determine that all should be excluded. If this should ever be accepted as a solution, we must face the certainty of vehement contests between the advocates of different kinds of sectarian teaching, the possibility that the character of the teaching might vary with the fluctuations in the strength of parties on the board of managers, and the strong probability that repose from religious controversy might be found in the acceptance of a religious teaching

This objection is removed by the proposals laid before the House of Commons by Mr. Balfour on June 23. The sums paid to voluntary schools and the smaller sums paid to necessitous board schools under the Acts of 1897 will be withdrawn, and their amounts (860,0001.), together with a sum of 900,000l. contributed by the Treasury, will be paid to all schools alike. Four shillings a head will be paid for every child in average attendance, and the residue will be divided, in proportion to their necessity, among districts where a penny rate produces less than ten shillings per child.

which was colourless, or the rejection of such teaching altogether.

Then there is the proposal to allow what are called 'out'side facilities.' These would enable the child to be sent, or kept from school, during some part of the school hours, when he could receive, at home or in some neighbouring room, religious teaching which might not be given at school.

Lastly, there is the proposal which figured as clause 27 in the Bill of 1896, by which every school should be open on reasonable demand to external teachers of every denomination. This plan would, doubtless, involve some difficulties as to the time-table of study, possibly also some difficulty as to accommodation. But it would more surely than any other plan meet every reasonable and genuine requirement.

It may be worth while to profit by the experience of a neighbour. Mr. Brereton, in his interesting report on the rural schools of North-West France, describes the process of secularising the schools. Elementary education was made free in 1881; compulsory, in 1882; secular, in 1886. The 'school-programme was to be purged of all denominational 'teaching distinctively Roman Catholic, Protestant, or 'Jewish, the teaching of la morale being put in its place.' In State schools for boys all teachers were, within five years, to be laymen: in those for girls, the religieuses who taught were to be left in possession until death or resignation. The consequences of the new régime to some of the teachers in rural districts were decidedly painful.

The adversaries of the school in one village put about statements that the lay-teachers strangled their pupils. In ' other communes the parents, under threat of extreme ' ecclesiastical penalties, withdrew their children en masse. In others, the new teacher (sometimes a woman) was ' received with a shower of stones. Other teachers, again, 'found themselves boycotted. The local grocer and pro'vision-merchant refused to supply them; they could get 'neither flour nor milk on the spot.' A parish council, with a fervour which some English ecclesiastics might envy, passed a resolution deploring 'd'être obligé par une loi scélérate à entretenir une école de perdition.'

This bitterness is passing away, but still the struggle between the State schools and the private schools under religious superintendence continues, and as with our board and voluntary schools the struggle is partly religious, partly financial. Mr. Brereton cites the opinion of a primary

inspector, well spoken of by both parties, who said to me that perhaps Jules Ferry went too far; that had he allowed 'the curé to enter the school to teach the catechism to those whose parents wished for it, the result would probably ' have been peace in the long run. For if the curés could have given up their schools with honour, they would have 'done so long ago, as they constitute a heavy drain upon 'the clergy.' > *

The solution of our own difficulty might be found if secular instruction were placed entirely under the control of the local authority, and every school were open, under reasonable regulation, to the religious teaching of every denomination.

The religious difficulty may be said to be confined, except in the case of the training colleges, to elementary education. At least its appearance in the field of secondary education is fitful and comparatively unimportant. If we ask why this is so, the answer supplies one strong recommendation of the Bill of 1902. For many years in many parts of the country the parson has been for all practical purposes the managing director of the voluntary school. Under the Government Bill he will be so no longer. The representatives of the local authority will bring with them outside criticism, and, for purposes of secular instruction, outside control. If the Bill passes, the sole and undivided sway of the parson is at an end.

But though when we leave elementary education, properly so-called, we may be said to leave the religious difficulty behind us, we are confronted with other problems, less acrimonious perhaps, but hardly less perplexing. What sort of education is wanted, for whom, whence is it to be supplied, by whom controlled ?

The Secondary Education Commissioners sought long to distinguish elementary and secondary education. They received many suggestions: that it depended on the length of years given to school life; on the character of the instruction given; on the social position and pecuniary means of the parents; on the department responsible for dispensing the money voted by Parliament. At last to the question, uttered almost in the tones of Pilate, 'What is secondary education?' they formed an answer on this wise. It is the education of the boy or girl not simply as a 'human being who needs to be instructed in the mere rudi

Special Reports on Educational Subjects, vol. vii. p. 39.