The Daily News of yesterday informs us that Dr. Frederick
Wood has retired from his candidature for the University of London, and in doing so has encouraged his supporters to give their votes to Mr. Lowe, on the ground that Mr. Lowe will support the true Liberal view both in relation to the Irish Church Establishment and in relation to the education both of the middle and the lower classes. The Daily News says justly that Mr. Bagehot, who is a graduate of the University of London, which Mr. Lowe is not, will, " both on that ground, and by reason of his literary eminence and economic knowledge, receive a large amount of support from gentlemen of all shades of opinion." For our own parts, we believe him to take quite as liberal a view of the Irish-Church question as Dlr. Lowe, as sound a view of primary education, and a much sounder one of middle-class education. A statesman who thinks that the Universities should abdicate what is, after all, their highest function,—that of laying down the curriculum of liberal education,—and would let " parents,"—whom, by his own account, he regards as thinking so much of the till and the counting-house that they have no mind left for greater affairs,— replace them as a matter of " privilege and prerogative," is no typical representative for a University. Indeed, Mr. Lowe betrays no belief in intellectual culture at all. His idea of a University is the Useful Knowledge Society. In any case, we hope that the University will not publicly register her inability to choose a fit candidate from amongst her own graduates.
