Sports, there appeared to be a difficulty in reconciling the authority of the Fathers with May-pole dancing. But Heylin surmounts the obstacle, by contending that the Fathers did not refer to such respectable, virtuous "hops" as those round a May-pole by the swains and maidens of an English village -of which, alas! we could state some melancholy results-but only the licentious dances of the heathen! He says, for example: "In the dancings of old, throughout the principal cities of the Roman empire' there was much impurity and immodesty; such as was not to be beheld by a Christian eye." "This made the Fathers of this age, and of some that followed, inveigh as generally against all dancings as most unlawful in themselves; so more particularly against the sport itself, and beholding of the same, upon those days which were appointed to God's worship. And to these kind of dancings, and to none but these, must we refer those declamations which are so frequent in their writings, whether in reference to the thing, or unto the times." (Part II. c. iii. sect. 9.) "In the next six hundred years, from Pope Gregory forwards, the Lord's-day was not reckoned of as of a Sabbath." "In the judgment of the most learned of these six ages, the Lord's-day hath no other ground than the authority of the Church." "For recreations in these times, there is no question to be made, but all were lawful to be used on the Lord's-day which were accounted lawful upon other days, and had not been prohibited prohibited by by authority; aut and we find none prohibited but dancing only. Not that all of dancing was by law restrained; but either abuse thereof at times unseasonable, when men should have been present in the Church of God; or else immodest shameless dancings." (Chap. VI., Contents, and sect. 10.) By "times unseasonable," Heylin means, as he explains, church hours, that is, in the former part of the day; for the sanctification of the afternoon of Sunday (our ancestors called the hours after noon evening) he accounts a corruption of the Gospel. "I say now that the evenings of the Lord's-day began to have the honour of religious meetings; for it was not so from the beginning; nor had it been so now, but that almost all sorts of people were restrained from works as well by the imperial edicts, as by the constitution of particular churches." (Chap. IV., sect. 10.) We have thus seen, from Laud's own chaplain, what were the opinions of the Laudites, the precursors of our modern Tractarians, in reference to the Lord's-day, and the great advantage of Sunday wakes and merry dancing round May-poles, in order to check Puritanism, or, as it would now be called, "Methodism," or "Evangelism," or "opinions of a certain class." The same principles produced at a future day precisely the same effects; in illustration, rather than proof, of which we will transcribe the following passage from De Foe, in his "Review." We do not call in De Foe as an ally; but we may quote him for the statement of an uncontroverted matter of fact; and even if his story of the old woman should be apocryphal, it is not less to the purpose; for such a tale must have comported with known facts, or it could have had no point or meaning. "And here I must note, and I am sure I do it with a great deal of justice, that in the first two years of her Majesty's (Queen Anne's) reign, when the high-flying party had the ascendant over our councils, the kingdom of crime began; and Maypoles and play-houses grew up, like churches at the Reformation. If any man doubts the truth of the fact, let him put me upon the proof of it when he pleases; and in the mean time let him but observe, with me, this one thing, that there were more May-poles erected, and old ones re-edified, in that one year, than ever were in this nation since Bishop Laud's reformation by the Book of Sports, the year of the Restoration excepted. This gives ground to the story of an old woman, who, having seen the music and dancing about one of their new May-poles on a Sunday, and remembering the blessed time when the Sabbath used to be kept in that manner by authority, broke out in this most pious ejaculation about it; G-d L-d, here's the old religion come again." And this is the "blessed time" which some among usare striving to revive. They may indeed hesitate about Sunday shooting, merry-Andrews, and dancing around May-poles; having been themselves (unhappily) educated in "Protestant" principles, which it is not easy at once to shake off; and also fearing whether the nation is prepared to repudiate the divine obligation of the Christian Sabbath; and to make it merely a day of ecclesiastical injunction, like Holy-cross day, or the martyrdom of Becket; but still the "blessed time" of Laud's domination is that which they look back to as the golden era of the Anglican Church. When it returns, there will be time enough to consider whether Sunday Wakes and merry May-poles shall be again prescribed as a