Mind.
It is refreshing to know that so far as this branch of the subject is concerned, our governors, having by the force of circumstances been compelled to realize the fact of our existence, and our claim to be considered as veritably part and parcel of the body politic, with rights of common citizenship, have further, within the last few years, by the passing of the Compulsory Education Act, shown themselves possessed of political sagacity, by thus taking steps to insure that our descendants, when their turn comes to exercise and enjoy the civil privileges now granted to them, shall at least have a ploughed and manured soil in which to sow the seeds of love for law and order with some chance of due fructification, instead of the rough, hibbly-hobbly cinder-heap of their forefathers, which acknowledged no fertilizing influence but gross bribery, and partially justified the political ostracism and exclusion of its owners from all share in electoral privileges.
All hail, then, to the School Board system as a great step in the right direction. Undeniably true as are some of the accusations brought against it, alleging that many blunders and useless extravagances, and much disregard for the susceptibilities of well-meaning but mistaken opponents, have marked its progress onward in too many instances; yet as the general idea is laudable and eminently conducive to promoting the highest interests of the entire population, and as in the nature of things it may be expected that greater experience will bring greater wisdom, and the faults charged against the movement gradually become “small by degrees and beautifully less,” let us heartily wish it God-speed.
Yet, why does the good work stop here? Why should not provision be made for building upon the foundation thus laid? Why should totally unformed intelligences be the only ones to profit by this guardian care, and why should they be led a little way on the road and then left to flounder along by themselves, and lose themselves in interminable mazes? Why, in short, should education be confined to children, and not extended to adults?
It is true that the University Extension Scheme, as now carried out in many of our larger provincial towns to a very, very limited and only faintly appreciable extent, tends to show that the wind is just beginning to blow in this direction also. Something, however, much more comprehensive is needed. The masses are not reached, as will be patent to any one who will take the trouble to attend any of the courses of lectures delivered in connection with this extension system. The neophytes seeking initiation into this or that special branch of learning will be found to be composed principally of what we call “better class” people, with a sprinkling of pupil teachers and sucking governesses.
Nor is this the fault of the masses themselves, as may perhaps be conjectured; the mere circumstance of the prices charged for admission in itself forming an insuperable barrier to the great majority having any part or lot in the matter, to say nothing of the fact that the whole apparatus is professedly set in motion for the benefit of the middle-class public solely.
But however inadequate this minute increase in the volume of the fertilizing waters of Literature and Science may be for the mighty task of irrigating the parched and arid desert which stretches out in measureless extent before us, yet I am fain to regard it as a favourable omen—as a symptomatic indication that the “fountains of the great deeps” of human ignorance are beginning to be broken up, and that the tide is rising which, when it has reached its full height, will disseminate the fruits of the Tree of Knowledge far and wide over the landscape so that the lowly equally with the high-born may pluck and eat thereof. The monster Cerberus has received a buffet on one of its three heads, and the Hesperidean Gardens may ere long, I am sanguine enough to hope, be entered by any thirsty passer-by without fear of molestation.
All this, however, is dreamy, unsubstantial verbiage. That it is not also mere chimerical nonsense, which will not bear the strain of practical application, I will attempt to show—always supposing as a necessary preliminary, as in all the hypothetical propositions throughout this paper, that that portion of the community who are nursed in the lap of fortune are imbued with sympathetic feelings towards the less favoured sharers of their common humanity, and do not object to take a little trouble and bear a little charge by way of displaying their fellow-feeling.
Grant this premiss, and what follows, or something better, may easily be rendered an accomplished fact.
The first step will be the formation of a council or committee, after the manner before suggested, save that in this case we shall want an infusion of men of culture who at the same time shall be good workers and good philanthropists (a rare combination, but not an impossible one, I venture to think, notwithstanding the seductions a life of Sybaritic ease and delicate refinement specially offers to the scholar), in every considerable town or group of villages throughout the length and breadth of the land, with power over the district purse-strings, and with no superior authority except the Minister or Secretary of State for Education at Whitehall—for, of course, such a functionary will in those happy times be quite as much a necessity as a Master of the Buckhounds—who alone will have power to veto their proceedings and issue general rules for their guidance.
