The first meeting of the Scientific Society for the present winter session, 1901-02, was held at the Mansion House on the 9th inst., when the President, Councillor S. Edgar, J.P., delivered his inaugural address on popular education.
I appear before you as an adviser and sympathizer in the great work of education, and to press its importance from a national and individual point of view. It is necessary that I should notice the struggle which led up to our system of national education, and the effects of that struggle in promoting the cause of voluntary and co-operative education by the establishment of numberless societies similar to our own. The education of the masses is an idea that has dawned late upon the world. The ruling classes in this country had always an appreciation of the value of knowledge, and were careful to keep it to themselves, the Universities being only open to the wealthy and to members of the Established Church. The battle for national education in England during the first half of the 19th Century was a terrible uphill fight. Many interests were arrayed against it, both religious and commercial.
The great impetus given to our manufactories by the improvement in machinery called forth a huge amount of child-labour. And to this day it is remembered against the manufacturers that they opposed the Factory Acts, which partially relieved poor children from bondage. But the master difficulty was, and is yet, the religious difficulty. Both State Church and Dissent professed that the people should be educated bur each insisted that their own dogmas should be taught. The extension of the franchise in the boroughs sent a majority into Parliament determined upon passing a measure for national education, and by the perseverance and skill of Mr. Forster a Bill was passed.
Long before the Education Bill became Law, there had been a great movement for adult co-operative education, and under the guidance of Brougham, Erskine, and others, the London Mechanics Institute was established. This was only the beginning of a great number of similar institutions throughout the land. In vain did the Church decry these “hot-beds of schism and secular knowledge.” Once started the people gladly received the learning that could be gained from participating in these Institutes, etc. From these have evolved such societies as ours.
There have been others in Doncaster in past years, and a sketch of the history of two of these will conclude my address. The first historical order was the Doncaster Lyceum. I believe it was founded in the year 1836 by a committee of influential gentlemen. How long it flourished I am unable to say with certainty. I think it is probable it existed some nine or ten years. It was well supported by some of the gentry and tradesmen of the town and neighborhood. Their lectures were held monthly in the new concert room, and were mostly well attended, I believe there was a strong desire amongst members to have the use of the Mansion House for their meetings. I gather this from the report of a lecture by Dr. Lankester, of Campsall. His subject was “The Animal Kingdom.” The lecture was delivered in the room of the Lyceum, and only subscribers could be admitted because of the smallness of the premises, The lecturer regrated that the Town Council should still persist in refusing the use of the Mansion House to such a useful institution, which he said was like casting a slight, if not an insult, on such a respectable portion of the inhabitants as those composing the members of so useful an institution as the Lyceum. On the question of raising funds for building premises for the Lyceum, I gather from a reported speech of the secretary that 337 members’ names had been entered on their books since they began, and the then present number in the year 1838 of subscribing members was 258, of whom 64 were ladies.
At that time they had also a reading room, a library, and museum, and the Society was altogether in a very flourishing condition, so much so that local papers, in reporting the proceedings, always alluded to the Lyceum as “this respectable society.” From what I glean of its history I am afraid it was just a little too respectable to ensure any very lengthened longevity. Like other similar institutions it had its ups and downs. At first if gave very brilliant promise of success, and had the support and patronage of many of the leading townsmen. I have not been able to gather ant positive information as to its decay and final collapse. From an incident which occurred in its history, I fear it was very straight-laced in its orthodoxy. A young gentleman of the name Thorold Wood, from Campsall Hall, read a paper on Phrenology, in which he ventured some unconventional ideas regarding spirit matter, and fatalism. The lecture was able, but the discussion which followed the paper was anything by harmonious, and the treatment he received was not quite respectful, especially from such a respectable society. I don’t know whether the Society quite recovered itself from the shock. But I must leave the subject of the fortunes of the Lyceum to some future investigator, and those of my hearers who would wish to know more about them should consult the files of the “Doncaster Gazette” I the Reference Room of the Free Library.
