schools would be possible would be in the large and populous towns, and even there they have judged it inexpedient to attempt them, except in a few instances. The only denominational' schools that I am aware of in Massachusetts are set up by individuals, relying chiefly on the support of the denomination to which they belong, but without any ecclesiastical pledge of any sort, and these are rapidly declining; and even academies, incorporated and unincorporated, for the higher branches of English and classical education, are being converted in considerable numbers every year into high schools, which are frequented by the children of persons of the highest station in the country. We have a high school for every four thousand inhabitants.

"Our usual arrangement is this. Our townships are about six miles square. In or near

the centre is the village, the

chapels, and the high school.

about a mile distant from the

churches and

Around these,

centre, are the

grammar-schools; and nearer the extremities of the township, and elsewhere where needed, the

primary schools. We have two agents, who are sent where required, to give advice as to the best localities for these schools. One of these agents, Mr. Banks, was Speaker of the House of Representatives of the State, and the year before a Commissioner of Education: the other agent is Mr. Greene, Professor of Didactics at Brown University, New Providence.

"We have teachers' seminaries, established in 1836 or 1837, two for both sexes. The term is in one a year and four months, and in the other a year and a half. We intend to raise the qualification for entrance, and then make them. schools for teaching.

"Under the present state of things, our system does not reach the whole population in our manufacturing towns. The parents themselves neglect the education of their children, and the manufacturing companies sometimes evade the spirit of the law which requires a certain amount of attendance at school of children under a certain age. It is not the special duty of the school committees to correct this evil, and it will probably be necessary for the towns to appoint

some person of influence, or with more or less of legal authority, to look after such children. and bring them to school. A gentleman at Roxberry, Mr. Ritchie, employed by the city authorities, has made this experiment, and he has informed me that he has so far succeeded as to be of opinion that the attendance of all the children of school-age can be secured in this way, by the appointment of an officer of this kind. The condition of our population is such that there could be no difficulty in any family as to clothing the children decently, so as to attend the schools. If there are a few exceptions in our manufacturing towns, those towns themselves could easily make provision for that purpose.

On this plain and candid statement of the progress and present state of opinion in Massachusetts in regard to the question of religious instruction, it is in this country scarcely necessary to observe that the mode of imparting it in the day and Sunday-schools of that State, as above described, is one which, after long and vehement discussion among all the religious de

nominations of England and Scotland ten years ago, was unanimously rejected as dangerous to the faith, and as tending inevitably to confound all distinctions, and to weaken and eventually to destroy in the mind all firm hold of the essential doctrines of revealed religion.

may

It is at once noticeable, by any one who attentively considers the sections of the revised law relating to moral and religious instruction above quoted, that the list of moral virtues is no more than be found in the works of many excellent heathen writers, and does not include many of the distinctive virtues of Christianity. And when the necessity for something more positive and more distinctively Christian is felt, and the attempt made to act upon that feeling, nothing more precise is found possible, under what is called a general system, than a mode of teaching which the reason and convictions of all the religious denominations in this country with one voice decided to be one on which Christianity could not be taught.

I took all the means in my power to ascertain what were the various currents of opinion.

in the United States with respect to the actual effects traceable upon morals, character, and religion, of the mode of religious teaching in the public schools. On a question so delicate and difficult, and involving so much of political as well as other considerations, there will of course be many and great differences of opinion. Many gentlemen of distinguished ability, for the conscientiousness of whose convictions it is impossible not to entertain the greatest respect, while by their personal character they inspire the highest regard, informed me that they could discover nothing objectionable in the principle, and could recognise no injurious consequences as traceable to the system in its mode of action. Others, equally estimable and equally eminent, informed me that they looked upon it as "a great experiment," of the ultimate results of which upon the religious character of the people they confessed their apprehensions, but that in the actual state of public opinion they considered no other system possible. Other gentlemen again, both lay and clerical, with equal opportunities of observation and means of arriv