tablet swinging on their left arm,” went to the private school, and settled their accounts monthly: while,— for none can be more simply tender than the lyrist in his pensive mood, he describes his father, humble in circumstances but generous in views, taking him for education to Rome, still never abrogating domestic superintendence :

"Ipse mihi custos incorruptissimus omnes
Circum doctores aderat."*

We should scarcely have expected that in the Oceana of Harrington such opinions could be found. But that powerful and independent author is a very earnest advocate of them. "To set men to the work of industry, which is health, the Commonwealth must begin betimes with them, or it will be too late; and the means by which she sets them to it is education, the plastic art of government. But it is as frequent as sad in experience (whether through negligence, or, which in the consequence is all one, or worse, overfondness in the domestic performance of this duty) that innumerable children come to owe their utter perdition to their own parents; in each of which the commonwealth loses a citizen. Wherefore the laws of a government, however wholesome soever in themselves, are such as, if men by a congruity in their education be not bred to find a relish in them, they

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'He acting still as my uncompromising guardian, was always at the elbow of my teachers."-Satir: lib. i. 6.

the

will be sure to loathe and detest. The education, therefore, of a man's own children, is not wholly to be committed or trusted to himself." This reasoning is the more strange, inasmuch as the parent is supposed ready to do his duty; and should he fail, it is imputable to the excess of kindness. But could the parent, endowed with those dispositions, bring up child in any way that was not conformable to the rules of that government? If that were good, would not patriotism and allegiance be parts of the education? Is not submission to the civil rule, is not the admiration of the civil constitution, the very general characteristic of the governed? How vile must be that tyranny which youth will be sure to "loathe and detest!" How instantly should it be swept from the face of the earth!

Hobbes, in his Leviathan, strongly avers this prerogative of the Ruler to manage the education of his subjects." They also that have authority to teach, or to enable others to teach, the people their duty to the sovereign power, and instruct them in the knowledge of what is just and unjust, thereby to render them more apt to live in godliness, and in peace amongst themselves, and resist the public enemy, are public ministers ministers in that they do it not by their own authority, but by another's; and public, because they do it (or should do it) by no authority but that of the Sovereign. The monarch or the sovereign assembly only hath immediate authority from God to

:

teach and instruct the people; and no man but the sovereign receiveth his power Dei gratiâ simply; that is to say, from the favour of none but God: all other, receive theirs from the favour and providence of God, and their sovereigns; as in a monarchy Dei gratiâ et Regis; or Dei providentiâ et voluntate Regis."

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It is not easy to determine what are the exact ideas of Sir Thomas More in his interesting romance of Utopia. Some are beautifully domestic regulations. Every mother is nurse to her own child, unless either death, or sickness, be the let." "All in their childhood be instructed in learning." . . . . “The city consisteth of families: the families most commonly be made of kindreds." "But to the

intent the prescribed number of the citizens should neither decrease, nor above measure increase; it is ordained that no family, which in every city be six thousand in the whole, besides them of the country, shall at once have fewer children of the age of fourteen years or thereabouts, than ten, or more than sixteen. This measure or number is easily observed and kept, by putting them, that in fuller families be above the number, into families of smaller increase. But if chance be, that in the whole city the supply increase above the just number, therewith they fill up the lack of other cities." All these arrangements put youth at the disposal of the State. Bondmen are, likewise, introduced for the more humble duties of the community.

Bacon has chosen the same imaginative vehicle
In his New Atlantis he opens his

for his reflections.

conception of a true commonwealth. Here all is wise: "the riches of Solomon's house." Here all is pure:

it is "the Virgin of the world." He, alone, of this class of theorists, requires not the parent to forego his right in his offspring. His exquisite descriptions of the Feast of the Family, the honours of the Tirsau, the favours conferred upon the Son of the Vine, the retinue of the thirty descendants, the approach of the herald, -the entrances, retirements, and returns of him who is the pater-familias,—the kingly gift,— the shouts of the people of Bensalem,―are wrought as with one design, to do reverence to the marriage institute, and to proclaim the true glory of parents in their children.

We must not omit, that Infidelity ranges itself upon the side of parental irresponsibility. It is at every expense of feeling that we transcribe the language which it has uttered. "The present system of marriage is perfectly absurd, and the greatest piece of tyranny towards the females that could possibly be invented. Every contract of that kind ought only to be continued so long as it is agreeable to each of the parties, and each ought to be at liberty to put an end to it whenever he, or she, pleases. Mar

riage and separate families create selfishness; no one has any right to say that this is my child, or these are my children; they should all be brought up in

one general establishment, and then their habits and ideas would be similar, and they would then live together in harmony and concord.”* Similar doctrines

have been penned.†

No

Surely it is very obvious to every person, on the perusal of these opinions, that, if they contain any truth, they do not present all the truth; and that they have lost a very large portion of the ground which once they occupied, without any disputing them. As abstractions they would now be boldly denied. power could be brooked which would tear these earliest, holiest, ties of nature asunder. The infancy and youth of our children can only be placed under one control. But the wisest and freest government ought to see that this claim does not degenerate into bondage. The services of a child, at a reasonably appointed age, should become his own. The State may have yet a more delicate function to discharge. In this country there is a tribunal which has sometimes interposed between the reckless and vicious parent and the injured child. The equity of that proceeding is not arraigned. Yet it is to be doubted whether it be carried on in the supposition that the State is the foster-parent, "in loco parentis," or in simple protection of the helpless. It is obvious, too, that this appeal can only be of rare occurrence.

* Robert Owen's Speech at Manchester, in the Exchange Rooms, during his first public visit to that town.

+ His Book of the New Moral World.