CATHOLICS AND EDUCATION OUR SUNDAY VISITOR LIBRARY HUNTINGTON, INDIANA L O N D O N C A T H O L I C T R U T H S O C I E T Y 69 S O U T H W A R K B R I D G E R O A D , S . E . - CONTENTS - T H E EDUCATION A C T OF 1 9 0 2 : THE DIFFICULTY AND ITS SOLU- ~V ~-TION. ; By the Archbishop of Westminster. T H E - CATHOLIC A T T I T U D E ON THE EDUCATION QUESTION^ B y the same. T H E MAINTENANCE OF RELIGION IN THE SCHOOL. B y the same. CATHOLIC EDUCATION AND THE DUTIES OF PARENTS. B y the" I5jshop of Clifton. THE EDUCATION BILL.; By the Very Rev. Canon Glancey. T H E CATHOLIC ASPECT OF THE EDUCATION QUESTION. , B y Bertram C. A. Windle, M.D., F.R.S. | T H E RIGHTS OF MINORITIES. B y the R e v . Joseph R i c k a b y , S . J . ..RELIGIOUS INSTRUCTION" IN SCHOOLS. B y Robert J . Smythe . EDUCATION, TRUE AND FALSE. B y Wil l iam Samuel L i l l y . N O T E THÈ following pamphlets on THE attitude of Catholics- towards Education in general, and especially in relation., to threatened legislation, past and future, have'been published by the Catholic Truth Society, and are now brought together for the convenience of those who may like to possess them in a collected form. Tanuary, 1908 THE EDUCATION ACT OF 1902 T H E D I F F I C U L T Y A N D ITS SOLUTION"' B Y HIS GRACE THÈ ARCHBISHOP OF WESTMINSTER Y o u must be almost weary by this time of hearing of - the Education Question. For years we have been calling out for a resetting of the position of our schools. For years, too, "we have been watching, and criticizing, and striving to amend the efforts of the Legislature to effect that readjustment. For many months our attention has been fixed on the results of those efforts, and no one can yet say what phase the question will next assume. Whether we be weary or not of the whole subject, we can never forget it. It forces itself continually upon our notice. Qur interests as Catholics in the matter of education are so great that until some satisfactory solution is found—if that day will ever come—we must be alive to every change, actual or imminent, and we must not allow ourselves to be distracted from the subject by any weariness or any disappointment. You will " Inaugural Address at the Catholic Conference s held at Birmingham, September 26-28, 190 .̂ § The E d u c a t i o i t Act of 1962 pardon me, therefore, if I take for the subject of my address to you to-night the results of the Education Act of 1902. I. T H E G O O D OF THE A C T . I think that we may say boldly that this Act is great step in advance in the general educational pro- spects of the country. A spirit of method and of co-Ordination is brought into the national education which must certainly have the most far-réaching results. The complicated control of the Education Department and of the Science and Art Department, and óf the Charity Commission, and of the School Boards has been unified and simplified, and for the first time primary and secondary and technical educatibn with all their subdivisions have been brought under one authority, whose duty it'will be to see that they stand in proper relation to one another. Again, the training of teachers is. ait last receiving the attention which it deserves, and new avenues of usefulness are being opened up to those who desife to enter on the profession of teaching, while adequate remuneration is provided to stimulate their energy; Moreover opportunities are being afforded, and they will every day.'increase, whereby those who hava talent but small means will nevertheless be able by means of scholarships to avail themselves of every educational advantage, that the country has . at its disposal. But jnore important than all these reforms is the The Good of the Act 3 spirit which is animating them, a spirit very diffe- rent from that which we were once accustomed to associate with the Department. A glance at the " Introduction " prefixed to the Education Code for J904, or at the Regulations for Secondary Schools, will be sufficient indication of what I mean. It is now clearly recognized that the main object of education is not to give instruction in certain subjects and to enable children to pass muster at examination, but to train the character; and develop the intelli- gence of the children and to fit them for the work of life. Teachers are reminded how it is theif duty to implant in the children habits of industry, self- control, and courageous perseverance in-the face of difficulties. They are to teach them to reverence what is noble, to be ready for self-sacrifice, and to strive their utmost; after purity and truth. Again, due recognition is given to the fact that great freedom must be allowed to secondary schools, to work upon the lines either bequeathed by tradition or suggested by local circumstances, and that hard and fast rules would impede and not advance the educational progress of the country. On all these grounds I think that we have reason to be grateful to the promoters of the legislation of 1902, and to the framers of the various Acts and regulations which preceded or have followed that much-debated enactment. They have §hown them- selves keenly alive to the educational necessities of the country, and they have proved themselves to be men who know what real education is. i The nation cannot but be the better for the important changes :which have taken place. § The E d u c a t i o i t Act of 1962 II. T H E INJUSTICE OF THE A C T OF 1 8 7 0 . Having said this much, and having recognized most fully, as I consider we aie bound to do, all that is good and useful in the recent legislation, we are none the-less obliged to confess that the Act of 1902 has not solved the great. educational problem which has confronted and tormented the country for so many years. In order to show this, I will endeavour to'establish three points : (1) Thé-Education Act of 1870 was in certain respects an unjust law ; (2) The Éducation Act of 1902 has removed some of the inequalities created by the Act of 1870 ; but, (3) It has left the fundamental injustice of that Act untouched. 1., Until 1870 the education of the country was not adequately provided for. Thousands of children were without education, and a remedy was urgently necessary. Voluntary effort had done much,- and could do no more. The direct intervention of the State' was required in order ; to make good the . deficiencies which were recognized by all. But in carrying out this \ urgently needed reform a very great injustice was committed, and a privileged posi- tion was conferred upon those who had done little or nothing in the cause of education, while those who had made ' sacrifices of every kind were placed in a position of undeserved inferiority. In December, 1882, my great predecessor, Cardinal Manning, wrote The Injustice of the Act of i 870 5 an article for the Nineteenth Centwy, entitled, " is the- Education Act of 1870 a Just Law ? " T o m;.,ke my meaning clear I will 'quote largely from that article, which sets forth in terms plainer than any one else could have chosen the fatal flaw of the system introduced by that A c t : — The principles embodied in the Act of 1.870 may be stated as follows : — 1. That education, whether by voluntary schools or by rate schools, shall be universal, and co-extensive with the needs of the whole population. 2. That an education rate shall be levied in all places where the existing schools are not1 sufficient for the population in number or in efficiencyi and that such rate shall be adminis- tered by a board elected by the ratepayers. 3. That the standard of education shall be raised to meet the needs and gradations of the people. 4. That all schools receiving aid, whether by Government grant or by rate, shall be brought under the provisions of the statute law. 5. That all such schools shall be under inspec- tion of Government, and bound by all minutes and codes of the Committee of Privy Council as sanctioned by Parliament. 6. Lastly, it has been since that date enacteH ~ that education, Under certain conditions and for Certain classes, be compulsory. Now, these principles have been so" long admitted, and have worked themselves so deeply § The E d u c a t i o i t Act of 1962 into public opinion and daily practice, that no scheme or proposition at variance with them would be listened to. The condition thus made for us being irrever- sible, our duty is to work upon it and to work onward from it for the future. Assuming then that the principles of the Act of 1870 are good, and their results beneficial, the promoters of that Act cannot but desire that it should be carried out to its fullest extent. . . . Putting away all ecclesiastical questions, it cannot be denied that the State is justified in providing for the education of its people. It has a right to protect itself from the dangers arising from ignorance and vice, which breed crime and turbulence. It has a duty also to protect children from the neglect and sin of parents, and to guard their rights to receive' an education which shall fit them for human society a,nd for civil life. If the civil power has these rights and duties towards the people, it has the corresponding rights and powers to levy upon the people such taxes or rates as are necessary for the due and full discharge of such duties. But correlative to these rights of the civil power are also the rights of the people. If the'. Government may tax the whole people for education, the whole people have a right to share in the beneficial use, of such taxation. An education rate raised front the whole people ought to be returned to the whole people in a. The Injustice of the Act of i 870 7 form or in forms of education of which all may partake. If any one form of education can .be found, in which all the people are content to share, let it be adopted ; if no one such form be possible, let there be as many varieties of form as can with reason be admitted. No one form of religious education would satisfy Catholics, Anglicans, Nonconformists, and un- believers. No form whatsoever of merely secular instruction will satisfy the great majority, who believe that education without religion is impossible. Therefore, if no one iorm can be found to satisfy all, many and various forms of education bught to be equally admitted, and equally allowed to stand on the same ground before the' law. 1 This does not mean that every individual or every caprice may claim a share in the education rate ; but that every association or body of men having public and distinct existence, already recognized by law, should be recognized also as a unit for the purposes of education, and, being so. recognized, therefore admitted to a participation in the education rate ; reserving always'./to the Government its full inspection, and to the ratepayers their due control and audit of accounts. . . . W e may now go on to see in what the present way of carrying out the Act is open to the Censure of inequality and injustice. • x. First of all, the exclusive enjoyment and control of the education rate is given to one only class of schools, which represent one and § The Educatioit Act of 1962 only one form of opinion, and that form which is repugnant to the majority of the people of the United Kingdom, namely, that such schools should be only secular, to the exclusion of religion. The exclusion of religion excludes the vast majority of the people from those schools ; and such schools, being exclusive, are truly and emphatically sectarian. And here, lest I should seem not to know, or knowing, i o omit to say, that the Bible is read now in the majority of board schools, I cite the fact to' prove that religion is not taught in them. All doctrinal formularies and catechisms are ex- pressly excluded by the Act of 1870. But religion without doctrine is like mathematics without axioms, or triangles without base or. sides. I heartily rejoice that the life and words, and works, and death of the Divine Saviour of the world should be read by children. But that is not the teaching of religion, unless the true meaning and the due intrinsic worth of all these things be taught. But this would perforce be doctrinal Christianity, prohibited by law. There can be no mathematics without precise intellectual conceptions and adequate verbal ~ expression. . . . The Cardinal finally declares : " It would be difficult to find in all our recent history a more unequal and unjust condition." These words are true to-day as they were twenty-two years ago. I am willing to admit, if you like, that the old board schools gave more than secular instruction, and that The Injustice of the Act of i 870 9 they endeavoured to impart a moral and religious basis of conduct. Be it so f then the inequality created by the Act of 1870 is all the greater, for it gives a privileged position to one form of religious teaching, which is repugnant to vast numbers of the people. Here, in a country which prides itself7 on its Christian character, the teaching of definite Christianity was refused the same recognition as that accorded to indefinite and indeterminate doctrines, and those who clung to it for the most conscientious motives were made to suffer for their convictions. Unwillingly, unwittingly very likely^ the framers. of .the Act of 1870 introduced a system of unfair treatment of definite religious belief, against which we have protested for more than thirty years. 