Page:The probable course of legislation on popular education, and the position of the church in regard to it.djvu/9

 confusion that had arisen hetween convictions and concessions. Whilst a few Reformers meant more than they ordinarily allowed themselves to utter and maintain, the great number meant really a great deal less. So a bold clear mind could, the opposition standing true to its position, rally, one year, the convictions of these last against their concessions; whilst a yet bolder, making his followers change front, could, the next year, rally their concessions against their convictions. Any question like Education, following close on such an experience, must feel its effects. Many who advocate prompt action in the matter of education, do not of course fully realize what they mean. But herein it will only be unreality, not insincerity; which difference but proportionably weakens the chances of delay, and the power of resistance. We may be sure that all checks, scruples, doubts, difficulties, or vague common-places, will scarcely gain audience against a simple clear expression of want, and a determination to supply it. Our wisdom then would seem to lie in trying to forecast these necessary or likely conditions, since any disasters or disadvantages can but be aggravated by being unforeseen.

Besides the medium through which we have said all facts and probabilities should be viewed, there are certain things we may certainly presume. We may feel quite sure that a good deal which heretofore has been matter of controversy will be taken as matter of fact. The case will be received as proven. The weary fight over facts and figures will be no more heard, or little heeded if heard. Nobody will care whether the 150,000 without education in London, or the 42,000 in Manchester, are strictly accurate statements, whether it is quite true that Prussia has 96 per cent., and England only 46 under Education. These data will be taken as sufficiently proved, under the quickened sense of the necessity. Those rocks and quicksands, too, by driving the vessel on which people often seem to try and escape the duty of pilotage, will be taken as sufficiently marked on the chart of discussion for avoidance. The distinction between instruction and Education will not be allowed to bar even instruction, where there is no pretence of the existence of either. Nor will the law of demand and supply be longer upheld for a case, in which its application can only produce a dead-lock, since supply must, like the water poured down a pump to encourage the up-stream, of necessity precede any demand whatever.

Then what we may call the axioms and postulates of the problem, will also be admitted as such. The value, for instance, of Education to the subjects of it, for their own sakes, and as members of Society and the body politic. Then, this value being admitted, the duty of its being realized somehow or other, will be admitted also. Some controversy may still arise as to where that duty lies, but the controversy will not be allowed to supersede action. Though, perhaps, theory might lay the duty at the door of the parent, the State will feel bound to take it up, rather than let it lie there unfulfilled. Then, further, the State having decided that Education on a more general scale must be, and that, failing the parents or others