THOUGHTS OF LEADERS.

Press, Volume LVIII, Issue 17452, 12 May 1922, Page 12

THOUGHTS OF LEADERS.

RELIGIOUS TEACHING IN SCHOOLS.

(raoil OTJB OWN CORRESPONDENT.) LONDON. March 31. Bishop Welldon, on the Geddes recommendations as affecting education! "I am not sure that the moral gain of education in the last fifty, years has been equal to' the intellectual. It is probable that the war is responsible for the present outburst of grave offences, but I venture to urge that in all schools there should be. more teaching in patriotism. It is time to insist upon the duty of citizens to the State. I- sometimes wish persons who cry out against civilised government could live a few months among savages. Tho Public Schools, while, 1 think, they have to some extent failed on the intellectual side,-• have . yet_ encouraged the, spirit of good citizenship.- It is- pay earnest hope that the elementary schools, will not fall behind the Public I am convinced that the Lcnse of duty will never be adequately Impressed'upon the coming generation unless and until religious teaching becomes the recognised part of tho curriculum in all schools."

. The Sanctity of Human Life. The same speaker, on capital punishment : "I feel no doubt that the fact of capital punishment impresses the public mind in its sober moments, and so far rendets people indisposed to gratify their anger in such a way as might bring upon them the supreme penalty of the law. I think, too, it.is important to mark the d'stinciion between the' action of taking human life and otner acta which are also contrary to law. The sanctity of,human life is ono of those principles upon which society rests, and if it were not safeguarded by the supreme penalty imposed upon one who violates it, it would, I am afraid, fail to .be maintained against human interest and passions. . The point upon which I would insist, is that that human life m sacrosanct. He who destroys it commits the supreme offence against both God and. man. Whatever penalty he incurs should be higher, than the penalty inflicted for any other offence."

War's Effect on the Mind.' The i Bishop of Birminghamj. at a meeting : of the People's League l of, Health, on "The Mind and what we ■ ought to know about it" : • "I am grateful that you are getting the public to realise that there should be as much .care taken with regard to the mind as the body; that the mind has the some need for development that it should be'as reverently treated; that it is liable to many diseases, and that it has a great, central effect for the advancement and benefit of "humanity. • We are not, most. of. us* absolutely .normal. • War has hadits inevitable - effect, and-you can/.see .it in every direction. J think it .would be fair to -say we see- it in the- way in which people have not the same regard for human life that they had before the war. Wo want now to bring our country to what it was in some respects before the war, whilst in other respects we hope. it will be mentally improved."

; Ah Economic ; Lord Inciitcape', in a -letter "I certainly would never say that the* University training of a boy who turned out to be a poet was wasted. It would be a poor world without poetry. I have advocated economies in the cost of education, which I be-lieve-can be made'without in any way impairing efficiency.. The Geddes Committee was appointed id suggest economies in the spending departments, and this they have don ft. _ If the Government' do not see their way to carry out the whole of the-cuts recommended, that is their look-out, and the .tax-., payers' and- ratepayers willhave to (grin and bear it till their resources are: exhausted. In my somewhat tact with business and public affairs during,.half, a century of active work it must b© [ self-evident that I have suf-. fered no delusions as to the value cultivated intelligence among all grades of workers up and down the industrial ladder; In v the larger field of national activity and social life, at home. and overseas, there is no room for misapprehension as to the value of education. My personal efforts and those of, many others of equal responsibility whom I could name have aimed at hastening the country's post-war convalescence, and in this connexion I believe a bomparison of our ideals with thoso of the benevolent —-well-wishes of the community—among the leaders of Labour would disclose no wide difference. But with 2,000,000 people in the country without employment, supported by the taxpayer, while we are rapidly-eating u'p our capital, the time is not/far distant when even more drastic economics than those 1 ©commended by the Gedd/?s Committee will have .to be adopted » .we are to avoid -national Let all jealousies and political differences be sunk until such time as we get back to something approaching normal conditions. Let us remember that we are engaged in another war, though not with foot, horse, and artillery, o.r ,in the air or on the sea, but that we are fighting now for. our economic lives, and that-we shall'only win th© present war if we stand shoulder to shoulder as we did in .the late conflict. It is to be fervently hoped that the Prima Minister will go to Genoa with the full confidence not only of: the House of Commons, but with that of the country, in his patriotic and farseeing desire to bring about, the reconstruction of & devastated and moribund Europe."

Literature and the Printing Press. : Mr J'. Mricl>ehose (president of the Federation of Master l'rinters of Great Britain and Ireland): . , . "Printing has widened the portals of literature in a way that it is perhaps 1 difficult to -realise* Printing has transformed the work and the opportunities of. the scholar and of every individual in the country. People were perhaps apt to think' that because tihere were I great libraries in the old days, and literature and philosophy flourished to luxuriantly, every citizen \Vns a bcholav or a poet. But it - was : not ao. Th<» inspiration and relaxation of literature were confined to a narrow. circle, and. although there were peat libraries, access to them was difficult, and to-day the humblest sdholar, however abstruse his subjects, could feel that there was an open door to a great library awaiting him. # That change was due. to she printing industry. While it was true it had enormously multiplied the opportunities of reading, it was a very interesting and difficult question whether it had heightened the standard of literature. When comparing standards, the better literature has a longer life; the contemporary was apt to look at the very large amount produced in the present day by the printing press, ana to think that the general average, was not high. The older time had very inferior literature aJso, but in the waste of,time only the great outstanding things remained. It was said that when there were a large number of people working at heart that the one helped- to encourage' and. inspire the other, and that the work of Michael Angelo or Raphael would not have-been as groat if they had not had fellow-craftsmen who. perhaps unconsciously, encouraged and inspired them. If that was true, even though they knew that the poet was born and not made, one might have expected that there would have been a larger number of great works in.

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literature in recent years. The world waited long for a Pinto, or I>jnte, or Shakespeare, and in 1922, when we look, back upon the great names of the last century, we are apt to think that our , competitors in the last- generation - were few."