2. W e readily admit that the Act of 1902 has removed some of the inequalities created by the Act of 1870. W e shall no longer be called upon to content ourselves with insufficient apparatus a.nd furniture. Our teachers will be adequately re- munerated, and will not now have 1 to make the Sacrifices so generously and so nobly accepted in the- past. W e are given a more definitely recognized place in the educational system of the coun.try. W e , have no longer to appeal to the charity of our people for the "daily working of our schools. In other words, the inequality existing between the provided and non-provided schools of to-day is not so-great as that which existed between the board schools and the voluntary schools which they have supplanted. But though less in degree, the inequality is the same ir\ character, and it calls loudly for redress. § The E d u c a t i o i t Act of 1962 O N L Y AN INSTALMENT OF JUSTICE. 3. Some time ago, when the Act of 1902 was. under consideration, I ventured to' say that it was only an instalment of justice. I repeat that state- ment to-day, and I say that that Act leaves untouched the ^fundamental injustice wrought by the Act of 1870. What is the actual position ? The people of England are divided into two camps: Those who prefer that their children shall' receive at school only secular training or some colourless moral instruction are placed in a position of privilege. Sites are pro- cured, and schools are built for them, without regard to expense ; and all this is done at the public cost. Those, however, who regard definite religious teach- ing as an all-important and fundamental part of education, are called upon to provide at their own expense sites and. buildings in order' that their children may receive the education which, as a matter of conscience, they require for them. In other words, while both classes alike are composed of those who pay the same rates and taxes, and have • the s^me rights as citizens, of the ,one same country, the upholders of definite religious teaching aré placed under a disability, and are, in fact, penalized on account of their conscientious belief. We, have heard a great deal of the Nonconformist conscience, and of the injury done fo Nonconformist children because they are obliged to frequent Anglican or'other schools. I would gladly do away with every such grievance, where it exists, but I confess that I am astonished to find so little appreciation on the part of our Nonconformist friends of the fact that other The Injust ice of the Act of i 870 11 people have consciences too, and that many of them,, owing to the Acts of 1870 and 1902, have suffered, and are suffering still, a far greater injustice than any of which Nonconformists have to complain. Until the privileged position accorded to secularists and Nonconformists by the educational legislation begun in 1870 is swept away, there Can be no per- manent settlement of the Education Question, and the primary education of the country, will continue to suffer to the great detriment of the nation. T h e voluntary schools : struggled on for years with an insufficient staff of under-paid teachers, only too often in badly built and ill-equipped schools, and, notwithstanding, they attained results beyond all expectation. But they could not compete with their rivals backed by the public purse, and able to indulge in costly improvements at their whim. The non- provided schools, of to-day will do their best with such buildings as their friends can provide, but they cannot compete on equal terms with those who will find schools provided at public cost whenever and wherever they need them. I do not complain of the vast sums expended on school sites and buildings by the public authorities of the land. Education is so important that I welcome everything that will make it more efficient, more attractive, and more accessible. But all these advantages should be the heritage of all alike, and it is unjust that any one should be debarred from them on account of his conscientious beliefs. All should have the; same rights in this respect, be they Catholic, Anglican, or Nonconformist. § The E d u c a t i o i t Act of 1962 III. T H E SOLUTION : RECOGNIZE AND M E E T THE RELIGIOUS D I F F I C U L T Y . Where, then, ladies and gentlemen, is the solution of the education difficulty to be found ? Some will tell you that we are tending to the complete seculari- zation of all public elementary schools. I trust that this is not the case, for such a policy would not only be a calamity to the nation as a whole, but it would most certainly not be a solution of the difficulty which confronts us. Rather it would intensify still more the crying injustice of which we have already so much reason to complain. The lesson of passive resistance has been taught very prominently of late. But what, I ask you, would its most acute recent -developments be in comparison with the resistance, both active and passive, which—if the Christianity of England is worth anything at all—would at once be aroused, if Christian parents were to be forced to send their children to schools which their conscience abhorred ? Compulsory education in secularized schools would most certainly not end the difficulty. To find a solution I go back to the words of Cardinal Manning, written in 1882 : — . . . If the Government may tax the whole people for education, the whole people have a right to share in the beneficial use of such taxation. An j education rate raised from the whole people Ought to be returned to the whole people, in a form or in forms of education of which all may partake. If any one form of education can be found, in which The Solution T t I J all the people are content to share, let it be adopted ; if no one such form be possible, let there be as many varieties of form as can with reason be admitted. No one form of religious education would satisfy Catholics, Anglicans, Non- conformists, and unbelievers. No form whatsoever of merely secular instruction will satisfy the great majority, who believe that education without religion is impossible. Therefore, if no one form can be found to satisfy all, many and various forms of education ought to be equally admitted, and equally allowed to stand on the same ground'before the law. In other words, an equitable solution is to be found not in ignoring, but in recognizing to the full, the religious differences of the country. On this matter we Catholics can speak quite frankly. W e are in no .way responsible for the religious divisions which unfortunately exist among our fellow-country- men. None deplore those divisions more than we do. W e would heal them if we could, but we recognize them as stubborn facts' which must be taken into account in every department of our national adminis- tration. With regard to the provision of elementary schools, let all Englishmen alike stand on an equal footing before the law, and let all alike have, under reasonable conditions, schools properly built and fully equipped at the public cost—to which all alike contribute—but of a character to which they Can send their children without any injury being done to their conscientious religious convictions. I say undet reasonable conditions, because where very few chil- dren of one religious belief are to be found, it would. § The E d u c a t i o i t Act of 1962 be obviously impossible to provide an efficient school for thehi, and it would be necessary that their own pastor, priest, or clergyman, should see that adequate provision is made for the religious instruction of the very small minority. But in all large centres where a number of children too great for individual religious care out of school is to be found, I maintain that for such children schools should be provided and maintained at thè public cost, wherein they shall receive an education in accordance with the religious convictions of their parents, at the hands of teachers who are recognized as fit and capable for their task by the religious body to which they belong. Many, no doubt, will say that such a scheme is chimerical and Utopian. However this may be, I am convinced that in nò other way can the educational difficulty be ended, and that until such a solution is devised, with all its necessary details, the education of the peoples of England will be retarded, and the injustice done to conscientious religious belief by the Acts of 1870 a.nd 1902 will remain unredressed. And I hope that a day may come when those who understand the full importance of harmonious action, wherè education is concerned ; and those who are interested in assuring to England that foremost place in education upon which her future prosperity depends ; and those who, like ourselves, desire to enter most fully into the educatiónal life of the Country, provided that conscience does not hold us • back, will at length realize that the only way to educational peace and concord is*by recognizing in the> fullest way the religious and conscientious convictions which underlie every aspect of the question. The Attitude of Catholics 15 I V , T H E A T T I T U D E O F CATHOLICS. What is to be our attitude at the présent moment ? ' . W e are in presence of a new crisis, as we were • in 1870, W e must face it with the same earnestness 1 , and determination as our fathers a generation ago . met the position that confronted them. First, we see already that in many places we shall have to improve or replace our school buildings. Elsewhere new sites must be acquired and new schools erected upon them. Every effort must be made to meet these requirements, crushing though • they will undoubtedly be in a large number of localities. In the large towns it is simply impossible to vie with the public purse in the acquisition of rschool sites, and we must be content, as in the past, with taking the position that is within our means. At the same time, bearing ever in mind the unjust burden placed upon us because of our religious con- victions, we have