The Waikato Times. TUESDAY, JANUARY 16, 1877.

Waikato Times, Volume X, Issue 715, 16 January 1877, Page 2

The Waikato Times.

TUESDAY, JANUARY 16, 1877.

Equal and exact justice to all men, Of whatever state or persuasion, religious or political *#* * ' # Here shall the Preai the People's right maintain, Unawed by influence and unbribed by gain.

We have just received from Dunedin the copy of a small pamphlet entitled " The Practice and Theory of Economics m the School." The title is a fair index of the contents — high sounding, and with little or no piactical meaning. The plain common sense title to a plain common sense text would have been "Institution of Penny Savingsbanks m Schools," and the text would have put practically before the reader the way to set about initiating and carrying out such institutions. The little brochure before us does nothing of the kind. It moralises and philosophises, indulges m weak platitudes on the value of economics, and mildly replies to the assault, of those who, at the time that a previous and more practical pamphlet was issued from the pen of Mr Fitch showing the results of the savings banks m the schools of Belgium, attacked it with the charge that to encourage children m saving pennies was to create a miserly, niggardly feeling, and love of greed. Any such defence was totally unnecessary, for to what does all education tend but to the acquisition of money, and to the enabling the educated class to live on and by the uneducated class. What but the acquisition of money is the be-all and end-all of an age of luxury into the enjoyment of the outer courts even of which none can enter without a golden key. Money is like charity, it covers a multitude of sins. It is like cleanliness, for it is next to godliness j only that it is, m this world at least, before, and not after it. It transforms old age into youth, repulsiveness into beauty. It is the lever that moves the world Can we lead the minds of our children, then, to the study of any more useful or beneficial art than that

Which is to underlie their whole, course of action m after life. We need but to look around us m the world and see what an opposite training has done and is doing for the masses. How the- want of thrift places the axe and the bucket m the, hands of millions, and keeps them to the end of their days hewers of wood and draweis of water for the benefit of the comparative few who have learned the art both of making money and keeping it. What was wanted was not the ■prospectus of an association for promoting the study of economics m our public schools, with the Marquis and Marchioness • o|Wormanby as its patrons, and a host of highsounding colonial names as its presidents and honorary members, but a simple exposition of the working of the penny savings bank system m connection with common schools. We don't need to be told the advantage of this by any pamphleteer, or by any number of Mrs, Jellabies associated for the purpose. The inculcation of thrift m the children of all classes is a necessity patent to every thinking- man and woman. What is wanted is some practical application of the Belgian system, and a single paragraph showing how the penny savings bank system could be worked between the masters of schools and the local government savings bank agents would have been worth the whole eight-and-twenty pages of the pamphlet before us. % We have more than once m these columns advocated the adoption of such a system, and not many months ago had hoped that by arrangement between the officials above mentioned it would have been practically carried out m Hamilton. Many boys m this small community have their savings bank accounts, but no deposit less than a shilling is received, and this hinders the general usefulness of the system. In Auckland a penny savings bank has been established m connection with the Auckland Savings Bank for rather more than a year past, and to give an idea how the new institu tion has been" appreciated we may simply state that the returns for the first year of its operation show that during that period 1946 new accounts were opened, and a sum of £1,164 altogether lodged. Perhaps nothing more to the point could be urged m arguing the want of such an institution m every f*one of the numerous communities m the colony than the narration of this simple fact.