THE NEW TYRANNY, AND THE WORST OF ALL.

New Zealand Tablet, Volume XXI, Issue 16, 18 August 1893, Page 16

THE NEW TYRANNY, AND THE WORST OF ALL.

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- — ♦" — HE pages of history tell us much about the tyrannies of the past ages, but nothing is found in them comparable to this new tyranny. In the past tyrants were generally cultured, learned, and able men, who, whilst exercising tyranny ' over those immediately about them, or employed in high office, took good care to promote the happiness and prosperity of the mass of the people. Thus, when there were tyrants in Greece, the arts and sciences flourished, literature was encouraged, the various states were illustrious in war and peace, and agriculture throve.

It was bo in Egypt, and in ancient Rome, where, notwithstanding tyranny and the fearful persecution of Christians, the most perfect system of jurisprudence was built up, and the great body of the people enjoyed much pejsonal liberty and a large share of well-being, and unless in exceptional cases, private property and rights were hfld sacred . But what is the state of things under the new tyranny ? Now, ignorance and inexperience have obtruded themselves everywhere, and assumed the right to dictate to everyone how each is to conduct his business, when shops must be closed, holidays taken, the amount of wages to be paid, how people shall educate their children, and what they shall all drink. The tyranny has not yet prescribed the quality and amount of food each one shall use, but this is coming, and will be with ns immediately, for we are in the hands of great philosophers, who boast of the greatness of their philosophy, solely because they have the hardihood to deny the existence of God and responsibility to any authority or principle outside themselves. We know from this they are, after all, only fools, and what folly may not there be expected from them ? Platforms as to politics and education are placed before the public, which, whilst they are simply ridiculous on account ot their absurdity, are for their stupid wickedness enough to make even angels weep. The affectation of philosophical knowledge and political economy on the part of men who know nothing about either is the characteristic and bane of this century. And the most striking point in relation to these is the universal contempt of these wise statesmen, the titter contempt with which they treat the Lord and Master of the universe, and their Creator and Judge. In fact the claim now is that the greater the infidel the Bounder the philosopher. To use a vulgar phrase, the world is to be run now on purely secular principles, as if God and religion had nothing whatever to do with secular affairs or education, and as if man had no responsibilities towards the Creator and Lord at all. The less a man has to do with religion the wiser and more philosophical he claims to be. What shallowness and what folly ! Not so thought a real philosopher. What, for example, does the great Bacon say? Here are his words: — "The superficial philosopher is generally an irreligious man, whereas the real philosopher entertains the protoundest respect for religion." Our superficial philosophers and unlettered politicians are always and at all times in direct antagonism to religious education, and the loud-mouthed, unreflecting advocates of what they triumphantly proclaim as secular education. Why, every scholar and philosopher knows, that is every real scholar and philosopher, that there is not, and cannot be such a thing in existence as secular education. There is, to be sure, such a thing as secular instruction, but secular education is a misnomer. Education necessarily includes religion as being the first, most important and all-pervading, of science, and it is an utter absurdity to speak of secular education. No really well-educated man would do so. But our new tyrants think it is quite philosophical to advocate free and secular education from the primary school to the university. Heaven help the country. Another of their philosophical absurdities is that it is no theft or robbery to plunder Catholics as they constitute only the minority, whereas the majority must rule. How ridiculous. This means, of course, that the majority, because it is a majority, may lawfully commit any species of crime and tyranny against a helpless minority, simply because it is helpless. Whence did the majority derive such power ? We are simple enough to be persuaded that no individual or number of individuals has any right from reason, nature, or God, to do a wrong, to commit a crime, or to injure, not only a minority, but even one person. And here we hold, and have ever hc4d, that the conduct of the majority in this country, in wringing from Catholics money to support their godless schools, is as low and mean a theft, or robbery, if you will, as would be knocking each of us down and extracting our purses from our pockets. But what is the result even now of the thoughtless and ridiculous policy of philosophers and statesmen— the new tyrants ? In consequence of the minute and petty interference of these gentry with private rights, there are less employment and lower wages than have ever been known to exist in New Zealand before. And we think there is no immediate prospect of any improvement in these respects. On the contrary, il is not improbable that what is now taking place in Colorado, may come to pass here. Men will not long aubmit to the tyranny of idiots. They will either clear

out, as in Colorado, to some reasonably and justly-governed coantry, or sensible men, combining in self-defence and in defence of truth and justice, will put their feet upon this new tyranny and stamp it oat. These new tyrants seem determined, if they can, that none shall obtain any employment or enjoy the means of existence except themselves. Employers, according to this new tyranny, must on no account employ any but unionists, and none shall have any education except what is ridiculously called secular.