every right to expect and demand considerate treatment at the hands of all the public authorities. They must be content with what we can achieve, and not regard it as a sign of half- hearted interest on our part, if we are able to do far less well than we desire. But a prolonged and very strenuous effort is needed to cope with immediate needs, and to ensure our maintenance of the position \Vhich we have gained by the struggles of so many years. Secondly, we must be ever on the watch. The Board of Education and the local authorities will § The E d u c a t i o i t Act of 1962 • admit, I believe, that the Catholic body has en- deavoured to co-operate with them loyally, and to abstain from raising difficulties, in the very complex | and difficult work of reorganizing the education of " the country. They will-not take it amiss/therefore, I trust, if, as we are bound to do, we urge most strongly upon their notice any deviation from the understanding arrived at in 1902, or any matter in which educational requirements are enforced to the detriment of our schools. The Education A c t ' •of 1902 has lessened the injustice to which all voluntary schools, were subjected ; there must be no increase of that injustice in any shape'or form. Lastly, while we toil and strain every nerve to make the best use of the existing-situation, while we do all in our power to promote in every way the education of our children and of the nation to which they belong, we must never forget that the Edu- cation Question has not received its final solution. While the Acts of 1870 and of 1902 have done much ' to ensure the due - instruction of the people, they have done so by leaving an unfair burden on religious conviction. Until that burden is removed, until all English children are able to receive on equal terms an education irt conformity with the conscientious requirements of their parents, the , problem remains unsolved. Against the fundamental injustice initiated by the Act of 1870, and continued, though in a mitigated form, by the Act of 1902; we protest.as loudly as we can, and our protect must be renewed and repeated until that injustice is finally swept away. PRINTED AND PUBLISHED BY THE CATIJOtJQ ;TRjj™ SOCJETY, | . " THE CATHOLIC ATTITUDE ON THE EDUCATION QUESTION BY THE ARCHBISHOP OF WESTMINSTER 1 FOR thirty-five years the education of our poorer children has been the absorbing preoccupation of the Catholics of this country, and there seems no prospect of arriving, within a measurable space of time, at & solution which will put an end to all controversy and allay all anxiety. There are, in- deed, many subjects which are intimately connected with the progress of the Catholic Church in England which might well be treated on the occasion of a great gathering like this, in a large centre of a very important diocese. But, weighing their gravity against that of this question of education, I feel that, without -excuse or any seeking for justification, I may again ask the members of the Catholic Truth Society, and the friends who have welcomed them to this town, to give all their attention for a few 1 Address delivered at Blackburn, Sept. 25, 1905, at the opening of the Catholic Conference. 2 The 'Catholic Attitude moments to the aspects of the question -which now confront us. As far as legislation goes, we are as we were just a year ago. A clearer interpretation of the Acts of 1902 and 1903 has been given on some disputed points. Increased powers have been granted to the Board of Education to facilitate the working of those Acts. The opposition to them is less noisy aiid less virulent, and this in many cases because personal contact and more intimate knowledge have brought a truer and fairer conception of the work carried on in the non-provided schools. Accurate informa- tion shows that in very many parts of the country our schools are working under decidedly improved conditions, and that a good understanding prevails between the foundation managers and the local authorities. In some few areas there is bitter and avowed hostility to our schools, showing itself in acts of grave injustice, and, it would appear, of positive illegality. No distinct provision seems to have been made in the Acts to prevent an unjust differentiation between the salaries of teachers; probably because it never entered the mind of any honourable man to suppose that such an attempt would be ever made. T h e majority of the London County Council, with the support of those who in all other matters make themselves the champions of fair wages, have decreed that our Catholic teachers are to be underpaid, and can assign for their decision only the shallowest and most flimsy of reasons. on the Education Question - 3 Our Attitude in the Future. What of the future ? W e are told repeatedly that the present Government is d o o m e d ; that before a year is passed a great Liberal majority will be the parliamentary masters of the country; that their first concern will be to amend, or repeal,-or manipulate the Education Acts, in such a way as to destroy the Catholic character of our schools, In other words, w e are assured that in a few months' time w e shall be in presence of a crisis far more serious than any which w e have yet had to face. These things may be true, they may be fa lse ; probably they contain some exaggeration. But, if it be a fact—and the recent forced retirement of a great soldier, a distinguished Irishman, and an excellent -Catholic, Sir Will iam Butler, from the field of political candidature is a most ominous sign —i f it be a fact that the great political party now in opposition has definitely committed itself to a policy which means the destruction of what we regard as essential to the Catholic character of our schools, what, then, is to be our attitude ? Our attitude in the future must be true to our attitude in the past. In that phrase, w e may fairly sum up the whole.situation. It is not in our power to initiate policy ; it would indeed be a great error on our part to make the necessarily fruitless attempt to do so. W e have neither the numbers nor the political strength to warrant any such attempt. Wfc have rather to scrutinize very closely the proposals 4 The 'Catholic Attitude of those who sway the political destinies of the country, to whatever party they may belong, and to endeavour to discern the aim and object towards which they are ultimately tending. If these pro- posals are in accbrdance with the principles for which w e have contended so long, then they deserve all our support. If, however, they are in contradic- tion to those principles, no effort must be omitted to bring them to nought. W e cannot-say with absolute accuracy what the future policy of political parties is to be. But w e do know, and w e ought to be absolutely clear in holding and in enunciating, the principles which have always animated us in the struggles of the past. Standing, therefore, midway between the anxieties which preceded the last efforts of the Legislature, and the fierce battle which very probably soon awaits us ; on this, the last occasion on which it may be possible to address a Conference of the Catholic Tputh Society before the conflict is actually joined, I desire to recall to you some of the declarations of the last thirty-five years, and to place before you in what may be a useful outline, the great principles which have been our mainstay in the past, and which must, under all circumstances, be the foundation of our policy in the future. T h e Declaration of 1870. T h e first declaration to which I call your attention is very interesting, as it was prepared in 1870, when the Bishops were absent in Rome, with a view of on the Education Question - 5 conveying to Catholic Members of Parliament the views and wishes of the Catholic laity in reference to Mr. Forster's Bill which had just been introduced. Its main statements are as follows : — That no moral training can be efficient unless built on the truths of religion, and therefore the Church is essentially concerned in the most important part of true education, since accord- ing to our faith Christ has appointed the Church and its ministers to be the teachers of moral and religious truth.—That by the natural and divine law it is the duty and right of parents to educate their children, and all Christian fathers and mothers are bound to see that their children receive a Christian education.—That it is the duty of the State or civil authority to provide for the good order and well-being of the com- munity and, as these depend principally on the proper education of the individual members of the community, it is the duty of the State and its truest policy to assist parents in the discharge of the aforesaid duty, or to compel them to fulfil it if they neglect to do so.—That the manifold differences in religious convictions which exist" in this country render such action on the part of the State a matter of grave practical difficulty, because while on the one hand the general enforcement upon all of any: particular system of sectarian teaching would involve most serious violations of the rights of conscience, the establishment on the other of 6 The 'Cathol ic Attitude a system of secular education from which religious teaching should be excluded 'would be equally opposed to the conscientious convictions of the majority of. the people of this country, which are deeply impressed with the importance of the sacred truths of. Christianity.—That con- sequently a system of popular education founded on the secular system, instead of being unsec- tarian, would be sectarian in the most obnoxious sehse to the community generally, and it would be especially unjust to Roman Catholics, who under such a system would be compelled to support schools contrary to the plain dictates of their consciences and to send their children to them, or burthen themselves additionally with the entire cost of maintaining other schools of which their consciences would approve.—That whilst, therefore, the Roman Catholics of Great Britain declare cheerfully their readiness to co-operate in establishing any just system of national education which is necessary to extend to ail the benefits of education, they have a right to ask that it may be based on principles which will not do violence to their con- sciences-, and be protected by provisions which will enable them to avail themselves of its benefits, without sacrificing rights and interests the most sacred to themselves and their | children. I need not allude to the article'which Cardinal Manning wrote in The Nineteenth Century of on the Education Question - 7 December, 1882, for I quoted from it at length last year, and it is no doubt present to your memory. 1 T h e Bishops in 1884 and 1885. T h e next pronouncement of importance is con- tained in the resolutions of the Bishops in L o w W e e k , 1 8 8 4 : — | T h e Bishops are of opinion that the time is come when Catholics should make a great and united effort to secure the just rights of Catholic schools, by using every means to set before the | public the many grievances inflicted on them by the educational law, and by labouring in ¿very way for the removal of these grievances. All w h o pay rates and taxes have an equal right to receive educational assistance in proportion to their need, their numbers, and the value of their services. In 1885 w e find the following most important declaration : — T h e sacred rights and liberties of parents and children are invaded and destroyed by any kind of compulsory State education which separates - religion from -education, or which dictates what shall be the amount and kind of religious in- . struction which children shall receive during the period-of their education. W e renew the repeated-condemnation pronounced by ourselves 1 See The Education Act of 1902 ; the Difficulty and its Solu- tion. Price-id. Catholic Truth Society. 