can be done with safety. Simple lessons in Reading Books would show the object of such rules, and tend to secure the willing cooperation of the people. Many years ago the late Sir J. K. Shuttleworth, in an admirable letter on the "Education of the Coloured Races in the British Colonies," recommended that they should be taught "how health may be preserved by proper diet, cleanliness, ventilation, and clothing, and by the structure of their dwellings." In Massachusetts the following Act was passed in 1850: 1. Physiology and hygiene shall hereafter be taught in all the public schools of the Commonwealth, in all cases in which the school committee shall deem it expedient. "2. All school teachers shall hereafter be examined in their knowledge of the elementary principles of physiology and hygiene and their ability to give instruction in the same. The last Madras Public Instruction Report contains the following: "Some knowledge too of the laws of health, apart from its importance to the individual himself, seems very desirable among men who, as members of Municipal and Local Fund Boards, are expected to discuss and decide on sanitary measures, and who ought to be our main instruments for spreading some idea of the advantages of such measures among their countrymen." 3. Diffusing knowledge fitted to improve Agriculture and the Arts.-Some parts of India are densely peopled, and the population is pressing upon the means of subsistence. Every practicable appliance by which the fertility of the soil may be increased, is of great importance. Improved agriculture has probably doubled the produce at home during the last half century. It seems possible to make a considerable advance in India. There are also special reasons for directing effort in this line. As already noticed, there is everywhere a strong craving for a knowledge of English, as the pathway to office, honour and wealth. Even peons not unfrequently struggle hard to give at least one son a fair English education in the hope that he may eventually rise to a high position. The number of applicants for places under Government is far in excess of the demand. The following extract from a Bengali newspaper shows that some are beginning to realize the actual state of things: "The great question which English journals are now discussing regarding the possible future of the numerous young men of promise down and sleep like dead people until morning, when they wake up with stiff limbs. The time for reading is wasted in this way. Chota Srijukto (Lieutenant Governor) is not wanting in artfulness. He has devised many methods to eat the head' of the higher Bengali learning; though this may not be his design, this is the fruit which will result." Quoted in Indi & Mirror, 1st May, 1873. Quoted in Report of Committee of Council on Education, 1862-63 p. 207. whom the universities are annually disgorging from their classical throats bids fair to be ere long the most perplexing problem of Indian politics. How are our B. A.s and M. A.s, not to speak of the undergraduates and other small fry, to be decently fed and clothed. The public service with its ten thousand nooks and corners is filled to overflowing, the houses of private enterprise are also similarly crammed, the markets are overstocked and the trades offer no refuge. What are these young men with their grammar and lexicon, their hard-earned degrees and literary honors, to do? Where are they to work with the distinction which has separated them from the common herd? Some field of enterprise beyond the limits of the country, some outlet so to speak from its overstocked markets and teeming offices seems imperatively demanded by the rapid progress of education in the country." Bengal Christian Herald, 9th May, 1873. It would be useful to insert in Reading Books, in a suitable form, advice like the following: Sir Richard Temple, when addressing in 1870 the students of the Free Church Institution, Calcutta, said : "Then I must entreat you not to look too much to Government appointments as constituting the one great end of educational life. Doubtless the Government will always do, as it has heretofore done, all it fairly cau for you in these respects. But you should try to strike out paths for yourselves, and to seek for non-official employment. You cannot all enter the public service; you cannot all rise to good positions."* The Hon. J. B. Norton urged the same course in Madras : 66 I can perhaps scarcely expect that the young persons I see around me can fully appreciate the truths which I have been telling them; and therefore, Mr. President, I address myse'f more particularly to you and the more advanced in age of those who now hear me; and I tell you that this reliance upon Government, and seeking after its employ, to the exclusion of all other legitimate and honourable means of procuring a livelihood, has up to the present moment been the principal bane and curse of Native Society." At the last Calcutta University Convocation Lord Northbrook remarked: "I cannot help noticing in this country how some professions which in England are filled by some of the ablest men in the highest ranks of society, appear in India, not to be looked to as professions in which educated men and graduates of the university can properly be employed. "I look to the fine arts, and I look to commerce in which a large portion of the educated men in England obtain their positions in life, and I see that in India those professions are not valued so much as they should be by those who have gone through a university course. I, however, look forward to the time, which, in this city at any rate, is * Report of the Bengal Mission of the Free Church of Scotland for 1870, p. 26. rapidly approaching, when the customs which at present prevent educated men of the higher ranks of society from entering such professions will be regarded as things of the past." While advice like the above is especially required in advanced classes, lessons may be given even in village schools highly calculated to promote the future temporal well-being of the pupils. 4. Instruction in Social Economy.*-The Education Commission, 1861, remarked: "Next to religion, the knowledge most important to a labouring man is that of the causes which regulate the amount of his wages, the hours of his work, the regularity of his employment, and the prices of what he consumes."