government inspector of schools, no less than 807,200 children, forming almost one-third of the inhabitants, have received the benefit of instruction either for the whole or part of the year. Of these, 31,240 attended private schools, and 742,433 the common or public schools of the State. We are also informed in the same official document, that the number of public schools is now 11,003. The whole amount of money received by the school trustees during the year for teachers, wages, and district libraries, was 1,191,697 dollars, equal to about 250,000l. This sum has been raised chiefly by rates, and about one-third of it from the revenue of the school fund, which produces a yearly income of 375,387 dollars. The teachers in the common schools, both male and female, are boarded at the public expense, and, in addition to their board, receive the following salaries:-Male teachers, during the winter term, 14 dollars 16 cents; and during the summer term, 15 dollars 77 cents per month, equal to about 50. a year. Female teachers, 7 dollars 37 cents in the winter term, and 6 dollars 2 cents in the summer term. In some counties, however, the average is stated to be as high as 20 or even 26 dollars per month for the male teachers, and from 9 to 11 for the female. There are also district libraries in connexion with most of the schools.

"All these 11,000 schools have been organized on what has been styled in England, even by respectable members in the House of Commons, the infidel or godless plan, which generally means nothing more than that they are not under the management of the clergy.”—I. 245, 246.

Sir Charles visited a school at Boston in which nine-tenths of the pupils were the children of English or Irish emigrants. He found the girls between the ages of 9 and 13 well instructed in arithmetic and algebra, and he satisfactorily tested their intelligence by hearing them read Paley's remarks on Sleep and Gray's Elegy in a Churchyard. We fear in very few of our National schools, and not in all of our British schools, would the result be equally satisfactory.

"They each read a verse distinctly, and many of them most gracefully, and explained correctly the meaning of nearly all the words and allusions on which I questioned them."-I. 190.

The social position of educators in America is far superior to that of the same class of persons in England. In Boston, men of superior scholarship and general knowledge devote themselves entirely to the teaching of young ladies, and are recompensed by handsome incomes and not humble rank in society. In the country towns, schoolmasters associate with the upper classes of society, and are on a level with the clergy and medical men. It would appear from Sir Charles Lyell's remarks (p. 193), that the exhortations of Channing to his countrymen to honour the vocation of the instructor, as more noble even than that of the statesman, have not been fruitless. All agree that the pay and social rank of teachers need to be raised still higher, in order that the State may command the services of able and accomplished men and

women.

We sigh as we read Sir Charles Lyell's glowing descriptions of the free-schools of America, to think how few places of instruction of the same kind and of equal merit the mother country possesses. It is only here and there we can point to schools of great excellence, like that of Cleator, and King's Samborne, and Upper Mosley Street, in Manchester.

"The high schools of Boston, supported by the State, are now so well managed, that some of my friends, who would grudge no expense to engage for their sons the best instructors, send their boys to them as superior to any of

the private establishments supported by the rich at great cost. The idea has been recently agitated of providing similar free-schools and colleges for girls, because they could more easily be induced to stay until the age of sixteen. Young men, it is said, would hate nothing so much as to find themselves inferior in education to the women of their own age and station.

"Of late years the improvement of the schools has been so rapid, that objects which were thought Utopian even when Channing began his career, have been realised, and the more sanguine spirits, among whom Mr. Horace Mann, Secretary of the Public Board of Education, stands pre-eminent, continue to set before the eyes of the public an ideal standard so much more elevated, as to make all that has hitherto been accomplished appear as nothing. The taxes self-imposed by the people for educational purposes are still annually on the increase, and the beneficial effects of the system are very perceptible. In all the large towns Lyceums have been established, where courses of lectures are given every winter, and the qualifications of the teachers who deliver them are much higher than formerly. Both the intellectual and social feelings of every class are cultivated by these evening meetings, and it is acknowledged that with the increased taste for reading, cherished by such instruction, habits of greater temperance and order, and higher ideas of comfort, have steadily kept pace."-I. 195, 196.

Another evidence is given of the value put on education in the States in the considerate kindness with which governesses are treated. Our own country has much to answer for on this point. The cold and haughty reserve with which these accomplished and invaluable women are often treated by the elders of the household and their guests, is disgraceful to our civilization. It is most unwise on the part of parents and others interested in the successful education of young people, to depress the spirits of their teachers. The labour of teaching is most exhausting, especially in the case of governesses, who are on duty from twelve to fourteen hours daily, and who are separated from their own families and friends. Without personal kindness and the relief of pleasant and equal social intercourse, the spirits and energy of very few ladies can escape injurious depression. We are willing to believe that some improvement is going on in this matter, and we gladly record the fact that in many families, especially of well-educated Dissenters, governesses are now welcomed to their rightful rank as members and friends of the family; but we have listened to many experiences of a very different kind. Let the ladies of England ponder on the hint which the following passage may suggest to them of their duty to the instructress of their daughters:

"The treatment in the Southern States of governesses, who usually come from the North, or from England, is very kind and considerate. They are placed on a much greater footing of equality with the family in which they live, than in England. Occasionally we find that the mother of the children has staid at home, in order that the teacher may take her turn, and go out to a party. This system implies a great sacrifice of domestic privacy; but when the monotony of the daily routine of lessons is thus relieved to the instructress, the pupil must also be a gainer. The salaries are from 50 to 100 guineas, which is more than they receive in the Northern States.”—I. 297.

