BISHOP MORAN'S SPEECH AT THE CHRISTIAN BROTHERS' SCHOOL.

New Zealand Tablet, Volume XIV, Issue 35, 24 December 1886, Page 15

BISHOP MORAN'S SPEECH AT THE CHRISTIAN BROTHERS' SCHOOL.

fFTER having distributed the prizes and made some remarks on the school work of the year, B ; shop Moran spoke as follows :—": — " It is customary for me, on the occasion of the annual breaking-up of this school, to draw the attention of those present to some considerations regarding the qjestio i of education in general, and in particular to our relations towards Government on this question, and to protest against the injustice done to Catholics by the system of education legally established in this Colony. I Bee no reason why I should on this occasion depart from my usual mode of proceeding. The injustice so often complained of continues, and is becoming more striking as the years pass by. Instead of getting tired of the contest with injustice and godless education, Catholics are daily putting forth new energy, and proving both their determination to save their children from its baneful influence, and their ability to come through the crisis victorious. Since I had the pleasure of meeting you for the purpose of distributing | prizes twelve months e^o, St. Patrick's College, Wellington, f was solemnly opened by the Cardinal Archbishop of Sydney, assisted by a large number of Bishops from Australia and New Zealand. Though only recently erected, the success of this college has been remarkable. It has already a large staff of able professors, and no less than 120 pupils. The mention of the name of this college suggests to me to institute a contrast between the action of the Government in reference to the St. Patrick's on the one hand and the Wellington secular college on the other. In the Wellington College there are 30 students, whereas in St. Patrick's, Wellington, there are one hundred and twenty students. The curriculum of studies is about the same in both. Both are attended by the sons of colonists, who are equally bound to contribute funds to provide education for our youth. Observe, however, how differently Government treats these two colleges. The Wellington College

has been built and furnished at the public expense, and its staff of professors and miintenance are largely provided for out of public funds, to which all are compelled to contribute, whereas, on the contrary, St. Patrick's has been built, furnished, and is maintained exclusively by Catholics, who after paying tlieir share to the establishment and upholding of the Wellington College, feel themselves obliged to provide a coMege for their own sons by reason of the godless system of education pursued in the Wellington College. Tbat is, Government provides a system of education at the public expense for secularists, aud for secularists alone, to the exclusion of all Christian people. It is of no avail to say and to prove that in St. Patrick's, and all other Catholic schools, secular, subjects are as successfully taught as in purely secular schools, and that, therefore, they who contribute money for providing education in Catholic schools are as much entitled to the the consideration of the Government as merely secular institutions. And this proves that it is not so much the obtaining by our youth of a secular education that is sought for as the withdrawing of our children from the influence of religion. Were it otherwise, surely Government would not refuse to us Catholics, for the support of our own schools, the money we contribute towards the maintenance of education. Again, here is another instance of the same palpable injustice. A few perches from where we are now assembled, there are two Government schools, one a common school, the othe • the Dunedin High School. The common school has been built and maintained entirely by Government at the public expense ; the High School has been built and is in great part maintained out of tbe proceeds of public endowments. In the High School there are 240 boys, about the same number as that of this school. The curriculum of education is pretty much the same in both schools, and yet Government is lavish in its generosity to the High School, frequented by the sons of all the rich people of this city and neighbourhood, whilst all aid is stubbornly withheld from this school, frequented by the sons of struggling Catholics. No consideration is paid to the claims of Catholics, no pity extended to people who are compelled to pay for the free and godless education of other people's children whilst bravely discharging their duties like men and Christians to their own, and providing at their own expense excellent schools for them. The reply made to our claim is that ■we are asking for denominational education, and that this is a system which the public are determined shall not be established. Our answer is, We are making no such demand ; neither are we, as has been sometimes said, able ing non-Catholics to aid Catholic schools. Wo do not wish to interfere with the majority or with other people in their wish for a secular or any other system of education. We simply ask for justice, claiming that as tax-payers, we are injustice entitled to spend on our own schools the money we contribute for the purposes of public education. And we maintain that this is just reasonable, and politic, and that to refuse us this is not only the result of foolish bigotry, but also a rank injustice. It is instructive to observe the conduct of some secularists, particularly the most rabid of the sect. Observe the way, for example, in which some newspapers discuss thi.s question, and you will be enabled to ascertain what sort of teaching your children should be subj cted to in the seculir schools, for which these are so zealous. They are secularists, and, of course, as they are, so will the school be. How, then, do th^se treat questions of history bearing on religion and political religious questions. Some illustrations of this point are so recent that it is hardly necessary to trouble you with any detailed description of the views our secularists are so anxious to impress upon the public, and consequently on the school children. We need not go far a-field for an instance. Our near neighbour, the Evening Star, is a loud secularist, and, nevertheless, holds the scales so even that it hesitates not to publish forgeries, with the object of misrepresenting Catholics find of exciting odium against them. What a secularist is so zealous in teaching the public, he will, you may be sure, be equally zealous in causing to be taught in public schools. From this you can easily arrive at a conclusion as to the nature of the education secularists have prepared for your children in government institutions. And, by the way, as I have mentioned this subject, I avail myself of the opportunity of expressing my surprise at not seeing in the Evening Star, that extremely eloquent letter of the Rev. Mr. Keating alias Moreton, to the Priest's Protection Society in Dublin. Perhaps, indeed, the editor has not had the happiness of seeing a copy of this pre-

