THE REPTILE PRESS.

New Zealand Tablet, Volume X, Issue 510, 19 January 1883, Page 2

THE REPTILE PRESS.

If the arguments of the Bishop prevailed, the community would be split up into sectarian divisions, each of which would have schools indifferently officered and but scantily attended. What, therefore, the electors have to consider is, whether they would prefer these inferior schools — especially would such be the case in sparsely populated districts — to schools established under a National system, and which are under tLe control of teachers of fair educational attain* ments who are, reasonably well remunerated. All that the Bishop is endeavouring to accomplish by entering the political arena might

very well- have been undertaken by any zealous and intelligent layman belonging to his own Church ; and had he succeeded in inducing the chairman of his meeting, Mr. Callan, to enter the contest in place of himself he would have acted wisely. Probably Mr. Donnelly's ambiguous movements annoyed him, and this not unlikely had the effect of drawing forth his somewhat unexpected announcement, and having once declared himself as a candidate he cannot very easily retire. Mr. Donnelly, with noticeable adioitness, is playing the role of the martyr, to what we suppose he considers — or, at all events, wishes tbe electors to believe — is ccclcstiastical persecution. He states that he has never said that he is in favour of Denominational education, the reason being, doubtless, that he did not consider it prudent to do so. The struggle with him must have been violent and protracted in deciding between principle and expediency — between adhering to and openly advocating Denominationalism and passing it by on the other side.— Dunedin Morning Herald.

It is a remarkable fact that Dr. Moran has failed to get any layman of his own faith to come forward to represent the views which he so eloquently and so persistently advocates. Tbe fact is, it is far more a priest's question than a people's question. As we recently showed, even Dr. Moran himself, genial as he is in private life, has I thought it needful, on coming straight from Borne, to threaten his 'people with the worst ecclesiastical pains and penalties if they dared to send their children to the State schools. He doubtless has his orders direct from the Pope himself: he knows that the absolute power of the priests depends in great measure on their having exclusive access to the children of their charge ; and while he is the representative and mouthpiece of the worst ecclesiastical tyranny in the world, he stands before a public audience and talks about civil and religious liberty I If be is such a friend of liberty why does he not permit his people to do as they please in this matter, without exercising an overwhelming pressure upon their consciences ? We say unhesitatingly that this is not a question of the rights of 70,000 Catholics, but of the aims and wishes of a tyrannous hierarchy, the head of which is the " infalliable " Pope himßelf . Speaking of the money voted for the purpose of education, Dr. Moran says : "In the expenditure of that money for the purpose for which it has been voted, 70,000 of your fellow-citizens have bad no share whatever." This we entirely deny. Thousands of Boman Catholic children have enjoyed a free education out of that vote. And wherever the pressure of the priests is for a time withdrawn, there do the people still avail themselves of the advantages of such education. Left to themselves, only a minority of the Boman Catholic laity would be dissatisfied, and we deny the right of Dr. Moran to speak in the name of the whole of the Boman Catholic people of the colony in denouncing the system. We do not believe that the majority of the Boman Catholics desire to be a peculiar people in this respect, segregated from their Protestant fellow-colonists into separate seminaries, and trained in a system opposed as much politically and socially as it is in matters of faith to the exercise of private judgment and individual freedom of thought. The State is indeed bound to leave every man to the free exercise of his religion, but it is not bound to step out of its way to hand over a large section of the people to the absolute control of an alien hierarchy. We have over and over again shown that we are not indifferent to the claims of religion ; and in advocating the " religious half -hour " as a means of providing an opportunity for Boman Catholics, equally with all other religious bodies, to inculcate the special tenets of their faith on tbe youthful members of their own body, we have endeavoured to show how the only valid objection to our present system can be fairly met. Further than that we are not prepared to go. ... We say, then, to Bishop Moran, as we hope the electors of the Peninsula will say to him next Monday, Hands off 1 rash prelate ; hands off this ark of our liberties I—Otago1 — Otago Daily Times.

We must legislate for the greatest good of the greatest number, and foremost among the duties of tbe State in a Democratic country such as New Zealand, is undoubtedly that of seeing that every child in the community is educated. Experience has taught us that denominationalism has most certainly failed to accomplish that task in the past, and it therefore rests with those who are agitating for a change in the law to prove that it can be so amended as to secure what national education aims at giving, while making the required concessions to the religious bodies. And that, we contend, has never yet been proved. The vast majority of the people of the Colony are sincerely convinced that its future greatness and stability are intimately bound up with its free, undenominational, and compulsory system of education, and that any concessions in the direction demanded by Dr. Moran would be disastrous to the best interests of the community.— Christchurch Pres*.

Denying utterly as we do that any injustice whatever is perpetrated by the Education Act in regard to any section of the community, we have, unfortunately, the fact to deal with that the existence of such injustice is forcibly and persistently asserted, and ip^jl will be supported by all the authority of the Church of Borne. Dre- Moran, so far as he is a free ' agent, is thoroughly clear-headed and practical ; assuming the injustice as a fact he states unreservedly how he conceives it should be remedied. To this portion of his speech we would direct the particular attention of the electors of the Peninsula. He would have, he says, the Catholics receive what he terms their fair share of the educational appropriations. We presume his meaning to be that capitation money on the same scale and under Bimilar conditions as the State schools should be paid in respect of the Catholic schools, and that a proportion of the moneys available for school buildings should also be allocated, Such an arrangement would simply be destructive of the present system of education, and would lead to the establishment in lieu thereof of denominational schools. What was conceded to one denomination could not reasonably be denied to another, nor is the ground at all tenable that the Boman Catholic body alone has a right or claim to separate schools. " You may talk," said Mr. Bolleston in his speech last session on Mr.

Pyke's Bill, " about liberalism as much as you like, but if you destroy this national system of education you will deprive the people of that education which fits them most fully to form a nation. This system we look to as breaking down class distinctions, and tending to produce a people with common aspirations and common hopes."— Dunedin Evening Star.