In his 12th Chapter, Sir Charles Lyell gives some interesting particulars respecting Harvard University, which, however, we refrain from quoting, as it is our purpose in a future No. to give a sketch of the history of this important academical institution. Of the other higher academical institutions of America, his accounts are very brief,

but they show that of late great improvements have been made in them. Even the more enthusiastic religious sects, who once gloried in their ignorance and spoke with contempt of human knowledge, have found it necessary to send candidates for their ministry to theological seminaries where they have the opportunity of attending courses of Church History, the Greek, Latin, Hebrew and German languages, the modern writings of German and other Biblical scholars, and every branch of divinity. He mentions with praise a College of Methodists at Middleton, in Connecticut, one of the Baptists at Newton, and that of the Independents at Andover, in Massachusetts. Large theological libraries have been recently collected by the more wealthy clergymen of New England, and by the trustees of its colleges. The recent active exportation of old books of theology and history from England to America threatens to produce a scarcity of these treasures in the parent country.

Before we leave the subject of education we must quote one brief passage on the effects of education on the religious habits of the people:

"The clergy are becoming more and more convinced that, where the education of the million has been carried farthest, the people are most regular in their attendance on public worship, most zealous in the defence of their theological opinions, and most liberal in contributing funds for the support of their pastors and the building of churches."-I. 232.

The religious life of America offers a wide and interesting field of observation to every intelligent visitor. The lover of an exclusive State Church finds in the history of American Churches all his favourite dogmas confuted. Religion is not despised or neglected; the growth of religious error, measured by the number of sects and the amount of fanaticism, is not more rank than is to be seen under the shade of a richly-endowed State Church; sectarianism is stripped of much of its bitterness; religious literature is assiduously cultivated; and in no country in the world are ecclesiastics invested with greater moral and social influence.

No portions of Sir Charles Lyell's interesting volumes are likely to do more good at home than those in which he treats of the religious habits and opinions of New England. In order to make room for as many quotations as possible, we shall be most sparing of our own

comments.

"During my first visit to the New England States, I was greatly at a loss to comprehend by what means so large a population had been brought to unite great earnestness of religious feeling with so much real toleration. In seeking for the cause, we must go farther back than the common schools, or at least the present improved state of popular education; for we are still met with the question-How could such schools be maintained by the State, or by compulsory assessments, on so liberal a footing, in spite of the fanaticism and sectarian prejudices of the vulgar? When we call to mind the religious enthusiasm of the early Puritans, and how at first they merely exchanged a servile obedience to tradition, and the authority of the church, for an equally blind scripturalism, or implicit faith in the letter of every part of the Bible, acting as if they believed that God, by some miraculous process, had dictated all the Hebrew words of the Old, and all the Greek of the New Testament; nay, the illiterate among them cherishing the same superstitious veneration for every syllable of the English translation-how these religionists, who did

not hesitate to condemn several citizens to be publicly whipped for denying that the Jewish code was obligatory on Christians as a rule of life, and who were fully persuaded that they alone were the chosen people of God, should bequeath to their immediate posterity such a philosophical spirit as must precede the organisation by the whole people of a system of secular education acceptable to all, and accompanied by the social and political equality of religious sects such as no other civilised community has yet achieved-this certainly is a problem well worthy of the study of every reflecting mind."— I. 49, 50.

"To account for the toleration prevailing in New England and the States chiefly peopled from thence, we must refer to a combination of many favourable circumstances, some of them of ancient date, and derived from the times of the first Puritan settlers. To these I shall have many opportunities of alluding in the sequel; but I shall mention now a more modern cause, the effect of which was brought vividly before my mind, in conversations with several lawyers of Maine, New Hampshire, and Massachusetts, whom I fell in with on this tour. I mean the reaction against the extreme Calvinism of the church first established in this part of America, a movement which has had a powerful tendency to subdue and mitigate sectarian bitterness. In order to give me some idea of the length to which the old Calvinistic doctrines were instilled into the infant mind, one of my companions presented me with a curious poem, called the Day of Doom,' formerly used as a school book in New England, and which elderly persons known to him had been required, some seventy years ago, to get by rote as children. This task must have occupied no small portion of their time, as this string of doggrel rhymes makes up no less than 224 stanzas of eight lines each. They were written by Michael Wigglesworth, A.M., teacher of the church of Malden, New England, and profess to give a poetical description of the Last Judgment. A great array of Scripture texts, from the Old and New Testament, is cited throughout in the margin as warranty for the orthodoxy of every dogma.