cious document ; if so, we shall be happy to send him one ; it f is a valuable historical documeut and a neat companion record j to the forged speech of Archbishop Keniuck, so lately pub- ' lished by him. It is hardly necessary for me, however, to spend bo many words in pointing out the way in which, most i probably, secularists would educate your children if | they got a chance. You are quite alive to the i dangers inherent in Godless schools, as your zeal in establishing Catholic schools abundantly proves. All, I think, must by this time be convinced that it is idle to hope j for any change in this respect ; and is it therefore, too | much to expect that in view of t 1 is fact, Government and ! Parliament may be induced to reconsider their attitude towards ' us, with a view of doing justice to a large and deserving body of people, of putting an end to a policy of tyranny, which ' plunders the poorest portion of the community, and applies the plunder to providing luxuries for the richest, and of securing peace. I hope it may he so. There is a great fear, how- i ever, of even attempting to amend the present Education Act. Our strong minded and philosophical legislators, particularly the Premier, who is not, of course, a victim of superstition of , any sort, are in terrible alarm lest our present system, like a ; house of cards from which one is removed, should suddenly collapse. It is agreed on all hands that the Education Act i requires amendment on many points. But the secularists, ' led by the Premier, refuse to touch it, on the gromd that it i is incapable of being m *ndVl without the imminent risk of being utterly destroyed. What a comment on the law, and what a comment on legislators ! A law is such that an attempt to amend it endangers its existence, and therefore, say our legislators, it must c )ntinue with all its imperfections ■unchanged. And this is the outcome of philosophy, strongmindedness, and superiority to all superstitions ! Well, I can only say that the greatest enemy of our present system of education could say nothing worse of it or of its supporters, nothing more condemnatory of both. It must bo a wretched i Legislature that is either unwilling or unable to amend an \ Act of Parliament which all recognise as needing amend- I ment; and he u-ust be a curiosity in the shape of a member of Parliament who advises his fellow-Members to let the Act i alone, on the ground that to attempt to amend it would most ! probably lead to its repeal." Another reason advanced against our claim is the , additional expense that a concession to our schools would , entail. This, however, is a delusion, unless, indeed, it is the \ real intention of the secularists to save money through the well-known determination of Catholics not to send their children to secular schools. For does not the law at present sanction the paying of three pounds fifteen shillings each for the education of all children of school age ? How, then, could the J paying of this -"mount to Catholic schools for Catholic ' children increase expense. T''e number of school children ! is not increased by doing so, and the aggregate expenditure would be only the same, to which all children are entitled. But, even should the expense be increased — which, however, would not be the case — secularists to be consistent should , not complain, for is it not on record that our secularist i Premier stated only the other day that theie was not nearly ' education enough, and that the consideration of expense ! should not be permitted to embarass the final settlement of | the question ? This was His Honour's statement in substance, I if not exactly in these words. Expense, however, or no ex- j pense, are not Catholic children of school age entitled to have throe pounds fifteen shillings per annum expended on their education, and if they frequent Catholic schools instead of godless institutions, and are refused what they should receive in the secular schools because they go to Catholic schools instead, are not those who refuse to do them justice bigots, and paltry misers, who are saving money on their adherence to principle and the dictates of conscience ? Arc they not guilty of a gro^s injustice ?

