Current Topics

New Zealand Tablet, 4 March 1915, Page 23

Current Topics

/Think of the Kaiser’ Thomas A. Edison is evidently something of a philosopher as well as a mechanician; and his inventive genius has recently exhibited itself in quite a new direction. - To his already long list of achievements he has just added the invention of a recipe for worry. It is certainly timely, and has at least the merit of being simple and easily applied. As the cables informed us, Edison a short time ago lost part of his great manufacturing and experimenting works by fire. ‘Are you worrying?’ asked a New York reporter. ‘ Not a scrap,’ replied Mr. Edison, puffing a cigar contentedly, ‘we have a new standard of worry, beside which all others seem trivial. I look from the ruins of ,my works here across the Atlantic, and I see the Kaiser on the defensive on both fronts of the immense battlefields. When you realise that the Kaiser has been living for years in the atmosphere of his “ impregnable General Staff,” when you know he has been trained on the idea that a quick, smashing blow at France would enable him to rush to Russia and quell the Tsar, and then you realise what the Germans themselves must shortly realise, that final victory cannot Ire theirs —why, it is enough to make the gods, let alone mortals, weep. I have lost £600,000 worth of property by fire, but that is nothing to the Kaiser's loss. Here is my New Year’s recipe for worry: "Think of the Kaiser, and realise that you are the luckiest dog imaginable.” ’ A Courageous Doctor All honor to Dr. Foreman, chairman of the medical staff of the Sydney Royal Hospital for Women, who at the annual meeting of the institution the other day outspokenly condemned certain practices which are sapping the foundations of the vitality and morality of the race. According to a Press Association message in Friday’s papers, ‘ He said the cases treated included 124 of that most abominable practice, criminal abortion, which was becoming a flourishing industry all over the place. Doctors, nurses, chemists, and illegal practitioners competed all over the city. It was a shocking state of affairs, and one that was increasing at a great rate. Those treated did not represent a twentieth part of the total number of cases. Dr. Foreman scathingly denounced the doctors who descended to such practices.’ * W can only hope that the denunciation and the lashing will get home'; and it is to be hoped also that Dr. Foreman’s exposure of the existing state of things will not be lost upon the Sydney police. It would seem quite evident that they have been neglecting their duty in the matter. We have no idea as to the extent to which the evil referred to may be prevalent in New Zealand; but occasionally facts are brought under our notice which give ground for the suspicion that race suicide, in one form or another, is very far from being unknown amongst us. Only a fortnight ago we received from the mother of a family resident in a country district a copy of a catalogue which had been posted to the household from a Christchurch chemist, in which instruments of vice for interfering with the laws of nature were openly listed and advertised. We are under the impression that this is a violation of the law, and further inquiry will be made into the matter. In any case, information of such a kind falling into the hands of young people would be capable of working irreparable mischief ; and parents cannot be too strongly warned of the necessity for constant watchfulness and care, and of the strict obligation which rests upon them to keep all lists and catalogues of the kind well out of reach. Public and Private ‘ The public (school),’ remarks a sapient writer in the Christchurch Star of February 23, ‘is no more like a private school than light is darkness. The one pro-

