The Evening Star THURSDAY, OCTOBER 30, 1873.

Evening Star, Issue 3337, 30 October 1873, Page 2

The Evening Star THURSDAY, OCTOBER 30, 1873.

The chief object of Mr Fish’s meeting appears to have been the advocacy before his constituency of the resolutions proposed by him in the Provincial Council for the abolition of the High School for boys. Notwithstanding the ingenuity of the propositions on which he bases his arguments, they are mere opinions, not by any means justified by the arguments urged in their support. The first and most specious is a question of cost compared with result. Mr Fish assumes that these two bear no proportion to each other; that the result is small compared with the money expended. We confess ourselves utterly unable to arrive at a conclusion on that point from such a method of deduction as he has followed. We do not know a more difficult problem to solve than to ascertain the effect of an educational course upon the minds of some four or five hundred lads who, we suppose, have been taught at the High School for a longer or shorter period during the past nine years. In order to judge correctly of the effect of culture, the material on which it has been bestowed and its surroundings must be thoroughly appreciated, We may know in some instances what they are now, who have been subjected to the character-form-ing process of school discipline; but we cannot tell what they would have been bad they been without the means provided by the High School. It is impossible to judge of educational results as we value the cost of so many yards of Mosgiel tweed, in which every operation can be measured by the outlay in machinery, time, and material, compared with the additional commercial value to the fabric. Fifty or fifty thousand pounds spent in training a human mind for the future, only prepares a being for competition with the world, mental and material; but how much better that being is than he would have been without the outlay, not even he himself can tell. At best, education is but a training hi the best means of acquisition ; and if so little has been done as Mr Fish makes out, although the ablest agents have been obtained that could be selected, the really rational conclusion seems to ns to be, that had that agency not been available, our educational condition would have been.miserably low at present. Mr Fish endeavors to meet this objection by an attempt to show that equal educational advantages are, available at the Grammar schools throughout the Province at one-eighth of the cost. We should be very glad to believe it to be true, but there is no.

proof of it ; and reasoning from the nature of the case we do not hold it to he likely. And, supposing it true, , another difficult problem requires answering ; What has been the client of the educational standard of the High School upon the District and Drainuuir schools 1 It it iy be true thfffc tliA standard of the High School is too low;; if so, let it be raised. For our own parts we are free to confess that we think there is much room for improvement in our modes of education, and that these will never be improved until wo hold correct views of what is implied in tno term. Professor Huxley’s argument showing the absurdity of estimating the benefits of education from statistical returns, applies exactly to Mr lisils monetary calculation that no benefit has resulted from the High School. After pointing out the character of what is now-a-days dignified with the name of education, the Professor remarks :—• tV 1 Kit wonder then if, very recently, an appeal lias been made to statistics for the profoundly foolish purpose of that education is of no good- -that it diminishes neither misery nor crime among the masses of mankind? I reply, Why should the thing which is called education do either the one or the other ? If I am a knave or a fool, teaching me to read and write won’t make me less of either one or the other—unless somebody shows me how to put my reading and writing to wise and good purposes. Mr Fish quotes largely from evidence taken by a Commission to prove his position, which seems to be that a high class education is not needful. Our conclusion, from careful reading of that evidence, differed much from that of Mr Fish. The fault seems to us to be that the notions people hold respecting “ the thing which has been called education,” partly through not being able to judge of the value of what they do not possess, and partly because ot mistakes concerning its value by those who do possess it, to a great extent paralyse the efforts of the teachers. 'They hardly know what to do. One parent wishes to exclude classics, another imagines them supremely useful, and so on through every variety of subject. A longer time than the High School has been in existence must pass before this is corrected It is the work of a better educated generation. It seems to ns that the true position of a High School should be that a standard institution—a model to which District and Grammar schools should as far as possible approximate. It should be a school for training teachers, as well as teaching youth, and if devoted to such purposes when “ the thing called education ” is properly understood, any fair amount expended on its support will ,bo well appropriated.