Excerpt from The Public Statutes of Massachusetts Relating to Public Instruction: With Annotations and Explanations, Including the Laws in Force, December 31, 1888 Lord Macaulay once said in Parliament: Illustrious for ever ln history were the founders of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts though their love of freedom of conscience was illimitable and indestructible they could see nothing servile or degrading in the principle that the State should take upon itself the charge of the education of the people. In the year 1642 they passed their first legislative enactment on this subject, in the preamble of which they distinctly pledged themselves to this principle, that education is a matter of the deepest pos sible importance and the greatest possible interest to all nations and to all communities, and that as such it is, in an eminent degree, deserving of the peculiar attention of the State. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.