32 The 'Catholic Attitude and by the Church on all systems o£ mixed education ; and w e declare that thé temporal and eternal interests of Christian youth demand above all things that the mind, heart, and character shall be trained and educated in Christian truths and principles. While we heartily unite in the universal desire that all children shall be suitably educated, we maintain that the State cannot, without violation of the natural and divine law, compel parents to educate their children in a system which is opposed to their conscience and religion ; and we declare that the Catholics of this country' cannot accept for themselves any system of education which is divorced from their religion. Inasmuch as in the year 1869 a scheme of education, " universal, secular, compulsory, and free," in the hands of the State, was announced and recommended by parties and by persons of political notoriety, we feel bound in duty to declare that we cannot consent to accept such a scheme, or in any way to aid in substituting a system which is foreign and fatal to Christianity, and to the traditional Christian education of the people of England. W e have abstained from entering into many details, but there is one so glaring in its inequality and injustice that we cannot refrain from entering our protest against it, namely, the use of two measures in apprais- ing the value of work done and of instruction given. . . . on the Education Question - 9 Cardinal Manning's È Reasons." Readers of the Life of Cardinal Manning will recollect the impression made on thinking men by his publication in 1888 of " F i f t y Reasons w h y the Voluntary Schools of England ought to share the School Rates." I will give you some of the most striking of those reasons : 1. Because all who pay Rates ought to share in the benefit of the Rates. 2. Because to compel payment and to exclude from participation is political injustice. 3. Because to offer participation upon con- ditions known beforehand to be of impossible acceptance is wilful and deliberate exclusion. 4. Because to offer education either without Christianity or with indefinite Christianity to the people of England—of w h o m the great majority are definitely and conscientiously Christian—is a condition known beforehand to be of im- possible acceptance. Such offer is therefore politically and morally unjust. 11. Because they (the voluntary schools) are the only safeguard of the rights and conscience both of parents and children. 12. Because they embody the freedom of the people to educate themselves in opposition to the pagan and revolutionary claim that the education of the people is the State. 13. Because the Christian'people of England never have given up, never can give up, this 34 The 'Cathol ic Attitude natural and Christian liberty of conscience. The Act of 1870 did not spring from their will, nor does it represent their mirid. 14. Because, until Christianity, full and defi- nite, made England to be one and Christian, there was no England. T h e only England known to history and to the world is Christian England, which has been perpetuated by the Christian conscience of the people until the schools of 1870 departed from the education of their forefathers. 41. Because neither will the denominational system ever win back the whole population; of England and Wales, nor will the board school system ever extinguish the Christian schools of this country ; but a higher, larger, and equal law, giving place and liberty of action to both the voluntary and board school systems, will reconcile their variances and peacefully mature and complete a National system of education worthy of the name. 45. Because local administration is surest, and develops local responsibility and energy: which are suspended and destroyed by cen- tralisation. 46. Because a large decentralisation of the functions of the Education Department is cer- tain, inevitable, and more expedient. 47. Because what touches so closely the conscience and homes of the people ought to be within their knowledge and reach. on the Education Question - 11 48. Because the education of- the children is a local duty, and confers a- local benefit. It ought, therefore, to be cared for, and in part paid for by each locality. • Further Declarations by the Bishops. In 1891 the Bishops resolved t h a t — It was preferable that the control of elemen- tary education should be transferred to the county councils, and that school boards should be abolished. Later in the same year they declared t h a t — It is important both for the present welfare and for the future safety of our schools, that the com- mittees of management be made efficient, and that two persons elected by the parents of the children be added, to the three ex officio existing managers, and that, as the voluntary system is essentially the education of children under the responsibility of their parents, every possible effort ought to be made in all the dioceses and parishes to awaken parents to a consciousness of their duties and rights ; and that the manage- ment of the schools, according to the require- ments of the law as it now exists, should be vigorously and efficiently carried out, In 1893 the Bishops pronounced as follows : — 1. That in accordance with natural law, the management of public elementary schools ought to be in the hands of persons having the 12 The 'Catholic Attitude confidence of the parents of the children fre- quenting such schools. 2. That consequently the denominational system of education must be maintained and strengthened by all means in our power. 3. That, towards providing the cost of im- proved secular instruction, Catholic public ele- mentary schools have a right to a fair share 9! the rates; and that the ratepayers have a corresponding right to such inspection and oversight as shall ensure a proper expenditure of their contribution towards the cost of- public education. T h e Declaration of 1894. In 1894 the Bishops again discussed the matter at length, and their resolutions were as follows : — 1. That it is a right and a duty, given to parents by their Creator, wherever such natural right has not been forfeited, to secure and watch over, the education of their children in that which they believe to be the true religion. 2. That no plea on behalf of educational uniformity, and no decision by any majority of votes, can alter or abrogate this fundamental natural law, which the Legislature and the people of this country are equally bound to respect and observe. 3. That, in the nature of things, it can never tend to the happiness, the welfare, or the per- manent advantage of a State, to disregard, and on the Education Question - 13 in practice to outrage, a law of nature, such as the right of parents over the education of their children, be the injury brought about directly, or indirectly, by a process of law, o r ' b y a process of privation and exhaustion. 4. That, while political power and the respon- sibilities of self-government are more and more devolving upon the masses of the people, and while obvious dangers menace the future of Society, it is to the country's highest advantage that religious principles of life and conduct should be deepened and strengthened in thé" souls of all during the period of. elementary education ; and that these advantages can be adequately secured, so far as the education of Catholics is concerned, only by Catholic public elementary schools, conducted under Catholic management. 5. That Catholic parents cannot in conscience accept or approve for their children a system of education in which secular instruction is wholly divorced from education in their religion. 6. That Catholic parents cannot in conscience accept or approve for their children a system of religious education based upon private inter- pretations of the Bible given by school teachers, whether trained in religious knowledge or untrained. 7. That the only system of religious education which Catholic parents can accept for their children- is that given under the authority and The Cat ho He Attitude direction of the Catholic Church, which they believe that Christ Himself has appointed to teach all those things which He has revealed. 8. That to take the management of schools intended for Catholic children out of the hands of those who represent the religious convictions of their parents, and to place it in the hands of public ratepayers who cannot represent those convictions, is a violation of parental rights, to be resisted as an unwarrantable attack upon religious liberty and upon a fundamental law of nature. 9. That Catholic public elementary schools, satisfying the demands of the Education Depart- ment, have a right to as full a share of public money, whether from the rates or from the taxes, as any other public elementary schools in the country ; and that it is unjust to deprive them of it because of the religious instruction -required by the parents, which is given to the children attending such schools. 11. That compulsory State education is an intolerable tyranny, unless due regard be paid by the State to the education of the children in their own religion ; that happily, in the case of pauper and semi-criminal children, such regard is part of the English Law, which makes provision for the education of such children in their own faith ; and that, therefore, consistency and justice require that the children of the honest working classes, who are compelled on the Education Question - 15 under penalties to attend school, should not be less advantageously provided for in respect to education in their own religion. 12. That the doctrinaire assumption, presented to the people as axiomatic, viz., that a contribu- tion from the rates to a school invests the rate- payers with a right, never claimed on behalf of taxpayers, to supersede the natural responsibility of control invested in the parents, is prepos- terous, unjust, and contrary to fact. Demand for Equal Treatment, 1895. In 1895, w e find the following : — T h e justice of the claim put forward in the Draft Bill, adopted unanimously by the Catholic Archbishop and Bishops in January last, ought to be more and more urgently- pressed home upon the minds of the electorate of the country,, and upon statesmen and politicians. N o effort should be spared to convince the English people that the -public elementary schools, used by parents determined that the secular education should be associated with definite religious training, cannot be thrown upon private charity ' (and thus be placed at a fatal disadvantage with board schools) without a flagrant injustice, and without national reproach and dishonour in a Christian country like' England. T h e electorate must be persuaded and c o n v i n c e d — t h a t all denominational schools, faithfully complying 16 The 'Catholic Attitude with the requirements of the Education Depart- ment have a right to receive an equal propor- tionate share with board schools of all public moneys, whether paid from the rates or the taxes, for educational purposes; and that liberty should be granted to open new denominational schools wherever required by a sufficient number ; of- parents and children. Declaration in view of the Bill of 1902. In November, 1901, in view of approaching legisr lation, the Bishops issued a statement of the Catholic claim, from which w e extract the following sen- tences : — I. T h e y take it for granted that the