They are all laymen; for it is now a principle established in the Grand Duchy that parents shall train up their children in the creed which they may prefer. Thus Protestants, Catholics, and Jews all receive the blessings and benefits of the secular education; no tampering with religious opinions--no proselytism being permitted. The whole scheme is on the broadest basis of liberality; and the people are delighted with its working. As for the Church, it is entirely separated from the State; and the order of Bishops has been suppressed. The Catholic religion is still that of the great majority: but it is shorn of its pomp; and ecclesiastical ostentation and vain display have received a blow which they will never recover. The result is, that the Christian creed has been restored to something resembling its primitive simplicity, and such as its Divine Founder intended. I have now, my lord and gentlemen, given you a hasty, but I hope intelligible sketch of the condition of Castelcicala at the present day; and it only remains for me to sum up the reforms which have been accomplished, and which completely carry out the views and the theories so ably propounded by you, my dear Earl, nineteen years ago. In the first place, there is a Throne surrounded by Republican Institutions; and the hereditary principle as well as the law of primogeniture have been annihilated--never to be revived. Then, we have adopted ‘a _minimum_ rate of wages, to prevent the sudden fluctuation of such wages, and to compel property to give constant employment to labour:--indirect taxes upon the necessaries of life have been abolished;--the laws and their administration are equitably proportioned to the relative conditions of the rich and the poor;--a general system of national education has been established, and intrusted to laymen, totally distinct from religious instruction and sectarian tenets;--a complete reformation in the system of prison discipline has taken place; and establishments have been founded for the purpose of affording work to persons upon leaving criminal gaols, as a means of their obtaining an honest livelihood and retrieving their characters prior to seeking employment for themselves;--and the franchise has been so extended as to give every man who earns his own bread by the sweat of his brow, a stake and interest in the country’s welfare.’” The Prince ceased speaking; and those who had been his auditors expressed their sincerest thanks for the gratifying explanations he had given them with so much readiness and affability. Nor less were they charmed to find that a truly liberal and enlightened system of policy would stand such remarkable tests, and work so well. The question, whether the nations of Europe are civilised enough to receive Republican Institutions, was completely solved, to their satisfaction; and even Sir John Lascelles, who was somewhat tainted with the doctrines of the Old School, acknowledged himself to be a convert.