The Lyceum had run its career before I knew anything about Doncaster, except as a town famous for race-horses and whose patron saint was “St. Leger.” But I can not close this paper without mentioning Doncaster Philosophical Society, with which I was personally connected, and also to which I was very much indebted for the opportunity it afforded me for acquiring much mental improvement and general information. During the twelve years of its existence I was a member and subscriber. It was established on the 27th July 1863. Its promoters held a preliminary meeting in one of the committee rooms of the Plant Railway works. Mr. George Raynor was in the chair, and there were present Frederick Parker, David Small, W. S. Smith, and several others. Mr. John Hawley was appointed president, and all through the existence of the Society was most indefatigable in the promotion of its interests. The Philosophical Society held its meetings in the Old County Court Room of the Guild Hall, It had a very wide circle of subjects, and long, varied, and interesting were the papers which were read and discussed by the members. Every real and imaginable phase of science. Literature, history, and economics was turned inside out and upside down, and investigated with keen and delightful earnestness. Nothing was tabooed accept
Party politics and Theology – the two dangerous rocks which, alas, have proved so fatal to so many laudable enterprises, and which all societies have found it so difficult to steer safely by, because they naturally impinge on nearly every subject interesting to humanity; and they will ever remain a danger until mankind learn to hear both sides of a subject without prejudice or intolerance. But with all the short-comings of the old Philosophical Society, I, who for twelve years participated in all its many advantages, would be ungrateful indeed if I were not to confess my deepest gratitude to that now defunct institution, which gave to me and many of my fellow townsmen the opportunity of much mental improvement.
Alas, the majority of its old members have now crossed that bourne from whence no traveler returns. I count only about a dozen who are left, five of whom are to-day members of the Town Council. Two have passed the Mayoral chair, and three have seats on the Borough Bench of Magistrates. All of these confess their gratitude to the old Alma Mater which gave them the mental stimulus to vault the barriers of class and share in the honour of administering public business.
In now coming to our own Society, which I look upon as the heir-at-law to all the others which have precede it, I congratulate you in falling into so great a heritage, to all the advancement which past ages have made you are the heirs and legal successors, but I would advise that we should not be content with the spoils others have won, but take what they have bequeathed merely as stepping-stones to higher heights of intellectual advancement.
Nature has yet unnumbered secrets to surrender to investigators, the value of which no human mind is able to appraise, and the value of which, great as they may be, do not outweigh the pleasures of research and the training which that research gives to the fibre of the human mind. A great German savant once gave expression to this thought in this way; If God were to offer him in one hand the choice of all knowledge, or in the other hand only the opportunity and ability of research, he should prefer the latter. But no great research can be made without proper opportunity and efficient appliances. The more come-at-able these advantages are the greater will be the chances to progress.
One of the greatest advantages in the centre of any important community is a good museum. In this matter, after much cogitation and wearisome delay. This Borough is now in possession of at least the nucleus of a museum. The Corporation has taken a first step in the matter by providing a room with useful fittings, though not quite adequate to safely encase all the valuable specimens which already are packed within the walls of the little room. It is wonderful how quickly these stores of interesting specimens have accumulated. Most of them are gratuitous presentations from their owners, the most valuable of which is the one presented by the family of the late Mr. John Hawley. This valuable acquisition will preserve the memory of the townsman who was through life an ardent student of Nature and a true friend to the cause of universal education. I trust our Borough will not rest content merely taking this first step but will ere long provide the inhabitants with a building worthy of the town and worthy of the home of art and science.
Ladies and Gentlemen, I am not here to-night as a teacher; I am only a fellow-student, a humble gleaner in the great field of Nature. I can bring not a sheaf, hardly a straw, at most only one grain, and that one grain of encouragement to those already better equipped for the work. Happily, in the present day there is little need to sing dithyrambs to the glory of science and art. Their importance is granted on all hands, and modern nations are contending with each other for the prizes they award. These awards with some are greater military adroitness in producing engines of destruction, with others greater commercial prosperity and social well-being. With the true humanitarian, the great reward is to take the individual in the extension of greater social happiness in the enlargement of the mind, in rising to higher zones of thought; to feel within himself that the human mind hath a principle within itself of perpetual growth. That it is essentially diffusive and made for progress. When such a one treads the geological departments of a museum, he can fancy he hears voices coming from the shores of the dead prehistoric past and vibrating on the shores of the living present, proclaiming the glory of the eternal Restorer, which is ever giving to past life a higher resurrection.