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State the henchman or follower of private enterprise, but rather the representative of the whole community, having a vital interest in the education of every one of its members. I shall now submit to you what I consider would be a fitting outline of a plan by which this might be accomplished. I cannot do complete justice to it without trenching on politics. It is a thing which must be done, and done immediately. We cannot suffer any large number of our citizens, now that they have obtained the right of influencing the destinies of the country, to remain uneducated. It was a great evil that we did so before—it was an evil and a reproach, a moral stigma upon us. But now it is a question of self-preservation—it is a question of existence, even of the existence of our Constitution, and upon those who shall obstruct or prevent such a measure passing, will rest a responsibility the heaviest that mortal man can possibly lie under. Now, my friend Mr. Bruce had a scheme which, I think, in the circumstances under which he proposed it, was a good one, and which I would have willingly supported—a scheme for permitting persons to tax themselves for the purposes of education. I am sorry to say that in the circumstances in which we are now placed I consider that scheme not nearly drastic enough for what is wanted. Permission can only make a general system, what we want is an universal one. We must go further than permitting—we must compel. We must insist that there shall be some means or other by which education shall completely pervade in this country. We must carry out in some way or other the great work of the Reformers in Scotland when they placed a school in every parish. I am going to show you how I believe, with such experience as I have, this can be effected.
I think the first sacrifice the advocates and friends of the present system must make is that they must give up the denominational system of inspection. I think the State will have to confine itself to the secular part of education; to give up what is at present a sort of joint partnership in inspectors with the different denominations. You will see in a moment why I put this in the front. I think also that the present schools must be
