THE EDUCATION QUESTION.
[TO THE EDITOR OF THE "SPECTATOR.")
Sin,—The formation of School Boards in country districts, in' order to bring men of all creeds and classes to discuss and settle the best way of making the existing schools efficient and suitable,. is one thing ; it is quite another, to appoint them for the purpose- of establishing Board schools which shall systematically supersede- the existing schools. The former course is what you advocated in the Spectator of September 13, and which I ventured to support, in a somewhat different shape, in my letter last week. The latter- course is what your correspondent " A Country Squire " seems to dread and deprecate, or at least is that to which his facts and arguments are properly applicable. But the one is not really involved in the other, and it is of tne utmost importance at this moment that each should be discussed on its own merits. Though I cannot admit that farmers generally deserve such hard names as your correspondent gives them, I do not think they are the men best qualified to organise the education of their parishes, or that they would do it at all well. But I do think they would be found both quite competent, and what is more, quite willing, to discuss with the squire, the parson, the Dissenting minister, and the other professional people of the parish, the best way of making the existing schools efficient and suitable, and among other means for this purpose, to join in any voluntary rate that might be required. Let me ask any- one who has read Mr. Morley's articles in the Fortnightly, and, Mr. Dickinson's account in the Guardian of September 17, of the- resolutions and intentions of the Bath and Wells Diocesan Con- ference, whether the time is not come when something must be- done to reconcile parties which are becoming more and more- exasperated. And if this is not to be done by bringing the practi- cal men on all sides to act together in School Boards, bow is it to,
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