342 Gilbert He was also interested in the training of Christian ministers, and believed, like Bucer, that the most necessary qualifications of the minister were character, and devotion to his sacred office, and not mere learning. Indeed, in spite of his opinion of the high value of liberal, classical education, he did not hesitate to say that men might become acceptable religious teachers without training at a University. 66 Bucer was in his day not satisfied with the work of the Universities in providing ministers, but wished their reform, 67 and suggested that addi- tional schools should be opened for the training of men who could minister to the Church. 68 Milton's tractate Of Education presents no plan for the general education of the entire country, yet in his later writings he does suggest such a thing, with the good of the nation in mind: They should have here also schools and academies at their own choice wherein their children may be bred up in their own sight to all learning and noble education; not in grammar only, but in all liberal arts and exercises. This would soon spread much more knowledge and civility, yea, religion, through all parts of the land, by communicating the natural heat of government and culture more distributively to all extreme parts, which now lie numb and neglected, would soon make the whole nation more industrious, more ingenuous at home, more potent, more honorable abroad. 69 Apparently these schools were freely to be opened to the poor. At least, there were to be schools for the training of poor chil- dren who might become religious teachers, where they could learn languages and arts 'freely at the public cost.' 70 And indeed if Milton agreed with Bucer that every man should study the Scriptures for himself, and that the education of the people was of the utmost importance to the state, he could not but agree with him that education should be accessible to the poor as well as to the rich. In order that poor boys who applied themselves to learning might be sure of maintenance, Milton advised that while at school they learn trades. This, and more especially the suggestion, in the passage just quoted, that education would make the nation more industrious, reminds us 66 Considerations . . . to Remove Hirelings, Milton's Works, vol. 5, p. 383. G7 Scripta Anglicana, p. 61. 68 Ib., p. 168. 69 The Ready and Easy Way to Establish a Free Commonwealth, Milton's Works, Vol. 5, p. 450.
70 Considerations . . . to Remove Hirelings, Milton's Works, Vol. 5, p. 370.