If I had the ear of this all-important official, I should whisper to him that in my view the best mode of enlightening the working classes would be to take possession of three already-existing institutions, and enlarge their dimensions so as to make of them real forces, distinctly visible, instead of the hole-and-corner obscure trivialities they are now. These three institutions are—1st, Free Libraries; 2nd, Lecture Halls; 3rd, Class Rooms.
1. To Free Libraries I have accorded the first place, because in all probability it is there that the beneficial results will be more immediately apparent, and the advantages offered will, in the first instance, be most considerably made use of. The major portion of the huge and unwieldy mass to be operated on would fly off at a tangent from the exactness and method necessarily incident to formal lectures, and in a still greater degree to class-work. It must first be left to itself to sprawl and struggle at its own free-will; the restraining chain must not be too soon brought into view; gradually and insensibly the quickening influence must be brought to bear; the change from density to clear-headedness, from sluggish inertness to mental activity, will not be effected in a moment; not all at once will the spiritual part of the long-benighted assert its claim to an equality with the animal part; desultory reading only will impart a love for reading; odd waifs and strays of information picked up just anyhow will alone create the desire for the acquisition of further knowledge, and by imperceptible degrees the naturally well-regulated mind will reject vagueness and demand exactness; having reached which stage it will be fit to undergo the further regimen prescribed. A good starting-point, however, will have been gained when our operatives generally are imbued with a genuine love of books and obtain a somewhat varied, if superficial, knowledge anent the salient features of English literature.
These words, “English literature,” are used advisedly; for while I would have every town of over 5000 inhabitants possessed of a Free Library (varying in size according to the population), and every village have its book-loan society, it would be well to insist on the greatest and best of our own writers being well represented upon the shelves of every institution of this character before venturing on translations either of the ancient classics or modern foreign authors, even of European reputation. Homer, Thucydides, Æschylus, Plato, Virgil, and the rest, as well as Dante, Cervantes, Goethe, and the innumerable host of Continental immortals, can very well wait a bit. We want to inspire British operatives with a love of letters. In endeavouring to effect this, shall we not give the foremost place to the productions of British genius? We have to form a taste. Is it not desirable that, to begin with at all events, this should be a national taste? But is not this the very way, it may be asked, to foster insular prejudices, narrowness, and bigotry? I reply, not necessarily, as many of our ablest littérateurs have not hesitated to attack the various abuses, follies, and weaknesses which crop up in these islands from time to time—some hurling denunciations at them aglow with all the fervour of passion and intellect; others piercing them with the sharp spear of satire; and others yet again calmly but pitilessly holding them up to contempt in a train of close reasoning. Many, too, in addition to lashing the vices peculiar to their native country, have, in terms of generous eloquence, eulogized the virtues of our neighbours. Therefore, the man who is disposed to wrap himself up in a mantle of national self-glorification and self-righteousness will not find that the hierarchs of our national literature are at all times compliant enough to fasten the clasp for him.
But I have a further answer—i.e., independently altogether of the question whether the perusal of English works solely will or will not have a tendency to nip the growing flower of cosmopolitanism in the bud, the one essential point in training the English subject to think is to train him to think in his own vernacular—to show him of what mighty things his mother-tongue is capable, and to satisfy him that
“Age cannot weary, nor custom stale
Its infinite variety;”
and that if ever he, individually, wants to raise up his voice and make himself heard on any subject that interests him or his fellows, he must not fritter away his attention on more distant objects, but concentrate his gaze on those which immediately surround him.
This view may appear somewhat contradictory to the one expressed when dealing with the subject of Emigration; but really it is not so. The leaving behind the special spot of earth where one drew one’s first breath, played as a boy, saw his first sweetheart, and grew up to manhood, the parting from old friends and long-familiar objects, may and does entail a severe struggle, and inflict many a bitter pang; but it is unavoidable, and so must be submitted to. It is otherwise with home ideas, habits, modes of thought, literature. These will serve to mitigate the poignancy of separation from one’s native land, will intertwine themselves more closely round one’s affections by reason of that very separation, and be the means of causing miniature Englands to arise in far-off regions, and in various degrees of latitude and longitude. While releasing as cheerfully as may be what we must let go, let us hug more closely still that which we can retain.