cure for Puritanism. Having stated these facts, we must venture to say, in conclusion, that though our correspondent Πιστις, if he errs, errs on the candid side, in admitting that the Bishop of Oxford's chaplain does not declare that the May-pole 66 merry dance" which he panegyrises occurred on Sunday, yet, taking the whole bearing of the matter, it is not by any means clear that he meant Sunday to be exempted from such profanations. For the object of his book, like Laud's "Book of Sports," is to "depress Puritanism," under which name he especially includes that serious observance of the Christian Sabbath which Laud and his chaplain set themselves to banish from the land; the former by fines, whips, and dungeons; the latter by means of a great book; it being the habit of bishops' chaplains in those days to write learned treatises, not foolish novels. Mr. Paget says: "At the period of which we are speaking the spirit of Puritanism had not yet obliterated the calendar, had not yet made Sunday ('the Sabbath,' as in their Judaizing spirit they called the Lord's-day) the only day of public worship, and turned the weekly festival of our Redeemer's resurrection into a dismal, cheerless day of austerity and gloom." The spirit of this passage is so identical with that which pervades Heylin and the "Book of Sports," that it requires Mr. Paget's very distinct assertion (of which there is no trace) that he did not think Laud and Heylin right and the advocates for the sacred obligation of the Lord's-day wrong. Again, he speaks with admiration of "the dinner on the Wake-Sunday;" and it were something like affectation to suppose that, as a good Tractarian, he meant to separate this portion of the old Wake-day observances from its merry concomitants, which Laud took such care should not be disjoined fromit. And, to mention but one point more, he follows Heylin, and the Proclamation of Sports, and Laud's apology on his trial, in connecting the afternoon's May-pole and merry dance with the morning's being "sanctified by prayer and attendance on the Church's ordinances;" and as Laud, and Heylin, and the Proclamation, expressly referred to such doings on the Lord's-day, the whole dove-tailing of the matter makes Mr. Paget's remarks very equivocal-to say the least; nor shall we feel confident that our correspondent's first impressions were not right, till the Bishop of Oxford's chaplain distinctly states that he is horrified at Laud's conduct and Heylin's arguments; and that he meant-though he did not say so that the May-pole dance and the sports of "Wake-Sunday," should be postponed till Monday. He must also be put to the difficult task of shewing, without forsaking his allegiance to Laudism, why, since he so highly approves of dancing round May-poles after coming from church on Saints'-days, he objects to it on Sundays; for Dr. Heylin, who is one of the golden links in the Catena of Tractarianism, asserts that, in respect to dancing on Saints'-days and Sundays, the Church in ancient times forbad or sanctioned both alike (according as the dance was licentious or decent); for, says he, (Part. II., c. v., sect. 9, 10.) "The Church had no less care of the one than of the CHRIST. OBSERV. No. 59. 4 P other; and so indeed it had, not in this alone, but in all things else; the Holy-days, as we now distinguish them (from the Lord's-day) being in most points equal to the Sunday; and in some superior." If this be so-and what good Tractarian would contradict Laud and Heylin?-it is squeamishness, we repeat, to pretend that any Laudite would suppose that if dancing round May-poles is edifying on the "superior" day, it would desecrate the Sunday. DEFENCE OF NATIONAL SCHOOLS AGAINST UNJUST CHARGES. To the Editor of the Christian Observer. I HAVE perused with interest the remarks upon Stanley-Grove Training College in your last two Numbers; and feel much confidence that this important establishment will be of signal service in the great work of scriptural National instruction, in connexion with, and upon the principles of, the apostolical branch of Christ's Church Catholic established in this land; provided the conductors adhere closely to genuine Anglicanism, keeping clear of errors on the right hand and the left, of which Tractarianism is at the present moment the most rife and dangerous. This much-needed institution, and our other training and model-schools, - with the designs, executed or in progress, for producing suitable books and other necessary scholastic appliances, -afford an extensive and well-arranged system of organization for conducting the work of public instruction. But in our exultation at the vast "strides," as you have phrased it, of improvement in our National school system, we should avoid the injustice of disparaging what was already good and useful. It cannot but cause a heartless and hopeless feeling, to speak, as some persons have done, of all that has hitherto been effected as almost