166 'THINGS' versus 'WORDS'. their prejudices. I do not expect to find many agreeing with me at present; and I shall be glad if what I have said should lead to discussion and even controversy. Sydney Smith has inveighed against our practice with all his force; two centuries since Bacon protested against the sacrifice of" things" which we were making to the study of "words." It has taken the interval to rouse us. Now Mr. Lowe has stood forward as the champion of these new ideas, although I don't go his lengths; Dr. Lyon Playfair has insisted on the infusion of new principles with regard to instruction in art. Mr. Coleman has, among ourselves, somewhat anticipated me in the observations he lately addressed to the meeting at the Doveton College. This train of thought is not especially applicable to this Institution; here, and indeed in the scheme of our Government education, we have given more room for science and modern literature than obtains at home; because we are not trammelled by any worship of the ancients; but I trust that I may be pardoned for having selected this subject. Every thing that concerns education is my fair game on these occasions: it is difficult to find new matter, after having spoken for fifteen years on education: I thought it would be more agreeable to my audience to break new ground than to travel again over what has been so well beaten; and I feel assured that whatever affects the cause of education at home must have an effect upon education here. Mark me, it is not my object to lower the standard of education. I deny that the application of the principles I ad-. vocate will lower the standard. On the contrary, I maintain that they will raise it; and that education thus purified and improved will produce stronger and better men, politically, intellectually, and socially. And now, Mr. President and Trustees, it remains for me to thank you for the compliment you have paid me in asking me to sit for my picture, and giving it a domicile in this noble Hall; as well as for the handsome terms in which you have been pleased to speak of my poor services in the cause of Native education, and of the Natives in general. You have placed me in a very trying position. I hope I am not a vain man: I am sure that I am not a proud; but you have appealed to my vanity and my pride after a fashion which renders it very difficult not to be overborne by it. The terms you have used are far beyond anything I deserve but this I can say, that if the thing were to do over again, I would do it as I did before, without fear on the one hand, or the hope or desire of reward on the other; for in all that I have done I have been actuated by two motives only, charity and justice; charity, which made me desire that those among whom my lot in life was cast should participate in that education which had bestowed such signal benefits on myself; justice, because I thought that the Natives of this country had a right to social recognition and elevation, and to an increasing participation in the administration of the affairs of India, in proprotion as they proved their fitness for higher and higher positions of responsibility, emolument, and honour. What we have witnessed this day is a practical refutation of those who are pleased to say that the Natives have no feelings of gratitude, and that their vocabulary contains no expression equivalent to our "Thank you." It will always be a satisfaction to me to hope that when we who are assembled here this day shall have passed away from the scene, some scholar of this people who shall then be, in the words of the parchment that lies buried beneath the foundation stone of this Hall," educated, free, civilized, and happy, at peace among themselves, and with all nations," may point to my portrait with the kindly thought in his heart, that this, too, was one of those who, when our forefathers first began to strugggle against the darkness of ignorance and the servility of dependence, stood forward to battle for them and by their side. I cannot pass away from this subject without calling the attention of this assembly to the picture that hangs opposite The cause of native education owes far more to him my own. than to me. It was his prudence, his patience, his wisdom which fought the long hard battle of secular education, and secured its victory. It was he who secured the funds from which this institution sprang; it was he who laid down the fundamental rules to which our school owes much of its prosperity and success. He gathered around him the enlightened Natives of the past generation, men who may well be regarded as the fathers of education, whose portraits are preserved in the same picture; Ragavah Charry, Veeraswamy Iyer, and Seenevassa Pillay, whose portrait also adorns the opposite end of the Hall; a man who was so enlightened as to see that the character of the mother lies at the very root and foundation of the social state, and who therefore devoted a portion of his benevolence to the foundation of Female schools. Let me here invite attention to an admirable series of lectures which Mr. Norton delivered to instruct the Natives in the principles of the English constitution and British Government in India. These lectures were collected and published by him in a volume called "Rudimentals." It has gone out of print, and never has met with that reception which its merits deserve. I think that it ought to be made a school book in every school in India; and indeed that i should form a subject in the examinations in our Universities : for it contains the most untechnical and satisfactory explanation I know, of a subject on which most men are prodigiously ignorant, but which every well educated man certainly ought to know. I recommend to the consideration of the Trustees its introduction as a subject of instruction in this institution. And now I cannot more appropriately conclude, than by pointing to that other picture which at present completes the gallery of our Hall; the portrait of Patcheappah, our founder, from whose benevolence such undreamt of benefits have proceeded; who is depicted with his hand upon the head of a Hindu youth, happily typical, as it appears to me, of the blessing he has conferred, and will continue to confer, upon rising generation after generation of his fellow countrymen. ADDRESS on the Twenty-sixth Anniversary of Patcheappah's Institution in the MY LORD,-It is very gratifying to me, and doubtless to all in this Hall, to find this noble Institution in so sound and satisfactory a condition on this its six and twentieth anniversary. The various Reports which we have heard read, testify to the progress of the pupils, and the efficiency of the teaching; and I beg to tender the best thanks of the trustees to the masters, for their faithful discharge of their onerous and important duties. There are but a few points in the Reports to which I desire to call particular attention. In the first place, it is a most creditable circumstance to this Institution, that it should have attained the third highest place among the Educational Establishments of this Presidency, in respect to the number of candidates who have passed the Matriculation examination at the Madras University. Mr. Lovery reports that out of 28 boys who went up, 18, or 6.4 per cent. passed; 4 being in the 1st class; and one attaining a high place in that class. That boy was placed seventh in the first class: he missed the Governor's scholarship only by six marks, and was unfitted for the other scholarship by his being above the age of nineteen. |