THE GODLESS SYSTEM OF EDUCATION IMMORAL.

New Zealand Tablet, Volume XXI, Issue 15, 11 August 1893, Page 16

THE GODLESS SYSTEM OF EDUCATION IMMORAL.

HAT a godless system of education should be immoral is easily seen. Morality, properly socalled, cannot be taught without the sanction of religion. This is a truth recognised by philosophers of ancient and modern times, and confirmed by the experience of mankind. Christian morality requires the sanction of the Christian religion, and natural morality requires the sanction of natural religion. A system of education, then, which ignores God both in the supernatural and natural orders, having no real adequate sanction for moral principles of action, must necessarily conduce to immorality. All this is obvious and clear to every man of sound mind and common sense. There are, to be sure, some would-be philosophers, but who are really only shallow faddists, who say that morality can be taught in godless schools and that an adequate motive can be found for such in its utility and many other advantages. But utility and mere worldly advantages are, as experience proves, a weak barrier against fierce passions and the overwhelming propensity of the moment. But enough of this species of reasoning for to-day. We have now to deal with a fact which has for us a pressing and overwhelming interest. We maintain that, independently

altogether of the foregoing considerations, our colonial system of godless education is essentially immoral. What is it in its main features and its monumental aspect ? How is it supported, and what are the lessons its mere existence m& & law aud iustitution inculcate ? All the inhabitants of this country, whether they derive any benefit from it or not, •re compelled to pay for it. Nay, more. Those to whom it 18 a positive injury are compelled by law to contribute to its maintenance. It is a standing monument of robbery and a perpetual object lesson to all, and especially the youug, that to take other people's property against their will, for the enriching of one portion of the community, is allowable ; and that to plunder one-seventh of the inhabitants of this country, that the other six-sevenths may have entirely free and godless education, is a lesson of morality that should be taught the rising generation. If this is not immorality of the most debasing kind, then the word immorality has in reality no meaning. Nor is this all. This godless system of education teaches all under its influence, and especially the young, that, provided pecuniary advantages accrue from the denial of liberty of conscience, such denial is not only not to be condemned, but to be highly applauded. Is not this immoral ? And this is what our godless system of education teaches day by day and from year's end to year's end. This system standing erect by virtue of law in this country teaches the people they may lawfully, and in accordance with the principles of morality and fair play, plunder, without remorse, one-seventh of the population and deny them religious liberty and freedom of conscience. For this system not only plunders Catholics but compels them, in defiance of religious liberty, to send their children to godless schools so detested by them. This system, then, is not only godless but directly injuriously and offensively immoral. What can it lead to ? To only one end — the demoralisation of the people of this country, to a hard-hearted, cruel, and reckless spirit of public robbery and tyranny. And does not experience prove that these lessons have already produced the effects indicated ? For who are the greatest enemies to the claims of Catholics to justice and religious liberty ? Who are most loud and determined to compel Catholics to pay for the free and godless education of their children and to force Catholics to send their children to godless schools ? Yes ; we ask again, Who are they ? The working men as they call themselves, and the working men's candidates, who, forgetful of their own claims as against capitalists, nevertheless insist on plundering Catholics and denying them religions liberty and freedom of conscience. This shows how deeply these people have imbibed the lessons which a godless system of education has, by its very existence, taught for so many years. There used to be some care for Catholic purses and some respect for Catholic consciences, but now all that is changed and the veiy men who of all others ought to be moßt friendly to justice and religious lib rty have, under its hateful influence, become the unreasoning advocates of odious tyranny and the cruel plunderers of their fellow-citizens. People will not be slow to perceive this, and We have sufficient confidence in humanity to hope at least that a reaction is inevitable and our working men tyrants will have cause to regret their insanity.

At the meeting of the Dunedin St Cecilia Society on Monday night, there was a good attendance. Miss Bolton played a selection of Irish National Airs. A part-song entitled "In This Hour of Softened Bplendour" by Ciio Pinsuti, was practised by the members and an instruction on the staff notation waß given by Mr Vallis, mnsical director. It was announced by Mr Carolin, vice-president, that the session would close for the summer on Sept 18, on which date a re-union would be held.

The Unionists are palpably funking. They bad given notice of 44 new dances when the Bill was reported from cimmiitee. Their greater number, however, including Mr Balfour, failed to be present, and the Speaker, consequently, ordered the clauses to be struck oat. This, of coarse, caused a great commotion among the Union ibt°, who had remained on the alert. But the defection of the greater and more important body is most significant. In any case the stone wall erected against the Bill has received an ominous shake.

That, then, is to be another of the dodges. We quote from the Auckland correspondent of the Otago Daily limes—' Mr Cad man, it is Baid, will get th 6 Catholic vot« out of gratitude for the Magdala gift." No- Popery, you Bee is thick in the air. The device betrays the Btraits in which the Opposition find themselves. Unfortunately

for them, however, the cry can be raised quite as loudly and quite as willingly on the olher side. We have little doubt, moreover, that such will be the case. Meantime we must not omit to notice the particular malice of our contemporary's correspondent. He evidently points it out as & dangerous crime tbat a Government should so much as help a Catholic hand to take an unhappy woman off the street. It such be a common disposition in Auckland, no wonder the police authorities have bad to take Btringent measures there. We should say a good many respectable gentlemen would have to fear an expo* sure of their names. The Otago Daily Times, however, continues his cunning tactics for indirectly raising the cry.

