admitted in all enlightened communities; but there are some who,
honestly no doubt, question its _practicability_. If they provide for
the education of their own children, they claim that they have done all
that duty or interest requires them to do. They even aver that there is
absolute injustice in compelling them to contribute toward the education
of the children of others. Now these very persons, when called upon
annually by the tax-gatherer to contribute their proportion for the
support of paupers--made so by idleness, intemperance, and other vices,
which, as we have already seen, result from ignorance--do so cheerfully
and ungrudgingly, and without complaining that they support themselves
and their families, and that neither duty nor interest requires them to
aid in the maintenance of indigent persons in the community.

_The Poor Laws of our country_, in the case of adults who are unable to
support themselves, require merely their maintenance. But with reference
to their _children_, more, from the very nature of the case, is needed.
Their situation imperatively demands not only a sustenance, but an
education that shall enable them in future years to provide for
themselves. The same humane reasons which lead civilized communities to
provide for the maintenance of indigent adults by legal enactments, bear
even more strongly in the case of their children. These require
sustenance in common with their parents. But their wants, their
necessities, stop not here; neither does the well-being of society with
reference to them. Both alike require that such children, in common with
all others, be so trained as to be enabled not only to provide for
themselves when they arrive at mature years, but as shall be necessary
to qualify them for the discharge of the duties of citizenship. Then,
instead of taxing society for a support, as their parents now do, they
will contribute to the elevation of all around, even more largely than
society has contributed to their elevation.

Let the necessary provision be made for the education of the children of
the poor, in common with all others, and successive generations of the
sons of men will steadily progress in knowledge and virtue, and in all
that has a tendency to elevate and ennoble human kind. But let their
education be neglected, and their rank in society will of necessity be
lower, when compared with the better educated and more favored classes,
than it would have been only two or t