It is the scandal of Christianity that, for twenty-five years, it has paralysed School Board instruction by its discord of opinion as to the religious tenets to be imparted; while in Secularity there is no disunity. Everybody is agreed upon the rules of arithmetic. The laws of grammar command general assent. There are no rival schools upon the interpretation of geometrical problems. It is only in divinity that irreconcilable diversity exists. When Secular instruction is conceded, denominational differences will be respected, as aspects of the integrity of conscience, which no longer obstruct the intellectual progress of the people. But there are graver issues than the pride and preference of the preacher; namely, the welfare of the children of the people. What the working classes want is an industrial education. Poverty is a battle, and the poor are always in a conflict--a conflict in which the most ignorant ever go to the wall. The accepted policy of the State leaves the increase of population to chance. It suffers none to be killed; it compels people to be kept alive, and abandons their subsistence to the accident of capitalists requiring to hire their services. Thus our great towns are crowded with families, impelled there by the wild forces of hunger and of passion. From the workingman thus situated, the governing class exacts four duties: 1. That he shall give the parish no disquietude by asking it to maintain his family. 2. That he shall pay whatever taxes are levied upon him. 3. That he shall give no trouble to the police. 4. That he shall fight generally whomsoever the Government may see fit to involve the nation in war with. Whatever knowledge is necessary to enable the future workman to do these things, is his right, and should be given to him in his youth in the speediest manner; and any other inculcation which shall delay this knowledge on its way, or confuse the learner in acquiring it, is a cruelty to him and a peril to the community which permits it; and the State, were it discerning and just, would forbid it. In April, 1870, in a letter which appeared in the _Spectator_; I wrote as follows: