The Intellectual Development of the Canadian People by Sir John George Bourinot (best novels to read .txt) 📖

each. In 1816 the first steps were taken by the Legislature in the direction of common schools--as they were then, and for some time afterwards, designated--but the Acts that were then and subsequently passed up to the time of the Union were very inadequate to accomplish the object aimed at. No general system existed; the masters were very inferior and ill paid. A very considerable portion of the province was without schools as well as churches. Of the lands which were generally appropriated to the support of the former by far the most valuable portion was diverted to the endowment of King's College. In 1838 there were 24,000 children in the common schools, out of a population of 450,000, leaving probably some 50,000 destitute of the means of education. The well-to-do classes, however, especially those living in the large towns, had good opportunities of acquiring a sound education. Toronto was well supplied with establishments, supported by large endowments: Upper Canada College, the Home District Grammar School, besides some well conducted seminaries for young ladies. For years Cornwall Grammar School, under the superintendence of the energetic Dr. Strachan was the resort of the provincial aristocracy. Among the men who received their early education in that famous establishment were Robert Baldwin, H. J. Boulton, J. B. Macaulay, Allan McNab, John Beverley Robinson, Dean Bethune, Clark Gamble, and many others afterwards famous in politics, in law and in the church. Dr. Strachan was not only a sound scholar but an astute man of the world, admirably fitted to develop the talents of his pupils and prepare them for the active duties of life in those young days of Canada. 'In conducting your education,' said he on one occasion, 'one of my principal duties has always been to fit you for discharging with credit the duties of any office to which you may hereafter be called. To accomplish this it was necessary for you to be accustomed frequently to depend upon and think for yourselves. Accordingly, I have always encouraged this disposition, which, when preserved within due bounds, is one of the greatest benefits that can possibly be acquired. To enable you to think with advantage, I not only regulated your tasks in such a manner as to exercise your judgment, but extended them for you beyond the mechanical routine of study usually adopted in schools.' [Footnote: Scadding's 'Toronto of Old,' p. 161.] None of the masters of the high schools of the present day could do as much under the very scientific system which limits their freedom of action in the educational training of their scholars. But whilst the wealthier classes in the larger centres of population could avail themselves of the services of such able teachers as the late Bishop of Toronto, the mass of people were left in a state of ignorance. The good schools were controlled by clergymen of the different denominations; in fact, the Church of England was nearly dominant in such matters in those early times, and it must be admitted that there was a spirit abroad in the province which discredited all attempts to place the education of the masses on a more liberal basis.

The Union of 1840 and the extension of the political rights of the people gave a new impulse to useful and practical legislation in a country whose population commenced from that time to increase very rapidly. In 1841, 1843 and 1844 measures were passed for the improvement of the school system of both provinces. In 1846, the system of compulsory taxation for the support of public schools was, for the first time, embodied in the law, and education at last made steady progress. According as experience showed the necessity of changes, the Legislature improved the educational system of both provinces--these changes having been continued to be made since Confederation. In Lower Canada, the names of two men will always be honourably associated with the working out of the School Law, and these are Dr. Meilleur and Hon. Mr. Chauveau, the latter of whom succeeded in establishing Normal Schools at Montreal and Quebec. In the Province of Ontario, Egerton Ryerson has perpetuated his name from one end of the country to the other, where the young are being educated in large, comfortable school-houses by a class of teachers whose qualifications, on the whole, are of a high order.

Great as has been the progress of education in Quebec, yet it must be admitted that it is in some respects behind that of Ontario. The buildings are inferior, the teachers less efficient, and insufficiently paid in many cases--and efficiency, no doubt, depends in a great measure on the remuneration. The ratio of children who are ignorant of the elements of knowledge is greater than in the Province of Ontario, where, it must be remembered, there is more wealth and, perhaps, more ambition among the people generally. Still the tendency in Quebec is in the direction of progress, and as the people become better off, they will doubtless be induced to work out their system, on the whole so admirable, with greater zeal and energy.

In the Province of Ontario every child can receive a free education, and can pass from the Public School to the High School or Collegiate Institute, and thence to the University, where the fees are small and many scholarships are offered to the industrious student. The principles which lie at the basis of the system are local assessment to supplement State aid; thorough inspection of all schools; ensuring the best teachers by means of Normal Schools and competitive examinations, complete equipment, graded examinations, and separate schools. The State recognises its obligation to the child, not only by contributing pecuniary aid, but by exercising a general supervision, by means of a Superintendent in Quebec and by a Minister of the Crown in Ontario. The system of Ontario, which has been the prototype for the legislation of all the smaller provinces, is eclectic, for it is the result of a careful examination of the systems that prevail in the United States, Prussia, and Ireland.

