2. Educational Resources of Roman Catholics.-In reviewing the existing means and arrangements for extending the blessings of sound elementary education amongst the Roman Catholics of this country, there is one circumstance which, as it appears to be in some degree peculiar to that body, deserves especial notice. Of all the classes and communities into which our society is divided, there is none so burdened by almost hopeless poverty, or so embarrassed by the disproportion between its necessities and its resources as the body in question. Not only do the immense majority of its members in this country belong to the ranks of the poor, but even in those ranks they usually occupy the very lowest place. If amidst the most obscure and crowded haunts of our populous and manufacturing towns there be one spot which penury seems to have marked in a special manner for its own, that spot will commonly be found to be tenanted by English or Irish Catholics. Within a circle of 12 miles round Manchester, to take but a single example, it is computed that more than 100,000, almost all of whom are more or less familiar with suffering and want, are to be found at this day; while so small is the number of their own community in the district referred to who possess the comforts or luxuries of life, that the devotion of the whole possessions of the few would not suffice to make even an approximately adequate provision for the spiritual and temporal needs of the many. In London, from the same cause-if indeed this can be admitted as a sufficient explanation of so melancholy a fact,there can hardly be less than 30,000 Roman Catholic children, of whose daily life, or means of acquiring useful knowledge, their nominal pastors and guides would find it difficult to give any accurate account. The net which should have enclosed so great a multitude has broken, and there are not sufficient labourers at hand to gather in its scattered fragments.

But if the social position and the temporal resources of the Roman Catholics of this country be, in the main, and with only partial exceptions, such as has been described, the nature of the work which Divine Providence appears to have committed to the more wealthy and influential amongst them, and which the civil power now invites and encourages them to undertake, should rather excite them to efforts commensurate with its magnitude and urgency than be suffered to induce despondency or alarm. For though it be true that the work admits of no delay, and that every successive year of apathy and neglect, or even of languid and illdirected effort, will but augment its difficulty, yet there are many reasons for the confident expectation that it both can and will be accomplished, and that at no distant period the advantages of a solid religious and secular education will be placed within the reach of every poor Catholic in Great

Britain. It may be well, therefore, to say a few words upon the agencies already in operation to secure this end, and the additional means still required for its complete eventual attainment.

3. The Catholic Poor School Committee.---Of all the grounds upon which cheerful anticipations in this respect may be most confidently reposed, the growing influence, activity, and usefulness of the Catholic Poor School Committee" assuredly deserves to be regarded as the most encouraging. Composed of many of the most intelligent and influential members of the Catholic body, and enjoying a twofold advantage in the unlimited confidence of the ecclesiastical authorities, and in being the recognised organ of communication for educational purposes with the Committee of Council, it has not only employed all due means to promote and recommend the Goverment measures for the benefit of elementary schools, but has in a great measure created or perfected the machinery for developing the efficiency of existing schools, and taken the initiative in preparing or suggesting the gradual introduction of all those new institutions of which it has been the first to discover and point out the imperative necessity. Very few are the localities which I have visited where I have not detected the signs of its powerful and beneficial action; and it is impossible for me to express adequately the sense of my own obligations for the facilities which its judicious intervention has afforded me in the discharge of my official duties, and the valuable assistance which it has constantly extended to me, as an agent of the Committee of Council, in removing difficulties which might otherwise have impeded the course of my labours. pecuniary aid which it affords to schools struggling with difficulties, the encouragements which it proposes to deserving teachers, the establishment of "exhibitions" to be filled up, from time to time at my recommendation, the employment of an "organizing mistress" to visit female schools where her services may be desired, the assistance and counsel afforded to local managers, particularly in facilitating their communications with the Committee of Council; these are some of the most important benefits which Roman Catholic poor schools are already deriving from its administration.

The

I conceive, therefore, that all who possess the means of promoting the welfare and the extension of this class of schools will do well not only to consider, without delay, how they can best acquit themselves of this sacred and pressing obligation, but to accept the organization which the Poor School Committee supplies for carrying their benevolent purposes into effect. It is not, let them be assured, by individual or desultory efforts that so large and difficult a work can be effectually completed; nor will the best intentions, nor even the most lavish

sacrifices, constitute a sufficient instrumentality for accomplishing it, unless directed by practical knowledge and experience, and aided by the technical appliances and regulated machinery which the Poor School Committee, acting in conjunction with the Committee of Council, is prepared to recommend, and within the limit of its resources to supply. The almost enthusiastic zeal which, as I am bound to testify, has been manifested, with barely two or three exceptions, by all the managers of Roman Catholic schools with whom I have come in contact, and their evident desire to respond to the appeal which is now made to them, in common with others, leaves no room for doubt that they will, as I have ventured to recommend, cheerfully co-operate with the Poor School Committec in calling into existence those educational institutions which are necessary for the remedy of present defects and short-comings. It only remains, therefore, to point out some of the most important and essential of those which are still wanting, and without which no really satisfactory or enduring results can be obtained.

