; (2) the management of the parochial and
other schools of Scotland by the people themselves, instead of by a
Board in London, which could know but little respecting the educational
wants of the country; and (3) that a proper training in secular and
religious knowledge be provided for the teachers, along with a due
remuneration for their labours. Mr. Baird then proceeded to show that
there was a danger of allowing the education of the country to become
secularised, and that the word religion, which only appeared twice in
the Education Bill, was inserted in the sense of forbidding it to be
taught at all. With reference to the support of education, Mr. Baird
expressed a clearly defined opinion, of which we quote the _ipsissima
verba_. "I have," he said, "a strong and conscientious objection that
any of my money, whether exacted from me by rates and taxes, should be
expended in teaching secular knowledge unless it is permeated by
religion, and I believe I shall be joined by an overwhelming majority of
the people of Scotland in that objection." ... "Religious and Scriptural
education is what we are contending for, and religious education we must
have, even should the State withdraw its support, which is a thing not
likely to be done." These are the words of one who has evidently "read,
marked, learned, and inwardly digested" the whole subject of education,
and is prepared, at whatever sacrifice or cost, to stand up for a system
of instruction that shall embrace preparation not only for the duties
and exigencies of this life but also for that which is to come. And the
views of such a man have all the more weight that they accompany and
flow from a sincere desire and a tangible readiness to afford practical
support to the cause of education.

But if education owes much to the generosity and practical sympathy of
the Messrs. Baird, the Church has still more reason to register their
names in its roll of attached friends. With reference to Mr. James
Baird, it may be fitly said that he is "a pillar in Israel." He is
conservative to the extent of maintaining unimpaired all the
institutions of the Church; but patronage, and other plague-spots in her
bright and noble constitution, he would utterly abolish. Progress has
long been his watchword, but it is in the direction of building up and
not of pulling down. He is not an iconoclast for the mere sake of
change. But he would remove out of the pathway of the Church all that
would hind