nothing,often worse than nothing. Those who have for thirty or forty years been zealously labouring in the work of National education, by means of Sunday and Daily schools, and have witnessed the extensive benefits which, notwithstanding many defects, mistakes, and disappointments, have been undeniably produced, through God's blessing, by such institutions, cannot think that the wholesale disparagement of the past, which is now so common, is equitable; or that some new light has broken in upon the world, which is to illuminate our schools in the next generation with meridian effulgence. The agents of novel systems will find by experience, as did their predecessors, that even a little child is partaker of a fallen, corrupt, and wayward nature; and that its baptism has not, as some affirm, given it "the nature of an angel;" and it is to be feared that our children's children will have too much reason to speak of the effects of our plans as we speak of those of our fathers; and will devise new ones with as much avidity and confidence as we do. Still, this does not hinder that those who are passing off the stage of life should rejoice to witness the correction of past errors, the augmentation of zeal, the invention of improved designs, and the execution of better measures. Only let us be thankful for what has been done, and not undervalue it, while we "go on to perfection." Let us not despise even "the day of small things." And here permit the remark, that some of the advocates of the five or six plans of improved education, have been too ready to take up and repeat, on very slight grounds, a great variety of entertaining stories against our old schools; the effect of which, upon the minds of many, has been to involve them all in one common proscription. There is ample room for great improvement in public education; but it is unworthy of a good cause to attempt to promote it by exaggerated estimates of the errors or evils which it is intended to correct. I will illustrate my meaning by an example. Most of your readers must have heard of the Glasgow "moral-training system;" and some of them may have seen a very instructive volume respecting it, entitled: "The Training system established in the Glasgow Normal Seminary, and its Model Schools; by David Stow, Esq., Honorary Secretary to the Glasgow Educational Society; author of 'Moral Training,' &c." Mr. Stow deserves public gratitude for the zeal and ability which he has evinced in improving popular education, but was it necessary or candid to interlard his book with such stories as the following, in order to set off his own system? "Imperfect as mere verbal answering is, when every child knows all the answers in the lesson, and can repeat them, it is still more imperfect when the child only commits his own particular one to memory, which formerly was, and still is, too common in school. Most ludicrous scenes have taken place occasionally during public examinations, when a child happened to absent himself, and thus, by withdrawing a link of the chain, breaks its continuity. An alert examinator, however, in most cases can heal the breach, by a rapid movement to the next question in the order. A case lately occurred which illustrates this rotation system. A clergyman of profound piety, and high literary attainments, was the public examinator; and, among other written questions which he was to ask, he put the one, 'Who made the world?' The child answered, 'Noah, Sir.' The clergyman said, 'I beg your pardon, children, I am in the wrong, and you are right; that child is not here (meaning the child who was to answer that question); I ought to have asked, 'Who made the ark?"" Now, Sir, I frankly tell Mr. Stow that I do not believe this story. I make no question that he does, or he would not have related it; but let him give his authority for its authenticity; nay, I will add, let him in candour name the "clergyman of profound piety and high literary attainments" who acted in a manner not only so silly, but so immoral; first, in order that others may not suffer from the tale ; and secondly, that the supposed offender may explain his conduct. I am aware that the system of each child conning his own question and answer has been too common; and I have been much pained when, as a public examinator," I have suspected that this disingenuousness was being practised; but I do not believe that any clergyman would be a party in the falsehood, or make such an absurd apologetic speech as that retailed by Mr. Stow. The following story carries on its face the appearance of having been invented to excite a laugh; for I will not believe, without proof, that any "gentleman of high literary attainments" made so absurd a speech. I have uniformly observed that "gentlemen of high literary attainments" (my experience relates chiefly to Oxford, as I have never visited Glasgow) are remarkably simple in their language, especially when addressing uneducated persons. If a