duces independence the other submission one a leader, the other a follower; one freedom and, toleration, the other slavery and superstition. The public school makes good citizens, the private school makes good bigots.’ Although this paragraph appears in a column ostensibly devoted to Topics of the Day ’ and is presumably intended to be taken as editorial, we have grave doubts as to its originality. It looks painfully like a scissors and paste production from the pages of Robert Ingersoll, or of some of the glib writers of his cheap and shallow school. But whoever the author is, it is certain that he writes without knowledge of his subject. He may know something about the public schools, and of course he is entitled to his own opinion regarding them. But unquestionably he has no extensive, first-hand, adequate acquaintance with private schools, or he would never have perpetrated the swift and sweeping generations above quoted. * Just by way of contrast let us quote the considered opinion of one who has some claim to be regarded as an authority on the subject. The Hon. Bird S. Coler (Protestant), formerly Comptroller of New York City, has long been prominent in the public and political life of New York, and is the author of several valuable publications on educational subjects. Pie has made a long and careful study of the public school system, and has made some attempt also to investigate the work of the private schools. He was at first opposed to private schools, because he thought the idea was unAmerican, but he has now arrived at quite a different conclusion. In a recent address at the closing exercises of St. Patrick’s Academy, Watervliet, N.Y., Mr. Coler bore the following generous testimony: ‘ I have found in the parish schools the saving principle which has been eliminated in the public school system. I have found in them a secular education which, in every recent test, has shown superior efficiency over the public school education. I have found the idea of authority dominating moral instruction, and the idea of Divinity vitalizing moral instruction. I have found the idea of personal responsibility to God pressed home upon the mind of youth. I know no other way of making good citizens. I can say that, in its parish school system, your Church has built an institution that makes for the conservation of the American' ideal of life and government.’ The Christchurch Star paragraphist thinks that the private school makes for slavery and superstition; the eminent American authority declares that it makes for the conservation of the highest ideals of life and government. The difference in the verdict is due to the difference in the equipment and competency of the judges. Bible in Schools and the General Elections The Southern Cross, a Methodist weekly edited by Dr. W. IT. Fitchett and published in Melbourne, has been undertaking to enlighten Victorian politicians on the significance of the general elections held here in December last. It is always difficult for an outsider accurately to interpret the politics of a country, and it is not in the least surprising, therefore, to find Dr. Fitchett falling into divers blunders. First of all he gives some items of information which will certainly be new to New Zealanders. ‘ The political situation in New Zealand,’ he writes, ‘ is interesting, and is full of warning to some Victorian politicians. At the recent elections in New Zealand Mr. Massey’s majority was almost completely destroyed, to his own astonishment, and though he is still in office, he is no longer in power. Tie has a majority of only one, and that one is doubtful. Now, Mr. Massey is furious, and accuses the. Bihle-in-Schools Lea fine of having wrecked his Ministry.’ When, where, and how did Mr. Massey display this fury, or make the accusation referred to ? We claim to have read all the published speeches of Mr. Massey since the elections, and we defy Dr. Fitchett .to point to a single utterance in which the Prime Minister displayed fury over the result of the elections, or in which he accused the Bible-in-Schools League of having .. wrecked . his Ministry. On the contrary, Mr. Massey has never for a

moment admitted that his Ministry was wrecked.’ As ( to the causes of his diminished majority, the public has heard much regarding an alleged alliance between Liberalism and ‘ Red-Fedism,’ but not a word from Mr. Massey about the Bible-in-Schools League as a factor in the matter. * Then we are told that Mr. Massey ‘ hedged ’ on the Bible-in-sohools question, and that this cost him public respect and many Bible-in-schools votes. ‘lt did not disarm his opponents,’ says our Victorian mentor, ‘ but it chilled the zeal of his friends. It was claimed as showing that the Cabinet was opposed to the 'Bible-in-schools, and this, no doubt, influenced the votes of many members of the Bible-in-Schools League. As one keen judge puts it: “ Had Mr. Massey taken a definite line in granting us the referendum, he would have had an assured majority behind him to-day. But he vacillated. He proved himself a piece of putty in the hands of Rome. The secularist opposition was noisy, determined, and virulent, but it was very carefully engineered by Rome, which put the secularists into the front.” ’ It is very flattering, of course, to find ‘Rome’ credited with all this supernatural cleverness, but we are afraid we cannot accept the compliment. So far as the Bible-in-schools issue affected the elections it is perfectly clear that, broadly speaking, it was Mr. Massey’s support of and not his opposition to the Bible-in-schools proposal which weakened his position in the country. Here are the facts: (1) Mr. Massey, after at first announcing that he had always stood by the secular system and would continue to do so, subsequently ‘ virtually promised ’ (to use Dr. Gibb’s expression) a Referendum Bill to a Bible-in-Schools League deputation, and practically invited the League to supply him with a statement of the issues which they desired to have submitted. (2) The Hon. J. Allen, a leading member of Mr. Massey’s Ministry, fulfilled the Precunei s virtual promise and brought in a Religious Instruction in Schools Referendum Bill containing the exact issues demanded by the League. (3) In the°division in the House of Representatives in regard to the Education Committee’s report on the Bill,- Mr. Massey himself voted with the Bible-in-schools supporters, and only one member of his Ministry voted against them. (4) Prior to the elections Mr. Massey had a majority of eight in the House; after his dallying with the Bible-in-schools party he has been returned with a majority of only two, and even that is not as yet absolutely certain. There is a warning in all this for the politicians —both Victorian and New Zealand— the danger signal points in a very different direction from that indicated by Dr. Fitchett. German Catholics and the War An anonymous correspondent, with a very obvious bias, writing a week or two ago in the Taranaki Herald asked the question : ‘lf the Centre Party hold the balance of power in Germany what have they done with it? And why are they not, at the present time, able to protect their clergy and cathedrals?’ Anonymous communications of this kind are as a rule not worthy of any very serious attention ; but as there may be some perplexity in the minds even of our own people in regard to the attitude of German Catholics towards Germany’s military policy it may not be amiss to bring under notice one or two facts that will help to make clear the position. With regard to the mad race in armaments which preceded the present crisis, German Catholics were as powerless as English Protestants to prevent such a policy. Both countries ere more or less the victims of an inflamed public opinion. England rightly , deemed it necessary, as a measure of selfpreservation, to maintain a predominant navy to protect her island shores. Germans were led to believe that their only safety against England’s overmastering sea power was to make their own navy stronger and ever yet stronger. So long as Germany went on building Dreadnoughts, England must follow suit. So long as England continued building, Germany could not

