We copy the following interesting paragraph from a work just issued in
London on "The Social Condition and Education of the People of England
and Europe," by Joseph Kay, of Cambridge University.
"As I have already said, the _moral, intellectual and physical
condition of the peasants and operatives_ of Prussia, Saxony
and other parts of Germany, of Holland, and of the Protestant
cantons of Switzerland, and the social condition of the
peasants in the greater part of France, _is very much higher
and happier, and very much more satisfactory, than that of
the peasants and operatives of England_; the condition of the
_poor_ in the North German, Swiss and Dutch _towns_, is as
remarkable a contrast to that of the poor of the _English
towns_ as can well be imagined; and that the condition of the
_poorer classes_ of Germany, Switzerland, Holland and France
is _rapidly improving_. The great _superiority_ of the
_preparation_ for life which a _poor man_ receives in those
countries I have mentioned, to that which a peasant or
operative receives _in England_, and the difference of the
social position of a poor man in those countries to that of
a peasant or operative in England, seem sufficient to explain
the difference which exists between the moral and social
condition of the poor of our own country and of the other
countries I have named. In Germany, Holland, and Switzerland,
a child begins its life in the society of parents who have
been educated and brought up for years in the company of
learned and gentlemanly professors, and in the society and
under the direction of a father who has been exercised in
military arts, and who has acquired the bearing, the clean and
orderly habits, and the taste for respectable attire, which
characterize the soldier. The children of these countries
spend the first six years of their lives in homes which
are well regulated. They are during this time accustomed to
orderly habits, to neat and clean clothes, and to ideas of the
value of instruction, of the respect due to the teachers,
and of the excellence of the schools, by parents who have, by
their training in early life, acquired such tastes and ideas
themselves. Each child at the age of six begins to attend a
school, which is perfectly clean, well ventilated, directed by
an able and well-educated gentleman, and superintended by the
religious ministers and by the inspectors of the Government.
Until the completion of its _fourteenth_ year, each child
continues regular daily attendance at one of these schools,
daily strengthening its habits of cleanliness and order,
learning the rudiments of useful knowledge, receiving the
principles of religion and morality, and gaining confirmed
health and physical energy by the exercise and drill of the
school playground. _No children are left idle in the streets
of the towns; no children are allowed to grovel in the
gutters; no children are allowed to make_ their appearance
at the schools dirty, or in ragged clothes; and the local
authorities are obliged to clothe all whose parents cannot
afford to clothe them. The children of the _poor_ of
Germany, Holland and Switzerland acquire stronger habits of
cleanliness, neatness and industry at the _primary_ schools,
than the children of the _small shopkeeping_ classes of
England do at the private schools of England; and they
leave the _primary schools_ of these countries _much better
instructed_ than those who leave our _middle class private
schools_. After having learnt reading, writing, arithmetic,
singing, geography, history and the Scriptures, the children
leave the schools, carrying with them into life habits of
cleanliness, neatness, order and industry, and awakened
intellect, capable of collecting truths and reasoning upon
them."
* * * * *
[FROM THE DUBLIN UNIVERSITY MAGAZINE.]