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    Untitled Article

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    THE TRUE AND FALSE IN EDUCATION.

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    Untitled Article

    posed by most advocates for the recognition of tenant right , arid it wUimot therefore encounter that strong hostility in . the * House of Comm which previous measures , violating every principle of justice and political economy , have necessarily provoked . Even the -House of Lords may be wiliing to accept it as a settlement of an agitation which has at times threatened to be troublesome . The chief danger to which it is exposed is the irrepressible eloquence of Irish patriots , who are sure to waste the little time that can be devoted to the bill in such a busy session in omnium gatherum speeches , embracing every topic , from the annexation of the Legations to Protestant proselytism in workhouses , about which Irishmen and ^ Catholics take any interest . It marks , indeed , a marvellous change in the condition of Ireland , and in the feelings of her people , when we find the chief members of independent opposition prepared to support , whilst stylingit amockery , such a bill as that of Mr . Cardwell ' s . In the first place , it is

    capital , who are themselves willing to do the necessary , im * provements ; and it is absurd to suppose that the class of small farmers , for whom tenant-right is most urgently demanded , are in a ; position to expend large sums of money in the improvement of-their occupations .- ' The tenant-right . they wanted was the right to hold their farms against the will of the landlord , and at a rent to be fixed by themselves , or that privilege of selling possession to any incoming tenant which has grown up in some parts of Ireland . ' The Legislature could not grant that ; but the Government has resolved to do something out of sheer wear iness , and hence this bill . It is time , however , that this system of exceptional and unsound legislation for Ireland should cease . Its only effect is to keep up dissatisfaction and agitation in the country , * and hinder the full development of its resources . Eeal justice to Ireland would consist , not in passing special laws at the demand of fuming patriots to favour special interests , but in treating her exactly as the rest of the empire , and legislating for her upon the same general principles which are applied to England and Scotland .

    solely of a prospective character , has none of that retrospective operation which was the great demand of tenant right meetings , and its prospective working will be of so limited a kind , that the , only thing the friends of tenant right really obtain is a sort of legislative sanction of the principle for which they have contended . Mr . Card well proposes to give the holders of settled property power to borrow a sum of money for the purpose of improvements not exceeding a fifth part of the value of the property by annuities of twenty-five years . The amount , and the propriety of its application , are to be determined by the Chairmen of counties—barristers executing functions something akin

    to those discharged by the English Chairman of Quarter Sessions—alter hearing any objections which the reversioner may make to the outlay . Such holders under settlement are also to have power to grant improvement leases of forty years , but are not to take fines as the consideration for them . Lastly , and this is the only part of the bill which deals with tenant Tight proper , a tenant from year to year is to be allowed to give notice to his landlord of his intention to make certain improvementis ; and if the landlord consents , or makes no objection , he may execute them , and obtain from the Chairman of the county a certificate charging the cost upon the land by the same _ twentyfive years ' annuity—which annuity , if subsequently evicted , he can recover from the landlord for the unexpired -portion of the

    possession , those estates charged with annuities for money uselessly expended or leased at a low rent for forty years . Important as it is that every owner of land should have the power to lease it , the term proposed is needlessly long . The great improvements effected in Scotland have all been accomplished under nineteen or twenty-one years' leases . A longer term diminishes too much the interest which a landlord should feel in his property , and does not give sufficient spur to the energy and industry of the tenant . That , however , is a question between the present tenants of settled estates and their successors , and its determination wilt not at all affect the question of tenant

    twenty-five" years . If the landlord objects * the tenancy is to terminate . - There is certainly nothing in this measure to alarm the most timid landlord . So far as he is concerned , it is merely an enabling bill , allowing him to improve himself , or find a tenant willing " to do so . No tenant can force improvements upon his landlord , since the very notice places it in the power of the landlord to determine the tenaucy . The only persons whose interests can be affected unfavourably , are the tenants m remainder of settled estates , who-rmiy-fiTid-when-they-eome-into

    right , with which , indeed , it has no connection ; it might therefore have been more appropriately dealt with ; simply by a further extension of the powers recently given to the tenants of limited estates . Any tenant-right bill must be , like this one of Mr . Cardwell's , a shorn—or like those of other years , a measure of more or less confiscation , and it is not creditable to the House of Commons that it should lend itself to the one any more than to the other . The improvement of the land is a matter to be

