RELIGIOUS INSTRUCTION IN SCHOOLS.

Colonist, Volume XIII, Issue 1285, 18 January 1870, Page 7

RELIGIOUS INSTRUCTION IN SCHOOLS.

(From the Nelson Colonist, January 4.)

It is admitted that the system of Public Education in Nelson, although by no means perfect, is second to none that exists in the other Provinces of New Zealand. In no small degree its excellence, the satisfactory prevention of disputes, and the generally smooth working of the internal arrangements in the schools, spring from the virtual secularity of the scheme. To that, as we have repeatedly stated in these columns, is due the avoidance of sectarian difficulties, and, as we have formerly done, we once more deprecate any interference which would tend to introduce an element of discord, which religious controversy invariably introduces, frequently producing bitterness of feeling, and always a great waste of power. That waste of power, in a desire to gain more, has been begun by the Synod of the Episcopalian Church of Nelson and Marlborough, and is about being prolonged by his Lordship the Bishop of JNelson, who, in a letter to our contemporary of Saturday morning, throws down the gauntlet against secular education. We take leave to warn his Lordship, and those who think with him, that not only are they courting certain defeat, but that they are opening a door for another kind of controversy, which it will require all their logic to meet, and the current of which we venture to predict, they will scarcely be able to stem. In his charge to lb.B voynod, Bishop Suter made a most remarkable statement with respect to what men were to teach to children. He said: —

"First of all, teach rham all you do believe, nnd they will know much more than they do now. Secondly, do not be afraid to wait till yon can explain what you do not understand, or evon what yon disapprove. You may, for example, think ib very difficult to receive some of the historical parts of the Scriptures — they are more titan you canreceiee. Now do not think a child as sceptical as you lire. Childhood is not sceptical, it is serious; and while you are not to take advantage of that receptive faculty to instil folly, falsehood, and fiction as truth, you need not he so anxious as some are on this subject.

What! take advautage of the serious receptiveness of childhood to instil into their minds what, according to the Bishop's own admission, the mature mind of manhood " cannot receive!" Write on the tablets of their understanding dogmas their teachers " cannot explain," "do not understand," or " even disapprove !" Is this to be the basis of scholastic teaching respecting "things unseen and eternal ?" The Bishop says in his letter, which we reprint in full, that he is " proud and thankful" because his Church has made a movement for introducing the reading of the Scriptures into our schools. If his Lordship is proud of the scheme of religious instruction foreshadowed in the above quotation, we only express the general feeling in saying we are " thankful" to know that the Synod will be unable to introduce it. The public mind after many discussions (that of the Anglican Synod is not the first that has been raised), is we believe made up on this subject, and the general opinion is unmistakably in favor of secular instruction. The money is paid from the public revenue, contributed alike by Jew and Gentile, Catholic and Protestant, Unitarian and Freethinker, and each, as such contributor to that revenue, is as justly entitled to consideration as to how his money shall be spent by the Government in the direction of education, as storekeepers are in seeing that the Government shall not set on foot with public money an establishment for the sale of goods in opposition to the private dealer. The broad principle is the same in the one case as in the other.

The Bishop declares that the scheme by the "act professedly permits religious instruction." We read the act as it goes. The clause says:—

" Any religious instruction given in such schools shall he free from all controversial character."

Wlat is controversy ? The Presbyterian, Wesleyan, Baptist, Congregationalist, and Episcopalian, referred to by the Bishop, are not the only citizens of the Province interested in the system, and, as we have said, where the public money is expended by the state, the state shall not usurp any power in a question of conscience. When his Lordship has solved the problem of What is controversey in matters pertaining to religion? and reasoned it according to the principles of just government by a body purely secular, administering secular revenue, and distinct from everything ecclesiastical or sectarian, then, but not till then, will he have proved the position he assumes that the Education Act professedly permits religious education. When the previous acts were consolidated in the one act of 1863, that clause was referred to more than once in committee in the Council, and was accepted as in no ways injuring the secular system which the first act really inaugurated. Break that system, however slightly, and the door ia opened for a flood of difficulties which would destroy the system altogether. If there is one thing on which the mind of the public of Nelson is made up, we believe it is to allow pf no ecclesiastical interference in the control of our common schools.

It might be mentioned that the. Bishop's

allusion to the remarks made at the .;

distribution of prize*.' could scarcely be termed just. Neither his Honor the Superill ten dent, nor the other speaker is in i! habit of giving an " annual caution on stonethrowing, or deportment." Both these subjects were merely casual to the time, rising afe the moment; not unnecessary, but perfectly subsidiary to weightier matters, which were referred to, concerning the welfare of the schools, and the position and dutieß of pupils, teachers, and parents.. An extract from what we wrote some eighteen months ago on the subject of religious education, may not inaptly lead to a conclusion of this article: —

" What are the duties of Sunday schools connected with so many churches ? What are the congregational classes for, if not to give that religious instruction which ministers and others desire to see follow the clerical ministrations of the first day of the week ? If, with all the influence of the widespread polity of the different churches, they fail in the successful exercise of these duties within their own especial bodies, is it not too much that they or any of the churches should, with such a failure in their hands, go to the general public schools, from which, sect and controversy are excluded, and practically say: —' We have not accomplished what we desire, what it is our duty to accomplish, and we come to you, who are supported by public iunds for quite a different purpose, and ask you to perform part of our work for us ?' In plain terms, this is what is asked, and in equally plain terms we believe it will be refused."

■ For how many years, for how many generations haa the persistent opposition of the churches in England to this very principle of secularity kept back a national system of education ? How many home heathen has that opposition allowed to grow up in ignorance of that knowledge which, though secular, is nevertheless sacred in view of the progress of humanity, the lessening of crime, the growth of morals and the improvement of the human intellect? Surely it is too late in the day; surely it is not under the " strange stars" of these Colonies, freed as we are from much of the trammels of tradition and obedience to the rule of ancient custom that opposed improvement—surely it is not now in the year 1870 that the battle of secular education as giving justice to the people at large has again to be fought. If so ; so be it. We are prepared to enter the lists with a full consciousness of victory.