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 LI E) RAR.Y 
 
 OF THE 
 
 UNIVERSITY 
 
 or ILLINOIS
 
 THE 
 
 DUTY OF THE CHURCH OF ENGLAND 
 
 ON 
 
 THE CESSATION OF THE RELIGIOUS INSPECTION OF 
 SCHOOLS BY THE COMMITTEE OF COUNCIL. 
 
 A LETTER 
 
 ^0 ^XB (^xut the ^ixhbiBh0p of CanterburB, 
 
 BY 
 
 B. F. SMITH, 
 
 DIOCESAN INSPECTOR OF SCHOOLS FOR THE DIOCESE OF CANTERBURY, VICAR OP 
 RUSTHALL, AND HONORARY CANON OF CANTERBURY CATHEDRAL. 
 
 AUGUST, 1870. 
 
 Sold at the National Society's Depository, Sanctuary, Westminster. 
 
 Price 2d. 
 
 ^
 
 LETTER, &c. 
 
 My Lord Archbishop, 
 
 Of all the sacrifices which the Church of England 
 will be called apon to make by the Education Bill of 1870, I 
 am persuaded that none is so great as the surrender of that 
 part of the concordat between the Church and the State, which 
 has hitherto guaranteed to it Clerical Lispectors of Schools, 
 who at their annual visit should make inquiry into the 
 Relio-ious as well as the Secular Instruction. And the readi- 
 ness with which such a demand has been acceded to by the 
 Church is a lasting proof of its readiness to give up valuable 
 privileges, when the general welfare seems to demafid it. But 
 I cannot disguise from myself that the gravity of the change 
 has not yet been fully appreciated. For, however necessary it 
 may be that, in a National Scheme of Education, Inspection 
 should become purely secular, no change is likely to take 
 place which would subject the Religious Instruction of our 
 Parochial Schools to a more formidable trial. 
 
 I do not think that the members of the Church are fully 
 aware of the important assistance to the Religious work of 
 Schools which has been rendered by H.M. Inspectors at their 
 Annual Examinations. Time after time, however, I have felt 
 it my duty to draw attention to the valuable influence I have 
 observed to be exerted by Government Inspection in this 
 direction. 
 
 In my Report of 1864, p. 8, I said — 
 
 " To H.M. Inspectors, acting in this District, the Church is much 
 indebted for the satisfactory result already noticed, that there has been no sub- 
 stantial falling off in Religious Knowledge, consequent on the introduction of 
 
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 the Revised Code. Conscientious as the body of Teachers undoubtedly are, and 
 sincerely and intelligently attached to the Church of England, they necessarily 
 take much of their tone and regulate many of their proceedings for the year, by 
 what goes on during the few hours of Government Inspection." 
 
 Again, in 1865 — 
 
 " The Religious Instruction in Parochial Schools will depend mainly 
 for its excellence on three principal conditions : the character and ability of the 
 Teacher, the superintendence exercised by the Clergyman, and the recognition 
 it meets with from H.M. Inspector at the Annual Examination. It arises proba- 
 bly from a happy concurrence of these causes, in their several measures, that in 
 so many instances in this Diocese secular instruction is built on the only secure 
 foundation of a sound Religious Education." 
 
 In 1868— 
 
 " Even if I were compelled to take a more gloomy view than I do of 
 the prospects of Religious Instruction in Day Schools, I should be re-assured 
 by the marks of watchfulness over it which appear in the recent Reports, both 
 of H.M. Inspectors and of the Committee of Council on Education. For this 
 is sure to re-act on Teachers, who are properly held responsible by H.M. In- 
 spectors for such Religious Knowledge." 
 
 In 1869— 
 
 ** The Religious Instruction keeps up its former reputation for effi- 
 ciency, which is largely attributable to the stress laid upon it by H.M. Inspectors 
 for this Diocese." 
 
 At the risk of tediousness I have ventured to re-call these 
 testimonies, casually borne in years past, to the important 
 assistance H.M. Inspectors have rendered to the Work of the 
 Church ; because I could in no way so strongly express my 
 conviction of the importance of what we are about to lose ; 
 and because it seems no more than right that the ministerial 
 work, which these Clergymen have now for a quarter of a 
 century been performing, should be ungrudgingly acknow- 
 ledged by the Church, now that these clerical functions of the 
 Inspector are about to cease. And I venture to think that there 
 can be few persons in England who have enjoyed the oppor- 
 tunities allowed to me, of observing, as an independent witness, 
 their great influence for good on Religious Instruction, in those 
 Schools, in which it has been for twenty years my lot to follow 
 on their footsteps. 
 