With this week's isßue we present oar subscribers each with a picture of the Holy Family. Our intention is to comply with the wishes of the Pope, by doing something towards the spread of the devotion, and also, in the best way possible, to maik oar gratitude for the kind support given as by those who take oar paper.

Ok Sunday at the three Dunedin churches the congregation wai respectively presented with a very nicely-executed lithograph of the Holy Family. The picture is a copy of one lately received from Borne, and which has been hung in St Joseph's Cathedral. It represents the Holy Child standing, a little in advance and with his anna outstretched, between the Blessed Virgin and St Joseph, the Holy Ghos% under the form of a dove, appearing above. Tbe copy, on ft diminished scale, has been executed in Dunedin, and, to mark iti New Zealand origiD, on its border have been placed some clusters of the native clematis and fern, The intention of tbe presentation in tbe Dunedin churches was, first, the desire of his Lordship the Bishop to promote the devotion for which the Holy Father has recently expressed himself so anxious, and, secondly, to acknowledge the kindness of bis people daring his illnesß, as manifested in their unceasing- solicitude and prayers for his recovery. The picture had been blessed by the Bishop and will be treasured ia Catholic homes,

The obstruction offered to the third rtadiag of tbe Home Bale Bill may possibly have appeared to som« of as Dot quite easy to understand — particularly as it must delay the Bill in going to the Lords, who have pledged themselves to reject it. The Dublin Free* ■man, however, of July Bth makes tbe matter a little clearer. " The Lords (it says) will, it is probable, throw out the Bill, and the struggle against them with regard to this matter will be postponed to next year, when the Bill will be sent up again. Meanwhile English legislation (which Mr Chamberlain and tbe Tories drtad) will take the stage. If tbe Tories could only succeed in showing that the Liberals blocked the whole of a Parliament with Home Rale to the exclusion of any English measures, do doubt they would thereby gain much support in tbe country. They feel, however, that if the Government carry out their programme of useful legislation, especially in the nature of electoral reform the game of Unionism is lost. When the Home Rule Bill has passed tbe House of Commons the Liberals will be able to attack these measures, and the Tories dare not obstruct them, and the House of Lords dare not throw them out." The policy ie, therefore, the proverbial one of killing two birds with one stone. The intention is to hinder English legislation, of which they are afraid, and at tbe same time, to make it appear to tbe English people that such legislation is blocked by the Bill. The device, no doubt, is a cunning one, but we may trust Mr Gladstone to thwart it,

We are promised all sarts of splendid things for the coming man in the Colony — as the consequence of an experimental policy guided by a clucking philosophy. We shall not, meantime, commit onraelvea to any statement as to the boy who is with us. He is human, we suppose, aud perhaps he may be capable of soaring. From a perfectly unsuspicious source, nevertheless, we take a sketch of the boy, and also of the youth, as they exist in the neighbouring Colonies. It would seem that a brand new incubator is very necessary there also, where, nevertheless, secularism has been at work, trying to improve the breed, for more than tweoty years. It is the people's paper, the Sydney Worker that gives us the following pictures. " The average Australian boy is a cheeky brat with a leaning towards larrikinism, a craving for cigarettes, and no ambition beyond the cricket and football field ; he regards his parents with contempt, takes it for granted that his mother mostly talks nonsense or 'rot' when she talks to him — and he doesn't always hesitate to tell her so. The average Australian youth is a weedy individual with a weak, dirty, anJ contemptible vocabulary, and a cramped mind devoted to sport ; his 1 god is a two-legged brute with unnaturally developed muscles and nr» brains. The average Australian intelligence gives a Searle. the rower, the burial of a hero, and doesn't know the name of Gordon or Kendall from that of Adam , it thinks more about Carbine than one man one vote." Let us bope that the goose-eggs from which our own swans are to be produced are a little less addled. A horrid thought will, however, intrude itself, to the effect ihat a Bimilar Btram runs ♦brough tbe young colonial everywhere. So at > least teaches oar personal experience of four colonies. Bat, of courte,

to! hatch swans from goose-eggs that are addled will reflect a higher glory on the incubator.

The followiag passage from a reply made by the Bishop of Meatb to an address presented to him on Jaly 4, in the parish of Donore near Drogbeda, seems particularly deserving of quotation :— '• A fact," he Bftid, " that brings the decline cf the population forcibly to my mind is that now I have only thirty-five children to confirm where formerly I remember having five hundred — indeed I think at the present day I have that and more in the King's County, where the land is far inferior to this, and which will not produce anything but by labour, and the people who toil weie allowed to remain on it, We have a great many other grievances, but the fundamental grievance of the country is that of the land. There are other grievances too, and in the matter of education we are wronged, and we claim our full educational rights ; but after all what are the educational rights of the people compare! with the right to live 7 We must first live before we can be educated, and if we have other grievances, I say they are nothing when compared to the grievances of the land question. I hope that the Parliament of England will settle this question. I confess I would much rather see the land question settled by the English Parliament than at home. When the English people understand the injustice under which you labour they will break up the monopoly which the landlords have appropriated in the land, and when they set about making a settlement of a question in England they do it radically and completely." Dr Nulty, nevertheless, as we all know, is an ardent Home Ruler.

