by the President of the Board of Education show that he, at any rate, admits the criticism to be well grounded.  A system which compels a child to attend school until he is fourteen and then leaves him to his own resources can do little to create, and less to satisfy, a thirst for knowledge.  During the most critical years of his life—­fourteen to eighteen—­he is left without guidance, without discipline, without ideals, often without even the desire of remembering or using the little he knows.  He is led, as it were, to the threshold of the temple, but the fast-closed door forbids him to enter and behold the glories of the interior.  Year by year there is an appalling waste of good human material; and thousands of those whom nature intended to be captains of industry are relegated, in consequence of undeveloped or imperfectly trained capacity, to the ranks, or become hewers of wood and drawers of water.  Many drift with other groups of human wastage to the unemployed, thence to the unemployable, and so to the gutter and the grave.  The poor we have always with us; but the wastrel—­like the pauper—­“is a work of art, the creation of wasteful sympathy and legislative inefficiency.”

We must be careful, however, in speaking of “the State” to avoid the error of supposing that it is a divinely appointed entity, endowed with power and wisdom from on high.  It is, in short, the nation in miniature.  Even if the Legislature were composed exclusively of the highest wisdom, the most enlightened patriotism in the country, its enactments must needs fall short of its own standards, and be but little in advance of those of the average of the nation.  It must still acknowledge with Solon.  “These are not the best laws I could make, but they are the best which my nation is fitted to receive.”  We cannot blame the State without, in fact, condemning ourselves.  The absence of any widespread enthusiasm for education, or appreciation of its possibilities; the claims of vested interests; the exigencies of Party Government; and, above all, the murderous tenacity of individual rights have proved well-nigh insuperable obstacles in the path of true educational reform.  On the whole we have received as good laws as we have deserved.  The changed conditions due to the war, and the changed temper of the nation afford a unique opportunity for wiser counsels, and—­to some extent—­guarantee that they shall receive careful and sympathetic consideration.

It may be objected, however, that in taking the teaching profession to exemplify the duty of the State to assume responsibility for both individual and community, we have chosen a case which is exceptional rather than typical; that many, perhaps most, of the other vocations may be safely left to themselves, or, at least left to develop along their own lines with the minimum of State interference.  It cannot be denied that there is force in these objections.  It should suffice, however, to remark that, if the duty of the State to secure the efficiency of its members in their several callings be admitted, the question of the extent to which, and the manner in which control is exercised is one of detail rather than of principle, and may therefore be settled by the common sense and practical experience of the parties chiefly concerned.