 
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 5 
 
 The change which is now to reduce the work of an In- 
 spector to a mere lay inquiry will, I fear, be a much greater 
 one than the Clergy have as yet realized. Hitherto Teachers 
 have been aware that failure on their part to present a satis- 
 factory condition of Religious Teaching threatened the Grant 
 with reduction. But what acted even more powerfully as a 
 stimulus to their daily exertions in these matters was the 
 knowledge that they would come under the eye of a practised 
 and sympathizing inquirer, and receive that recognition to 
 which no earnest workers in the cause of truth are insensible. 
 
 These aids and inducements are now about to be with- 
 drawn ; and Religious Teaching will suffer the discouragement 
 of being passed over in silence in the annual review of the 
 rest of the year's work. Not only will it cease to tell on the 
 result : it will cease even to come under the notice of the In- 
 spector, to whom Teachers look up to shape their work for 
 another year. Where they are conscientiously desirous to 
 abate nothing of the pains hitherto bestowed on what they feel 
 to be the most important subject, they will still labour at it 
 under a sense of discouragement. But in how many cases 
 will it insensibly lose ground in competition with the work 
 which is to claim inspection and carry rewards. 
 
 Nor is it only the trial of being simply ignored which 
 Relio-ious Instruction in the hands of Teachers will have to 
 face. It has hitherto formed the test of the Teacher's ability 
 in oral instruction. Now that it is prohibited, other subjects, 
 especially in Infant Schools, must be substituted for it at the 
 annual examination. And those who know how difficult it is 
 to find time for the work required to be done in each School 
 year, will appreciate the danger lest the additional secular sub- 
 ject, which will replace Religious Knowledge in the Inspector's 
 programme, should displace it in the daily work of the Teacher. 
 Yet it will be with unfeigned reluctance that most of our 
 Teachers surrender one jot of the efficiency of that Religious
 
 6 
 
 Teaching into wliicli tlieir hearts are thrown. And they would 
 gladly welcome any machinery which would take off the stress 
 of an adverse pressure, against which human nature in the long 
 run can hardly be expected to bear up. It is hardly to be 
 doubted that Religious Instruction will be reduced to narrower 
 limits, given less effectively, in a more perfunctory manner, 
 if not actually abandoned, unless special steps be taken to 
 counteract these tendencies. For, to insist once more on the 
 facts. Religious Instruction will henceforth be conducted not 
 as before under the stimulus of able and generally sympathiz- 
 ing Inspection, levying a fine in case of default. It will have 
 to hold its own against being ignored, unrewarded, and even 
 pursued in competition with new and well paid accomplish- 
 ments. 
 
 If the natural results of this great change are to be 
 obviated, it can only be by the Church maintaining a ma- 
 chinery to which Teachers shall be able to look up with respect, 
 capable of organizing, inspecting, and possibly rewarding, 
 the Religious Instruction, with a regularity and uniformity of 
 standard approaching that they are likely to find in the 
 Government Inspection of their secular work. 
 
 The Clergyman to whom most frequently by the Trust 
 Deed the supervision of the Religious Teaching is committed, 
 who may have hitherto left it much to the Trained Teacher, 
 checked by the vigilance of H.M. Inspector, will now find 
 himself invested with duties which no one else can perform. 
 
 It will devolve on him to arrange, supervise, and in some 
 cases to give the Religious Instruction. He will have to throw 
 the weight of his office, of his frequent presence, and perhaps 
 of the School purse into the scale as a counterpoise. All the 
 while he may be conscious of his own want of technical 
 acquaintance with the science and art of Schoolmastery. And 
 he may be sensible how unequal a contest he is engaged in, 
 while endeavouring to protect the most important subject from
 
 the encroachment of more honoured and more remunerative 
 ones. 
 
 Certainly his position as the guardian of the Religious 
 Influences of the School will be much fortified, if his be not 
 isolated or independent action, but part of an organized system, 
 common to a whole district, and tested by periodical examina- 
 tion by an Inspector who shall carry weight with the Teacher. 
 
 In short, if the first object for which Parochial Schools 
 were founded is not to be defeated in detail, and suffer gradual 
 extinction, it will be necessary to secure an A7inual Religious 
 Inspection^ under Episcopal Authority, of all Church Schools 
 willing to receive it, conducted hy Inspectors qf wide ex- 
 perience ; who may act on a concerted plan ; carry weight 
 enough to give the key-note to the Teachers' work ; and assist 
 in harmonizing the duty they owe to the Church with that 
 which they have undertaken for the State. 
 
 It may admit of question whether, in addition. Managers 
 might not be encouraged to offer their Teachers some pe- 
 cuniary recognition of excellence reported by the Diocesan 
 Inspector, where the School funds admitted of it ; or (in the 
 event of entering upon new engagements, or their being able 
 to re-consider the existing ones), to make a small part of the 
 salary dependent on the same. This need not be large in 
 amount to be a very effective counterpoise to the heavy draw- 
 backs with which Religious Teaching will now be saddled ; 
 and will be in the nature of a payment for results, so far as 
 they can be ascertained by inspection. 
 