To return: In a well-equipped Free Library no standard British author should be conspicuous by his absence. The poets, from Chaucer and Gower to Tennyson and Browning; the dramatists, from Marlowe and Shakspeare to W. S. Gilbert and Tom Taylor; the modern historians, from Hume and Gibbon to Froude and Freeman; the modern theologians, from Hooker and Jeremy Taylor to Canon Farrar and the Dean of Westminster; the modern essayists, from the projectors of the Tatler and Spectator to the contributors to the current Reviews and Magazines; the philosophers, the leaders in all departments of science, should be there; the best writers of prose fiction, also, from Fielding and Goldsmith to Trollope and George Eliot, should be well represented. The most profound and the most volatile will alike find sufficient to occupy their attention here for some time. The “Anglican paddock” (to misapply a now well-known term) will afford plenty of grazing ground to cattle of moderate appetites for a considerable period; and when it is exhausted, why, then, there are toothsome grasses in endless profusion to be cropped over the boundary fence.
2. With reference to Lecture Halls, these ought to be nearly as plentiful as churches both in town and country, and can with proper management be made to serve two ends—the carrying forward the work begun at the Free Library, and the rousing from torpidity those whom even that useful institution would fail to reach; for as many would only be led to attend the lecture through the library, so there are many with whom the contrary would hold good, as many a dormant, beer-sodden soul would consent to be carried off for an hour or two to a lecture hall who could never be persuaded to sit down in cold blood to the perusal of a book, although such book might be written in the most fascinating and brilliant style imaginable: the unused eyes would soon begin to ache, the palsied brain soon begin to numb; whereas the speaker, if a good one, and his heart in his subject, would contrive to rivet the man’s attention, despite of himself, by the magnetism of enthusiasm, and he would carry away with him some sort of idea—muddled and distorted probably, but still an idea—of what it was all about.
Penny Readings interspersed with music have been very much derided by our erudite critics, I think without sufficient cause. These really harmless, if not very high-class gatherings, blending together the ingredients of a certain kind of instruction and of entertainment, were doubtlessly called forth by a genuine desire to familiarize the lower orders of the people with some of the more dramatic passages in our literature, and to render visible to them a higher intellectual standard than the tap-room and the music-hall had made them acquainted with. It was a happy thought to mingle singing and playing with the readings. The introduction of these not only served to take off a possible monotony which might otherwise have been felt, but added attractions really elevating in their influence, the status and general surroundings of the auditory being taken into consideration. There is no need to pry too curiously into the petty vanities which prompted this elocutionist or that vocalist to make an appearance in public, nor to speculate too closely upon the disproportion between the ludicrous extravagance of the efforts often made by incompetent aspirants to obtain fame, and the very modest modicum and evanescent character of that article vouchsafed in return. All this is nothing to the purpose. The simple query is,—Have these things, known as “Penny Readings,” in ever so slight a degree, fulfilled the object of their existence as that object is generally understood? If an affirmative answer can be given (as I certainly believe it can) to that question, then are they entitled to honest praise, and not to supercilious contempt.
However, having deposited my little offering at this humble shrine as I passed by, I am free to confess that if we never get any further than this on the road towards the mental improvement of the million, the march of intellect will be a very short march indeed. But it will not—it cannot stop here. The universal law of progress forbids the idea; and in some form or another the irresistible impetus to advance will be felt and obeyed.
Meantime, no better means, so far as I see, appearing for the moment to be available, I fall back upon my pet project of lectures, to be delivered every night (Sundays excepted) from the middle of September to the middle of May in every year, in every one of the multitudinous halls built for the purpose, by men or women well versed in the several subjects upon which they discourse.
