Report of the Superintendent of Public Instruction

dom of the majority. The University has been benefitted rather than injured by the organization of other institutions, and the cause of liberal learning has been promoted by their labors. A little reflection will show that this result is reasonable, and demonstrate that there is no real or necessary conflict of interest between the University and other Colleges.

The chief, if not the only valid argument for one College, instead of several, in a State, is that the concentration of funds and efforts may create one great and commanding institution, while the division of the same funds and efforts among several Colleges, would leave them all small and feeble. This argument assumes, first, that all the College funds and interest in the State can be collected in one great central enterprise; whereas, it is notorious that none of the funds of the private Colleges could be thus collected. They are donated as a special gift to the College whose existence called them forth.

It assumes, also, that there are funds and pupils for only one great and worthy institution; for certainly if we can have two great Colleges, two are better than one. They would more than double the benefits of the one.

The argument has exactly this force, and no more-in the infancy of a State, when men and means are few, it is better to concentrate all efforts, if practicable, on one institution, than to scatter them among several. But when the State has grown rich and populous, and the ability and need exist for additional Colleges, the argument expires by its own limitation, and falls to the ground.

But there is an argument on the other side, of far higher reach and more enduring force. The wider diffusion of high educational facilities, and the grander extension of educational influences and activities, will amply compensate for the larger expenditure of means. Each new institution becomes a centre of light and influence in the region in which it stands, and kindles the sacred love of learning in thousands of minds which had else remained in undisturbed and unblest ignorance forever. It is by no means true, as some seem to believe, that

all the students in the several Colleges might have been drawn to the University. As well conclude that all the business of the several railroads would have found its way to the great Central road, if that had been permitted to remain the sole great thoroughfare of the State. Who does not know that each new road has opened up and peopled a new section of the State, and thus called in and created a business for itself? The Central road, instead of having its trade diminished by the com petition of the others, has been largely benefitted by the gen eral growth to which it and they alike have ministered. So, too, by the establishment of other Colleges, the public intelligence has been largely increased, while the University has been helped rather than injured, by their coöperation in the same field. Judging by all the facts that have come under my own observation, I do not hesitate to affirm that for every student these Colleges have retained from the University, they have sent at least three to its halls; while they have educated hundreds of youth who, but for them, would have remained uneducated.

Nor does the argument end here. The mutual stimulation, and reciprocal and wholesome restraints exercised by these institutions over each other, afford no small security for their purity and fidelity. Even their mutual jealousies help to defend the public interests, while their more generous rivalries stir them to higher efforts for public good. I cannot believe that any true friend of learning, after profoundly pondering this question, would wish to confine the entire College work of the State to one institution, however magnificent. But if there are those who still look with regret at the other Colleges now rising into power in our State, let them reflect that the local interests and local pride of the several sections will not permit the shutting up of the entire State to one great central institution of learning. Each great section will certainly demand in time its own College as well as its own railroad. Nor is it reasonable to suppose that Christianity will forget her instincts of

eighteen centuries growth, and consent to hand over to the secular power the grandest of all her fields of labor. She must learn to forget all the traditions of the past, and consent to forego all the promise of the future, ere she shall cease to endow institutions for the education of the young and for the increase of Christian learning. It is the Christianity, not the sectarianism, of the Christian sects, that leads them to build Christian schools, and it is a fact well known that while these schools are Christian, they are rarely or never improperly or offensively sectarian.

Experience has proved that we need not fear an undue and dangerous multiplication of these Colleges. The great law of supply and demand, governing other departments of human enterprise, rules also here. If established before they are needed, they are built only to die. No more will remain than the public want demands, and the public patronage and Christian liberality will support.

I have never believed that one University could ultimately, or for any long time, meet the demand for college instruction in this State. Even now, its classes are crowded for room, although several other Colleges are furnishing instruction to large numbers of students. When the population of the State shall have doubled, and its wealth increased fourfold-when its Preparatory and High Schools, already multiplying so rapidly in numbers and power," shall double the candidates for college instruction, and when, especially, the advancing spirit of liberal learning shall come to prevail, as it will, through all our borders, then we must look to these Christian Colleges to rise up and help the University in its great work. If Germany supports twenty four great Universities, and over four hundred Gymnasia, besides all her normal schools, agricultural, polytechnic, mining and military Colleges, certainly we may look to see other great institutions rising into power and usefulness, to grace our goodly commonwealth with the pure splendors of their light.

In arguing thus this question of higher edueation, which I

have done not from any especial interest in any of the Colleges now existing, but from a profound regard for the great future of our State, I would by no means be quoted as favoring the hasty assumption of the high name and office of College by small and feeble institutions. That School does a gross and irreparable wrong, which, under the high sounding title of College, allures young men to its halls, and, by reason of its meager and inadequate means of instruction, fails to give them for their four years of toilsome study, the learning they crave. In vain would the cheated intellect cry out to such an institution, "give me back my misspent time-my stolen youth." In vain would society ask of it, "restore me my noblest sons whose promising minds have been hopelessly marred." I am happy in the belief that we have now no School obnoxious to this severe indictment.

It is but just to the Colleges of Michigan to state, in this connection, that while often embarrassed for want of adequate endowments, they represent, through the generous and selfsacrificing spirit of their faculties, a much larger capital than their financial statements exhibit. These Christian teachers not only give their services for salaries of half the ordinary amount paid in wealthier institutions, but they often do double the ordinary work; and thus make the stinted incomes of the institutions they serve, like the loaves and fishes in the great miracle of Christ, to become the abundant food of hungering thousands.

PRIMARY SCHOOL STATISTICS.

The following summaries, collected from the annual reports of the School Inspectors for the year ending the first Monday of September last, exhibit the school statistics for the year. For the purpose of making the comparison easy, the statistics of the previous year are republished in. a parallel column:

"" attending school,......

16 having graded schools,.

reporting over 100 children, and therefore allowed by law to organize graded schools,. No. of children between 5 and 20 years of age,

"6 under 5 and over 20 years attending school,. Average number of months the schools were taught, the union schools were taught,. Average attendance of pupils in months,. No. of male teachers employed,...

66 female

Total number of qualified teachers employed,
Average wages per month paid to male teachers,..
female teachers,.
Number of candidates examined by inspectors,..

แ

No. of meetings of inspectors,...

visits made to schools by inspectors,
townships reporting all the schools visited,.

116

124