seats and sinecures of idleness and exploded errors. It is the common fate of institutions which have no rivals, first to become stationary, and afterwards to retrogade. Certain systems must be taught and learned, not because they are useful, but because in former ages they were thought so, and prescribed. Institutions chained down to systems prevalent at the age when they are established, must be always lagging behind, and only reluctantly dragged on by the spirit and improvements of succeeding times. Teachers having no interest in the zealous performance of their duty, are jealous of others meddling with their pursuits, and always attach odium to innovation. But truth is necessarily progressive. It requires not the support of power to uphold it, which is always uncongenial to its interests, but should stand on its own merits alone. Notwithstanding that the interest of government is, that the people should be intelligent, skilful, and as productive as possible of the means of enjoyment, if it were only for their use; and notwithstanding that the love of fame has excited princes and rulers to patronize learning, yet knowledge has been scarcely at all advanced by their interference. Were nothing known, or diffused, but what the establishments they have founded and patronized have effected, or permitted, we should now be in little better than the darkness of the middle ages. It has been remarked, that, "In Scotland, where parochial schools have been long established, and instruction has been universal, far from their having made progress during the last half of the late century, there has rather been a decline; and the abilities of the teachers, and the desire to be taught, have in several instances suffered a diminution."

Yet when discoveries and inventions have been made which materially benefit humanity, they loudly call from society for a recognition of the debt of gratitude which is due to those who thus prove themselves its benefactors; they claim also to some extent a pecuniary recompence. When we consider the magnitude of the service which some of these discoveries and inventions have rendered to mankind, from their greatness in themselves, their extent, through the universality of their adoption, and the permanence in duration which will probably attend their employment, it would be wholly impossible to estimate in

its full measure the magnitude of the service thus rendered to our species, much less to reward the individuals in any degree commensurate with it. The £20,000 which the British parliament awarded to Jenner for the discovery of vaccination, or, again, the £5000 which it voted to Crompton for his invention of the spinning-machine, called the mule, are either of them utterly valueless when put in competition with the advantage that has been, and will be, derived by their country and by mankind from their exertions. But a recompence commensurate with the value of the benefits derived from such discoveries and inventions, is not less impossible than uncalled for. The highest interests of society, however, are involved in such exertions, and demand that aid should be afforded to struggling genius while contending with the difficulties and opposition which it has almost always to encounter, and which are often too strong for its unassisted efforts to overcome. And it must be confessed, that governments in general have been too slow in affording patronage and protection to such endeavours, and too penurious in rewarding their triumphs when successful. The aid which governments have in this way afforded to the advancement of science and the arts, seems liable to no possible objection; but, on the contrary, to be fraught with the greatest benefits, and seems to require a more ready and more liberal extension.

Though there are reasons to believe that the interference of the state in the establishment and support of colleges and schools for education, has rather tended to retard than advance the diffusion of knowledge, there can be no doubt that it ought carefully to avoid hindering, either directly or indirectly, by its measures, the progress of science and diffusion of information. To shut out from or discourage the communication of the physical sciences to the industrious members of the community, would be to diminish the quantity or deteriorate the quality of the products of their labour. To exclude from them the moral sciences, or to lower the purity and perfection of such branches of study, would be to diminish the enjoyment derivable from these products to themselves and to the community. That governments in earlier times have powerfully checked the advancement and diffusion of knowledge, is a fact too sensibly felt

in its melancholy results to stand in need of proof; and that they still do the same thing, though in a slighter degree, is scarcely less obvious. Let us then shortly glance at some of the ways in which these effects continue to be produced.

The advancement of science, and the acquisition of skill and knowledge by the people, are impeded by restrictions on the press, and duties on paper and publications, as also by duties on the chemical agents, and the instruments and materials of experiment, used in the different departments of science and the arts. Comments on such measures of government are too familiar to need repetition to any extent. It is sufficiently obvious, that, in increasing the price of publications, and consequently, the expense and difficulty of acquiring information, they cannot but operate prejudicially, both on the pecuniary and on the moral condition of the people. On the other hand, everything that either cheapens publications, lessens the expense of education, expedites the acquisition of learning, or lightens its labour by improved systems of teaching, is conducive as well to the wealth as to the happiness of society. It is however too little the subject of observation, that especially beneficial would be any plan which could be devised of teaching in a cheap, easy, and expeditious manner, the useful arts; and which would thus give to the people the means of earning their daily bread. It is the want of acquaintance with these arts, and of the ability and freedom to practise them, that are the great sources of a want of employment, of poverty, and of wretchedness amongst the poorer classes.