payment of public moneys, whether derived from the rates or the taxes, will be made equitably to the- maintenance of all schools fufilling the educa- tional conditions, irrespective of creed. II. T h e y consider it essential that there should be placed on the Education Committee of the County Council representatives of the great educational interests that have grown up with ; the Education Department. It must be borne in mind that the Education Committee of the County Council will be the educational citadel of each county. If that citadel do not contain chosen representatives of the great Christian educational bodies, these bodies will be constrained from the first to take on the Education Question - 17 up an attitude of well-founded fear and suspicion. They will perceive that the lead of the Govern- ment, ignoring their claim even to a minimum of official representation on the Education Committees, may easily be improved upon to their serious and permanent disadvantage. They will understand how, in the absence of official representation, public opinion may by degrees he formed and strengthened in the county councils against the interests of definite Christian education. Thus the refusal to admit any official representation of the religious or voluntary schools upon the education committees will inevitably lead to the introduction into the county council elections of politico-religious animosities and contests, which will be followed by their natural consequences. Whereas, if the constitutional precedent be followed, which recognizes the claim of religion to be represented in the Imperial Legislature, evidence will be given of a sincere desire to maintain that equilibrium of forces which is essential to the peaceful and progressive development of a national system of education. III. The Bishops censider it essential to the natural growth of Christian schools throughout the country, that the clause. in the Scotch Education Act of 1872, Section 67, which recognizes the increase of such schools, regard being had to the religious belief of the parents, should be introduced into the English Bill. 18 The 'Catholic Attitude IV. T h e y hold that it is an essential condition to the existence of their schools that . the manàgers should retain in their hands the right of appointment and dismissal of teachers ; while at the same time public bodies responsible for public money may naturally claim a repre- sentation on the school management for sanitary, financial, and scholastic purposes, in a proportion not exceeding one in three. . I need not make any reference to the mor.e recent declarations, for they are in all likelihood very well known to you. From these various declarations three principles stand clearly forth. _ Parental Right and Duty. i . It is a duty of-Christian parents to bring up their children in the Christian faith ; in other words, while preparing them to talke their 'place in life, to fit them at the same time for the kingdom of their Father who is in heaven. T h e y are bound to see that they are educated and trained in the practice of̂ religion. If they attend to all else and neglect this, then do they fail in the most important part ef their parental duty. Circumstanc&s are- such at the présent day that many parents are unable from want of time or lack of capacity, and too often from neglect and indifference, to provide adequately for the education of their children. And, as the con- sequences of this inability or neglect would be the on the Education Question - 19 most serious to the common weal, the State rightly intervenes, and makes every effort to assist and guide parents in the discharge of these primary duties, and to supply for all those things iji which they are in default. T o effect this, the State is entitled to resort to compulsion, and to levy rates and taxes, thus obliging the whole community without exception to bear the burden which belongs to the individuals that compose it. But the State does not thereby supersede the parent, or destroy the rights and duties which belong to parents, but assuming the responsibility which those rights and duties carry with them, is bound to discharge that responsibility without infringing the rights and duties which are its very source. In'arranging any system of national and compulsory education the conscientious con- victions of parents must never be overlooked, and any System which violates them is fundamentally unjust. T h e application of this principle is without doubt surrounded by many difficulties in a country like England, and Catholics have never shown themselves unwilling to consider and accept any fair, solution. But we can never insist too strongly on the fact that the policy followed for the last thirty-five years of giving an exceptionally favoured and privileged position to those who attach no importance to definite religious teaching in ele- mentary schools, is essentially unfair, and has retarded most seriously the educational progress of the country. It is, moreover, a violation of the rights of many parents and a wrongful use of money 20 The 'Catholic Attitude contributed by the ratepayers independently of their religious creed. T h e Right of All to Acceptable Education. 2. Our first concern is for our own Catholic children. Their parents and their pastors must ever give them the first place in their thoughts, and be prepared to make every sacrifice and every exertion to secure for them a Christian education. But w e should be false to the principles which our leaders have enunciated so often in the past, untrue to our name of Christians and Catholics, were we in the concern about our own, to forget altogether and disregard the thousands of" parents who, although they have not "the Catholic faith, are keenly and earnestly solicitous that their children should be brought up at school in the knowledge and fear of God, and receive therein a definite religious training. It matters not by what name they are ca l led—be they Anglicans, or Wesleyans, or belong- ing to any other denomination—we cannot be in- different to the zeal and earnestness and self-sacrifice which so many of them have shown in their endeavours to secure and maintain a religious training for their children. It has sometimes been said, generally by those w h o are opposed to us, that there has been an alliance on this question between Catholics and the members of the Established Church, and that our cause has been injured thereby. I believe this statement to be without foundation. I know of on the Education Question - 21 no understanding either in the past or in the present which, with any propriety of language, could be designated an alliance. But it is un- doubtedly true that many who are Anglicans, and many who are not, are led by the same principle of parental right which has guided us, and are striving after the same end, namely, the maintenance of definite religion in public elementary schools, and I trust that we shall never look with indifference, still less with coldness, on the efforts which they are making. Working as they are on lines, parallel to those which we have laid down for ourselves, they deserve our sympathy and encouragement, W e know the admiration with which many of them in their turn regard the hard struggle which we have had to make for our schools against odds far greater than those with which they themselves have usually had -to contend. Lamenting as we do the divisions into which the Christianity of England has been torn- s|nce it Was severed from the centre of unity, the Apostolic See, we can never, without failing in the duty of honour and of conscience which, precisely as Catholics, we owe to the nation as a whole, be indifferent to the. efforts of those who are convinced of the vital importance of maintaining definite religious influences in the minds and hearts of all the children of England, even though we see that those influences are only partial arid inadequate for their task. W h a t we ask for ourselves we ask for all those who claim i t on the same grounds. Our demand is that all Christian parents should have ft 22 The 'Catholic Attitude in their power to find in the elementary schools of the country an education in conformity with their conscientious convictions, without let or hindrance or disability of any kind ; and that the privileges now conferred on those who attach no importance to definite religious teaching should . be finally abolished. Fidelity to Principles. 3. Even if all others abandon-the principles for which we stand, w e can never relinquish them. I trust that the day will never come when those to whom I have just alluded will declare themselves indifferent to the maintenance of their schools, or will content themselves with some vague and shadowy " right of entry." I do not think that such a day is near, but should it ever come, and should all others fall away from the principles which have animated •us so long, we must stand firm, even though we stand alone. Then, and not till then, may we fairly clairp separate treatment, for others will have definitely separated themselves from us. Until then, such an idea is a mere will-o'-the-wisp, alluring us from the real and present work which demands all our attention. W e ask for no privilege, and at the present time separate treatment would be a privilege, arousing ultimately against us all the animosity which privileges engender. In the contingency—far off, I hope—which I have foreshadowed, separate treat- ment would be no privilege at all, but the only possible recognition of the rights which we have on the Education Question - 23 unceasingly ancl unflinchingly claimed. Till that moment comes, I trust that we shall not hear anything of such a solution of our difficulties. Conclusion. Looking back, as I have lately been obliged to do, pver the whole educational period since 1870, I find much to encourage and to strengthen us. T h e r e have been very dark moments, but they have passed and given place to comparative peace. T h e n the struggle has been renewed, and new fears have been awakened and fresh efforts have been needed. And meanwhile the work of the Church has advanced, and our bishops and clergy and faithful have been generous and united in the presence of each fresh difficulty. One conclusion forces itself upon my mind, that we are making a great mistake in attri- buting to the Acts of 1902 and 1903 the special diffi- culties which some of us feel so very keenly at the present moment. T h e causes are much further back, and those Acts are the inevitable result? of causes already for a long time at work, causes which w e cannot control, but the effects of which w e shall feel more and more as time goes on, and which bring with them difficulties of a new order which we must face with courage and strive to overcome. T h e whole education of the country is undergoing change. It has entailed fresh outlay, more co-ordination, increased local control. These things had to come, and in the resetting it was inevitable, as it was in 1870, that we should pass through a time of stress 24 The Education Question and toil. That time is not over, but with the experi- ence of the past and our knowledge of the strength of our cause, and above all with the assistance of God, we may surely hope that we shall come forth with our position strengthened and consolidated. Unity of action is of extreme importance. It is not wise to put forth unauthorized programmes of un- attainable perfection. It is neither wise, nor is it just, to impute to those who look with scant interest on such efforts, pusillanimity or a dangerous tendency to compromise, because they are obliged