Current Topics AT HOME AND ABROAD.

New Zealand Tablet, Volume XVI, Issue 37, 4 January 1889, Page 1

Current Topics AT HOME AND ABROAD.

One of the most remarkable publications of the period is the protest and petition against examination which have been signed by a long list of dis> tir gnUhed and influential names and published in

CXAMIVATION 'CONDEMNED.

the Nineteenth Century. The arguments urged may be briefly ■named up aftollowi :— Under the existing system boys are trained, as two years old bones are for races, without any regard to the future. Toung men are led to believe that all the purpose of education is to win a money prise and distingueh themselves at an examination. This misdireoted system injures the physical growth of the boy and, through the ill effects thus produced, is also accountable for moral •till; Under this prize system all education tends toward* the same type, bat hearth and progress depend upon continual difference, on nbw ideas and experiments. Tbe preponderating influence of the •xamination, moreover, destroys the best teachiug and tbe teacher is controlled by the sense of the coming examination. The pnpil allows himself to be mechanically guided for success,and life giving interests cannot exist together with the repressive influences of the training. Tbe true value of different kinds of education again cannot be judge i by the public, f >r tbe important controversy is obscured by monetary considerations. Tbe nobler educational ii-fluence besides is the de ire of getting knowledge and understanding the w>rl<l we live io, but this is replaced by mo'-ives that are poofcjpnd unfruitful. — Examination is a good educitiontl H»r?ant but a bad master. It h good as enabling a teacher to test hi* owa work bat it v rVal whin the teache* must confoim to external standards, and can give but li'tle ptrsona ity to his woik. If examination be drftndelasa test, tbe teacher's reply is that some other test must be found. Th« petitioners finally protest against tbe waete that is made, tbe n*>g!e.>t of increasing the teaching power a*vl attracting m<in of high and varieJ learn, ing as teaib^ra, the low ideals placul befurj youni; m*n, and the filling of Government appointments by competition. What is c id, they add, concerning young men and boys may alsi be s»i 1 with increased force concerning young women and girls. This p tition and protest are further supported by Pixf:s*o s Max Muller, Freeman, and Frederick Hariiion, who each wri ea a paper fir tbe purpose. Profess jr MulJer, who co- fei-scs that be bai been an advocate and promoter of rximination, points out the obfccarity that falls to the lot of young men of apparently brilliant promise, and Professor Frecmnn r cords how it was only when his own re-iod of examination terminated that he bad been able to b.'gin to read in earnest— a task that, after the laps? cC sonn f >m- hree or forty -four years t« still continues to fulfil. This petit ion and pro'ert, in abort, contain a very powerful indie men* ; but one, it is to be feared, that, owing to tbe exigencies of life as it exists at present. n»u»t pioducs comparatively little t ffrct. Those (.low »nd thorough methods to which the petitioners point belong to a stateof society that tbo world has left behind, and it would almost «eem as leasonable to hope that the years themselves might ba rolled back, as that the progress of tbe times might b* reversed. Cram and hurry are with us, and the superficial holds the place of honour, and tbe generation that has largely developed all this, and confirmed it with its crown of the approbation, is not likely to find or approve of tbe remedy. Still less likely to do so are those generations which are still to come, and which will themselves be tbe vitiated product of the evil systems. Worthy of consideration, therefore, as is th\« remarkable publication to which we have alluded, but little good need be expected to follow from it.

colonies, bears in an exaggerated form evejrjr m irk of evil that ii condemned by the many distinguished and blghauthorities wbo have signed the protest published In the Nineteenth CeSrtury. It embrace! the system of cram in alt its enormity ;it proposal low ideals. But above al!, and iadeftanca of all justice, it ineists on aa absolute uniformity. This is what our men of progress are accountable foi — uniformity above all, the parent of stunted growth and decay.

