A considerable opposition is rising against Mr. Forster's Education Bill,
founded,—(1), on the provisions enabling School Boards to permit the teaching of particular religious views in the schools under their control,—an objection we have discussed else- where; (2), on the untrustworthiness of the municipal councils and vestries which are to elect the School Boards ; (3), on the permissive character of the compulsion sanctioned by the Bill. We may add to what we have said on the first head that the able and liberal Head Master of the City of London School, the Rev. Edwin Abbott, has shown clearly in a letter in yesterday's Times that the principle of the Birmingham League, " Unsectariau National Education," is in effect either compulsory secularity, or sectarian teaching out of school hours with the help of the gas and coals provided by the " unsectarian" rate, and not in any sense " unsectariau" religious teaching. Mr. Abbott, himself a member of the League, draws the wise inference that the beat thing its members can do is to help on Mr. Forster's Bill. We are happy to observe that Mr. Abbott also agrees with the view we expressed last week, that some machinery for compulsion should be provided in districts supplied by voluntary exertions where there will be no School Board, The second objection, to the Municipal Councils and vestries as electors of the School Boards, we do not think very important. No better alternatives have been suggested. It is highly important to interest local feeling in these schools, and considering the strict supervision to be exercised by the central authority and its power to supersede inefficient School 'bards, we do not think any scheme so well combining the double purpose of securing an education both popular and efficient will be discovered. As to the permis- sive compulsion, let us make ft absolute by all !seams as soma as we dare,—i.e., as soon as we can without setting rural feeling against education as a sort of doctrinaire tyranny, which would be a monstrous evil. But how can we feel our way to this better than in the manner proposed by the Government ?