to look facts in the face, and are, perhaps, in closer touch with the men with whom decisions must ultimately rest. Our only hope, apart from supernatural aid, lies in quietly and courteously and firmly making known our convictions to our fellow-countrymen, and gradually bringing them to see in what light these matters appear t6 us. Heated language, violent discussion, polemical bitterness have not served us in the past; they are not serving us in the adminis- tration of the recent Acts ; they will certainly not help us in the future. But we have our principles to sustain us, and the history of the past to encourage us ; and we are determined to continue the struggle, which was begun long before most of us could have any share in it, and which will probably be still waging in one form or another long after the things of this world have ceased to be of any concern to us. PRINTED AND PUBLISHED BY THE CATHOLIC TRUTH SOCIETY, LONDON. THE MAINTENANCE OF RELIGION IN THE SCHOOL1 BY THE ARCHBISHOP OF WESTMINSTER H E L I G I O N is a vital element in every civilized country, an •essential factor in constituting a nation in that ordered well- being which every people desires to attain. And this is true even when men are not in agreement as to the precise forms which are to express their dependence upon their Maker, and when they view their relation to Him not all in the same way. Weaken the power of religion, and you rrelax the bonds which knit a civilized people together. Destroy and uproot religion, and you will have to en- •counter the wildest forces of human passion, and you will be beaten in the encounter. And the result will be the same whether you deliberately aim at the destruction -of religion, or allow it, without your knowledge or intention, t o grow languid and eventually to die away. In this country we pride ourselves, unduly in the estimate of our neighbours, upon our religious and God- fearing spirit. We point to the respect in which the Word • The Inaugural Address delivered at the Catholic Conference .At Preston, September 9, 1907. 2 Thé Maintenance of-. of God has been held; we are loudly conscious of the purity of our home life and of the right observance of the Lord's day; and, in a spirit of which the Gospel has spoker» in terms which are not those of commendation, we thank God that we are not as other nations, breakers of the Sabbath and heedless of family ties. Too close inquiry into the grounds upon which our self-complacency rests might lead to a very painful realization of the gulf which may easily yawn between pleasing theories and actual? practice. There is for my present purpose no object ir> undertaking such an investigation. We will take the average Englishman at his own estimate, and give credit to our country for all the virtues and super-excellent quali- ties that he claims for it. The more precious its gifts the greater is the danger which threatens the national life from the forces which are attacking religion at its foundation irk the very heart of the people. T H E ULTIMATE ISSUE. It is time, I think, to leave for a moment the engrossing, but still comparatively petty, details which are absorbing our thoughts in the great struggle for educational freedom in England. These details compel our attention, but if they are dwelt upon exclusively they obscure the ultimate issue, and may lead us to forget that in fighting for the existence of our Catholic schools we are also and neces- sarily withstanding those agencies which, unconsciously or wilfully, are working for the destruction of all religion in the country. For if the taskmasters that govern our present Parliamentary rulers have their way, the religion of the nation will receive a blow from which it can, humanly speaking, never recover. There are two main ideals ifor the religious life of. a Religion in the School 3 country. There is the old notion, consecrated by the practice and experience of so many centuries, that, as there can be but one Christian faith, delivered to us •wholly and fully by Christ Himself, so there should be but one worship and one religion, the natural out- come of that faith. It is that notion, familiar to us all, which explains the action of the Catholic Church in every age, namely, that there is but one Lord, one Faith, and one Baptism. And so when the authority of the Church was universally recognized, every child born into a Christian nation received as an inheritance transmitted by his parents a knowledge of the way in which God would be worshipped and his own salvation could be attained. The religious difficulty in the school had, and could have, no existence. Parents might indeed neglect their duty, and children might be allowed to grow up in ignorance of God's teaching, but all were agreed as to the form of that teaching and the place where it was to be found. There was one faith, one religion, and one school to teach them both. Regretfully we acknowledge that that ideal has passed away. Its destruction has not been the work of the Catholic Church, which has never ceased to uphold it, and which lives with the prayerful hope that it may one day be realized again. In place of this single teaching we now find a denial of any absolute certainty in matters of religious belief, and men band themselves together, with or without the over- sight and control of the civil Government, to worship God according to the views which they have conceived con- cerning their relations to their Maker. There is no longer one faith; religion has put on many varied forms; there can be no longer only one school, seeing that the teaching of these things no longer possesses the unity of days gone by. And men have come to understand that, just as of old 4 Thé Maintenance of-. there could be but one teaching of fundamental truths, because no one could dream of any other doctrine; so in the present divergence of opinions, schools of various types have to be admitted to allow parents to bring up their children in the doctrines which, in the exercise of their individual responsibility, they have adopted for themselves. The new ideal, then, has been that, as men were no longer agreed about the forms of religion, latitude must be given to teach children these different forms, lest all religion perish from their hearts. T H E ESTABLISHMENT OF UNDENOMINATIONALISM. But we have now to face a very different system, and one which, in its own nature, is singularly arrogant, aggressive, and unjust. It professes to be much con- cerned about the religion of the country, and most apprehensive lest a day should come when all religious teaching shall be banished from the elementary schools of the land. While proclaiming its hatred of all dog- matizing, it arrogates to itself the right of declaring that there is a form of teaching, so vague, so colourless, so simple, that it may be taught in every school without wounding the conscience of any learner; and that, in spite of its indefiniteness and nebulosity, such teaching •will be enough to maintain the religious character of the nation: for the upholders of the system of which I speak are perfectly aware that for vast numbers of the children there can be no religious teaching of any kind except that -which they receive while they are at the school desk. And so enamoured are they of their own invention that they propose to arm it with all the power of the public purse, and to deny this tremendous assistance to any teaching but that of which they themselves approve. Truly never has Religion in the School 5 there been injustice more shameless and more arrogant than this. I know full well that among those who are forcing this so-called undenominational teaching upon the elementary schools of the country there are many men of high prin- ciple, of deep religious feeling, and of undoubted kindliness of heart, and that they would be deeply concerned were they to see that, in reality, they are striking a deadly blow at the religious life of the country. It is to them that I would appeal, and I beg them to reflect very carefully and impartially whether they may not be making a very grave miscalculation, while imagining that they have found the solution of a very serious difficulty. I make no plea now for our Catholic schools in particular, although they do possess special rights to kindly consideration; but I plead for just consideration of various forms of religious teaching in our schools, lest the religious influences in the nation, already so much weakened, prove powerless to stem the torrents of evil which assail us. Pleasure, self-interest, self-advancement are breaking down the moral law to an extent which must appal all those cvho are in a position to mark their ravages. The civil law can do but little to withstand them, and not infrequently throws down itself some of the barriers which the religion and conscience of other ages had erected. After hundreds of years of Christianity we find ourselves obliged, year after year, to pass many statutes to regulate matters which the Christian conscience no longer suffices to control. This certainly is no moment to weaken still more those restraints •which rest for their foundation upon religion, and such weakening is the evident result of that Nonconformist solution of the Education question which his Majesty's Government would fain force upon us. They manifest 6 Thé Maintenance of-. horror at the idea of a godless school, of a school where the name of God may not be mentioned. Will, I make bold to ask, the ideal public elementary school conceived in the Act of 1870, and fostered by every Government since then—and now, by the starvation of other schools, to be made paramount and supreme—prove of much greater efficiency as a teacher of moral integrity than the " Ecole sans Dieu," at which the phariseeism of England stands aghast? ' ITS INSUFFICIENCY, In answering this question I can speak with certainty only in so far as our own people are concerned. With regard to others I speak under the correction of those who have more knowledge. But my own conviction is that in every case the undenominational school will have little more efficacy in inculcating moral rectitude than a school whence religious teaching has been excluded, though the absence of real religion may therein be concealed under the outward appearance of the few moments devoted to indefinite religious exercises. Children need very simple teaching, it is true; but they need, still more, teaching which is clear and definite and based on facts. The instruction which a Christian child receives in a good Christian home is simplicity itself, but it is so distinct and definite that it remains clearly imprinted upon his memory, and is quickly present in his mind to guide his will and to direct his conduct. Simplicity and indefinite- riess are not correlative terms, and I have no belief in the moral efficacy of indefinite teaching, which hesitates to speak in plain terms of God and our relation to Him, of the Fall and of the Redemption, of heaven and of hell, of the means of avoiding sin and of living in God's friend- Religion in the School 7 ship, and of all the other fundamental truths which have been made known to us. That this simple teaching is inadequate, as I assert it to be, is shown by the admission •of every earnest Nonconformist that the Sunday school is •absolutely necessary in order to complete the religious teaching imparted in the elementary school. But how many children are there to be found on the registers of Sunday schools, how few comparatively are in actual attendance, and how vast already is the number of those whose only contact with religion is the indefinite lesson allowed