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19 prizes stir up the minds and energies of some six thousand persons every year, surely such a result would be by itself an ample encouragement, as indicating not merely a direct influence to that extent but also a much wider indirect influence upon the people at large, in whose sight the importance of knowledge would thus be recognized and the exhibition of it rewarded. Surely such a spectacle, continually repeated, would produce even in the minds of the mass of non-competitors a sense of the value of instruction, when they should see, as see they would, that the benefits obtained were not confined to the victors, but that even the vanquished gained some prize, though not the one expected. Few, it may be confidently prophesied, would be those who would go wholly unrewarded; either mentally or materially most would find an ample recompense for their exertions, and many of the unsuccessful would soon discover that they had been disappointed advantageously. The old fable would again be realized: the young men digging up the field for the sake of the hidden treasure, would find in the fruitful soil a greater treasure than the one which they had vainly sought for.

And then, lastly, it is no unimportant advantage of this scheme, at a time when financiers are disposed to look with alarm at the annually increasing burden of the Educational grants, that the improvement, of whatever extent, it might be, thus effected in the Educational position of the working classes, would be effected at an insignificant expense to the State. Beyond a slight addition perhaps to the amount of capitation grants, the work would be done at the cost of the people themselves. Having before them an object worth contending for, they would soon find the moans of becoming worthy of the contest. From a hundred various sources, in addition to the elementary school, they would furnish themselves with weapons for the amicable strife; thus giving to their school-derived ability increased and prolonged effect. Whether thus to allure the people upwards to the light—inciting rather than compelling them to ascend—would not be a measure of policy