A BIBLE-BEADING in schools meeting, presided over by the Rev Dr Stuart, and at which the Right Rev Dr Nevill, the Veu Archdeacons Edwards and Fen ton, and several other representatives of the mixed Protestant community were present, was held in Dunedin on Tuesday. A resolution was carried to the effect that measures should be taken to assimilate the New Zealand Education Act to the English Act, in those clauses that relate to religious instruction. The Rev A. R. Fitchett and Mr B. B.Cargill spoke each in favour of the Catholic claims, and Dr Nevill seemed to signify, in an indefinite manner, that, at least, he would not oppose them. Mr Fitchett said, "It might be thought that if a grant to Boman Catholics was conceded other denominations would claim some concession, but be believed that that was quite impossible to any appreciable extent, because the schools must meet the demands of the syllabus and submit to Government inspection." The Rev Dr Stuart was strictly non-committal. "It seemed to him," he said, " that they should leave Parliament to do what it liked with the Boman Catholics or any others who approached it." Mr Cargill said he personally approved of grants to Roman Catholics, "If the Catholics were to disband their schools to-morrow and send their children to the national school?, it would be necessary to build new schools in Dunedin to accommodate them," The Right Rev Dr Nevill called attention to the fact that the English Act of 1870 allowed grants from the public fnnds to o her schools than the Board schools, provided they answered the demands of Government inspection. His Lordship afterwards said that he did not see why they Bhouid be •'cribbed, cabined, and confined" in this Colony on a question on which there was free liberty in the mother country. The Btupid speaker of the occasion was the Rev Mr North, who talked r farrago ot nonsense from beginning to end. Compare, for example, the following passages : — " He disagreed totally from any attempt to sxtract moneys from the Treasury of the Colony for denominational purposes." "He was very mncn afraid of any departure from right principle, and he was very much afraid of the infliction on any man of any measure of in jus 1 ice." Surely no man in his right mind can fail to see the absurdity of this, if he considers how Catholics are dealt with in the matter. Another silly body seems to be the Rev VV. Rtady, who expressed himself as " deadly opposed to denominationalism." On the whole, however, the meeting contented themselves with very little, the religions teaching given in English board schools being of the slightest and most doubtful charscter possible, where it is not positively rationalistic.

We find that our interpretation of the Pope's letter on the American Bchool question was quite in accordance with that of American Catholic contemporaries to hand by the mail. The Pilot, tor instance, says :— " While sustaining the Delegate's propositions the Holy Father repudiates those false interpretations of them which enemies of Catholic educaion made so freely snd scattered so widely among the people. . . . The rule remains— the Christian school for the Christian child."

We are requestel by the Rev Father Craddock, P.P., Castlegar, County Galway, to acknowledge most gratefully on his behalf the following donations towards the repairs of hie churches :— Mr John Caeeerly, £1 ; Mr John Silk, £1 ; Mr Pat Cody, 10s ; bazaar tickets told by Mr John Casserly, £1.

As an instance of the queer customers with whom the police have occasionally to deal, we may mention the case of a doctor at

Kawakawa who has written to the force at Dnnedin to stop his paper for him. Does our medico, for example, call for the aid of the local constable in making his patients Bwallow his physic ?

The drawing of the Riverton art-union will take place on September 13. The holders of books are, therefore, requested to be prompt in making their return? so as to permit of all being in readiness. No further postponement is to take place.

The Auckland Education Board, as was to be expected, have rejected Dr Luck's renewed application, mentioned by our Auckland csrrespondent, for the inspection of his schools. Whether they have done so with a repetition of their impertinence we cannot say, but, no doubt, they have in all respectß been true to themselves.

The ob9tructionißts to the Home Rale Bill seem to have overdone their work. Even the London Times appears to complain and call for the closure. It asserts that otherwise the discussion will last for more than a month. But how much of the protest we are to attribute to justice and how mach to sport may remain doubtful.

Pressure on our space obliges us to hold over to next week several interesting articles— chief among which are a paper, read at the meeting of the Canterbury Literary Bociety, by the Bey Father Briand, on the late Mother 8t Gabriel, and a letter from a Grsymouth correspondent.