by the Cowper-Temple Clause. If our opponents have their way in starving the Non-provided Schools to •extinction, this army of little children, whose souls mutely cry out to know the God who made them, will be immeasurably recruited. T H E LIMITATIONS OF UNDENOMINATIONAL TEACHERS. Moreover, the teacher in the Provided School, well trained and able though he may be, cannot claim absolute con- fidence either as an imparter of religious knowledge or as the moulder of character on religious lines. It is no answer -whatever to this criticism to point to the good results said to have been attained in the past in the Board Schools, for until recently, as Nonconformists bitterly complain, the majority of teachers had been trained in colleges under very •definite religious teaching, as hardly any one seems to have thought it necessary to be at the .expense of establishing a really undenominational training college. Some two years ago a dignitary of the Established Church, speaking of the .London area, stated that he and many others would be •quite content with a settlement of the Education question on the lines of " a right of entry " to all Provided Schools, because in every one of them could be found Anglican 8 Thé Maintenance of-. teachers, trained under Anglican auspices, willing and competent to impart the definite teaching of their Church. But, in future, indefinite teaching is to b e imparted by those who have not necessarily had any- definite teaching themselves; whose belief or unbelief can never be called in question; and who, notwith- standing this, will have and must have that potent influence over the character of the children committed to their care which rightly belongs to every one who holds- the sacred office of a teacher, standing for the time being: in the place of the parents themselves. For elementary teachers are henceforth to be assimilated to civil servants,, as though there were any logical parity between the two- careers beyond the fact that they are both paid for from the same purse. A civil servant has a most honourable position in which he is called upon to discharge certain duties to the State, and in fulfilling them he must be upright, conscientious, and honest. But he has nothing whatever to do with the formation of the character of children. No one, save those of his own family, will look to him for guidance in moral conduct, or seek the inspira- tion of his life at his lips. Whereas in the case of the teacher, thousands of little children will be largely de- pendent upon his character, upon his ideals, upon the beliefs and unbeliefs and misbeliefs which unconsciously or consciously give colour and meaning to his actions, for the directing of their own lives and the mapping out of their future ethical careers. Never was analogy more absolutely false than that which is so glibly drawn between the position of an elementary teacher and that, of the civil servant. And it is surely a mockery to exalt, as it is but just to do, the dignity, the responsibility, and the far-reaching influence of the schoolmaster, and then to Religion in the School o 9 déclare that he may in conscience regard himself merely as a civil servant with no further responsibilities, and that all will in future regard him as such, for the sole reason that he is paid from the public purse. Moral teaching a t such hands will in the end mean the death of vital religion in the hearts of all those little children who receive no- other training save that of the elementary school, and they may easily come to constitute the majority of the child population of the nation. It is an outlook that no earnest: man can contemplate without terrible forebodings. Vague- moral training will be powerless against the tremendous- forces of human interests and the lust of human passions. Mere intellectual training without reference to the Christian, code of conduct will help a man to deceive and outwit his- fellows with greater probabilities of success : it will not check the various forms of dishonesty and over-reaching; of which all men know, but which the law is almost- powerless to control. T H E POSITION AS REGARDS CATHOLICS. In the case of our own Catholic children we have ex- perience of the sad results which attend their inability to- find definite Catholic teaching. Catholics they may cease to be, Protestants they will never become, and they drift away to swell the ranks of those who are entirely indifferent to all religious teaching. The position as regards ourselves- may be broadly stated as follows : First, where a Catholic child has a good Catholic hom& with parents of sufficient knowledge and leisure to watch, closely over his religious education, guiding him by both precept and example, he may spend the hours of the school day in a school where no religion is taught, and he will suffer little or no harm, for his home is of such a character 58 Thé Maintenance of-. to be able to do the essential work of a Christian family Such a child may lack the detailed knowledge of his Faith which a good Catholic school would impart, but he will 3iave the necessary knowledge. In the present rush and stress and material absorption of life, there are few homes •that can thus accomplish their whole duty; and it is, therefore, only in exceptional cases that a Catholic child may with- any safety lose the advantage of the training ^iven m a Catholic school. The State, moreover, has led parents to expect the school to supply the place of home in -almost every detail of education. Next, those children whose parents are lacking either in the knowledge, or in the leisure, or in the will, to superin- tend their education in religious matters, stand in manifest sieed of a school which is Catholic in the full sense of the -word, if they are to grow up faithful to the guidance and ¡practice of religion. Without such a school vast numbers will inevitably fall away from the faith of their parents • they will become irreligious and a menace to the society in which they live, for the only control which they can reasonably recognize, outside the menace of the law will Slave been fatally obliterated from their consciences.' We 3iave the experience of a generation of lay teaching in France, and we know the terrible results of robbing a •Christian people of its hereditary faith. The work of •destruction is rudely and easily done ; the ruins remain to «how what once existed; the long-promised new edifice of -civic moral teaching is not yet in sight; and meanwhile the youth of both sexes are astounding the onlookers by the logical cynicism of their crimes and by their immorality and unbelief. The religious devastation of Italy is not yet so complete as that of its northern neighbour, but the evidence there is clearly to the same effect. Root the Religion in the School 11 Catholic faith out of the heart of those to whom it has come as the inheritance of many ages, and they will cease ¡to believe in God or master. Socialism, anarchy, and political murders are the natural retribution of those who •deny religious teaching to the little child. T H E R E S U L T OF THE WITHDRAWAL OF STATE A I D . Lastly, in the present condition of the Catholic Church in this country, public elementary schools for Catholic -children cannot exist without the financial assistance of matter is even more serious. Every person interested in education knows that the ques- tion of the training of teachers lies at the very bottom of the whole educational problem. With respect t o the training of pupil teachers, which is the first rung in the ladder, we might have taken up .one of two attitudes. - W e might have decided to send our children to a common centre, with the right of entry -for religious teaching, and have, in addition, provided hostels where they could live and be brought up under Catholic supervision, "or we might have adopted the plan of providing separate f centres for the education of our own teachers. 6 The Catholic Aspect From the number of our schools, from the number of teachers whom we require, and from our position as ratepayers, we were, and are, perfectly entitled to demand either of these measures. W e have chosen the latter, and I am not going to take up time by giving the arguments in favour of that line of action. Now Pupil Teacher Centres can also obtain grants from local and national sources. W e have every right to assistance from local sources. W e are providing teachers for local schools in which local children will be educated, and where,, very much against our own wishes, we are obliged to receive the children of parents professing any or.no religion, as well as our own children for whom the schools were intended and provided. Yet . in at least a large number of cases all assistance from the rates has been refused to our Pupil Teacher Centres. But more than this, in some places at least, 'the local authority, though it was not asked to allot a single copper to the support of the centre, has refused to. permit such a centre to exist, in so far as it can refuse, by declining to recognize it, and thus doing its best to cut it off from national as well as local , resources. W e have yet to learn how far this policy may be tolerated by the Board of Education. It is generally supposed that all kinds of knowledge are valuable and worth possessing, but one could have dispensed with the knowledge that there were men and women in this country capable of perpetrating such an outrage in the name of religious equality. My hope is that these things have only been d o n e — and 1 recognize that it is only in certain ill-favoured localities that they have taken place—in the first of the Education Question î t flush of responsibility, and that when the real needs of the education of-the children of this country come more home to the minds of the too-often ignorant persons to whose tender mercies such needs are entrusted, saner counsels may prevail, and more thought be taken of the future inhabitants of this land, and less of the temporary success of some local religious struggle. O U R E L E M E N T A R Y SCHOOLS. Turning now to the question of- the elementary schools, I am confronted with the fact that there,are some persons who seem to think that, on the whole, we have done well in this direction. I find—to my surprise and delight—that the land of Leicester is one flowing with milk and honey. It is not the place where I myself should have looked for an abundance of kine and bees for Catholic use ; but one never knows, and I can only congratulate those who live in that favoured spot. I turn to the con- dition of- the rest of South' Britain, and" here again I exclude 'Wales—a locality from which one does not expect much. Now here, in this country, the Act has been in some cases fairly carried out, and in others unfairly. T h e Act, as must necessarily be the case with any measure conferring large powers upon popularly elected bodies, afforded innumerable loopholes for harassing and annoying the voluntary schools. It was one which could be worked with great unfairness, and possibly the Act could not otherwise have been framed if it were to carry out the statesmanlike objects which its originators had 8 The Catholic Aspect in mind. Let us be thankful that in—I think I am right in saying—the large majority of places the Act has been not unfairly administered, and that, at least in most cases, our teachers, who have up to this borne so large a portion of the intolerable strain, are now properly remunerated. W e have not fully reached this last ideal here in Birmingham, but, on the whole, I recognize with gratitude that our schools have received fair, if not exactly