one representative, and against another.  And, gracious goodness! what will become of us if the refractory sheep should get as high as the generalities of history, or the speculations of philosophy?—­if he should begin to stir important questions, to inquire into great truths, to refute sophisms, to point out abuses, to demand rights?  The shepherd’s occupation is assuredly not all roses from the day he finds it necessary to muzzle his flock.

Sovereigns who are not Popes have nothing to fear from the progress of enlightenment, for their interest does not lie in the fabrication of saints, but in the making of men.  In France, England, Piedmont, and some other countries, the Governments urge, or even oblige the people to seek instruction.  This is because a power which is based on reason has no fear of being discussed.  Because the acts of a really national administration have no reason to dread the inquiry of the nation.  Because it is not only a nobler but an easier task to govern reflecting beings than mere brutes,—­always supposing the Government to be in the right.  Because education softens men’s manners, eradicates their evil instincts, reduces the average of crime, and simplifies the policeman’s duty.  Because science applied to manufactures will, in a few years, increase a hundredfold the prosperity of the nation, the wealth of the State, and the resources of power.

Because the discoveries of pure science, good books, and all the higher productions of the mind, even when they are not sources of material profit, are an honour to a country, the splendour of an age, and the glory of a Sovereign.

All the princes in Europe, with the single exception of the Pope, limit their views to the things of the earth; and they do wisely.  Without raising a doubt as to a future existence in another and a better world, they govern their subjects only with regard to this life.  They seek to obtain for them all the happiness of which man is capable here below; they labour to render him as perfect as he can be as long as he retains this poor “mortal coil.”  We should regard them as mauvais plaisants if they were to think it their duty to make for us the trials of Job, while showing us a future prospect of eternal bliss.

But the fact is that our emperors and kings and lay sovereigns are men with wives and children, personally interested in the education of the rising generation, and the future of their people.  A good Pope, on the contrary, has no other object but to gain Heaven himself, and to drag up a hundred and thirty millions of men after him.  Thus it is that his subjects can with an ill grace ask of him those temporal advantages which secular princes feel bound to offer their subjects spontaneously.

In the Papal States the schools for the lower classes are both few and far between.  The government does nothing to increase either their number or their usefulness, the parishes being obliged to maintain them; and even this source is sometimes cut off, for not unfrequently the minister disallows this heading in the municipal budget, and pockets the money himself.  In addition to this, secondary teaching, excepting in the colleges, exists but in name; and I should advise any father who wishes his son’s education to extend beyond the catechism, to send him into Piedmont.