ABSTRACT
For the next twelve years events were too exciting for the generality of the nation to have much thought for education, however eagerly Mill and the Benthamites discussed it. 1 During this period there were no debates on English Education in either house of Parliament, though education in Ireland received a little notice from time to time. These were the years in which South America was freed from Spain and opened to English trade; when Greece cast off the Turks; when the disabilities were removed from Dissenters and Catholics; years of the building of the first railways; and of the agitations which led to the freeing of the slaves, and the reform of the Poor Law. Above all and dominating all was the massive movement for Parliamentary Reform.