We understand that it is in contemplation to give entertainments in the old church building, Dune lin, on January 27 and 28, in aid of the St. Joseph's school removal funl. — The programmes will be particularly brilliant, consisting of vocal and instrumental music, plays and tableaux. This following paragraph which we clip from the Pilot has a very important si<*nirlca"ce • — " L ist year in the city of Boston there weie, by official report, over 11,000 births. Of this number, over 7,000 were Catholics, as shown by the ecclesiastical register of baptis'U*. A steady animal g-owthof 7 to 11, independent of the gain by immigration, will, in the course ot one generation, mike Boston the most distinctly Celtic city in the world."

We do not suppose that the spirit of the poet ia caught by infection. M>. J.imea Jeffrey Roche, nevertheless, who is associated with Mr. John Boyle O Reilly in the literary department of the Boston Pilot has published a volume of poems that are very highly spoken of. We reproduce one of them in another place which we thmk will be generally recognised as of extreme power and beaaty. The end to which scientific scepticism or the philosophy of the period may lead, has recently bad a striking illustration in a certain work published by M. Renan. M. Renan had, indeed, already given cause of doubt to hig graver admirers by admitting it to be at least open to question as to whether after all it was not the followers of pleasure who were in tho right. But now at the age of sixty-three he has thought good to answer the question and that in the affirmative. His latest publication, in a word, is said to dispute the palm for nastiness with the novels of M. Zola, and to profess a complete distrust in the virtue or even the common decency of the human race. It's moral is the conclusion that were mankind certain of an immediate destruction the few hours left to them would be devoted to the indulgence of the passions, and complete abandonment to vice. With the noble army of martyrs, moreover, full in his memory, and notwithstanding bis own testimony to at least one career worthy of being enrolled among their records, and the witness he himself has borne to the great holiness of the religious life, he has chosen to confound the whole human race together in his brutal conclusion, and to draw his revolting example from that life. But such is a natural progress, from pride to false science and unbelief, and from unbelief, so-called scientific, to baseness of miud, contempt for the truth and the drivelling of filth. Let our secular apostles beware, if their desire for the prevalence of virtue be indeed sincere. Whe.n Renan falls, even in his old age, what security is there for the common herd in all the heat of youth and desire ? We find the following good news in one of our Catholic exchanges :— A telegram from Berlin informs us that after the school vacations, all the Catholic seminaries will be re-opened, in conj sequence of the late religious law. There is a return to the policy of [ wisdom and fairdealing in Germany ; while in France, injustice and i persecution are on the increase. And again, it is given as a positive i fact that in Prussia and i a the Suabian dominion of the House of j Hohenzullern, the Benedictines will return to their monasteries. The first house that will be op3ned to them ia the Abbey of Beuron in the j Black Forest. Several years ago the Benedictines banished from 1 this Abbey took up their residence at the mother-house of Monte i Cassino ia Italy. There several of the monks who were excellent artists, they having introduced anew school of religious art known by I the name of the Beuron school, painted a series of admirable frescoes | in the older part of Monte Cassino, where St. Benedict lived, which i were exposed to public view on the fourteenth centenary of St Benedict's birth in ISBO. The Abbey of Beuron is a foundation of the Catholic branch of the Hohenzollern family, but even that did not save it from the effects of tha Kulturkampf. A member of that ' house, tbe pious Princess Catherine, lives a retired life in a building I attached to the Abbey. She is a widow and devotes herself wholly to [ works of charity. When she saw the Benedictines driven from their 1 h irae she predicted that they would return to their Abbey. Now she isab^ut to sop them return under, the Father Abbot Maur Wolter, the same with whom they went into exile. Lord Londonderry had rather a lively time of it in presiding I in Dublin the other day at the conferring of degrees by the Royal j University. In comparison with it our gallant Premier spent a h tlcyon hour at the Lyceum in Dunedin on a recent memorable occai sioo. Lard Londonderry, however, accepted the inevitable with a I better grace, and made no appeal to the protection of the police. It I was hard, nevertheless, that his lordship should be interrupted in a ! carefully piepared speech on education, by eager inquiries, for cxi ample, as to the whereabouts of Fred Archer. Sir Robert Stout can | fully understand tbe grievousness of such a situation, and realise the frivolity of such an interruption at a moment of awful solemnity and supreme heaviness. But who among ourselves, except Mr. W. D. j Stewart, could perfectly sympathise with his Excellency on being I interrupted by some rapturous undergraduate desiring to partake in | his congratulations addressed to the ladies who had taken their i degrees. Had Mr. Stewart been so broken in upon by any one desirous of sharing his sunny memories of fair editors and charming lawyers across the Pacific, his condition would have been j most pathetic. What completely floored Lord London- ' derry was the determined rejection of his kind proposal to preside ao-ain on a similar occasion next year. This the undergraduates ! would not hear of by any means, and his Excellency was obliged to ■ sit down defeated. In recompense for his forbearance he was ! treated to a hearty chorus of " God save Ireland." But here, on similar occasions, we have no one to sing •' God save New Zealand," i of which, however, there is much need. The Catholics of the United States have now finally determined against the government system of secular education, and are making vigorous efforts to remove their children from the schools* " Tne exodua is going to continue," says the Brooklyn Catlwlic Review,

