pose ought to be made without reluctance. The scenes of depravity disclosed in that Report, reflect disgrace on the license system, on the whole police of London, and excite wonder and astonishment that such deeds could be acted night after night, without colour or concealment, in any country where criminal law exists and civil order is established. If the multiplication and management of public houses really augment misery and guilt to that degree which has been here supposed, the good they do to agriculture and the revenue by the sale of spirits; is but a slender compensation for the evil they occasion. To connive at dissolute or desperate habits, because they may help to replenish an exhausted treasury, will be thought but a miserable shift for any minister, as long as any sense of right and wrong is left among us. It has not even the merit of a sound state expedient; for private vices, when traced through all their consequences, will never prove in the end to be public benefits; and no prodigal heir ever disposed of his expectations so improvidently, as a finance minister, who, for the supply of the immediate wants of the state, practically assigns over the expectant virtue of his country."

I am very much inclined to ascribe the great prevalence of insanity of late years to the effect of ardent spirits in producing constitutional derangement in the offspring of those who have been much addicted to the practice.

If a temporary derangement of intellect be the constant result of an occasional excess in the use of stimulating liquors, a permanent derangement of intellect, will as surely be the result of an habitual excess. That which we call habit, arises from the repetion of single acts. It is a law of pathology, that frequent repetition of functional derangement, at length produces organic derangement; and that is propagated. In this way, where absolute insanity is not propagated, a deterioration of intellectual power, proportionate to the cause, surely is. This is a subject which if more frequently thought on by parents, might tend to check the abuse in question.*

Perhaps until we see our way more clearly, the present system of poor laws being repealed in toto, we might grant

*In Great Britain the return of registered lunatics from 1815 to 1824 is 7904 persons: of whom the females are as four to three, In Scotland it is about half as many,

compulsory relief of the frugalist description to every poos person unable to work, from actual sickness, lameness, blindness, old age, or who is an orphan child; and no other: encouraging as much as possible the system of Savings-Banks. Five years notice of the proposed repeal, would be reasonable.

CHAPTER 26.

OF POLICE LAWS RELATING TO INSTRUCTION AND EDUCATION.

It is in vain to talk of equal rights and equal laws-of the obligation of constitutions-the dependency of legislatures-or the responsibility of public officers, to members of a community who can neither read or write.

The first duty of a republic, is to provide for the instruc tion of its citizens: the next, to exact the evidences of it. The most useful, the most charitable of all contributions, is the contribution of knowledge.

One of the contrivances of an antient tyrant, was to engrave his laws in characters so small, and to hang up the tablets so high that the people who were required to obey them could not read them The British parliament have acted much in the same way: their criminal code, does not consist merely of the common law with the innumerable distinctions and decisions belonging to the penal portion of it, but of seven hundred and fifty verbose, close printed and in many cases incongruous statutes; the inventions for the most part of aristocratical pride, of fiscal necessity, and manufacturing cupidity. Surely for a code of such voluminous fecundity pressing upon the people, the necessity of a national education, is most glaring: yet the benefit of clergy is still a part of the law by which males who can read are exempted from the punishment of crime to which the ignorant poor, and offenders of the female sex are yet subjected. Let it be so there: it ought not to be so here; more especially as we adopt the British maxim, Ignorantia legis, excusat neminem.

There is no remedy against mistake or imposition of any kind, political, clerical, medical, or legal, but knowledge. There is no method of attaching the mass of the people to republican institutions, or of inducing them to prefer common sense to

mystery, but by giving them information, and enabling them to think and reflect. Ignorance is necessary to the continuance of slavery, whether the object be to keep the mind or the body, or both in chains. Hence throughout Europe, the dread of discussion; the tyrannical extent of the doctrine of libel; the morbid aversion of legitimacy to all mental improvement beyond mere scientific fact. Hence the holy alliance in that quarter of the world between church and state, in which one party says to the other, "if you will preach up and inculcate implicit faith in all the mysteries of politics, and implicit obedience to all the pretensions of government, we will enforce all the theological mysteries that you may deem requisite to a full command over the minds of the people, and a plentiful share of the public wealth." We want no learned men in our dominions, says the present Emperor of Austria; we want none but good subjects; we want no instructors but the worthy priests.

