“The other passage referred to is my addressing a letter to Lord Brougham, in April, 1834, on the subject of pauper education. The bill subsequently called the New Poor Law was then in progress through Parliament, and the intended changes seemed to me to afford an opportunity, not to be neglected, for improving the education of pauper children, then for the most part in a wretched state, the schoolmasters being very frequently themselves paupers. To suggest this improvement was the object of my letter. “I pointed out that the union of parishes, combined with the proposed classification of paupers (a design unfortunately but very imperfectly realized), would bring together large numbers of pauper children, and thus facilitate their education. By reference to the report of the Commissioners, I showed that children educated in workhouses became for the most part paupers for life; while in the few parishes where good education had already been established, few remained chargeable beyond the age of childhood; that by making good education general, one great source of pauperism would be stopped; and that even as regarded immediate benefit, if industrial occupation were introduced into the schools, the expense of maintaining the children would be partly defrayed by the results of their labour, while such occupation instead of retarding would even promote their intellectual progress. After urging some further considerations, I concluded by offering any assistance that I could give in forming a complete plan. Perhaps amidst Lord Brougham’s multitudinous duties he had no attention to spare for the proposal; perhaps the difficulty with which the actual changes were made, and the outcry long maintained against them, may have indisposed Government to any further innovation. But whatever may be the explanation, I cannot avoid speculating on the amount of the benefit which might by this time have resulted from the suggestion, had it been adopted and efficiently worked. How much pauperism and how much crime might have been prevented![81]