The laws of apprenticeships, now, happily, in our country repealed, though the customs and habits of thinking they have confirmed and perpetuated must continue to be felt for generations to come, had a tendency rather to retard improvements in the arts than to contribute to their perfection. Through this custom, the arts became "crafts and mysteries," men were brought up and occupied solely in one trade; they were forbidden to interfere in other trades, and thus prevented from knowing them. Consequently, those of one occupation were commonly unacquainted with the methods in use in others, and ignorant of the advances which had been made in them. Dis

coveries and improvements are not to be expected from men whose sphere of information is thus limited, and whose conceptions must be narrow and confined. It is from men of more extended knowledge, and of a more general range of observation, that these are to be hoped for; men whose ideas are not confined solely to following in the footsteps of those who have gone before them, but who can bring the knowledge and advancement of one art or science to bear on the progress of another, and consider what can be done, rather than what is or has been done. To perfect the arts, every process connected with them must be submitted to the test of general principles.

It is unquestionable, that customs of apprenticeship impede the ready acquisition of skill and knowledge in the arts. A young man would apply himself with more diligence and assiduity to become thoroughly acquainted with his art and expert at his work, if from the beginning he wrought as a journeyman, being paid in proportion to the work he executed, and paying in his turn for the materials which he might sometimes spoil through awkwardness and inexperience. His education in this way would be more effectual, and less tedious and expensive. But the worst effect of long apprenticeships is, that, from their great expense, the great body of the poor are prevented altogether from acquiring the skill and knowledge necessary to the performance of the arts. When, in addition to a premium to be paid to a master, the lad is to be clothed, and perhaps maintained, by his friends for seven years, it is not to be wondered at that there should be found but comparatively few parents amongst the lower classes who are able to bear the expense. Long apprenticeships are altogether unnecessary. Apprenticeships were wholly unknown to the ancients. Το discover the several processes of any one of the arts, and to invent all the tools and machines employed about it, must have been the work of long time and thought. But now that both are well understood, to explain to any young man in the completest manner these processes, and show him how to use the requisite tools and machines, in any of the arts, cannot require a long time. In most of the common mechanic trades, a few months might be sufficient. Dexterity of hand, indeed, even in common

trades, cannot be acquired without much longer practice, but the knowledge of the use of tools is easily learned.

But long apprenticeships, however injurious to the acquisition of knowledge and skill, however prejudicial to the interests of society at large, and in their ultimate effects even detrimental to the trades themselves in which they are customary, are, in their immediate effects, apparently to the advantage of these trades. The master has all the labour of the apprentice during his servitude for nothing; and in the end the apprentice himself seems to be a gainer, when his wages as a journeyman are raised higher in consequence, and he himself in his turn becomes a master. There is no very great difference between the skill of a journeyman bricklayer and that of his labourer; the teaching of a few months at furthest would be sufficient to qualify an intelligent labourer to perform all the work of a common bricklayer. Yet the wages of the one are in London five shillings a day, while those of the other, whose work is equally laborious, are but two or three shillings. If it were not for the custom of apprenticeships, the open competition in a trade so easily learned, would bring these wages so near to an equality, that there would not perhaps be more than sixpence a day difference between them. It is to the laws which till lately existed with regard to apprentices, and to the customs to which they have given rise, and which still continue, that we must attribute this great disproportion in wages. The monopoly which they have given to the more wealthy artisans, who were able to bear the expense of apprenticeships, has contributed to the entire degradation of the poorer, who were unable to bear this expense. The limited number of the workmen in each trade enabled them to get high wages, and the monopoly rate of wages enabled the masters to procure large premiums with apprentices. The loss of this monopoly, and of the power to check competition, will lower both the profits of the masters and the wages of the workmen ; while the inferior labourers and the public at large will be the gainers. Since skill and knowledge increase the productiveness of the chief source of wealth-labour, every regulation or custom which checks their acquisition, cannot but keep down the excellence, the value, and the adaptation to our wants of the produce