I do not assert that the certificate even is an infallible test. Some certificated teachers are mere grinders. Some teachers who have no certificate are of the highest order of merit. About this a good deal has been written on false assumptions. For instance, it is argued that, as a medical man is not allowed to practise without learning his profession, so a schoolmaster ought not to be allowed to teach without previous training. But the cases are not analogous, for this reason, that there is no such thing as an innate knowledge of medicine qualifying a man to practise, whereas, of the teacher of the first order it may be said, "Nascitur, non fit." There is no gift more special bestowed on mankind than this. No training can come up to it. The best that training can do is to make a good approximation to it out of ordinary material. And let it be remembered that the elementary teacher, unlike the medical man, requires no special knowledge beyond what everybody ought to know. He may therefore, if he has the natural gift, be qualified without any training except practice. It is scarcely necessary to say that this natural qualification, in any high degree, is rare; but in a lower degree it is not uncommonly met with. It is often brought out by circumstances in the case of persons who have not before turned their minds to the subject, and have been occupied in other professions. Some of the best teachers I have known have begun in this way. One schoolmaster, of the first order, had been a journeyman carver and gilder, and had begun by teaching in a Sunday-school. Another had been the skipper of a collier. One of the best female teachers I ever knew had been led to adopt the profession by being left a widow, without means of support. Those who thus take to teaching late in life are often very ill-fitted to pass examinations, and can seldom do themselves justice. Thus, some of the best teachers have either failed to get certificates, or have only got them after repeated trials. And let it be remembered that the certificate does not necessarily imply training, though people often argue as if it did. It can be obtained by any teacher in charge of a school who can pass a given examination, his school being at the same time approved by the Inspector. Such a teacher is often very little, if at all, better than his uncertificated brother, who cannot get over a nervous dread of examinations, and is by that prevented from doing him

self justice, or perhaps even from presenting himself at all. Still the certificate is far the best testimonial, and often the only one which can be relied on at all. The exceptionally good teachers who are without it are few and far between.

But, acknowledging all the advantages of employing a certificated teacher, may it not be better to recognise the results produced without that condition, than to have no school at all? I can conceive only one answer to this question. Take the extreme case of a teacher only able to produce the dry results. There is no doubt these are better than nothing; nay, that they have their value, though not constituting education in themselves. They are instruments, which are capable of being turned to good account. And it is by no means certain that the humble teachers of small schools will be found devoid of the higher qualifications above spoken of. The money paid for the results of examination, therefore, would bring at least its due return. And I think that much would be done to improve the school, by giving the teacher a definite aim, encouraging him by increased salary, according to his success, and also by the annual visit of the Inspector, from whose examination and advice he would be enabled to learn a great deal of what a school ought to be. The managers also would, I believe, be led to increased interest and exertion.

So far it seems to me that the relaxation of the existing conditions would do unmixed good. I should not, however, advocate the entire abolition of the requirement that the teacher should hold a certificate. I would still make this necessary for the reception of the part of the grant paid upon average attendance. This would remove the temptation to save money by employing uncertificated teachers, except in schools so small that this addition to the grant would not cover the increase of salary necessary to secure a certificated teacher. I would also require a certificate as a condition of being allowed to have pupil teachers. With these reservations, I do not see why the paying for results should tend to throw certificated teachers out of employment. It argues very small confidence in their superior merits to suppose that managers of schools will not employ them where they have the means; but even if it be supposed that managers are so ignorant or indifferent as to be only bent on cheapness, the proposed plan will not tempt them to employ

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uncertificated teachers except in those small schools which can get no help at all under the existing conditions, but which the amount of help proposed would very much tend to improve.

We have hitherto spoken of maintenance only. If, however, it is an object to set up a school in every parish, there must be some means of facilitating the erection of suitable buildings. The difficulty is now sufficient to deter all who are not zealous enough to undertake a thankless and expensive duty. Here I do not think the conditions should be relaxed. I have known deplorable evils result from improper school buildings, contracted space, bad ventilation, and brick or stone floors. The only alternative is to increase the grants. But, in addition to this, it would be a great boon, if legal means were afforded of spreading the payment of the cost of building over a term of years, as is the case when money has been borrowed on the security of Church-rates. A voluntary rate, if it could be so confirmed by law as to be a security for borrowing money, would in all probability be agreed to in many places where it is impossible to get the amount all at once.

By these, or similar means, I think a great extension of our present system might be made, sufficient to meet the demand for the supply of which education by rates is now called for. If this cannot be accomplished, that demand can no longer be resisted. The occasion needs all our exertions. If the withdrawn Government Bill be again brought forward, I hope the clergy will use their influence to secure its passing. It met the difficulty of the "Conscience Clause" with a proposition which, it seems to me, the Church might accept without any compromise of her just claims. To exempt Nonconformists, on the one hand, from teaching, which they conscientiously object to, and to secure to the Church, on the other hand, full liberty of teaching, were surely conditions perfectly fair to both parties. By accepting these terms, the Church will be doing more to maintain her character as the Church of the nation and not a sect, than by taking up an exclusive position. She may be glad to get the children of separatists under the indirect influence of her teaching, though in lessons merely secular, and though she would scorn to evade her obligations by introducing even a word with proselytising intention.

I trust the importance of the crisis will be realised, for that,

in this matter, we are now on our trial, I am very strongly convinced. If, from apathy or disunion, or any other cause, we fail, we must look to be thrust out of our place as educators of the people, and to have to feed the lambs of our flock under the double disadvantage of want of the means and appliances of instruction, and of an antagonistic system pre-occupying the minds of the whole rising generation with opinions destructive of the foundation of our teaching, and neutralising the efficacy of our exhortations and warnings by intellectual pride and unbelief.

ALEXANDER R. GRANT.