    settled between the landlord and the tenant ; the lntter has no business to expend his money for that purpose unless under a lease the term of which is sufficient to recoup him , or a written agreement specifying some mod e in which , upon the determination of a yearly tenancy , such improvements may bo ynhied , It is entirely a question , for the parties themselves , mid the law has no right to give tlio teiiant the , power of improving against the landlord ' s will , any more than , as many Irish and some English agitators really nek , to give to the occupier the to the

    actual property in the land , reserving only lnntuqru a certain quit rent , fixed by a jury of tenants . Nor is there anything in the peculiar condition of Ireland . to necessitate a departure frorn sound rules of political economy . The land of Ireland has . in great part , changed hands . The bulk of it is ho longer , held by beggared landlords , but belongs to men of

    Untitled Article

    W HILE it is generally felt that Education is the only mean for effectually resisting or remedying the social evils that afflict the community in this and other countries , it is not so generally understood what Education itself is . What passes for such at ordinary schools , or even extraordinary universities , falls very short of the idea . An eminent scholar , just called to the Chancery bar , confessed to us . that he had then to commence his education afresh . His college courses availed him but little when the real pressure of life and its duties had to be encountered . It was not alone the technicalities of his profession that he had to master ; but he had to select for himself a course of too

    philosophy and poetry , which was either too modern or native to find a place at college . All that belonged to the present world , and to Ms own country , as well as all that appertained-to his immediate business , had yet to be mastered . And he worked , accordingly , at Continental -philosophy , and English and German poetry , in the solitude of his chamber , every spare momenfcthat he could rescue from the bar . And when he had done all this , he felt only as a schoolboy who had just finished his task . There were still the influences of the active and busy world to be received , and which were destined to modify materially his speculative views , in order to fit him for the practical tr ialswhether of his professional or domestic life .

    , How few , even in the class of individuals such as the gentleman now portrayed , have contr ived , notwithstanding all the instruction so expensively procured at our colleges , all the subsequent study gone through in order to supplement its usual deficiencies , and all the knowledge procurable by the practice ot « - ^» . n ,, ^ -p ^ fe . ^ ifvnT ^ we sa y , how few of these have been able so to conduct the double life we all have to live , as to dely

    reproach in matters concerning both the professional and the domestic . If successful in the former , how frequently unhappy in the latter . A wife ill-ielected , children ill brought up , a house ill-managed , all come in proof of educational defects that touch us in the nearest and dearest points of existence . As we descend the scale of society , they salute us in a form still more gross , and excite our unmitigated loathing and disgust . Such is the ordinary view presented to us of this great subject a view confined within the limits of the actual , and patent to every observer . " Were we to call in the idealist to our aida Kant a Platoor a Socrates— we should find more

    im-, portant fruits—faults of a fundamental kind—that would lead us to question the basis and root of existing syHtcms , even when connected with the most favourable conditions . It was , after all , as a barrister that our eminent scholar wns forming Ins mind . If he sought to gain a correct knowledge of German transccndcntalisnCor French eclecticism , or English realism ;—if to-these studies he added the poetry of the different countries , that lie might be able to dress the ideas of philosophy m the language of poetry—it was , after all , that he might shine at . the bar and compete * more successfully with his rivals . Whatever than this

    his desire , he had no leisure for more . Philosophy and poetry , if studied for themselves , require time , and imply stages of development ; but our barrister had to hurry his acquisitions , read up his authors in regulnr sequence , and apportion so many hours * rending to ench cloy . lie could make no pause for reuection- ^ aUow no time for tho identification ol what ho luid read with his states of consciousness—suffer no reactions , no questionings : but all had to bo imbibed as so much positive increment , and to assimilate as it could with his mental constitution . Followed ns . it wus by tides of professional experiences , and pressures of personal anxieties , it soon grew subordinate to tho routing business of life , and only so far regulated it « s it was useful in sudden expediencies , mid might bo readily brought

    Untitled Article

    M&t 26 ; 186 & 5 2 % «^ Ii ^^«^ 4 W

    The True And False In Education.

    -TTTTC TTC . TTTC AND FALSE IN EDUCATION .

• Citation
  • Leader (1850-1860), May 26, 1860, page 491, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse-os.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2349/page/7/