THB EVIL OP UNI POBMITT.

arrest of growth and consequent decay ; diversity means if>, growth, and adaptation without limit." But uniformity is the very soul of tbe secularism of the period. Tbe chief determina'ion of its advoca'es, and that which they «mploy every means to enforce, is to make uniformity the rule, and to stamp out everything at variance with it. Indeed, the secular system, at we have it especially in these

A LYING ANQ TVLOAB INVbSITIOS.

highest ranks of tociety, and is as familiar with mj Lord Tom Noddy, or at least my Lord Tom Noddy as represented by M Jeames de la Plachr, as with his own shadow, still condescends to earn an honest penny in a less aristocratic way by corresponding from the very doorsteps Of llayfair with oar contemporary, the Dune4ic Evening Star, and several other New Zealand papers. And it would be interesting to learn how far Major Pendennis, for example, would hare thought that compatible with the eot c i into noble mansions though, perhaps, the exigencies of the Primrose situation may admit of some concession's being temporarily made to the profanum rulgut Our elegant and exquisite and aristocratically -trimmed correspondent, then, has done some choice cooking of late, and sent his newspapers or at least the Dunedin Star, for that is the only one of them we havf seen, some articles especially iutended to stir up the bile of thcii readers and make them the unwholesome hi pport< rs of tbe " quality ' as opposed to the popular intires'H. Oar corret-ponre <t lifts « garbled and falee vention, for example, of Ch plain OVIi-k'a evider.ee to which, a* wo, the other. week, gave the s>lient point* as repot tec by the Time* itself, we need no" further refer, and hns (;enera'ly rfont his best in the in'croitt of those clahms io whose smile?, at h jwuvei gre.t a distance, tbe flunkey ba>ks. The f< llowiair, passive however, fi'oin his last currtspondi'i.ce, is too go <d to r >e lost n.it only exemplifying as it does tue manner ii whiih as i rule, thiri surt'itine gentleman corresponds but let iig in th< light also on the kind of oiupHuy fio'.n the middle of wl i t he floods the olooy with news cf an aristocratic fl ivour : - " An interesting tragment of coi, versa tion between the two Pdrueliiti leaders (Parnell and D.ivitt) was o\erbe*rd on lv ediy evening (Norember 6 b). A lady wan detained to* some litt'e tim?at thi crossing opposi<e the Marble Arch < wing to ihe density of th j traffic Hearing an eager dicmsiin bihind h*r, irmrepeieed with a goo^l mnny " bad words," as children say, she turned round and rtc ignisc J Paroell and Davitr, wborn she bad seen in Court and knew at 01 cc. Being usable to move at the moment, the involuntarily overheard what they said. They were diccuoNing the (Jornuiissi >n, and Davitt who was evidently very much excited a the cluiges of inti<nidjtin° witucees that bad boen brought against their side that day, buM 1 That was a d d inmlt they pir upon in to-d.iy,' to wi ish Paraell leplied in I is thin, piping voice, and with the most infinite contempt in bis tones :' I dou'i care a d— — n how (ha trial goo?. Whatev- 1 the result, may be, William will put it all right f >r us. aud square the peopled This little glance behind the scone?, tbe accuracy of wnicb I can guarantee, epitomises so neatly what are gent rally suppose I to be the relations of the two sections of tbe Gladstone-P^rneD alhiure that I think it is worth publishing." Nothing, it is me Ik-si to say can bsar clearer or more certain maiksof falsehood than dees this paragraph. Dark and wily conspirators, as their enemies accuse them of being — prude it men, as the r friends know them to be — like Mr Parnell and Mr Davitt, do not bpeak loudly in the et:e ts iexpecting their important affairs and private feelings, esp cially at a time when they know public attention is concentrated on 'hem. Neither of these gentler* n «gain is in the habit of using the language of a larrikin, and Mr I'arnell particularly, in this respect, is notable as a purist. Bat for the "lady" who is capable of inv>niing such an anecdote every man h a larrikin, and every man'd laaguage is a tissue of vulgarity and catbs. Or if tbeie be no such laly the miin wbu pictans her shows tic sort ot women be is used to This iuveutton, iberrfoie. ia at>y case, shows us iv what company our rnhgmfioo who write* wtat he Lelieves to be aristocratically loned letters to i bu New Zealand papers, finds himself. We fear that, whatever mty be tbe (xi^encien <>f the Pi im rose situation, Major P.-rulenn s would haidly ree<ive our correspondent hi a woruij exponeut cf maturi touchiug Mayfatr. Tbe Major was more di*. eliminating in his patronage of euobs.