young man in one of our English public schools, or an under-graduate at College, or a fellow, tutor, or other "gentleman of high literary attainments," were, in a familiar conversation among his equals, and much more in asking a question of children in a charity school, to talk of " mutation being stamped on all sublunary objects," he would be ejected from academical society as a pedant and a coxcomb ;-but I do not believe the fact, and Mr. Stow has not proved it. "A gentleman of high literary attainments, during the public examination of a Charity School, was invited by one of the directors to put a few questions to the children. One question, however, was found quite enough. He commenced, 'Now, chlldren, is it not a fact, that mutation is stamped on all sublunary objects?' Of course, he looked upon the children as very ignorant, for there was no answer !!! They had no picture in their mind of mutation,' or ' stamped,' or 'sublunary,' and of course could not give an intelligent answer." The following story is unquestionable, because Mr. Stow relates it upon his own testimony; but I apprehend that he has misconceived some of the circumstances. He says: "A short time ago I visited one of the National Schools of England, taught on the Monitorial System, and was introduced to the master by one of the directors, who stated that he was a very superior teacher, and had his boys, to the number of at least 350, in good order. I found the school as stated, in excellent order, all busy at spelling lessons, or reading the Scriptures. On reaching the highest class, in company with the master and director, I asked the former if he ever questioned the scholars on what they read. He answered, 'No, I have no time for that, but you may if you please. I answered that, except when personally known to the teacher, I never questioned children in any school. By all means do so now if you please, but them thick-headed boys cannot understand a word.' I proceeded, Boys, shew me where you are reading; and, to do them justice, they read very fluently. The subject was the story of Eli and his two sons. I caused the whole of the class to read the first verse over again: ' And Eli had two sons, Hophni and Phineas.' 'Now, children, close your books'-(presuming it impossible that any error could be committed in such a plain narrative, I proceeded): Well, who was Eli?' No answer. This question was too high, requiring an exercise of thought, and a knowledge not to be found in the verse read. I therefore descended in the scale, and proceeded: 'Tell me how many sons Eli had?' 'Ugh?' 'Had Eli any sons?' 'Soor?' 'Open your books if you please, and read again.' Three or four read in succession, And Eli had two soons,' &c. Now, answer me-How many sons had Eli?' 'Soor?' 'Who do you think Eli was? Had Eli any sons?' 'Soor?' 'Was he a man, or a bird, or a beast, think you? Who do you think Eli was, children?' 'Soor?' 'Now, look at me and tell me this, boys-If Eli had two sons, do you think his two sons had a father?' 'Soor?' 'Well, since you cannot tell me how many sons Eli had, how many daughters had he, think you?' 'Three, Sir.' 'Where do you find that, children? look at your Bibles. Who told you that Eli had three daughters?' 'Ugh?' The director turned upon his heels, and the master said, 'Now, Sir, didn't I tell you these fellows could not understand a word?' This I term Scriptural reading. Those who choose may term it Scriptural education. We admit the principle, that no school or system ought to be judged by a single exhibition, or after a transient inspection; but here there can be no mistake; for if the highest class of a school, consisting of a dozen boys of ten to twelve years of age, who had read the Scriptures daily for years, could make such an appearance, what are we to conclude, but that, in so far as their intellectual or moral culture was concerned, it mattered not whether the Scriptures they read had been printed in Hebrew, or in their mother tongue. I thought this at the time an extreme case, but afterwards met with one or two similar results in other schools." It is due to truth, and to the clergy of England, and their schools, that Mr. Stow should here also specify name and place; for a fair explanation of the facts might alter the complexion of the story. Is he sure that it was his questions, not his speech, which the boys did not understand? A Scots gentleman of great eloquence, and very distinct articulation, some time since delivered an address in London before a highly educated assembly, many of whom affirmed that they could not understand his dialect. "Count Saxe" sounded to them like the name of a celebrated Prussian commander; not as meaning "Enumerate six." It would be nothing disreputable to Mr. Stow, if being a Scotsman, he uses so much of Caledonian dialect as to make his speech unintelligible to an English rustic child, who had never heard a Scotsman speak. But I do not mean to lay the |