A lihcoln correspondent informs as that on the 25th of July the Rev Father Foley was vary agreeably surprised on being called into the schoolroom and presented with a beautiful dinner service by the Bchool children. In the evening the local branch of the H.A.0.8. Seciety invited him to the lodge room and th-3 President, on behalf of the member 0 , presented him with a suite of sitting-room furniture. Being hia feast day and coming as a genuine surprise — the rev Father was moved and delighted beyond measure.

We may add by way of postscript to a little instruction that we elsewhere give oar contemporary the Southland Times, and to Bare time, and generally oat of consideration for an editor for whom we really have some degree of esteem — that is when he is tafcen apart from the bigotry which devours him, and which, we admit, is rather his misfortune than his fanlt, that Constitutional law is not to be gathered, as it is actually practised, from hand-books of a former generation. If our contemporary would, for example, study some authorities, of ithe present day, the area of his culture would become much less fossiliferous. Here, for instance, is a passage or two from Freeman :— " The limits of the royal authority are, indeed, clear'y defined by the written Law, But I suspect that many people would be amazed at the amount of power which the Grown still possesses by Law and at the many things, which in our eyes would seem utterly monstrous, but which yet might be done by royal authority without any law being broken." Among these "many things " the writer classes as " practically impossible " the refusal of the Royal assent to measures which haTe passed both Houses of Parliament and the Sovereign's dismissal from office of a Minister of whom the House of Commons approves. He does not mention an arbitrary dissolution of Parliament, bat that, of course, is nndirstood. It is not always safe, theD, toiely upon the letter of the law. Those who, like our contemporary, look to it for a final defeat of Home Rule are likely to be disappointed.

We have to throw ourselves on the indulgence of our readers. If they observe any shortcoming in our columns, it all arises from a state of obfupcation into which we have been involuntarily and, indeed, quite unavoidably thrown. The fact is we have just received the number of Hansard containing Sir Robert Stout's famous peroration, and we have been reading it. If, therefore, we do not know whether we are on our head or our beelp, as the saying is, the fault is not ours. Oh, what a depth of wisdom is here. What an outpouring of life-giving eloquence. It is » mercy for some people that Sir Robert has repudiated Evangelical principles. Chadband would not have the ghost of a chance in competition with him. Indeed, ail Sir Robert's peroration recalls to us the "soaring human boy" made perfect, dressed up to perfection by the fervidly eloquent knight, and given by him as an example to the universe. Sir Robert, however, seems still to have method in his madness. "We must," he says," see that our Ministers are men of the highest qualifications and character." There is the key to the attack on Mr Seddon. Who in faot but Sir Robert himself ia anything of the kind ? It is incumbent apon him, therefore, to place him3elf at the head of the Cabinet. Tne spirit of the age, social individualism or individual socialism, we don't know which — the New Liberalism, in fact— demaads it of him, and who or what shall block hia way ? Not certainly any consideration of mere common sense, But his peroration, as we have said, is overwhelming. It is a flood of eloquence. The bursting of a street main, in fact, and the consequent setting of everyone to walk about on his tip-toes ia the only thing of which at the moment we can think. Well, Mrs Partington went out with a broom to sweep back the tide. Sir Robert goes oot with a high-falutin bellow to bring in the spirit of the age, Lord leave us all the use of our eeisas meaatime — especially that we may distinguish a nonsensical jargon when we hear it. Bat for the moment the peroration has placed us hors de combat . It is rain, you know, to hit out against the wind.

Another poiDt made by the Auckland correspondent of the Daily Times is that time-honoured one as to the reluctance of the Catholic laity to send their children to the Catholic schoola and their perfect contentment to bring them up in godlessness if the priests would only tell them that they could save their souls by doing sol The correspondent, however, pretends just to have found the matter oat. He alludes to the action recently taken by the Rev Father Hackett and to which we alluded last week. Here ia a specimen, of

the boeh oar correspondent writes on the subject : — " The curtain has been lifted up a little on ecclesiastical affairs during the past fortnight, and it has spoiled that pretty picture, and shown instead a reluctant laity, perfectly content with the Government schools, being pressed by the clergy to withdraw their children therefrom and to pay afresh for the maintenance of schools that th°y do not require." —Any kind of stuff, however, is good enough to use in raising the no- Popery cry, and we are sure to have a lot more of the same kind before the elections.

We Tecord with sincere regret the death of Mr Bernard Magee, which occurred at Oamarn, on Tuesday the Ist inst. The deceased was one of out most constant friends and was in every respect a Btaunch and sterling Irishman. He was a native of the Oouoty Down, and was 49 years of age. — R.I.P.

The Bight Bey Dr Nevill explaina La a letter to the Otago Daily limes that the Masonic ceremony of laying the foundation stone of a church is quite Christian, with only a harmless dash of Theiam thrown in. That ie, his Lordship admits that the Masonic ceremony is merely Theistic, but explains in effect that he so manipulates it as to Bwamp it in Christian observances. It is to be hoped the explanation may prove satisfactory to all the parties concerned. For our own part, nonsense even that does not concern us often affords as a little amusement.