Osk passage in particul tr strikes us as -deserving of attention in the publication to which we have referred ; it is the following :— " It cannot be too often repeated, that uniformity maans

Among the demimonde of journalism to whom .the Parnell commission affjrds the most agreeable materials for their cooking, we may notice especi ally that magnifico, who, though he moves in the

The various reports relative to the visit of the Gergroundless man Emperor to the Vatican and the conversation FELICITATIONS, that took place between bis Majesty and tbe Pope

have now received tl c fullest contradiction, »nd we know on unquestionable authority that nothing has transpired of what actually wu said, What was not said we also know, so fu as any allusion to tbe restoration of the temporal power was concerned, for the Ouert«,ture Romano, which was certainly well informed, has declared that tbe Pope did not in any way refer to tbe Masonic Government. Tbe Pope, in fact, had not expected that tbe visit of the Emperor could affect bis position favourably, for that could not be done by any renewal or confirmation of friendship between the Emperor and King Humbert, while the latter remained the usurper of Rome. What appears to us worthy of remark, however, is the manner in which tbe visit if the Emperor has been hailed by those who are unfriendly to the Papacy as a completely new departure made to its pr« judicft, and as confirming the usurpation of the Piedmontese King. These good people seem to forget altogether that, at worst, tbe Emperor does but openly teturn to the policy pursued by his grandfather for many years. He does not do so completely, indeed, for, during those years alluded to of his grandfather's reign, his Majesty's Chancellor was engaged in that attack upon the Pope's infallibility which he had told the Grand Duke of Baden, at the time of the war with France, that he meant to undertake, and which be did undertake only t) fail ignominiously. The visit of tbe Emperor now to Borne, moreover, has had no greater significance that that paid there by his father when he was Crown Prince, and represented the Eojperor William 1., so that, at worst, theie wculd be nothing new in the matter. Those people, meantime, who see in the visit alluded to tbe final loss of all hopes of the temporal power, and a pledge of the stability of the existing condition of thing*, must have short memories and unusually sanguine dispositions. When the Crown Prince, Frederick William visitel King Humbert at the Vatican, as his son has now done, and was seen in public with the Prince of Naples, then a little child, in his arms, the world opposed to the Pope rang with the assurance of an unalterable state of things, and cried out, as it crie9 out now, in delight at the final blow given to the temporal sovereignty. Germany was then at war with Rome ; the Kulturkampf was at its height, and all antiPapal Europe looked on with sympathy and in expectation of a speedy conquest. But it was the unforeseen that happened. While all the ant i- Papal world were {till looking on hopefully, Prince Biemarck and his Imperial master threw down their arms for their own sake and betook themselves to Cancrsa. What has already happened, therefore, with regaid to the siiritual aspect of the matter, may again happen with regard to its temporal aspect. Both art) perbapi connect. d in a m inner thtt the anti-Papal world little buxpectf, and tbe occurrence of tbe unforeseen may again seem necessary in the eye* of the German rulers. Of one thing wo mty b ; convinced, that is, if tuch turns out to be the case, the Govern m ntthitbas not slunnk fnm yieliing at home to the infallibility against which it hid entered upon a well weighed and maturely considered war, will not hang back from lending its aid to temporal claims that chu fly concern a foreign power. There is nothing now, then, in the present attitude of the German Emperor. It i«, in fact, less hostile, at worst, thin it w.is before, and there is no thin,' to g ye assurance that it will be more obstinate in temporal matters than it has proved to be in spiritual.