Part 14 (2/2)

His environment after 1844 strengthened and developed his natural tendency to be autocratic. He worked like a giant. He created the Education Department, appointed his subordinates, was his own finance minister, established a Normal School and appointed its instructors, nominated members of a Council of Public Instruction who often did little more than formally register his decrees, organized a book and map depository and an educational museum, edited an educational journal in which he published his decrees, and prepared legislation for successive Legislatures having comparatively few members competent to criticize school administration. He administered one of the largest spending Departments of Government, and ruled somewhat rigorously a score of subordinates, and yet, for many years, was not subject to any check except the nominal one of the Governor-General, and later of the Governor-General-in-Council.

When he visited District or County Conventions he came as a lawgiver, either to explain existing regulations, promulgate new ones, or obtain a.s.sent to those for which he wished to secure legislation. Only after the Grammar Schools had become efficient did Ryerson meet at Teachers'

Conventions men who were intellectually his equals and who were ready to criticize his policy, and, when necessary, give him wholesome advice.

Had Ryerson been a responsible Minister with a seat in the Legislature, either his nature would have been modified or he would have failed, probably the latter.

This would seem to lead to the conclusion that Ryerson after all was not a statesman, since a statesman must, in our age, carry out his measures and at the same time retain the confidence of his colleagues and the electors. But this is just what Ryerson did, although he did not do it directly through the Legislature. He appealed to a Court beyond the Legislature--the whole body of intelligent men and women of Upper Canada--and this Court sustained him in his work for thirty-two years, during which time it is doubtful if any single const.i.tuency in the country would have elected him to two successive Parliaments. If this be true we may safely a.s.sume that it was a happy chance which gave us a non-political Education Department during our formative period.

Ryerson's greatest admirers can scarcely claim that he was a scholar.

This was his misfortune and not his fault. He never failed to embrace whatever opportunities for intellectual improvement came in his way. His reading of history was broad and discriminating. He had little interest in anything that did not bear somewhat directly upon the problem of human virtue. Consequently his interests centred largely in civil government and theology.

Nor can we claim for Ryerson that he introduced original legislation.

Hardly anything in our system of education was of his invention. New England, New York, Germany, and Ireland gave him his models, and his genius was shown in the skill with which he adapted these to suit the needs of Upper Canada. Even in the details of his school legislation, especially that relating to High Schools, Ryerson adopted suggestions of men more competent than himself to form a judgment. To say this in no way detracts from the man's greatness. Little after all in modern legislation is actually new, and to say of a man that he is successful in using other men's ideas is often to give him the highest praise.

In one department of work Ryerson stood in a cla.s.s by himself. He was without a peer as an administrator. His intensely practical mind was quick to discover the shortest route between end and means. His energy, his system and attention to details, his broad personal knowledge of actual conditions, his capacity for long periods of effort, his thrift, his courteous treatment of subordinates, and even his sensitiveness to criticism were factors which enabled him to administer the most difficult Department of the Government with ease and smoothness.

The history of Upper Canada during a period of nearly sixty years is as much bound up with the labours of Egerton Ryerson as with the work of any other public man. He gave us lofty ideals of the meaning and purpose of life, and he had an abiding faith in the power of popular education to aid in a realization of these ideals; he fought for free schools in Upper Canada when they needed a valiant champion. Let the present generation of men and women honour the memory of the man who wrought so faithfully for their fathers and grandfathers.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Doc.u.mentary History of Education in Upper Canada. 28 vols. Dr. J.

Geo. Hodgins.

Story of My Life. Egerton Ryerson. Edited by Dr. J. Geo. Hodgins.

Egerton Ryerson. Chancellor Burwash.

Loyalists of America. 2 vols. Egerton Ryerson.

Ryerson Memorial Volume. Edited by Dr. J. Geo. Hodgins.

History of Upper Canada College. Princ.i.p.al d.i.c.kson.

Journals of a.s.sembly of Upper Canada, Legislative Library, Toronto.

Journal of Education, 1848-1876. 29 vols. Library of Parliament, Ottawa.

Ryerson's Special Reports on European Schools. Library of Parliament, Ottawa.

Ryerson's Annual School Reports, 1845-1876. Library of Parliament, Ottawa.

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