 Local and Voluntary Diocesan Inspectors may do some- 
 thing to carry out such a scheme. But from the necessarily 
 contracted field in which each operates, and the difficulty of 
 upholding the same standard, they would act at much dis- 
 advantage, and would, perhaps, fail to make the Inspection 
 universally received. In this Diocese, I fear, they would en-
 
 counter additional difficulties from the fact of its having so 
 long employed a single paid Inspector over its whole area. 
 
 I believe, therefore, that to ensure Diocesan Inspection 
 being systematic and regular, sufficiently influeiTtkl with 
 Teachers and prized by Managers, to enable it to hold its own 
 with Government Inspection, nothing short of professional 
 services will be required : each Diocesan Inspector being em- 
 ployed over a large area, in order that his standard of judg- 
 ment may be the result of a wide, varied, and growing ex- 
 perience ; being salaried in order to secure that the work shall 
 be done with regularity, and under that pressure of obligation 
 which voluntary services on a large scale can hardly have. 
 
 Such an agency of paid Diocesan Inspectors, besides an- 
 nually testing the condition of Religious Knowledge, and 
 giving it useful direction, would form an important channel of 
 communication with the Privy Council, and a means of ad- 
 justing difficulties likely to arise in consequence of the new 
 attitude which that Department will assume towards Religious 
 Instruction. 
 
 It would be better that Diocesan Inspection should hence- 
 forth abstain from inquiring into the secular attainments, 
 except in those Schools into which Government Inspection 
 does not penetrate. They would thus avoid any chance of 
 collision, each being confined to its own special field of action. 
 Diocesan Inspection would be thereby simplified. In a slight 
 degree the time required for it would be shortened. While 
 this limitation would widen the circle of those able and willing 
 to be employed as Diocesan Inspectors. 
 
 What, then, is the amount of work involved in such an 
 Annual Diocesan Inspection, by which alone, I venture to 
 think, the Church will be able to maintain and improve the 
 Religious Instruction in Parochial Schools ? 
 
 I can estimate it only in the Diocese with which 20 years 
 of Inspection has made me familiar ; and I must leave it for
 
 9 
 
 others to say how far the estimate will apply to other Dioceses, 
 mutatis mutandis. 
 
 Taking the whole number of School departments in the 
 Diocese at 500, experience would lead me to calculate that 450 
 might be expected to fall in with any well considered Scheme 
 of Diocesan Inspection. But I should further be led to expect 
 that circumstances would in any given year be likely to 
 diminish the number of visits actually paid to about 400. 
 
 Having regard to past experience, taking into account the 
 slight economy of time which the omission of all secular 
 subjects would effect, I reckon that on an average 2\ depart- 
 ments might be taken each day by an active Inspector. Many 
 of the Schools in Towns are grouped in triple departments, 
 and some separate Schools are small enough for an Inspector 
 to take two in the Morning and one in the Afternoon. This 
 would require 160 days or 32 whole weeks of Inspection, at 
 the rate of five days a week, to make an Annual Inspection of 
 the Diocese. 
 
 Such a work could not, however, be continuously carried 
 on through the year. It could begin no earlier than the 
 middle of November ; it would be liable to be suspended for 
 at least three weeks at Christmas, two at Easter, one at Whit- 
 suntide, and it must be terminated by the middle of July. I 
 do not, therefore, think that 32 whole weeks could possibly be 
 employed by one Inspector, even devoting to it all his time, so 
 long as he does not carry with him the consolations of the 
 purse, to reconcile a School to an unseasonable visit. 
 
 Perhaps the most hopeful way of distributing such work 
 would be to divide it unequally between two; a Senior Inspector 
 taking the correspondence, arrangement of work, attendance at 
 the Diocesan Board, examining Monitors, writing General 
 Reports, &c., as a set-off against the larger amount of Inspec- 
 tion deputed to the Junior. The Senior Inspector might thus 
 take in turn each third of the Diocese, deputing the remaining
 
 10 
 
 two thirds to his Junior. Both might be assisted in the 
 organization of the Inspection by a Diocesan Committee of 
 Inspection ; the weak point of the system hitherto pursued in 
 the Diocese of Canterbury having probably been that the 
 Inspector has been left too much — a law to himself — on his own 
 responsibility to organize, and carry on his own work. 
 
 The work of the Senior Inspector would then stand thus — 
 
 Inspection of 133 Schools at 2-| a day 53 days. 
 