. stand still. And so the insane competition went on, to the unspeakable injury of both. With regard to the actual declaration of war against Russia, there can be no doubt that the German Catholics, like the German Protestants, were led to believe that the sole object was to enable Austria to inflict punishment on Servia for the murder of the heir to the throne; To the vast majority of them the subsequent invasion of Belgium must have been a hateful step, but it was a military measure which they had neither the power nor the opportunity to prevent. ■, * • . So far as the attacks on cathedrals, convents, priests, etc., are concerned, it only needs to be said that the Catholics of Germany were and still are unaware of the magnitude of the crimes for which their country is answerable. Does the anonymous simpleton w ho disports himself in the Taranaki paper really suppose that detailed and definite information of the assassinations of priests, of the burning down of historic Catholic cities and churches, and of "the numerous other outrages inflicted on the Catholics of Belgium is allowed to reach the German people, either Catholic or Protestant ? He ought by this time to know better. It is little more than a week ago that the cables gave us the testimony of an English governess who had just i etui ned to London after seven years’ residence in Berlin, and who declares that ‘ during her stay in Berlin she did not hear a, single word of the German atrocities in Belgium.’ A very different sort of pabulum is served up for the Germans, both inside and outside of Germany. Here is a specimen, taken from a fearsome publication called Fatherland, which has been established in the United States for the express purpose of providing American Germans with the* ‘ truth ’ regarding the war. After referring to the English prisoners captured by the Germans, Fatherland proceeds : ‘ These English prisoners have treated our troops like savages. They threw up their hands, allowed our men to come within fifty yards of their position, then shot them down like dogs. With hooked blades and iron hooks they tore open the wounds of the captured wounded and cut their throats. What I am telling you is the result of official inquiry. With such beasts our brave troops are compelled to fight. , The Generalan:el(/er has received reports, based on official investigation, that Englishmen bored out the eyes of -wounded Germans with corkscrews.’ Fed up with stuff like this, and kept entirely in the dark as to the real facts regarding atrocities, the silence of the German people —both Protestant and Catholic— regard to the German conduct of the war is quite easily understood. For the rest, it is satisfactory to note that German Catholics have had the courage to make their voice heard clearly and strongly in protest against the insane and diabolical gosjiel of hate which is being preached by the representatives of German ‘ kultur ’ in the Fatherland: ‘The Catholic press of Germany,’ says a cable in Friday’s papers, ‘ has endorsed the German clericals’ article ( ? attitude) deploring the hatred against England as un-Christian, immoral, and unworthy of the German nation.’