+ The Schools Inquiry Commission took a somewhat similar view : "Before leaving those which we have called the human subjects of study we must not omit to mention Political Economy. The need of teaching this was pressed with the greatest earnestness, and with very weighty arguments, by Mr. Ellis and several others. It is undeniable that it bears directly on the conduct of life, and that in practical applications few studies can surpass it. It may be made exceedingly interesting. It supplies excellent examples of reasoning. In the hands of a thoroughly skilful teacher, it can be brought within the comprehension of boys at school. It would not take much time, and ought certainly to form a part of a good educational programme." " The London and Liverpool School Boards have determined to make elementary social economy an "essential subject in all the schools which they provide, and their example will not improbably be followed by other school boards."§ Some knowledge of this science is very important in India. "An ignorant impatience of taxation" is not peculiar to this country; but the people have little idea of Government beyond a despotic power, that takes all it can out of them and does as little for them as possible. The headman of a village who can defraud Government of its rights in the way of taxes, is considered worthy of being held in everlasting remembrance. The people have no clear views as to how the price of grain is determined. High rates are put down very largely to combinations among the grain dealers. This, of course, is true to some extent; but the laws which regulate prices should be explained. The last Madras Public Instruction Report has the following remarks: - "I also agree with Dr. Murdoch in considering that Political *Political Economy is included. Report, p. 127. Economy is very unwisely ignored in our scheme. The recent imposition of new taxes, the general rise in the prices of the necessaries of life, and the frequent occurrence of dearths and famines seem to render it necessary that sound elementary notions on this class of topics should be diffused throughout the country. The history of Trades' Unions in England and of Communism in France shows how much danger may lurk in hazy notions of the relative rights of labour and capital, and seems to indicate that Political Economy, which especially concerns the masses, should be taught to the masses, if not in their own interests, at least in the interests of society at large. The subject enters at present into one of the optional branches of the M. A. course, and the propriety of making it a part of a collegiate, much less of a school course, will certainly not be generally admitted. I have always thought that some elementary notions on the subject might very well be diffused through the medium of books modelled on the plan of Archbishop Whately's Easy Lessons on Money Matters and Miss Martineau's Tales, and it may be remarked, that Mr. Arbuthnot, when Director of Public Instruction, prescribed a translation of the former as a text-book for the fifth class of our Taluq Schools. part of the scheme, however, if it was ever carried out, seems to have fallen into abeyance." This By the employment of the means above mentioned, education may be made instrumental in promoting the temporal well-being of its recipients. II. THE INTELLECTUAL ELEVATION OF THE PEOPLE. The discipline of the intellectual powers is a most important part of education. At home, until recently, in schools of a higher grade, this was sought to be attained chiefly through the study of the classical languages of Europe. Gentlemen connected with the Educational Department in India naturally introduced the system under which they had themselves been trained. Shakespeare and Milton were, however, substituted for Horace and Virgil. The influence of Cambridge secured the study of pure mathematics; but physical science was, in most parts of the country, greatly neglected. During the last few years, the study of Latin has been encouraged to some extent in Western India.* A Bombay native. paper mentions that some of the educated Hindus look down with additional contempt upon the mass of their countrymen, not only on account of their ignorance of Shakespeare and Milton, but because they have never studied Cæsar! * An illustration of the tendency of educationists to get into a rut, is given in the last Punjab Public Instruction Report: : "A short time ago the Lieutenant Governor visiting the Montgomery Jail, found the prisoners, wild Jats and Kharrals of the Bár, learning Persian, a language as foreign and as useless to them as German. The Inspector who accom Public opinion on the higher education has changed a good deal at home of late years. Mr. Lowe remarked in his speech at Edinburgh : "Now I pass on to the other study that is the principal occupation of our youth, and that is the study of the Latin and Greek languages, and the history, science, geography, and mythology connected with themthe principal study being language and the rest only accessaries to it. Now, it strikes one, in the first instance, it is rather a narrow view of education that it should be devoted mainly-I had almost said exclusively to the acquisition of any language whatever. Language is the vehicle of thought, and where thought and knowledge are present, it is desirable as the means of conveying it. It is not a thing to be substituted for it—it is not its equivalent. It supposes knowledge of things, and it is only useful when that knowledge is attained for the purpose, namely, of communicating it. I will venture to read a few lines from Pope in illustration of what I say; I should only weaken the thought if I attempted to state the effect of them. They are 140 or 150 years old, and that only shows you how abuses and mistakes may be pointed out in the most vigorous language, and with the most conclusive reasoning, and yet they may remain utterly uncared for :— "Since man from beasts by words is known, And keep them in the pale of words till death." It is objected however that Greek and Latin are studied, not for the knowledge they contain, but for the mental discipline, This, no doubt, is valuable, but the question is, can this not be secured by other means? Herbert Spencer says: "We have now to judge the relative values of different kinds of knowledge for purposes of discipline. This division of our subject we are obliged to treat with comparative brevity; and happily, no very lengthened treatment of it is needed. Having found out what is best for the one end, we have by implication found what is best for the other. We may be quite sure that the acquirement of those classes of facts which are most useful for regulating conduct involves a mental exercise, best fitted for strengthening the faculties. It would be utterly contrary to the beautiful economy of Nature, if one kind of culture panied him did not think the study inappropriate. It was the regular course of the Department, and prisoners had to pass through it in the same way as all other scholars, whether the study was useful to them or not." p. 13, |