As in the larger provinces, much apathy was shown in Nova Scotia for many years on the subject of the education of the people. Unhappily this apathy lasted much longer; for the census of 1861 proved that out of a population of 284,000 persons over five years of age, no less than 81,469 could not read a printed page, and 114,877 could not write their names. It was not till 1864 that Sir Charles Tupper, then Premier, brought in a comprehensive measure containing the best features of the Ontario system; and the result has been a remarkable development in the education of the province. In New Brunswick, where the public schools were long in a very inferior state--though parish schools had been established as early as 1823--the system was remodelled, in 1871, on that of Ontario, though no provision was made for Separate Schools--an omission which has created much bitterness in the province, as the political history of Canada for the subsequent years abundantly testifies. In Prince Edward Island the first free schools were established in 1852, and further improvements have been made of recent years. In British Columbia, the Legislature has adopted substantially the Ontario School Law with such modifications as are essential to the different circumstances of a sparse population. In the North-west, before the formation of the Province of Manitoba, education was in a much better condition than the isolation and scattered state of the population would have led one to expect. In 1857 there were seventeen schools in the settlements, generally under the supervision of the clergy of the Roman Catholic, Episcopalian, and Presbyterian bodies. In the Collegiate School, managed by the Church of England, and supported, like all other institutions in the country, by contributions from abroad, Aeschylus, Herodotus, Thucydides and Livy were read with other classics besides mathematics. In 1871 a school law of a liberal character was passed, provision being made for Protestant and Roman Catholic schools separately.

The higher branches of education have been taught from a very early date in the history of all the provinces. In the Jesuit College, the Quebec Seminary, and other Roman Catholic institutions founded in Montreal, St. Hyacinthe, Three Rivers, and Nicolet, young men could always be educated for the priesthood, or receive such higher education as was considered necessary in those early times. The Quebec Seminary always occupied a foremost position as an educational institution of the higher order, and did much to foster a love for learning among those classes who were able to enjoy the advantages it offered them. [Footnote: Mr. Buller, in his Educational Report to Lord Durham, says: 'I spent some hours in the experimental lecture-room of the eminent Professor M. Casault, and I think that I saw there the best and most extensive set of philosophic apparatus which is yet to be found in the Colonies of British North America. The buildings are extensive, and its chambers airy and clean; it has a valuable library, and a host of professors and masters. It secures to the student an extensive course of education.'] It has already been noticed that a Grammar School system was established in the years of the first settlement of Ontario. Governor Simcoe first suggested the idea of a Provincial University, and valuable lands were granted by George III., in 1798, for that purpose. The University of Toronto, or King's College, as it was first called, was established originally under the auspices of the Church of England, and was endowed in 1828, but it was not inaugurated and opened until 1843. Upper Canada College, intended as a feeder to the University, dates back as far as the same time, when it opened with a powerful array of teachers, drawn for the most part from Cambridge. In 1834, the Wesleyan Methodists laid the foundation of Victoria College, at Cobourg, and it was incorporated in 1841, as a University, with the well-known Rev. Dr. Ryerson as its first President. The Kirk of Scotland established Queen's College, at Kingston, in 1841, and the Presbyterian Church of Canada, Knox's College, at Toronto, in 1844. The Roman Catholics founded Regiopolis, at Kingston, in 1846; St. Joseph's College, at Ottawa, in 1846; St Michael's, at Toronto, in 1852. Trinity College, under the auspices of the Church of England, was the issue of the successful effort that was made, in 1849, to throw King's College open to all denominations. Bishop Strachan determined never to lend his countenance to what he called 'a Godless University,' and succeeded in founding an institution which has always occupied a creditable position among the higher educational establishments of the country. The Baptists established the Woodstock Literary Institute in 1857; the Episcopal Methodists, Albert College, at Belleville, in 1866; and the Evangelical section of the Church of England, in 1878, obtained a charter for Huron College, under the name of the Western University of London.

But the great Province of Ontario cannot lay claim to the honour of having established the first Colleges with University powers in British North America. King's College at Windsor, in Nova Scotia--the old home of 'Sam Slick'--was the first institution of a high order founded in the provinces, its history as an academy going as far back as 1788, when Upper Canada had no government of its own. This institution has always remained under the control of the Church of England, and continues to hold a respectable position among educational institutions. Dalhousie College was established at Halifax in 1820, chiefly through the efforts of the Presbyterian Church. In 1831 the Baptists founded Acadia in Horton, and in 1843 the Wesleyans an Academy at Sackville, N. B.--a neutral ground as it were--which was afterwards elevated to the dignity of a University. The Catholics founded St. Mary's at Halifax in 1840, and St Francois Xavier at Antigonishe in 1855. In 1876 the experiment was commenced, at Halifax, of a University