[School Inspector controversy]

/To the Editor of the Standard,/ Sir,--Your correspondent "Farmer" anent School Inspectors, evidently piques himself as an authority on this question, and would so impress your readers, if expansion or diffusion could be a factor, but unfortunately for him the depthis not there. A statement is easily made and it is one thing, but its logical accuracy is another and quite a different thing. Notice one or two things. "The Dr. says they, the Inspectors, are mere fossils of a receding age," and then he formulates, "will not this apply to old Doctors, old Lawyers, and others as well as old Inspectors?" and after giving this sally, he adds, "but with this we have nothing to do." If Doctors, &c., were salaried officers, there would be some force in the question; but the one is sustained in position by statute and can only be dismissed by a statutory course. The others, the Doctors, &c., old or young, are employed or rejected at the will of their individual employers. The farmer eager to /catch/, failed to notice the difference. Then take the sentence of the Minister of Education, "that water cannot rise above its level;" upon which over forty attenuated lines are written to show that the Minister of Education and myself are wrong in our deduction, for he says, ["it is regulated by forced laws, that it is material, but mind is immaterial, so to attempt for a moment to compare a material substance with that which is immaterial, is out of the question, and no wise man will ever seek to do it. As is the teacher so will be the scholar,"] &c. This little flourish no doubt tickles our Farmer immensley. To have annihilated the Minister of Education and the Doctor, with one flourish of his pen, is huge, but unfortunately for his logic, it is very bad, and is a sad comment upon his Biblical studies which abound in illustrations, to say nothing about our best scientists, or the evidences of every day life. Comparison and elucidation of immaterial subjects, within the bounds of finite minds must necessarily exist in use of those things, which are tangible; seen and felt; they may be approximate, fallacious, specuris or correct, but nevertheless necessary. Our ideas of size, capacity increase, beauty, light or darkness as applied to mind are gathered from the sources named, and by the Farmer's own argument therefore, he cannot be a wise man. He says, "many of our most learned men never were taught by man." In this statement he evidently gives no credit to eminent teachers who have written their thoughts in books, from which the pap of Farmer's "learned men" has been so abundantly drawn and so successfully digested. It will appear to the most superficial observer, that regarding the quotation of the Minister of Education, Farmer has floundered in a maze of incomprehensibles, and that it is, after all, logically true. The careless, impunctual, indifferent, lazy, ignorant Teacher or Inspector begets to the schools the same habits and visa versa. In some other things mentioned by this Farmer, I can very readily agree with him. Our whole system needs reformation; we have too much red-tape-ism. The governing principle is being rapidly taken from the people. The only parties now that can reach the ear of the administration are the Teachers' Associations. The Trustees are mere instruments, through which the behest of the authorities are carried out. As to the representation of farmers and kindred subjects I leave with him. I merely adopt the principle, if we must have Inspectors and pay them, let us have the best article, but that their utility is questionable, I admit. Dr. Christoe.