The Survival of the Public Schools That some contact with
the problems • of our time is needed at public schools was implied in an interesting speech made by Sir Walter Moberly last Saturday when opening 'the new boarding-house at Mill Hill School. He was asking whether the day of the public schools was over and whether they must disappear in the demo- cratic State. Certainly they would • disappear; in his view, if they were content to live' on their past. a difficult world full of possibilities of disaster boys must learn to be ahead of the previous generation. If it is true that the public schools in some. respects at least need reforming, must we not conclude that that depends on two conditions : first, :the reform of their parents—that is to say, the social milieu from which. the boys come—and secondly, the reform of the masters,. who collectively do so much to shape the character of a school ? It may not be desirable that the latter should fail to live the " theoretic " life ; but that life is not incompatible with ardent interest in the practical. public affairs of our own time.
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