Letter Signed "W. Sidney Smith" to unnamed correspondent(s)
Letter in copperplate signed by Smith and with the subscription (corrected) in his hand, three pages, folio, chipped, edges dingy, tear on fold of bifoliate, some marking, but minimal loss of text which is legible. He is promoting the "enlightened and benevolent views of the Chevalier Jullien towards the establishment and developement [sic, indicating a French writer?] of the most improved and simpmlified methods of Education". He hopes that he can persuade his correspondent to promote Jullien's system. "His political principles are those of a national lover of civil liberty consequently an opposer . . . of the Revolutionary Doctrines which as being antisocial and (to use one of their new fangled expressions) 'liberticide' were most obnoxious to him. Victim of those political principles under the reign of the Child and Champion of Jacobinism he sought his consolation in literary pursuits . . ." He describes his benevolent nationalism, and his looking "to the improvement of the rising generation by means of a rational and liberal education." The correction to the subscription involves a change for "your Royal Highness's most obedient servant" to "Your sincere friend & most, etc." (From a website): "Chevalier Jullien, regarded by many as the 'father of comparative education'". Note: This item was originally part of a massive archive of material acquired by Richard Bentley and made available to John Barrow for his biography of Smith.