character could not subsist in the absence of mental culture. As early
as 1647, Governor Winthrop sanctioned a measure [Footnote: This measure
provided that 'every township in this jurisdiction, after the Lord has
increased them to the number of 50 householders, shall then forthwith
appoint one within their town, to teach all such children as shall
resort to him, to write and read, whose wages shall be paid, either by
the parents or masters of such children, or by the inhabitants in
general, by way of supply.' And it was further ordered that 'when any
town shall increase to the number of one hundred families, or
householders, they shall set up a grammar school, the master thereof
being able to instruct youth so far as they may be fitted for the
University.'] which was the first school law ever passed in America, and
outlined just such a system as we now enjoy on an extended scale in
Canada. Wise men those stern Puritans of the early colonial times! It is
not surprising that intellectual food, so early provided for all
classes, should have nurtured at last an Emerson, an Everett, a
Hawthorne, a Wendell Philips, a Longfellow, a Lowell, a Howells, and a
Parkman.

After the Conquest the education of the people made but little progress
in Lower Canada. Education was confined for the most part to the Quebec
Seminary, and a few other institutions under the control of religious
communities, permitted to remain in the country. Lord Dorchester
appointed a Commission in 1787, to enquire into the whole subject, but
no practical results followed the step. In 1792 the Duke de
Rochefoucauld wrote that 'the Canadian who could read was regarded as a
phenomenon.' The attempt of the 'Royal Institution for the Advancement
of Learning' to establish schools was comparatively a failure; for after
an existence of twenty years it had only 37 schools, attended by 1,048
pupils altogether. The British Government, at no time after it came into