tion which are now but ill calculated to furnish an enlarged and practical system of instruction.

But did this sacrifice made to their opponents mitigate the hostility which had been proclaimed against the Government? By no means: the war was continued, and was waged in a spirit of reckless malignity unexampled in the annals of party conflict, or even in those of ecclesiastical controversy.

Let it be first distinctly stated what the Government plan did not propose to do.

It did not confine its system to mere secular instruction; on the contrary, it bound up, inseparably, religious instruction with the whole course of study. It did not exclude the use of the holy Scriptures; on the contrary, the Bible was required to be read in every school. It did not supersede the existing voluntary societies; on the contrary, it continued them as before, as the agents and ministers for distributing the bounty of Parliament. It did not limit their spheres of usefulness; on the contrary, it made them more efficient, by granting to each a sum of L.5000 towards the foundation of creditable and useful model schools.

It did not deprive the clergy of any denomination of their right and authority of giving spiritual instruction to the younger members of their congregations. On the contrary, it laid the foundation for such special instruction, by communicating scriptural knowledge during the hours appropriated generally to education.

How, then, and why, should this scheme have been opposed? Simply because it was recommended by a Whig Ministry, and because it was convenient for party purposes to raise the crythat not only the Church but the Christian faith was endangered. But this real motive could not be avowed. The flag of the Carlton Club was raised, it is true; but the leaders of the party well knew that a more specious pretence than that of party hostility was necessary to give them a chance of success. Let us examine the arguments urged against Lord John Russell's motion; and, in order to treat the subject with perfect fairness, we shall not advert to any secondary authorities, but we shall refer chiefly to the objections raised by Lord Stanley and the more leading Conservatives in the House of Commons.

These objections may be classed under two heads: (1.) The Constitution of the Committee; and (2.) The functions with which it was intrusted. A few words upon each.

1. Our readers will have seen, that previously to the present year, the distribution of the Parliamentary vote had been intrusted to the Board of Treasury. The Lords of the Treasury include, as is well known, the first Minister, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, and four junior lords, all being political persons, and necessarily partisans; all holding offices during pleasure, and consequently removable with every change of the Government. Since the year 1829, Roman Catholics had been eligible to seats at the Board; as, previously to that time, Protestant Dissenters had also been. During the last four or five years, a Roman Catholic Member of Parliament has been a Lord of the Treasury; and as such has had cognisance of every Minute sanctioning school grants, and directing the appropriation of every shilling voted by Parliament for such purposes. We have already stated that this system was not complained of; on the contrary, it has been one of the many wonders of the late debates, that, now that they have abdicated their functions, though not till then, the Whig Board of Treasury has been lauded to the skies by the Tories, for their impartiality and wisdom. The warmth of this eulogium, as well as the quarter from which it came, must have been alike matter of surprise. This adulation in some degree resembled a laudatory inscription put up to the memory of a deceased parent by a most headstrong and undutiful boy. It might be suggested that this favourable judgment, if seriously pronounced, might in justice and in generosity have been somewhat sooner made known to the world. But it was considered to be ' private and confidential, and therefore could not be divulged in or out of Parliament. Lord Stanley is now pleased to inform us, that the former administration of the Parliamentary vote had the unanimous assent of the House of Commons, ' the almost unanimous assent of the people of this country, and 'the entire approbation of the great body of the community.' Yet this system, so lauded, involved the principle of distributing a vote of public money, under the authority of a political body, selected by the Government, and removable at the pleasure of the Crown. Now, when it is proposed to substitute for the Board of Treasury a Committee of the Privy Council, the change is objected to, because it is said that the Lords of the Council are political are partisans are liable to be removed and are not necessarily members of the Established Church. Every one of these objections applies with equal force to the system which the Tories praise, and to that which they condemn; with the single exception, that whereas in the Committee of Council there might have been found, but there is not, a member who was unconnected with the Church, there was actually in the Board of Treasury an individual Lord, whose activity and intelligence were not more notorious than his zeal as a sincere member of the Church of Rome. Notwithstanding this, the Treasury are declared worthy of all confidence; whilst Lord Ashley terms the Privy Council 'a hydra, a monstrous ano' maly, and a hideous chimera.' How Lords Lansdowne, Duncannon, or John Russell, are to appropriate these classical epithets among themselves we know not; but, in the absence of better materials, we recommend the subject to the pencil of that admirable and good-natured artist H.B., who might invent an excellent design, of which the subject should be the Hercules Ashley subduing the Whig monsters-whether hydras or ' chimeras 'dire' who have intruded into the Council Chamber.

But it seems the great objection to these Privy Councillors is, that they were not responsible. Not responsible! Why, in what school have these Tory statesmen completed their political education? We almost suspect that they must have studied at the central school of the National Society. What public officer is responsible, if a Minister and a Privy Councillor is not? Have these declaimers never heard of an impeachment ? Have they never read of a motion made to strike a statesman's name from the roll of Privy Councillors? Did not the Tories, by the very terms of Lord Stanley's motion, give a practical proof that responsibility existed, and that too at the very time when responsibility was denied? But here again, we ask, in what degree was the Treasury responsible, in which the Privy Council is not equally so? On this second, as well as on the first point, the disingenuousness and bad faith of the Tory party is made equally manifest.

