THE BIBLE IN SCHOOLS.

Evening Star, Issue 7252, 1 July 1887, Page 4

THE BIBLE IN SCHOOLS.

TO THE EDITOR. Sir,—lf the question at issue were less serious, it would be amusing to watch tho l antic efforts of the victims to that dire mental malady fanaticism. Goaded on by the wild spirit of bigotry by which they aro possessed, they eay and do much that " makes the judicious grieve.' 1 Utterly regardless of the lights and feelings of others, they seek to obtain for themselves the sole privileges of a national education. The cry for the Bible in schools is but an effort to insert tho thin end of tho wedge of denominationalism, which means a return to the sime form and mockery of education which obtained at the commencement of the present century, when sectarian ftudnand animosity formed an effectual barrier to the stream of knowledge—when the gaols were crowded, our laws wore Draconian, and the hangman was busy in the laid The class of which your correspondent " A Lover of the Book " i 3 atypical representative is the class that would, if it had the power, setup iron stakes in the Triangle or the Octagon and re-enact the fearful tragedies of old. The march of true civilisation has stripped bigotry of its rower to burn those whom it hates; but still it strives for the privilege to starve its opponents, for the honor and glory of its creeds. "A Lover of the Book " would not allow any one, no matter how well qualified in other respects, to tc a school teacher, unless ho b lieved the Bible whatever that term may mean. To be thoroughly logical, and true to his principles, he ought to extend tho same prohibition to all the profes'ions. No man should be a lawyer unless he believed the Bible, nor a doctor, nor a parson, of course, although there are scores even of the latter who don't believe a word of it in the same sense as your irate correspondent.

I do not believe in tho Bible as a class-book for children. I ask, in the name of csmiron senso and in tho love of moral purity, my fellow electors to pauso before they are led away by tho fanatical cries of disappointed and decaying bigotry. The blood of many mirtyrs has been shed to win the freedom we now enjoy, and I trust the good sense of the majority will prevent the possibility of retrogression—l am, etc., Charles J. Rab. Duncdin Souih, June 28.