The Otago Daily Times calls attention, in a thoughtfully writ ton article, to a particular phase of social ethics which now that the flow of immigration to New Zealand is rapidly changing the characteristics of population should command more than mere passing observation. Says our contemporary : " From the markets of the British Empire an exceeding loud and bitter cry is rising up that the Germans are " cutting out" the native merchants and the native clerks. The fact is unquestionable, the Directories of London and Liverpool and the other great commercial centres of the Empire show ten German firms at least for one but a very few years back. Worse still, many of these are leading firms in their respective lines of business; and worst of all, but very few of the secondclass firms can keep pace with the Germans on their road to the first rank. To the Empire at large this is, at present at least, of no great concern. These Germans are no less certainly, and perhaps more surely. working now for the commercial preeminence of the Empire, than Englishmen or Scotchmen could do. " The same outcry, with equal truth and reason, was heard in England when the Union flooded the Banks and countinchouses of England with hardy youn" Scots accustomed to oatmeal and hard work, and often cadets of families in which personal honour was the unbroken tradition of centuries. But no Englishmau will now contend that England herself is not richer in the highest, as well as the more material, sense of the word for that infusion of new blood." But for us of British descent residents in a British Colony —there is a question of immediate importance:—Are we prepared to see our children thrust from their stools bv theseentcrprising, indefatigable aliens'? And if not, are there any means by which we can preserve to our children the heritage wo have been wont to think their own ? Partly, perhaps, we may obviate the danger, though completely to escape it might demand a change of national habits which we can hardly hope to see. The German youth ousts the Englishman because, like the Scot of two centuries since, lie will live harder and work harder, and for less. He, coining from a poor and frugal country, where habits arc simple and paternal authority strong, regards as superfluities three fifths of what his English compeer holds" as necessaries. The one will save money, where the other would starve ; and further, wanting fewer luxuries, he requires less money, and is less open to temptation to dishonesty. But above all these agencies, wo should be inclined to place the spirit of discipline, which is in the air of the Fatherland, and the admirable system of schools, which forms so prominent a feature of that discipline. If young Englishmen will learn to obey legitimate authority as implicitly aud as conscientiously as
young Germans—if they will be content with the same pleasures and the same plain living—if they have imbibed the same eager desire for self-improve-ment—they may laugh to scorn tho armies of the aliens, whether iu the market, the schools, or the field. But for many a year, until they are taught perhaps by rude reverses, it will not. be so, at least as a rule." Referring to defects in the systems of education of colonial youth and the superficial knowledge wherewith the average lad of sixteen years of age or thereabouts, is set free from school to enter his noviciate in commercial life, the writer of the article suggests a closer assimilation to the German system, both in preliminary training and in the bighcrscliodls,and alsoinstructioninGerman language and literature, both from the point of view of material expediency —as a language becoming the equal of English as a commercial tongue —and of intellectual training. Then plainly, in words of pith aud moment, he lays bare a defect which legislators making constant profession of earnestness in the advancement of education yet find convenient to condone . " The scantily educated persons, who form so large a proportion of our wealthier classes, must not be permitted to dictate the curriculum of our higher rchoota. Many such persons, estimable in every way honourable, shrewd, energetic are perfectly unaware of the strides education has made since they quitted the Commercial School. These excellent people had pitted against them others similarly trained. Their sons will find it wonderfully different. Studies which are caviars to them —tho practical application of which no argument could niako them comprehend—are necessities to a young man now entering on life. A wider manner of looking at things—a more exact mental training—-are called for at every turn. Like hens who see their duckling foster children venture into deep waters, these good people must make np their minds to see their offspring take to wdiat they cannot fathom. But so it must be. Each generation must bo content to sec its successor mount on its shoulders to a wider survey of life. We see in this little cause for repining, Those children will hereafter remember gratefully that; it was their self-denial which enabled them to take a higher place. Meanwhile we feel assured that tho greatest difficulty the rising generation have to contend with is the narrow and limited view which many persons, whose natural ability and energy, however uncultivated, may have rendered them prominent, take of the needs of education in the latter half of the nineteenth century. The actual instruction the commercial man requires is small. If he can read, write, spell, and is a fair arithmetician, lie is amply equipped ; but if he is narrow in his ideas, devoid of imagination, unable to appreciate what is new, apt to bo thrown off his balaucc by unforeseen changes in this age of unceasing change, he will be hopelessly wanting. It is the breadth of German teaching, and its real elevation, that tends to give its recipients so high and so promising a position in the commercial world."
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Westport Times, Volume VIII, Issue 1183, 9 June 1874, Page 2
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994Untitled Westport Times, Volume VIII, Issue 1183, 9 June 1874, Page 2
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