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ndeed, it needs but the alteration of a single word to justify, at least to some extent, the "damning sentence," which, according to Arnold, Mr. Frederic Harrison "launched" against him in 1867. "We seek vainly in Mr. A. a system of philosophy with principles coherent, interdependent, subordinate, and derivative." For "Philosophy" read "Education," and the reproach holds good. For in Education, as in everything else that he touched, he proceeded rather by criticism than by dogma--by showing faults in existing things rather than by theoretically constructing perfection. Yet, after all said and done, his general view of the subject is quite plain. He had in his mind an idea or scheme of what National Education ought to be; and, though from time to time he changed his view about details and methods, the general outline of his scheme is clear enough. One of the most characteristic passages which he ever wrote is that in which he describes his interview in 1865 with Cardinal Antonelli, then Secretary of State at Rome. "When he asked me what I thought of the Roman schools, I said that, for the first time since I came on the Continent, I was reminded of England. I meant, in real truth, that there was the same easy-going and absence of system on all sides, the same powerlessness and indifference of the State, the same independence in single institutions, the same free course for abuses, the same confusion, the same lack of all idea of _co-ordering_ things, as the French say--that is, of making them work fitly together to a fit end; the same waste of power, therefore the same extravagance, and the same poverty of result." Enlarging on this congenial theme, and applying it to England and English requirements, he promulged in 1868 a very revolutionary scheme for Public Education. At the apex of the pyramid there should be a Minister of Education. "Merely for administrative convenience he is, indeed, indispensable. But it is even more important to have _a centre in which to fix responsibility_." In 1886 he said to the teachers at Westminster, "I know the Duke of Richmond told the House of Lords that, as Lord President, he was Minister of Education--(laughter)--but really the Duke of Richmond's sense of humour must have been slumbering when he told the House of Lords that. A man is not Minister of Education by taking the name, but by doing the functions. (Cheers.) To do the functions he must put his mind to the subject of educat
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