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ntil not a Catholic child is left in a public school. The late at Baltimore has assured-this by its legislation, and if one chooses to read the acts of the diocesan synods held and to be held before the year ends, one will see the command to the rectors of parishes to build schools for the children within two years after ratification . A thousand new Oatholic schools will dot the American landscape before the close of 1887, and two hundred thousand children will make their abode in them. Hitherto we have read of the depopulation of city schools only, but this year the country districts have suffered, and we have on our table a list of towns and villages whose school, have each lost from one to two hundred children by the building of Oatholic schools. Within the next two years the number will hare increased many times, and the demoralization of many district schools will be as complete as many of their enemies could desire/ , The spirit of the Irish landlord has received a striking illustration in the vindictive closing by Lord Cloncurry of the limestone quarries of Ardclugh in Kildare which for more than a hundred years have afforded employment to a thriving community. — His Lordship has taken the opportunity of a lapse of the lease to ruin these people completely.— And without a blush he admits that his sole motive is antipathy and vengeance against the Land League. — Such an action on the part of a representative man shows the worth of the party in whose interests it is still determined to ruthlessly oppress the Irish people. Lord C'lanricarde has been so far daunted by the campaign at Woodf ord as to offer his tenants a reduction of 20 per. cent. Considering his Lordship's well earned reputation as a usurer the concession is a most important one, and nothing has occurred more betraying the position to which the landlords feel themselves reduced. The esteem in which Mr. Justice Day has been taught by his Belfast experiences to hold the Orangemen is well proved by his refusal to permit the epithet " respectable " to be applied to any of them residing in the Shankhill district. He directed that they should be called " well-to-do " instead, whenever the occasion required. We are requested to announce that the drawing of the art-union in connection with St Columbkille's Convent of Mercy, Hokitika, ha s been postponed until St. Patrick's Day. United Ireland which has lately given some interesting details concerning the careers of the late Lord Clanricarde and the Marquis who now en joys the title, quoting as a principal source of the information published certain recoida concerning the blackguardism of the former nobleman contained in a blackguardly letter written by the latter, among the rest, publishes the following paragraph :— " He has himself done much to maintain the family reputation he inherited. In Inst and greed he has not disgraced his father, and if he shrank from the darker crimes of the bolder titled villain he has displayed instead a cowardly meanness that is all his own. It will be news to our readers, though it is no news in the haunts of London dissipation, that Sanguinetti (what an appropriate name), the notorious Jew money-lender, and the ' Most Noble ' the Marquis of ClanricaTde are identical. Indeed so closely has he trod in the footsteps of his illustrious parent that men gravely doubt whether the shame is greater to be son of the former Marquis of Clanricarde or to be father of the present." — Tet there are editors among ourselves who venture to 'pronounce Sanguinetti the Usurer an excellent Irish landlord.— But, let us give every man his due. Such editors are not necessarily to be accredited with favouring the Jew in a particular mannerTheir motive is merely contempt and hatred of the Irish tenant, concerning whom they know nothing whatever. — But ignorance and prejudice may well give birth to misrepresentation. Thb Hibernian Society's Fete at the Caledonian grounds, Kensington, will be among the chief events of Boxing Day near Duoedin: These sports have grown in popularity yearly, and large numbers of people are to be reckoned among their regular visitors . Everything has been done this year to secure the comfort and amusement of those who attendMb. Gladstone replying to an article of Lord Brabourne's published m Blackwood speaks as follows :—": — " He seems to be unaware that historical dependence on the Crown, even the Crown of the Dominits Hibernice, was as strongly asserted by Dean Swift, for example, as dependence on the English Parliament was denied ; and that the Parliament of the Pale grew into the Parliament of the nation, and would have obtained 90 years ago a worthy Constitution had it not been prevented by the British Government. Lord Brabourne will render good service to the causs he has esp^ Tod and will discharge the duty he has acknowledged if he can conf v - » assertions of Mr. Burke respecting the Grattan Parliament,and perhaps even more if be can perform the same office for the terrible proofs and citations contained in the memoir of Mr. O'Connell, published in 1813, which go to show, taken with what followed 1660, that the relations of England to Ireland have as a whole perhaps been more profoundly disgraced by crnelty and by fraud than those between any other nations in the entire history of Christendom."

