THE EVENING STAR. PUBLISHED DAILY AT FOUR o'CLOCK P.M. Resurrexi. SATURDAY, JANUARY 13, 1877.

Thames Star, Volume VII, Issue 2503, 13 January 1877, Page 2

THE Evening Star. PUBLISHED DAILY AT FOUR o'CLOCK P.M. Resurrexi. SATURDAY, JANUARY 13, 1877.

It would appear that educational matters on the Thames must hare an element of personality introduced to induce any show of interest ©n the part of the householders—the only persons, it seems, who can vote for the new school committees. In the Kauaeranga District during last year the committee were not a " happy family " —they were continually divided. The annual meeting of ratepayers, which was held tfie other day, to elect a committee who should succeed the Commissioners nominated by the Central Board when the old committee resigned, was well attended. Three out of the five who formed last year's committee were nominated, two being elected. The attendance was good, and considerable interc st was displayed. At the meeting of the Waiotahi householders yesterday only fire persons attended at first, but subsequently the number was increased to seven ; and although others were proposed, the old committee were re-elected, some of them in their absence. The results of these two meetings, together with sonae former incidents in connection with the working of the common school system here, we think, bear ©ut the statement we started with, that a personal element seems necessary to induce people to take any interest in educational matters. It is not flattering to the community, for the education of .the young and the efficient carrying out of the system established by law is important and ought to awaken a general interest, instead of being treated with such indifference. We do not approve entirely of local committees,'but we are prepared to admit that the selections made this year are fairly representative, and possibly as good as could be made.

Wk wrote some time ago on a proposal made to establish savings batiks in schools, in which. children who attended these schools might; be able.to invest such sums—from a penny upwards—as the kindness of their friends or their own industry might provide them with. We pointed out then what we considered the advantages and the disadvantages of the proposal. How on the one hand it might lead to good by encouraging boys or girls to save such money as they had for a time when it might come very useful to them, either to enable them to start in business oi* embark in some commercial pursuit. How, on the other hand, the habit of saving if insisted on too strictly might engender the habits and dispositions which make up the despicable miser. Since writing what we then wrote we have received a pamphlet, quite lately, entitled " A Plea for Economics," the careful perusal of which has led us again to write on this certainly important subject. In the short preface which is attached to the pamphlet the writer, who urges the necessity of forcing on children in schools the .study of economics, rinhtly takes objection to the term " political economy " being applied to his pages The word economy, derived from two Greek words meaning the " law of a house," —that is, the way by which to manage a house —may fairly and profitably be impressed on the minds of scholars, but the endeavor to teach children—who, if they are not of tender years, have at least not arrived at that period known as years of discretion —to understand the works of such writers as Sir William Hamilton, J. S. Mill, Locke and, the numerous others who have written on the subject, would no doubt prove both useless to the scholars and trying to the temper of the teacher. There seems to be no doubt, however, in the minds of most of th^se who have studied the sub-

jectybut that the teaching of economics to children* and yoiing people generally is advantageous, and miy lead afterwards to tliat ; knowledge of political economy which may render them, if called upon to do so,- in after life fitted to carry on the duties of a public life, and act in the best way. for the interests of their fellow citizens. This study^ of economics the writer of the pamphlet insists should be enforced both by practice and precept; both by instructing children how good a thing it is to save ihouey; arid by giving thenrfac lities of carrying out the lessons .taught, by ■ providing saving banks in each school. It seems from the pamphlet before us that the idea,' has the approval of many eminent men-in .New Zealand, for among the names of those mentioned as approving of the design wo find those of the Governor, the Speaker, the Premier, the Chancellors of the Universities of New Z< aland and Otago, and of more tfoa# one Bishop, besides many M.ff.it's. The $7?i|tep goes on to state his reasons why economies should form part of a school education. We quotes authorities, many of them emineut men, who agree with him in his views, and gives extracts of what they have said on the mattei 1. We have only to mention the names of Lord Derby, Cardinal Manning, and Lord Shaftesbury to show be i* well supported. Perhaps the last named went a little too far if it be true that he said he regarded these School Savings Banks as ': one of the very best christianising offices." Acwedmg to the statistics given the result of the jes^blishment of these savings banks has been o^y successful. JN'ot only in Belgium, of which Qoantry wespbke in our previous article on this subject, h&s this been the caso, but in Fraoce it is gaid that" Thousands of school banks are

now. in operation," and in England also it is said the system is gaining great favor. The writer answers the objection that a taste for saving, or as ho culls it the encouraging of thrift, will fester avaricious and..penurious habits, and quotes the instance of George Stephenson wlio, " though a thrifty and frugal man, was essentially unsordid." The quotation is from Smiles' "Self Help," and goes on to say that George Stephenson never saved to hoard, but saved for a purpose. This is no doubt true, and many other instances might be adduced of persons in, at first, similar positions to George Stephenson, becoming wealthy because they chose to save what they had acquired " for a purpose." On the other there are those who save for the purpose of gain, and in their saving habits are actuated by such motives as was Shylock when in reply to Antonio's question—

Is your gold and silver ewes or lambs ? said — I cannot toll—l make It breed as fast. Such a character was the one which Dickens has drawn of Ealph Nickleby, who, accustomed even while at school to save every penny he could, so as to gain, became, when he arrived to man's estate, a miser and usurer, and found afe the last he had simply hoarded his wealth that others might ei>joy it. Thrift, says the writer of the pamphlet, is a duty, and if so it must be right to inculcate it, and of course if this be true, it is necessary to inculcate it as soon as possible, so that it may, as it were, grow up with the child, and as a habit form a second nature. Taken as a whole we think this: that the study of social economics should certainly form a branch of the form of education used in our schools. The question of savings banks seems to us to be one which more nearly concerns the parents of the children than their teachers. In the first place the establishment of them would add greatly to the duties of the latter, and necessitate the loss of some time which should be expended on tuition, and in the second the parents are much more able to encourage those habit 3of thrift which, we believe, in a moderate degree, it is right to encourage.