NOTES AND COMMENTS.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXI, Issue 18630, 11 February 1924, Page 6

NOTES AND COMMENTS.

EDUCATION AND RELIGION The importance of education is urged by Dr. L. P. Jacks, principal of Manchester College, Oxford, in "A Living Universe." He says that in » few years the whole community of the next generation will pass through the schools. "If the whole community is set wrong in its education, what chances have the clergy of being able to set it right from the pulpit ? What are the chances of legislation To begin by starting the community on the wrong road, in the plastic period, and then, when it is grown up, to send out the parson and the policeman to bring it back —what fool's enterprise could compare with that? "In the best educational practice of the day the watchword is continuity. The function of primary education is to lead on to secondary, and of secondary to lead on to higher. And the function of all three together is to lead on to that highest education which comes from a faithful performance of the work of life, and to that very highest which teaches men obedience through the things they suffer— lesson of the Cross. That all education should be religious we have often been told. It is equally true that all religion should be educational —a point that is sometimes overlooked. The highest education is religion. It needs to be prepared for by the three kinds which precede it. That which begins as primary education should end in religion. That which ends as religion should begin in primary education. Religion might be defined as education raised to its highest power." RELIGION FROM WITHIN. Dr. Jacks says education and religion are indivisibly one, and you can have no reality in either unless you have reality in the other. Ho explains what he means by reality in education by quoting the answer given by a great schoolmaster whom he asked what place religion had in his time-table. "W»i teach it all day long," he answered. 'We teach it in arithmetic, by accuracy. We teach it in language, by learning to say what we mean'yea, yea, and nay, nay.' We teach it in history, by humanity. We' teach it in geography, by breadth of mind. We teach it in handicraft, by thoroughness. We teach it in astronomy, by reverence. We teach it in the playground, by fair play. We teach it by kindness to animals, by courtesy to servants, by good manners to one another, and 'by truthfulness in all things. We teach it by showing the children that we, their elders, are their friends, and not their enemies. We treat the children, not as members of this church or that, but as members of the school, and we show them that, as members of the school, in work and in play, they are members of one another. We teach them to build the Church of Christ out of the actual relations in which they stand to their teachers and their schoolfellows, because we believe that unless they learn to build it where they are they will not learn to build it afterwards anywhere else. I do not want religion brought into this school from outside," he added. ''What we have of it we grow ourselves." INDIA'S GOVERNMENT. To expect native India in the mass suddenly and from nowhere to possess itself of sane political ideals would be to expect a miracle, writes Lord Inchcape in the Spectator. But it is impossible that a century of active British administration, British justice and British protection against internecine strife should not have created in the breast of educated Indians tho desire, latent in all men of all races, for greater self-expression. That conception was bound to arise, and having fostered it, our trust must be, with sympathy, with understanding, forbearance and a good deal of patient indulgence, to help India toward the fulfilment of her destiny among the peoples of the world. It must be recognised that 99 per cent, of India is mute, while the over-articulate part is not yet wholly wise. India, as to the mass of her people is, politically and socially, practically in swaddling clothes. Her greatest and most stable asset, British Government apart, is perhaps that the outlook of her native princes and rulers on questions of government has changed from the autocratic*.conception of former times, and has, partly by contact with Western ideals and institutions, and partly from ether causes, been replaced by more liberal and enlightened views, both as to the privileges and the duties of rulers. India's security from internal warfare and outside aggression, and the welfare of her people, are now and will for many generations continue to be dependent on the Central Government with at its head the Viceroy, representing the Sovereign of Great Britain. Sensible Indians recognise this, and realise, that anything else ] would epell anarchy, chaos and bloodshed throughout the country.

WEALTH AND CREDIT. In the desire to deal with unemployment and other economic problems along Socialistic lines there are two great points which Labour fails to grasp, says Mr. A. W. Kiddy in the Spectator. The first error is, perhaps, more or less recognised by the more intelligent in the ranks of Labour itself, but I doubt if the second is ever thought about. The first error is that of supposing that the situa. tion can be relieved by a mere distribution of existing wealth, whereas the prime necessity is to create new wealth, so that there shall be a sufficient perpetual annual income for all. The other error consists of failure to perceive the extent to which wealth is mainly based upon credit. Our certificates of securities really constitute nothing more nor less than an undertaking on the part of the countries and companies represented by the securities to pay us a certain income, and ultimately a return of our capital, subject to the contracts which those countries and companies have themselves entered into being duly respected. Even with regard to our banking deposits themselves, running now into thousands of millions, we know that the greater proportion really depend for their liquidity upon the whole structure of mutual confidence being undestroyed. The average wage-earner when drawing his weekly wage has little idea of the extent to which that wage has depended upon the full maintenance of confidence and of credit. Probably during that very week his wife has obtained credit from the local grocer because the tradesman, knowing where her husband is employed, reckons with confidence that the weekly wage will be forthcoming and the wage-earner has relied with equal conndence upon the ability of his employer to meet his engagement on the Saturday. Equally, however, it must be remembered that the employer has also been relying upon the good faith and the ability of other people to keep their engagements with him. Once disturb this basis of credit and confidence and the stage is very quickly reached when the wage-earner is reminded by the less friendly attitude on the part of the local grocer of the extent to which thingn have gon« awry.