MB^iAtfBB^SON of Prince's street, Dunertin,. has issued as a Ohristmag f ift, a very pretty blotter. The idea is an original one' and is tastefully carried out. The Christian Brothers' schools Dunedin, will re-open after the holidays on Monday January 21. The Tory Government seem to be attempting to make the legitimate proceedings of the Land League in receiving such sums as tenants are able to pay in the way of ient and acting as their agents a pretence for coercing the country. We have, however, as yet only the version of the matter given us by the unfriendly hands that direct the cable, and cannot form any precise judgments. But our confidence in the wisdom of the League remains unshaken. We have to acknowledge the receipt from the Hon. Secretary o 1 the Irish National League, Kumara, of the sum of £33 15s, for transmission to the Hon. Secretary of the League at Dublin. With the next number of the Tablet we shall issue a handsome sheet almanac, containing besides the calendar, the despatch and arrival of the European mails, the principal Catholic festivals and fasts throughout the year, with some event to mark each day. Lobd Denbigh, who has lately returned from a visit to Borne gives his Conservative friends a version of an attempt evidently made by him to re-enact the famous part played by Sir George Err ing ton, at the Vatican. He does not seem to hare succeeded very remarkably in his interview with the Pope, who clearly confined himself to what was polite, bnt strictly not committing. Lord Denbigh gives his friends to understand that with an English envoy at the Vatican, England could torn Ireland with ease around on her little finger. He deplores the complete ignorance of Irish affairs shown by the Holy Father, who, nevertheless, is exactly informed of all that takes place there through the Irish hierarchy. Nothing can be clearer, in fact, than the polite reticence maintained by His Holiness . Of Lord Denbigh's sagacity as to other political matters, we may judge by his expressed belief that since the advent of the Tories to power, foreign nations looked on England with more respect. Lord Randolph Churchill's fighting shy at Bradford of the proposal madetofollow the policy of Lord Beaccnsfield sufficiently answeT3 that.