It will be replied, that the two cases are entirely different ;that there was no undefined discretion vested in the Treasury, whilst there is a dangerous latitude of power conferred upon the Privy Council: the first was a constitutional authority acting within limits; the other is a despotism which produces that misera servitus ubi jus vagum atque incognitum. Now, this is a distinction quite as false as those to which we have already adverted. The Treasury Minute regulating the conditions under which these grants were to be made, was passed on the 30th August 1833, not only subsequent to the vote of money, but after the prorogation of Parliament. All that had been previously stated or arranged was, that the two societies were to be made instrumental in the appropriation of the grant. It was open to the Board of Treasury to have stipulated for a right of inspection to have insisted on the qualification of teachers-to have varied the proportions in which public aid was to be granted. Not only was it open to the Treasury to do so; but they have done so from time to time; and that without being taxed with bad faith, or without seeking or requiring any new Parliamentary sanction. But that which they have not done, is to make a special case of exemption from the general rule at the request of a political friend: this was done for a Liverpool school patronised by Lord Sandon: this was done by the Treasury Board in Spring 1835; and yet it is Lord Melbourne's government, and not that of Sir Robert Peel, which is taxed with a decree to distribute their vote for schools to 'further their own 'political objects, and for the support of their own political 'friends! We do not ask whether this accusation evinces much generosity or even justice. We do ask whether it shows common honesty; and whether, under the circumstances, it shows a very sound discretion?

But further, it should be recollected, that, even if it could be argued that the vote for English Education was restrained or confined by the declaration of Lord Spenser in 1833, or the intervention of the two societies; the vote for model schools, and for Scotch education, were entirely unfettered. In our northern part of the empire the two societies exercise no control, and the Treasury pursued a more absolute discretion than what is now granted to the Privy Council; yet no member of Parliament objected to those votes when made; and no member of the community, however opposed to the Government, has impugned the manner in which these moneys have been distributed. From Dr Chalmers to Mr Gillon, from Mr Wallace to Mr Colquhoun, full justice has been done to the mode in which the functions of the Treasury have been administered. We advert to this fact with equal pleasure and national pride; because we cannot help thinking that the calm good sense displayed by Scotland, contrasts most favourably with the gullibility of our southern neighbours, who have endeavoured to make the sacred cause of the education of the people the selfish cry of a disappointed party, who would recover their ascendency by any means, or by any sacri

fice.

Danger was, it seems, apprehended from future variation, by the Council, of its own regulations. Were the Minutes of the Treasury, then, like the decrees of the Medes and Persians, which could not be reversed? On the contrary, is it not notorious, that these proceedings may be rescinded or varied with a facility and a dispatch which is well suited to their title and designation. At the Treasury, in as short a time as the necessary words can be spoken and recorded, an official act is perfected; whereas the rescinding or the passing of an order in council is a more serious and technical proceeding; and one which necessarily receives much more of consideration, and obtains more of publicity.

It is further objected, that no one ecclesiastical authority is named on the Committee of Council. True; but not only was there no such person named under the former system, but it was impossible that there should; unless some divine of the new school consider it expedient that a Bishop should be included in the next Treasury patent, in order that he may instruct the financial conscience how to prepare warrants after the most orthodox fashion, and suggest under what decrees of councils the issue of exchequer bills should take place: the true faith might then come in aid of public credit, and the doctrine of justification might be applied in the redemption of deficiency bills.

We hope that we have conclusively disposed of this part of the subject; and that we have proved, not only that the arguments which have been urged in Parliament are inconclusive, but that they have been advanced in a spirit of insincerity, and with a total disregard of all consistency and candour.

This, however, is not all. Another and a most precious argument has been relied on. We are told that, even if the plan of the Government were in its essentials unobjectionable, the mode in which it has been carried has superseded the privileges of the House of Lords; - is an usurpation of authority on the part of the Commons; is therefore without precedent, and therefore without justification. This is designated to be an unconstitutional mode of giving to resolutions of the House of Commons the authority of law: it has been compared with the evil practice of tacking irrelevant matter to bills of supply. This supposed usurpation of power, this tyranny imputed to the House of Commons, may not have frightened the isle from its propriety,' but it has nearly frightened some weak and credulous persons out of their wits. The accusation is in itself absurd; but, coming from the quarter it has done, it affords an additional proof of the animus which has influenced these proceedings. We shall not trouble our readers with the innumerable cases to which we might refer, if it were necessary. We shall confine ourselves to those only which are immediately in point. Sir Robert Peel and the present Lord Fitzgerald, justly considering that the old establishment of education in Ireland was unsuited to modern times, proposed, very much to their credit, a new and a more liberal system. How did they effect their object? Did they bring in a bill-did they feel it necessary to take the House of Lords into their counsels? No such thing. They naturally and properly proposed a vote in supply, and the proposition came before the House of Peers in the Appropriation Act only. At a later period, Lord Glenelg, as Irish secretary, but acting under the orthodox Lord Sidmouth, and the constitutional Lord Liverpool, ventured a step further. He recommended to Parliament, that a certain sum for education should be placed at the absolute and uncon