The Marquis of Salisbury made a speech at the National
Society's meeting on Wednesday in favour of the Archbishops' Educational programme, discussed at length in another column. But his speech, though very hearty, was not very sanguine. Lord Salisbury knows how very great a demand the Archbishops' proposal would make on the resources of the Treasury,— not less than two millions sterling of extra contribu- tions, and probably still more, and he knows very well how much difficulty any Chancellor of the Exchequer will make in. acceding to that demand ; therefore, he rather discouraged the notion that it would be at all easy to screw so much out of the State. At the same time he urged all the managers of voluntary schools to make a great effort to add to their annual income, and so render their help almost essential to the State. That, he said, was the first step towards gaining any further concession from the State. And there at least he was certainly on firm ground. To render the voluntary schools more and more indispensable to the Education Department is the only safe policy.
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