Failing the possibility of procuring a sufficient number of lecturers who could spare the time necessary to compose original matter for the purpose, it would be by no means a bad plan, I think, to employ good and experienced hands to condense and compress standard works on different subjects into such a compass as to occupy two or three evenings, and hand these digests over to practised elocutionists to be read. Take history, for example. Prescott’s “Conquests of Mexico and Peru,” Motley’s “Rise of the Dutch Republic,” Irving’s “Conquest of Granada,” Carlyle’s “French Revolution,” or Hepworth Dixon’s “Her Majesty’s Tower,” are peculiarly well adapted to undergo this process. The absorbing interest of the incidents described could not fail to engage the attention of the audience; and I cannot help thinking that the offended manes of such of the above-named great ones as have departed from amongst us would be appeased when it was represented to them that this mutilation of their invaluable legacies to posterity had been conducted with due reverence, and solely for the purpose of introducing them to a far wider (and, perchance, not less appreciative) audience than even their exalted talents could otherwise have commanded. As to the still-living ones, perhaps before taking the liberty suggested with their literary offspring, it might be courteous to ask their permission, and I feel confident they would not be churlish enough to withhold it. I may be reminded that there would still be publishers and owners of copyright to be dealt with; but I leave suggestions as to the best means of negotiating with these awful entities to persons of greater experience than myself.
Obviously this lecture-hall business, like most of my other theories, necessarily involves considerable expenditure; but if anything is to be done, opulence must feel for indigence not only in heart but in pocket.
3. A thorough and unstinted employment of the means above indicated will accomplish much towards the emancipation of our helots from that thraldom of ignorance which gives to the more galling thraldom of caste its sole raison d’être. But there is yet one thing needed, the utilization of knowledge acquired, and this can only be attained by dint of laborious and unintermitting class-work. The sacred flame may be kindled in the breast by desultory and omnivorous reading, but the light emitted is as uncertain as that of a wandering marsh-fire—it wants focussing to be of any use to its possessor or his species. And it is in the class, under the guidance of a gifted and genial teacher, that this operation can best be performed. It is here that the finishing touch must be applied; here the rounding-off take place; here the heterogeneous be brought into homogeneity, and the discordant be reduced to harmony and system.
If these things are so, the problems which present themselves to be resolved are:—Given certain millions of untrained intellects in crying need of class tuition scattered over certain thousands of square miles in unequal proportions—how to provide sufficient building accommodation to meet the exigencies of the case? and given an uncertain but confessedly immense mass of torpidity and stagnation—how to infuse the necessary leaven into it to quicken it and arouse its latent forces?
I answer as to the first proposition—Require the architects of the multitudinous lecture halls aforesaid to submit plans to you, which shall comprise sections not only of the main building but of three or four adjuncts thereto suitable for class-rooms, after the style of the chapels nestling under the wings of our old cathedrals, or the annexes thrown out at convenient angles from our modern industrial exhibitions for the display of specialities. These would add comparatively little to the original cost of the structure, and save a great deal of time and trouble in hunting up eligible sites, and, when found, negotiating terms of purchase. As to the second proposition, make a liberal distribution of prizes part of your system, so liberal that not only proficiency would be certain of obtaining a reward, but plodding and persevering mediocrity also. Constant attendance, combined with such written answers to questions as evinced that the pupil was making an effort, should, however imperfectly the answers were framed, insure the possession of a prize at the end of every session. With such materials to work upon, a free use of stimulants to exertion must form no inconsiderable part of the programme.
Again, no charge whatever must be made for admission to the classes. Indeed, the entire domain of adult poor education must be as free as United Italy—free from the Alps of the library to the Adriatic of the class-room.
Lastly, no restriction should be made as to the age or sex of the scholar. I am of opinion that no greater incentive to emulation can be offered to either man or woman than the consciousness that they are associated with co-workers or competitors of the opposite sex.
It would be travelling out of the record were I ever so faintly to attempt to enter into details as to the mode in which class-teaching could most advantageously be conducted, or to endeavour to shadow forth what I conceive to be the regulations best adapted for the purpose. No general rules would be found competent to meet ever-varying special conditions. All this must inevitably be left to conform itself to the peculiarities of the respective groups of the taught and the idiosyncrasies of the individual teachers.