his example on society, are in the present instance carried to their climax by the very circumstance that the "perjured violators of their trust" had clothed themselves with the character of religious teachers; and in virtue of that character alone were enabled to manifest to the world a detestable proof of how diametrically opposite might be the practice and the precept of a priesthood. It is not that one man forswears himself in a smock frock, another in a cassock and lawn sleeves,-it is not that an illiterate layman commits in ignorance a single act, and a graduated churchman perpetrates half a lifetime of perjury, with full consciousness of the transgression and its atrocity, it is not that the former gains a dinner and contempt, by cheating government of a few pounds, the latter wealth and consideration by violating his public trust, and defrauding the church, the professions, the country, of their education, it is not that the one offender may grace the pillory, the other the pulpit and the House of Peers;-these are not surely circumstances that can reverse the real magnitude of the two crimes, either in the estimation of God, or in the eyes of reasonable men. Why, then, repress the moral indignation that such delinquency arouses? Why stifle the expression in which that indignation clothes itself? But though there be no call for such restraint, we have imposed it. We have spoken plainly, as in duty bound, but without exaggeration as without reserve. "Dicenda pictis res phaleris sine, Et absque palpo. Discite strenuum Fabula non peragetur ulla. "Non est meun descendere ad oscula Aut nimias acuisse laudeis." Nor do we hazard our imputations, if unfounded, with impunity. We do not venture an attack, either agreeable in itself, or where defeat would be only fatal to the defender. We deeply feel, that the accusation of a betrayal of trust, self-seeking and perjury, to whomsoever applied, is of the most odious complexion; and that the accuser, if he fail in establishing his proof, receives, and ought to receive, from public indignation, an almost equal measure of disgrace with that reserved for the accused, if unable to repel the charge. But when this charge is preferred against a body of men, the presumption of whose integrity is founded on their sacred character as clergymen, on their hallowed obligations as the guides, patterns, instructors of youth, and on their elevated station as administrators of the once most venerable school of religion, literature and science in the world; what must be our conviction of its importance, of its truth and evidence, when we have not been deterred from the painful duty of such an accusation, by the dread of so tremendous a recoil! And in reference to the actual Heads, it is now nearly four years since we first exposed the fact and the illegality of the present suspension of the University, with the treason and perjury through which that suspension was effected, and is maintained. In our exposition we were, however, anxious to spare, as far as possible, the living guardians of the University and its laws, and to attribute rather to an extreme, an incredible, ignorance of their duty, what would otherwise resolve into a conscious outrage of the most sacred obligations. But since that period the benefit of this excuse has been withdrawn. The Heads cannot invalidate the truth of our statements or the necessity of our inferences; they have, therefore, in continuing knowingly, and without necessity, to hold on their former lawless course, overtly renounced the plea of ignorance and bona fides, and thus authorised every executioner of public justice to stamp the mark, wherewith the laws, by which they are constituted and under which they act, decree them as a body-as a body, to be branded.* * [On the false swearing practised and imposed in Oxford and Cambridge, I may refer, (besides Dr Peacock's Observations, ch. ii.,) to Mr F. W. Newman's edifying Note 99, appended to the translation (from another hand) of "The English Universities," by Professor Huber of Marburg, published in the year 1843. The annotation here, as in many other places, justly bristles against the text. Indeed, with reference to the original, I may remark, that the work was hardly worthy of a version, replete as it is with erroneous statements, in consequence, principally, of the author's want, not only of personal experience, but of the most indispensable sources of special information, besides his deficient acquaintance with academical history in general. He was confessedly without the great work on the subject, Wood's 66 'History and Antiquities of the University of Oxford," &c., possessing only that author's mutilated "Historia et Antiquitates," &c. ; nor does he seem even to have had access to the "Corpus Statutorum Universitatis Oxoniensis." Dipping merely into the work, among other mistakes :- in Oxford, Huber confounds Schools and Halls, and knows nothing of "The Street," which, however, was even more celebrated in that University than in Paris and Louvain (§ 227); he puzzles himself about the difference of Congregation and Convocation, or the Great Congregation, (§ 