A Question of Precedence.

Southland Times, Issue 12772, 4 December 1893, Page 3

A Question of Precedence.

TO THE EDITOR. Sib,—l see from this morning’s issue that you are having another quiet dig at the temperance party. You cannot advocate the introduction of the Bible in schools without giving a passing slap at thore who are working for what they believe in their hearts to be an immense good, viz., the abolition of the liquor traffic. I believe nine-tenths of the prohibitionists are with you on the subject of the Bible in schools, and if some one who has taken little or no interest in. the liquor question would take up the Bible and carry it to a successful issue we will rejoice with him, and in his efforts he shall have our practical sympathy and help. If, Instead of finding fault with the temperance party, and calling us fanatics, extremists, or any other name which is supposed to have some unpleasant odour in it, you would take the lead in the formation of a Bible in Schools Association it would be something practical towards the settlement of this question. You say “If the prohibition question were once out of the way, etc.” Just so, but in what sense out of the way ’ We all know where the brewers and publicans would like to relegate the question to, and I fear sometimes that the way the liquor question and the temperance party are treated in the Southland Times you will give the impression that you share the wishes of the publicans in the matter. The one object we have before us is to get (not prohibition but) the liquor traffic out of the way. We are asked often why we don’t take up the Bible in schools question. One fad at a time is enough for most people, and prohibition is ours, and we mean to stick to it until the goal is reached. Those gentlemen who have no prohibition fad can take up the Bible in schools, and I don’t think a, single prohibitionist will ever bring a railing accusation against them. The women are blamed, but their “spiritual guides” are “more severely ” blamed for allowing their “ narrow zeal for a single issue ” to lead themselves and others “ to overlook one of equal or higher importance.” But all spiritual guides have not been blinded 'by this single issue, and yet the Bible in schools has not been taken up, and nobody is blamed by you for that omission except prohibitionists. Let anyone else take iip the Bible in schools as his pet question, and work it with a zeal greater than that displayed by the temperance party, and I will predict that no prohibitionist will ever sneer at his fanaticism, but, almost to a man and a woman, we will render him all the help in our power. —I am, &c., R. Taylob.