4. Normal Schools. It was an observation of the venerable Overberg, Manuel de Pédagogie, § 34,-the most experienced and successful pedagogue of his day, that the qualifications which the continual improvement of modern_educational systems and methods requires in elementary teachers can only be obtained "by the frequentation of normal schools." I am unwilling to enumerate the qualities and attainments which this writer demands in all primary instructors, lest I should seem to pronounce a satire upon some of their number. But I . would ask the promoters of education in Roman Catholic schools to what class of teachers they propose to intrust them, seeing that not a single normal school has hitherto been pro vided for their training in England or Wales? It is true that the admirable training institutions which abound in Ireland have hitherto afforded such a supply of qualified schoolmasters and mistresses as, in some measure, to remedy the defect; and that a certain number of young men are now pursuing a systematic course of study, under the auspices of the Poor School Committee, at the Institution at Ploermel, in Brittany; while a few normal pupils, designed to have the charge of female schools, are under instruction in the new and promising establishments at Birmingham and Northampton. Ratcliffe College has also furnished a very small number of trained teachers, whose admirable schools, as at Newport and Hull, attest the value of the institution in which they studied their profession. But it cannot be said that, up to the present moment, the Roman Catholics of England possess, or have even made any attempt to establish, such normal and training schools as can alone furnish an adequate supply of that class

of teachers to whom the work of education can be safely en trusted. Yet it is certain, and all experience confirms the opinion, that schools conducted by untrained teachers are, with rare exceptions, of an inferior kind, and often a mere delusion. How, indeed, is it possible that the delicate and arduous functions, for the efficient discharge of which a long course of careful study and of systematic preparation is absolutely indispensable, can be successfully performed by persons whose only qualification for the business of an elementary teacher sometimes consists in the fact, that they have detected their own incompetency for every other? as if the discipline and instruction of that class upon whose future habits and dispositions the welfare of the State will mainly depend were a kind of hors d'œuvre, a "facilis labor," which might be suitably com-mitted to persons who had already been surpassed by their competitors in all the other occupations of life!

It cannot, then, be too earnestly impressed upon all who desire that the education of the Roman Catholic poor of this country should be a reality, that the very first step towards the attainment of that result is, the creation of normal schools. It would, no doubt, be unjust and unreasonable that the nonexistence of these important and necessary institutions should be made a ground of reproach to those who, in this country, and up to a recent period, have been in no condition to undertake such works. But the peculiar difficulties and impediments of a by-gone epoch have passed away, and the laws which once forbade one class of British subjects to educate even their own children have been superseded by a milder and more rational code; while proposals of assistance and encouragement have succeeeded to penal and repressive interdicts. The defect of energy and zeal at the present moment cannot, therefore, be excused by pleading the embarrassments of a past age; and all who, being invited by competent authority to perform their share in the work of national education, fail to respond to the invitation, must henceforth bear the reproach due to their apathy.

Of the particular form and constitution which should be given to the proposed normal and training schools, it would perhaps be premature to speak on the present occasion. Great facilities and advantages, however, are possessed by those upon whom their organization will devolve. They will find the most complete models in the analogous institutions, framed and conducted with consummate skill and attended with the most brilliant results, which have long been in operation in neighbouring countries. Let the promoters of elementary Roman Catholic schools only resolve that these indispensable establishments shall be called into immediate existence, and that the means shall be supplied by those who possess them, the rest will be merely a question of time.

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5. Infant Schools.-Next in importance to the subject just noticed is that to which I am about to refer. In the course of my visits I have observed with regret not only the paucity of infant schools actually existing, but an apparent unconsciousness, in some cases, of their immense value and importance. It is true that many energetic and intelligent school-managers have been restrained from the attempt to found them, simply by the impossibility of commanding the necessary funds. But the manner in which my suggestions on this point have sometimes been received, has convinced me, that the peculiar value of infant schools has not been universally appreciated as it deserves.

To insist upon the absolute necessity of commencing the work of education from the tenderest age would be, in our day, a mere superfluity. It is admitted on all hands. The consequences of delay in this matter are well known to those teachers who are accustomed to receive poor children into their schools at seven or eight years of age, who had been abandoned up to that period to the precarious influences of domestic teaching and discipline. Not only are such pupils an occasion of distractions and embarrassment to the teacher, who is compelled to submit them to the organization already established, but utterly unsuitable to their condition, and to minister to them instruction by methods which must in their case be nearly inoperative, but they are found to introduce an element of disorder and confusion, often seriously deteriorating the general character of the school, and tending to corrupt its best customs and traditions. invariable are the signs which indicate the presence of these disturbers, that a glance is often sufficient to detect them; and when they enter in large numbers into the composition of a school, no really satisfactory results need be looked for.

The presence of "infants," i. e. of children under six or seven years of age, in a school attended by those of more advanced age, is equally injurious to its efficiency. Experience has suggested the organization proper to children of this class, for whose training and instruction special and peculiar methods are quite indispensable, and wherever any other system, less effective and appropriate, is employed, the result will be comparative failure.

But there is another consideration connected with the establishment of infant schools which is of too much practical importance to be omitted.

Every one knows how unwilling the poverty-stricken parents, doomed by inflexible necessity pauperiem et duros ferre labores, are to lose the fugitive services of their children, or to forfeit the scanty wages which they are sometimes able to earn, especially in the manufacturing districts, even at a very early age. As far as my own experience goes, it is very rare in