230, note 56); he wholly mistakes the office and constitution of the Black Congregation, (§ 257, notes 72, 80); he misrepresents the age of ad mission into the University, and the statutory commencement of attendance on the statutory public courses ($299, 301, note 74); &c. &c. Since the above was written, I have seen the "Oxford University Statutes, translated by G. R. M. Ward, Esq. M.A., Late Fellow of Trinity College, and Deputy High Steward of the University of Oxford;" 1845. I am happy to find, that all the most important of my statements in regard to the University of Oxford are confirmed by the high official authority of Mr Ward; and not one of them gainsaid. See his able and candid Preface, throughout. (1853.) The same confirmation is afforded by the late Report of the Oxford Commissioners. I see also, by that Report, that the Oath to observe the Statutes of the University was, in 1838, rescinded by Convocation. (P. 147 et alibi.) I make no remarks.] VIII-COUSIN ON GERMAN SCHOOLS.* (JULY 1833.) 1. Rapport sur l'état de l'Instruction Publique dans quelques pays de l'Allemagne, et particulièrement en Prusse. Par M. VICTOR COUSIN, Conseiller d'Etat, Professeur de Philosophie, Membre de l'Institut et du Conseil Royal de l'Instruction Publique. 8vo. Nouvelle edition. Paris: 1833. 2. Exposé des Motifs et Projet de Loi sur l'Instruction primaire, présentés à la Chambre des Députes, par M. le Ministre Secretaire d'Etat de l'Instruction Publique. Séance du 2 Janvier, 1833. THE perusal of these documents has afforded us the highest gratification. We regard them as marking an epoch in the progress of national education, and directly conducive to results important not to France only, but to Europe. The institutions of Germany for public instruction we have long known and admired. We saw these institutions accomplishing their end to an extent and in a degree elsewhere unexampled; and were convinced that if other nations attempted an improvement of their educational policy, this could only be accomplished rapidly, surely, and effectually, by adopting, as far as circumstances would permit, a system thus approved by an extensive experi [This article was, I believe, the first publication in this country, which called attention to what was doing in France, and had long been done in Germany, for the education of the people. We are indebted to Mrs Austin (among her other admirable translations) for versions of this and subsequent Reports by her celebrated friend M. Cousin, on national education.] ence, and the most memorable success. Our hopes, however, that the example of Germany could be turned to the advantage of England, are but recent. What could be expected from a Parliament, which, as it did not represent the general interests, was naturally hostile to the general intelligence, of the people? What could be expected from a Church which dreaded, in the diffusion of knowledge, a reform of its own profitable abuses? But, though unaided by Church or State, the progress of popular intelligence, if slow and partial, was unremitted. The nation became at length conscious of its rights: the reign of partial interests was at an end. A measure of political power was bestowed upon the people, which demanded a still larger measure of knowledge; and the public welfare is henceforward directly interested in the moral and intellectual improvement of the great body of the nation. The education of the people, as an affair of public concernment, is thus, we think, determined. As the State can now only be administered for the benefit of all, Education, as the essential condition of the social and individual well-being of the people, cannot fail of commanding the immediate attention of the Legislature. Otherwise, indeed, the recent boon to the lower orders of political power, would be a worthless, perhaps a dangerous gift. Intelligence is the condition of freedom; and unless an Education Bill extend to the enfranchised million an ability to exercise with judgment the rights the Reform Bill has conceded, the people must still, we fear, remain as they have been, the instruments, the dupes, the victims of presumptuous or unprincipled ambition. “A man," (says Dr Adam Smith, who in this only echoes other political philosophers,)—“ a man, without the proper use of the intellectual faculties of a man, is, if possible, more contemptible than even a coward, and seems to be mutilated and deformed in a still more essential part of the character of human nature. Though the State was to derive no advantage from the instruction of the inferior ranks of the people, it would still deserve its attention, that they should not be altogether uninstructed. The State, however, derives no inconsiderable advantage from their instruction. The more they are instructed, the less liable they are to the delusions of enthusiasm and superstition, which, among ignorant nations, frequently occasion the most dreadful disorders. An instructed and intelligent people, besides, are always more decent and orderly than an ignorant and stupid one.* They feel *The following paragraph we translate from an Austrian newspaper, (Observer,) |