An address having been delivered by the Lord Chancellor, Lord Selborne, Chairman of the Committee of the Institute, the Prince of Wales delivered the following speech, which more clearly presents the whole subject, and brings out its national importance:--
"My Lord Chancellor, my Lords, Ladies, and Gentlemen,--I thank you for your address, and beg leave to assure you that it gives me much satisfaction to attend here to-day to lay the foundation stone of an institution which gives such forcible expression to one of the most important needs in the education of persons who are destined to take part in the productive history of this country.
"Hitherto English teaching has chiefly relied on training the intellectual faculties, so as to adapt men to apply their intelligence in any occupation of life to which they may be called; and this general discipline of the mind has on the whole been found sufficient until recent times; but during the last thirty years the competition of other nations, even in manufactures which once were exclusively carried on in this kingdom, has been very severe. The great progress that has been made in the means of locomotion as well as in the application of steam for the purposes of life has distributed the raw materials of industry all over the world, and has economized time and labour in their conversion to objects of utility. Other nations which did not possess in such abundance as Great Britain coal, the source of power, and iron, the essence of strength, compensated for the want of raw material by the technical education of their industrial classes, and this country has, therefore, seen manufactures springing up everywhere, guided by the trained intelligence thus created. Both in Europe and in America technical colleges for teaching, not the practice, but the principles of science and art involved in particular industries, had been organized in all the leading centres of industry.
"England is now thoroughly aware of the necessity for supplementing her educational institutions by colleges of a like nature. Most of our great manufacturing towns have either started or have already erected their colleges of science and art. In only a few instances, however, have they become developed into schools for systematic technical instruction. This building, which is to be erected by the City and Guilds of London, will be of considerable benefit to the whole kingdom, not only as an example of the institute devoting itself to technical training, but as a focus likewise for uniting the different technical schools in the Metropolis already in existence, and a central establishment also to which promising students from the provinces may, by the aid of scholarships, he brought to benefit by the superior instruction which London can command. While studying at your institution, they will have the further advantages that the treasures of the South Kensington Museum and the numerous collections in the City may bring to bear on the artistic and scientific education of future manufacturers.