As a member of the holy alliance, he was right. But look at the effect of this doctrine, in Spain, Italy, Austria, France, where the priesthood regulates every thing!

It is not sufficient that a knowledge of elementary science should be diffused among every class of the people; they should know also, if time admit, the elementary truths of politics, political economy, and ethics. This may seem a great deal, but almost all that is valuable as elementary and demonstrative truths in these branches of knowledge, may be taught in twelve months. If we are to have enlightened legislators we must have enlightened electors; especially in a government where the principle and the practice of universal suffrage is required to prevail. Without this knowledge, that principle and that practice is liable to many very formidable if not insuperable objections; give the knowledge, and the objections are answered: and I think it can be given. The Mechanic Library Societies, and the Mechanic Institutions for the purpose of affording and acquiring elementary science, now so prevalent in England, and commencing in New York and Philadelpnia, show what prodigious benefit can be effected in that way; and a very moderate extension of the principle, will embrace all that is wanted for the purposes of a republican elector. To extend knowledge among the rich, is doing great good: for the truths that have to fight their way in the

present generation, will become axioms universally adopted half a century hence: but he is the best patriot who extends the blessings of knowledge among the great mass of mankind; among those whose condition most requires to be improved. If liberty is to be placed on firm ground, it must be by the means here suggested, for there are no other equal to the required effect.

In the present state of public sentiment and public information, the requisites I now propose, will I fear, be more than cau be soon acceded to: and it may be wise not to attempt too much. If therefore the state were to open and furnish elementary schools for the purpose of teaching reading, writing, the English grammar, the rules of arithmetic, including vulgar and decimal fractions, mensuration, and the elements of geography, it would be perhaps as far as the temper of the times would admit. Less than this is surely too little. Some history of America and the American revolution, with the Declaration of Independence, the Constitution of the United States and of our own state, should be made school books. Snowden's History of America, or a concise history of the United States McCulloch Philadelphia, 1795) either of them are a good size for the purpose, and sufficiently well compiled.

The great difficulty is to lay down the principles on which the schools should be conducted to make them answer the required purpose. There is great danger of their becoming jobs in the hands of the managers.

1. What is the plan of teaching most convenient to be adopted in our country? In South Carolina?

1

2. What provisions are necessary in the law to render these means of instruction efficient?

3. What provisions are necessary to secure the due application of the school funds, without defalcation or waste?

4. Should the instruction afforded, be without pay, and without any price exacted from the parents?

5. Can any means be adopted to insure to the public, that every citizen really has been educated to the extent proposed?

As to the first question. It appears to me, that where a dense population, and the number of students will justify it, the Lancasterian monitorial plan of mutual instruction as describ. ed in the first number of that excellent work, the Westminster Re

view, is most efficient and most economical. It is therefore adapted to our large cities, and populous districts. But in country places, in remote townships settled as yet by scattered inhabitants, the schools should be conducted in the usual way, by single masters, until the population should admit of, or require a change.

As to the second question. The masters appointed, should devote every Saturday to examination into the acquirements of the preceding five days: and the trustees of the school should be required to attend at least all quarterly examinations. This should be a duty exacted under a penalty. At these quarterly examinations, specimens of proficiency, produced on the spot, on momentary requisition, should be demanded from each pupil. The secret of all school-proficiency, is frequent and rigid exami

nation.

I am inclined to think that every voter should be bound to declare, at every election, that the ticket by him delivered in, is in his own hand writing.

As to the third question. The expenditure of the money allowed to such school district, if the present plan of free schools, should be permitted to continue, should be rigidly enquired into twice a year, by some independent persons chosen at the general election to be school auditors of the district for the year. This audit should take place within a week after the expiration of the half year, and the result published in the newspaper; or in two newspapers of the place: open to a further audit if necessary, on motion made before the court of common pleas or chancery, shewing sufficient reason for further investigation. School funds are at present liable to great abuse, from collusion between the masters and the managers of the entrusted fund, and for want of some efficient means of rigidly compelling those who receive the money to account for its honest appropriation. This has been too much neglected in this State. But upon the plan I am about to propose, the expence of State schools will regulate itself, and there can be no room for expence arising from peculation or neglect.

As to the fourth question. I do not think that the free schools erected by the state, should be so free as to furnish knowledge without cost or price. This may do in the old countries of Europe, where taxation falls heavily on the poor; but I am per,