PRIMARY EDUCATION.-BREAKERS AHEAD.

Observer, Volume 6, Issue 141, 26 May 1883, Page 147

PRIMARY EDUCATION.-BREAKERS AHEAD.

" If the existing system of primary Nsducation should ever fall upon evil day, that result will fee"'";;, brought about more by the insidioixs attacks of--.;, false friends or traitors within than by the ,as« vAsaults of open enemies from without." This ' is^'. ? what we said on the 17th March last, and we haye 1 -' A already many premonitory signs of threatened 1 ... disaster. There was the mock inquiry on the ~-\ ■■.; Simpson appointment, Avith its lame and impotent' conclusion, and now there is dissension and col-' ? lision of authority between the Board arid some of ■ the School Committees, indiscreet interference, on ■'•, the part of fiery zealots of the Orange Lodges, "'V and the thin edge of the sectarian wedge by the, . Scripture Grift Association. • .' ■- • . ■ Zeal's a pestilent disease To Christian charity and peace. < •■ Meanwhile, the declared foes of tne secular system are watching with lynx-eyed vigilance and •: . impatient eagerness to discern the critical moment for an organised and decisive assault on the weakest ■ point in the secular lin^s. Tlieiv motto is, "divide ■'; et impera" but they have only to play a waiting game, while their enemies aye doing their best to undermine and weajsen theii-jown defences. . — «> — ! . • • ;■ If the education ship is to be steered clear of the breakers ahead, ib will bo necessary more' ■. clearly to define and fix the relative powers and ' functions of the Board arid School Committees, and to put an end to these unseemly squabbles between jealous and antagonistic bodies. As to . the outcry about the want of Bible-teaching in the schools, it is a cry, and nothing more. The • Act already provides facilities for it, if the teachers .' of religion will b\it take advantage of them. But all this vague clamour about G-odless education,' . this injudicious interference of rabid sectarians, and these indiscreet attempts to smuggle Scriptural literature into the school libraries will only furnish n point d'appui for an attack by the .'' , enemies of the system in Parliament and on the '•■; hustings. The friends of secular education may well exclaim, " Save us from our friends 1" ; ♦ — There is another matter in which reform is urgently called for. The bulk of the vote for education is being spent on school-buildings, salaries, and departmental expenses, and a system has come into vogue which, if not exactly one of fees, is closely analagous to it. To parents in comparatively comfortable circumstances the heavy and frequent charges for text books, slates, . copy-books, atlasses, and so forth, is not a serious burden, but it presses severely on poor struggling . families with limited earnings, where the bread- ' , winner is an ordinary day labourer, subject to the ' vicissitudes of bad weather, interruptions to and lack of employment. It is absolute cruelty to tell a man in whose family there has been sickness, who has been temporarily out of work, and whose baker and butcher insist on cash payments, that his children shall be deprived of education unless they bring with them every other, month three or four shillings a head for. school books. There has been gradually creeping into the primary schools an ambitious curriculum, ? '• and a degree of caste which threaten to make education an expensive luxury, if not an impossi« bility, to the poorer classes. This is one of the „ difficulties that will have to be faced sooner or later. ♦— .' ■