Asiatic Quarterly Review (Full Title: The Imperial and Asiatic Quarterly Review, and Oriental and Colonial Record): Volume XIII, No. 26 [‎454v] (33/238)

246 Is State-aided Education in any Shape
be forgotten, without reverence for God, parents, or society,
with little wisdom and no morality, discontented with his lot
and with no improvement in prospects, they come to the
conclusion that this thing called education, which the
authorities are always praising and urging on them, is not
wholesome or beneficial, and they have no appetite for it.’’
The Times writer The lowest of the four classes into which East India Company civil servants were divided. A Writer’s duties originally consisted mostly of copying documents and book-keeping. is no less emphatic in his warning
against “ the temptation to slur over considerations of
quality in order to secure at any cost results that can be
numerically exhibited.” It will not do, therefore, for the
Government to disclaim any intention of forcing the pace to
the ruin of the taxpayer, and to plead that they only contem
plate increasing the educational expenditure proportionally
to the expected increase in general wealth and tax-bearing
capacity. They must force the pace if they are not to
do more harm than good. As matters now stand, we are
taking from the people, over and above really necessary
taxation, an annual sum much larger than they can con
veniently part with, yet altogether insufficient for the
alleged purpose. We are pinching in order to buy a
pop-gun for game that can only be brought down with a
rifle. In order to decide whether it is wiser to go forward
or to go back, we ought to have before us an estimate of
the cost of providing for 50,000,000 (or, excluding girls,
25,000,000) children something in. the shape of primary
education which shall at least be sound and useful so far as
it goes, however limited may be its scope. But I much
doubt the new Education Commission having the courage
to present such an estimate.
I must now pass from the economic aspect of the
problem to a matter of even graver moment—I mean the
irrepressible
Religious Difficulty
which has already engaged our attention on former occa
sions. Those discussions brought to light a considerable
variety of opinion, but (to my mind at all events) no toler
able solution.