Established 1866. The Marlborough Express PUBLISHED EVERY EVENING. Friday, August 15, 1902. THE FRENCH EDUCATION TROUBLE.

Marlborough Express, Volume XXXVI, Issue 188, 15 August 1902, Page 2

Established 1866. The Marlborough Express PUBLISHED EVERY EVENING. Friday, August 15, 1902. THE FRENCH EDUCATION TROUBLE.

TnE French Government appears determined to push its policy of aggressive secularism to the borders of prosecution, indeed, unless the reports which are coming to hand on the subject are grossly exaggerated the border line between legitimate State interference with religious institutions and downright tyranny have already been passed. Up to a certain point there may have been good cause for the campaign which has been carried on against the members of the monastic orders, but to harshly decree that Frenchmen shall not, even if they so desire, send their children to schools conducted under the control of the church is surely carrying secularism too far altogether. Already there are signs of revolt in certain districts, such as Brittany, where the peasants are deeply attached to the church of their fathers, and both military and civic officials have refused on conscion tiom grounds to carry out instructions which they deemed tyrannical. It is a curious thing in France that politians have as a class, for the past thirty years or so, been active secularists, whereas in the hearts of the people there is a very strong feeling in favour of the church. Especially is this feeling strong amongst the peasant class, from whom the vast majority of the priests are drawn, and although the nation, as a whole, may have considered it wise on the part of the Government to break up certain monastic orders, to close their establishments, and to confiscate, in some instances, the bulk of their property, it will not, we fancy, long remain silent when matters are, as they are now, being pushed to extremes. Priestcraft may in the past ages have been an evil influence in France, but the Church of to-day has no chance of overturning the secular power, and it seems to us that to endeavor to stamp out all religious education simply because in the past some of the monastic orders may have inspired or been concerned in political intrigues is a step which is entirely unjustifiable. The indirect effects of this persecution may in time be very injurious to the Republican cause. Already the so-called "Nationalists," whose ranks include Royalists, Bonapartists, and other enemies of the Republic, are utilising the popular indignation caused by the recent decrees of Monsieur Coombes, the Minister of Education and Public Worship, and at the next elections the consequence may very naturally be that the Anti-Republican party in the Chamber of Deputies will be very much stronger—so much stronger, it may be, that it may seriously embarrass the Government. With all its faults the Third Republic has been the best form of government that France has enjoyed, and it would be a very great pity were the heads of the Republican Government to needlessly affront public opinion, and thus play into the hands of its enemies. And yet this, apparently, is precisely what is now being done.