"Were such a composition now submitted to any committee of school managers or teachers in New England, they would not only reject it, but the most orthodox amongst them would shrewdly suspect it to be a 'weak invention of the enemy,' designed to caricature, or give undue prominence to, precisely those tenets of the dominant Calvinism which the moderate party object to, as outraging human reason and as derogatory to the moral attributes of the Supreme Being."-I. 50-52.

Our author gives some extracts from this strange poem. Two short passages-one descriptive of the fires of eternal vengeance, the other of the complacency with which the righteous saved will regard the sufferings of their ungodly relatives-will satisfy our readers' curiosity :

"God's vengeance feeds the flame

With piles of wood and brimstone flood,

That none can quench the same.

The godly wife conceives no grief,

Nor can she shed a tear,

For the sad fate of her dear mate
When she his doom doth hear."

A visit to the Blind Asylum at Boston gave, amongst other instructive lessons, one on the rights of conscience.

"On looking over the annual reports of the trustees, I observed that on Sunday the pupils, about a hundred in number, and belonging to various sects, attend public worship in several different churches, they themselves, or their parents, choosing some particular church. Many of them,' says the report, attend Sabbath schools, and, as care is taken to exclude sectarian

doctrines from the regular course of instruction, the opinions of the pupils respecting doctrinal matters in religion are formed upon the basis prescribed by the parents.'

"The assurance here given to the public is characteristic of a settled purpose, everywhere displayed by the New Englanders, to prevent their charitable bequests, as well as their great educational establishments, from becoming instruments of proselytising, or serving as bribes to tempt parents, pupils, or the poor, to renounce any part of their hereditary creed, for the sake of worldly advantages. Such conduct, implying great delicacy of feeling in matters of conscience, and a profound respect for the sacredness of religious obligations, is worthy of the descendants of men who went into exile, and braved the wilderness and the Indian tomahawk, rather than conform outwardly to creeds and rituals of which they disapproved."-I. 170, 171.

Towards the Unitarians of America Sir Charles Lyell evinces a truly liberal and kind spirit. He appears to have taken some pains to ascertain the state of religious opinion amongst the different sects, and informs us (p. 173) that many who worship in orthodox congregations are heterodox on the doctrine of the Trinity, although they do not separate themselves in worship.

"One of them observed to me that he thought it nearly as presumptuous to acquiesce in the negative as in the affirmative of the propositions laid down on this subject in the Athanasian Creed. 'We are,' he said, 'like children born blind, disputing about colours.”—I. 173.

Here it

Sir Charles Lyell's description of the Unitarians of Boston is creditable to his intelligence, his candour, and his moral courage. It will, we venture to hope, do good on both sides of the Atlantic. may assist in rebuking religious bigotry, and there the example of a man possessing social and scientific rank, himself a member of an orthodox and established church, taking a lively interest in the peculiarities of a small religious sect, like the Unitarians, may embolden American Unitarians, when visiting this country, to seek rather than (as has sometimes been the case) to avoid intercourse with their religious brethren.

"The prominent position occupied by the Unitarians arises, not from their number, nor their wealth, however considerable this may be, but from their talent, earnestness, and knowledge. Many of the leading minds in the Union belong to this sect, and among them, Channing, Sparks, Dewey, and other well-known authors, have been converts from the Congregationalists.

"To have no creed, no standard to rally round, no fixed canons of interpretation of Scripture, is said to be fatal to their progress. Yet one of their body remarked to me that they might be well satisfied that they were gaining ground, when it could be said that in the last thirty years (since 1815) the number of their ministers had increased in a tenfold ratio, or from fifty to five hundred, whereas the population had only doubled in twenty-five years. He also reminded me that their ranks are scarcely ever recruited from foreign emigrants, from whom the Romanists, Presbyterians, Methodists, Baptists, and Episcopalians annually draw large accessions. A more kindly feeling has of late years sprung up between the Unitarians and Congregationalists, because some of the most eminent writers of both sects have joined in defending themselves against a common adversary, namely, those rationalists who go so far as to deny the historical evidence of the miracles related in the New Testament, and who, in some other points, depart more widely from the Unitarian standard, than does the latter from that of Rome itself. Norton, author of The Genuineness of the Gospels,' may be mentioned, as one of the