 Attendance at Diocesan Board 5 „ 
 
 Two Examinations of Monitors 5 „ 
 
 Annual Report 10 „ 
 
 Correspondence, &c. — — 
 
 73 days. 
 The Junior Inspector would be limited to 
 
 Inspection of 266 Schools at 2J a day 107 days. 
 
 The important questions now arise at what cost, and by 
 what means provided, such a system could be carried on. 
 
 An answer to the first question may be based on the 
 present arrangement. For about the same work here assigned 
 to the Senior Inspector, the present Diocesan Inspector is 
 actually paid £200, out of which he finds travelhng expenses ; 
 an amount arrived at, as the result of successive changes dur- 
 ing 20 years, each one in favour of the Inspector. 
 
 I believe that in this Diocese, to one well placed, an allow- 
 ance of 10s. a day would about cover travelling expenses (such 
 is the hospitality of the Clergy), taking account of the 3rd class 
 Railway accommodation, and the vast number of Schools that 
 lie within a walk of a Station and of one another. For the 
 Junior Inspector I should propose a salary of £250, which would 
 include an allowance of £50 for expenses. He would be at 
 liberty to midertake Sunday duty, so that the ofiiee might be 
 highly acceptable to a young man of mark and of high work- 
 ing powers, who had been a short time in orders.
 
 11 
 
 The Scheme, which I have thus tentativel}" sketched out on 
 the most economical basis, would add to the sum now spent by 
 the Diocesan Board on Inspection not less than £250 a year. 
 
 How are such funds to be provided ? I venture to suggest 
 that there is no resource so available or so generally acceptable 
 as a Pastoral Letter, such as has been occasionally granted 
 by successive Archbishops to the Diocesan Education Society, 
 and has been for some years annually granted to the Diocesan 
 Church Building Society. It is probable that such an appeal 
 triennially would meet the whole additional expense, the col- 
 lections under the last Pastoral Letter for the Education 
 Society having amounted to about £1,000. 
 
 But as the additional calls on the Diocesan Board of 
 Education for help towards building and enlarging School- 
 rooms will probably be very urgent during the short period of 
 grace allowed for voluntary efforts, and still more urgent for 
 the few remaining months during which Building Grants are 
 still obtainable from the Privy Council ; a biennial Pastoral 
 Letter, should your Grace see fit to grant it, would not only 
 meet the additional cost imposed by this Scheme of Education, 
 but also place in the hands of the Board additional Funds, 
 sufficient to enable many parishes to embrace the last chance of 
 obtaining a School in connexion with the Church of England. 
 
 I may be permitted to add that time presses. A single 
 year during which the Religious Instruction was allowed to 
 languish for want of Inspection would not easily be redeemed. 
 Once thrust into a corner, it might be difficult to reinstate. 
 The present is a favourable moment for immediate action in 
 this^Diocese. The scheme of Inspection which has been acted 
 upon for the last six years has just run through its cycle. It 
 would, in any case, have to be revised, to meet the altered 
 prospects of Education. It would also be of good omen, 
 should the Metropolitical Diocese be able to point out the true 
 solution of a great religious difficulty for others to follow.
 
 12 
 
 So far as the circumstances of other Dioceses resemble 
 those of Canterbury, an estimated expense of £1 for 
 each School Department, and the same for every 1,000 
 of the population, would be incurred in establishing a 
 system of annual paid inspection. It is probable that 
 such an expenditure would not be grudged by the 
 Laity of the Church in general. It would be acceptable 
 to the Teachers of our Parochial Schools, and I should not 
 despair in times to come of its being even courted by some of 
 the Rate Schools. Such a scheme would gain in power and 
 organization, by being taken up in many Dioceses. And as 
 Clerical Inspectors are probably a thing of the past at the 
 Council Office, it would afford a means of enlisting and train- 
 ing up a body of Clergy with special aptitudes for this depart- 
 ment of ministerial work. 
 
 I will not anticipate the action of the National Society ; 
 which, however, might most effectively promote the objects for 
 which it was incorporated by stimulating and supplementing, 
 by Annual Grants, Diocesan efforts to maintain an effective 
 annual inspection of Religious Knowledge. 
 
 I forbear, too, from mixing up with this subject the ques- 
 tion of Sunday School organization, which is now likely to 
 assume additional importance ; because I have no special ex- 
 perience on which to go. I will only say that some cognizance of 
 the results of Sunday School teaching might easily be combined 
 with the scheme which I have ventured most humbly, but as 
 plainly as I could, to lay before your Grace, as the only 
 solution that occurs to me of a very anxious problem. 
 
 Your Grace's Faithful Servant, 
 
 B. F. SMITH. 
 The Most Reverend 
 
 The Lord Archbishop of Canterbury. 
 
 J. GIBBS, PRINTER, FAL4CE STREET, CANTERBURY.
 
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