SCHOOLS DEFENCE LEAGUE.

Press, Volume L, Issue 15022, 17 July 1914, Page 9

SCHOOLS DEFENCE LEAGUE.

AN OPEN-AIR MEETING.

Tho Canterbury Natio. al School. Defence League are organishig a big meeting agaiust the -leferendum Bill. Dr. Chilton will preside, and tho -peakers will be tho lion. J. Barri tho Rev. T. A. Williams, and Mr J. Caughley. Tho meeting will bo held iv Victoria isquaro c_ Sunday afternoon, at 3 o'clock.

IO THE Eortoa 0. "the pbsss."

Sir,—l understand that the second reading of tho Bill dealing with this subject is set do .tti for Tuesday next. 1 recommend tho following quotation from the "Daily News" as an appropriate "Thoufthfc for the Day":— "The proposition that a majority of tho electors is a suiScient authority for abolishing by a mens act of fore© any legal right or any liberty possessed by . the miQOrity is the most dangerous ever put forward in a State. It empties all law of meaning, and therefore of rover- ' __co. No citizen can be called upon to " respect a law whoa it avowedly lies al- ' ways at tho mercy of tho caprice, the pa_sion, or tbo interest of the momentarily stronger."—Yours, etc., *■._...'7 CH>US. (JmLTON.

TO THE _. ITOIt O- "THE PBE-S." '• , Sir,—f fiotico your correspondents , have been treating, us to a vast amount of mutual recrimination, and much q .fbblhag, in dealing with this great 'question. I may «_y, the. ono great question of all others which most profoundly concerns us as-nation-builders, -TOO to the glorious traditions and prestige of our race and Empire. For withottt tho Bible thero would be very little, ' indeed, heard or knotrn of "Britons beyond tbo seas." Onco givo up ©thd * Bible to tho tender mercies of its traditional enemies (they who burned rt when they dared), and wo shall _oon he sunk as low in national degradation and ignorance as Italy, Spain, and-Other na. .ijOns Bible is not porffiitted to ''bo read by the people. Tho known one--mies of Bible-roadiqg are leaving nothing undono to bring 6nch a __sfort one ' upon us and our country. In your ' ■ issue of last Monday they occupy fully four columns of your valuable Epace with quibbling _o close that tboy quite seem to havo imposed on themselves. But. no; that emanation is buf;intended to draw the red herring across the . went. It is" an exemplification of the fact that the party described in tho 37th chapter of tho Revelation of .St, r Jcbn the Divino is a. resourceful as ever. So, let us b9warol Let ns re- ■ member that tho Biblo is the true _> cret of England's greatness—tho .print; •and inspiration of that righteousness which alike esalteth tho individual and ": the nation. Shame uflon the enemies of tho Bible, which through the rolling 1 centuries has been tho groat uplifter of the human race; which God has eujoincd npon us to teach our children , diligently, and npon tho reading of which Ho has pronounced His.blessing. Therefore*, bo it known to all concerned that as a community we aro quit© prepared to fight its battlo to the bitter .end. Lot mo couclude by saying that I, too. beg to protest against the utterance of the Hon. John Barr, to tbo . effect that tho ladies are "carried away by tho arguments of Canon Garland and bis brothers-in-arms." It is tho other w. y about. Tho leaders of the Pe'ble-iii-Schools League are defending living principles in which those ladies wore nurtured at tbeir mothers' knee— a.fact of which Mr Barr seems strangely ignorant, considering the circle iv .which the hon. gentleman is supposed . .to move. Thanking you in anticipation.—Yours, etc, W. L. CHRYSTALL.