NOTES

New Zealand Tablet, 26 June 1919, Page 26

NOTES

Federation Sunday Remember that Sunday, July 6, is Federation Sunday. Every Catholic, man and woman, boy and girl, ought to be enrolled. If you are not already a member be sure you enrol on July 6. All are wanted. . We want 150,000 members. A Memory of Napier Two things Napier boasts of: there is nothing likethat long walk by the changing sea, under the Norfolk Island pines, in front of the town; and the climate is as mild and as sunny as any reasonable man could . desire. There is another thing of which Napier does. not boast, of which many in Napier do not know, r which nevertheless we remember as gladly as we think., of the climate and the Esplanade: on the hill over the ■ sea the Mission Sisters have a boarding school, as healthy as sunshine and fresh air.and unwearying care could make it ; and there, as in all our Catholic boarding schools, the young girls in whose hands the future lies to such an extent, are educated on the eternal, true lines which must guide all education that is not a ; delusion and a snare. On a Sunday morning not long ago we had the good fortune to hear a concert of the Maori children at the Napier Convent, and it was a treat we shall not readily forget. The harmony of the "Swallow Song" was worth going to Napier to hear. The ''War Song" and the "Haka" were as., beautiful as anything can be that is drenched with the memory of old-forgotten far-off things and battles . long ago. The "Poi Dance" was a revelation of graceful gesture and artistic motion. The voices were as sweet and as natural as the scent of the flowers in the garden outside the schoolroom. And we were notsurprised to learn that the girls had won many prizes at the recent Competitions. It was delightful to.see, those innocent children of the ancient race so happy in their home on the sunny hill over the sea, and we could not help contrasting the work done by the, good nuns for their young charges with the harm done, to '_] the Maori people in the main by the white race. .'^ i Maori Folk Lore ..', ~'.~ -,,'i," The old race is dying. It is the law that when ■ the white man comes to civilise a dark people he cor- : runts them and sows the seeds of decay. The meek shall possess the Kingdom of Heaven, but the proud and the strong and the unscrupulous manage to get this earth into their hands as a rule. British civilisa- , tion means the spread of. materialism . and the gospel ■•■ of Utilitarianism which destroy every thing that is f ! beautiful in the world. As surely, as the virgin, bush is cut down to make room for railways,; and as surely as hideous stores arise like stains on the shores : of , lovely rivers and harbors, so surely does all that is worst,and-, most horrible in, British^"culture"; disfigure the poetic aiicr CiiiVaii'OuS ug&M»g^Ofc^Jiil&.-ji3npj-e.. r JuSulYi?. r&C£JL»_...

The f substitution of a ;■ name; like Palmerston North i for the musical Manawatu is a symbol of - what".takes" place. The teaching of 'f, the sing-song rhymes in the school-books ; and the ■ neglect of the old Maori songs is another sign. ,; A material people : that have driven God out : of their, schools cannot be expected to understand these things. .One might as well expect to see Joseph Hanan doing a haka or singing a lullaby in Maori. But there . are a few people who realise that not on bread alone does man live, and on them the duty devolves of saving what little remains of Maori traditions and folk lore. . The legends of the Maori race are too beautiful to allow them to die. Let us give them to the children if we have nothing of our own to give. The white man's record in New Zealand has no romance and no poetry about it. Let us not, however, be so stupid as to lose that older heritage which is not ours but the Maoris'. We took pretty nearly everything else from them and made our own of it. Let us take their legends too and save them for the future which may bring to New Zealand better men and women than they who are content to send God into exile and turn their lives and. their children's, into a series of market days and circuses. Superstition and Materialism "Can you not see," says Chesterton, "that fairy talcs in their essence arc quite solid and straightforward ; but that this everlasting fiction about modern life is in its nature essentially incredible? Folk lore means that the soul is sane, but that the universe is wild and full of marvels. Realism means that the world is dull and full of routine, but that the soul is sick and screaming. The problem of a fairy tale is—what will a healthy man do with a fantastic world? . The problem of the modern novel iswhat will a madman do with a dull world? In the fairy tales the cosmos goes mad ; -but the hero does not go mad. In modern novels the hero is mad before the book begins." In the name of Progress we are trying to do away with - folk lore and fairy tales now ; and in their stead we have a literature that is often redolent of the sewer and unfit to be read by decent people. Folk-lore and fairy tales never did children any harm, but the modern novel does harm to everybody who reads it. If it is not true to say with G. K. C. that the hero of modern novels is mad before the book begins it is at least true that the reader is mad with himself before it ends. The people who have deceived the masses and persuaded them that filth was better than poetry and romance have a lot to answer for. Forgeries of the sort committed by Haeckel and Huxley are a hundred times more criminal than those for which a man is sent to gaol. As long as a people believe in the world of fairies-even though they were to take them seriously they have, at any rate, a hold of a great truth; but when we have given up the fairies for Eugenics and Free Love it is time for us to look for a sign-post to tell us what direction was taken by the Gadarene swine. Excess or Defect Whether is it better to have too much of a thing or not to have it at all Of course it all depends on what the thing is, but when the thing is belief in the supernatural there is no doubt that excess is better than defect. A superstitious race of savages is better any day than an unclean race of modern ladies and gentlemen who have removed their souls and developed their passions. Superstition generally keeps people pure, but materialism makes them lower than the beasts which at anyrate follow unperverted instincts. There is beauty and loveliness and poetry in superstition, but in materialism there is nothing but ugliness and grossness. The practices of people who think they gain something by dancing round a bonfire on St. John's Eve, or \ skimming a well on May Morn, are things that a child may read about with interest. u What things the materialist who persuades himself that there is no God and that he has no soul may do under the driving of his creed are usually found in papers that specialise "in \ Divorce Court -reports-- Superstition is a

feverish sort of faith, and out of .it may. come , a robust faith. Materialism puts faith in the gutter and stamps on it. Superstition is a Celt cryingfor the moon, while . materialism is a Saxon Gurth fighting among';his swine for a share in their happiness. :A, superstitious man would always be incapable, for example, of insulting the memory of a Joan of , Arp—his; trouble would be that he would be inclined to pay. her, too high worship. One has to go to the materialists to find men capable of reviling and calumniating her. by trying to make out that she was as bad as the sort, of women with whom they are most .familiar. Very good, people may be prone to superstitions at times, but it is to materialism the very bad people find their way as. a rule.