cordial, treatment. H o w TH-EY MAY BE T R E A T E D UNDER T H E A C T . But if any person desires, to learn how the volun- tary schools may be treated within the four corners of the Act by persons devoid of deeent feeling and desirous of harassing, as far as possible, those whov are opposed to them, let him read the articles which have recently appeared in the Times on the methods pi the Welsh education authorities towards the hap-, less schools which now lie at.their mercy.; It is of little profit, however, to pursue this inquiry, for I suppose no person is so sanguine as to imagine that the present Act, as it stands, will exist for ever, or perhaps even for any great length of time. Even if a Government of the complexion of the present does not find it necessary to do something in the way of modifying the law, some day or another the " popular vote will give us a Liberal administration pledged to alter the Education Act. It will be an interesting spectacle, or would be if it were not one of such vital importance, to see such an administration, perhaps under the sway of Mr. Lloyd George, attempting to tinker with this measure. One feels a glow of thank- of the Education Question î t fulneás when one reflects that the task will not be one of any great ease, and that there will be more than one interest which will have to be fully satisfied- before any alteration can find its way on to the statute book. But let that pass. W H A T ARE WE TO DO ? In the face of present political affairs it is at least of great importance that we should make up our mind as to what we want and what we will accept, and to make it abundantly clear, to all whom it may concern,, that with anything less than our rights we will not be satisfied. Moreover, we" should let it be clearly know« that we are not prepared to be treated with injustice, and that we will resist by every means m our power—and I think we might, if we choose, make ourselves quité as unpleasant as the Passive Resisters—any arbitrary interference with, our rights to give our children the kind of religious teaching which is-desired for them by their parents. W e d o not desire to give it-to the.children of others. If we could reserve our own schools for our own children I believe we should all be grateful for the privilege, but our own children w e , must have, and that w e must make perfectly clear; W e are now being asked to lay down- a policy which we should be prepared to accept. In reply to this request I would say, In vain is thé net spread in the sight of any bird. Do you make a proposition to us, when you are in a position to attempt to carry it into law, and we will then tell you whether we will accept it or not." And this brings me to . the question of the so-\ to The Catholic Aspect called "special treatment." Hitherto we have made common cause with the Anglicans and the Wes-- leyans, but in view of recent developments it . seems to be doubtful whether this policy will be open to us for any very great length of time. As far as the Wesleyans are concerned, it would appear that a large number at least of that body are prepared to give up the policy of separate schools, so that, if this ijhould turn out to be the case we can no longer count upon their support or assistance. T H E A N G L I C A N POSITION. Then we come to the Anglican position. It has always seemed to me that our relations with them, whilst no doubtof advantage to the cause.of religious education at large, have had at least this one dis- advantage—that they have led persons to imagine that our positions were identical, i This is very far from being the Case. In the eyes of the overwhelm- ing majority of the inhabitants of this country the Church of England is.one of several, I might say- many, Protestant bodies in this land, and to the careless observer it is not very easy to see why all such bodies cannot combine on some common modicum'of religious instruction. W e can see that such a plan would not be acceptable to some Angli- cans—to others it would be welcome-—-and can understand their motives. But what we want made clear to Gallio in the street is that whether this is a possible policy for Anglicans or not, it is not possible for us. W e cannot take any part or lot in a common system of religious education, and we are not going of the Education Question î t to agree to any scheme which tends to make us do so., I repeat that it is important that our distinct position should be made clear on this head. Then, again, it is extremely difficult to know what the Church of England does want, if, indeed, it has any clear idea itself. Recently I have seen a letter in the Times from the Anglican Dean "of Bathurst, New South Wales, extolling the I right of entry " method which prevails in that Colony. This was followed, a day or two later, by another from the Archdeacon of Monmouth, in this island, complaining that such a policy is not possible in this country on account of the refusal of the non-religious party to accept it, and stating that, " it would, I venture to say, meet the views of the majority of Churchmen if a compromise could be brought about on this basis." T h e Dean of Bathurst ends his letter with the remark : s It is only fair to say that the Church of Rome does not look with favour on this provision, though it gives satis- faction to the rest of the population, secures equal rights to all, and is not a Godless system." For the last fact we may at least express our thankfulness, but the Catholic inhabitants of this country will no more " l o o k with favour" upon this proposition than their brethren in the Antipodes ; indeed, they will go further and refuse peacefully to accept any measure which ties them down to this limit. Now, "on the other hand, I can very weH see certain advantages which the »Anglican Church might gain from such a compromise. It is not for me to argue this aspect of the question, and I am not going to do so, because it is not my place to express an opinion as to what is the proper The Catholic Aspect . policy on the part of the Establishment. What I do want to bring out is that we are coming .to a point at which it may be possible for the Anglicans to accept a measure which we could not,.and that in that case we should have to depart from our " policy of the past, and-demand different measures for our children from those with which Anglicans might content themselves. One cannot also conceal from oneself that far too l a r g e r proportion of the Angli- can laity has ho strong convictions on the subject of religious education. I give all honour to those clergy and laity who'have done what they have done in the past, and who are now carrying, on their schools with a definite religious teaching-which, though it is not ours, is at least far better than the stuff which is ' described as undenominational Christianity. But one is forced regretfully' to admit that there is not the same force of lay opinion behind the Anglican demand-that there is behind ours, in proportion to the numbers of the two bodies. Poll the Catholic body throughout the land, and you will find it abso- lutely determined that its children shall be taught the Catholic religion in Catholic schools, and prepared, too, if necessary, to take any needful measures to ensure that this shall be the case. If there were, the same unanimity óf opinion amongst Anglicans— "which is, perhaps, too much to expect—the position of religious education in this country would be much stronger than it isf Let me repeat that we have a somewhat different platform from that of the Anglicans, and that we have a laity which, though" numerically much smaller, is much more united ánd in earnest as to its educational programme. of the Education Question î t R A T E - A I D AND S T A T E - A I D . , T h e s e are matters of prime importance in the. present controversy. It has been suggested by some that the Act should be so modified as to permit any school to opt itself out from under the local authority; ,to cease to receive any rate-aid and to obtain in lieu thereof an extra capitation grant from the Treasury. From one point of view this would, in my opinion, be an excellent thing, I have never ceased to believe that the paying for any kind of education out of local sources is a gross absurdity. John Bull and Patsy Murphy are not being educated jjj in Birmingham for Birmingham, but for the good of the nation at large, at least so it is hoped and believed. In so far, therefore, such a scheme would have my support.. And it would have it in its entirety, if it were the only way by which we could retain the only kind of school which we are prepared to accept or submit to. But I should deeply regret to see such a measure carried," for it would at once take from out of the" scheme of national education not only our own but presumably a n u m b e r of other schools. W e have at this moment a great scheme of national education—one which, if fairly worked and administered without religious or irreligious prejudice, might and could accomplish great things, and it would be a thousand pities to see it torn to pieces. But torn to pieces it must be if in no other way we can obtain fair treatment. It is not our place, however, I submit, to discuss the question, at least in public, of how our demand' is to be met. Suffice it that we lay down precisely 14 The Catholic Aspect what is the minimum which we are prepared to accept, and then leave it to those who are concerned with the drawing up of an amending Bill'(I think it may be some time before we see an amending 'Act) to make such provisions as they see fit. W h e n we see them we shall be able to say whether we can acc6pt them or not. But there is one thing for which the time is more than ripe, and that is the putting of our present schools into proper order and the provision of such new schools, particularly of the secondary group, as we may require. This is a point upon which various writers in The Tablet, and particularly my friend Abbot Ford, have most properly insisted. I wish the bulk of our laity could be got to understand how pressing and how great a task this is. It is pressing because at this moment -there is a number of our schools which a hostile authority, prepared for any kind of depreda- tions upon the public purse, could practically close, unless large sums of money were forthcoming. How long it may be before some such attempt is made no one can say ; not long, it would appear, in the West Riding, at any r?ite. - T H E N E E D OF M O N E Y . And it is great because it entails the raising of a great sum of money. I believe that the estimate of ^1,000,000 which has appeared in our papers is not an exaggerated one, and I believe that if we are to save bur schools a determined attempt must be made to raise this sum by contributions, large and small. May I add another suggestion, without any intention of the Education Question î t of giving offence ? It is prompted solely by the very keen interest which I take in this matter of education. I think we should enforce a " self- , denying ordinance " and add nothing to our churches, J save what is absolutely necessary, until our educa- tional necessities have been relieved. New churches we must have, and repairs and alterations unfor- tunately cannot be postponed, but I would make a plea that beyond. this we should not go, until we have put our educational organization on a proper and sound footing. I must confess—I hope I shall not be thought to be temerarious in saying it—that I never read of an erection of a new high altar, or the putting-up of a new stained-glass window with- out a pang of regret for the needs of the heavily mortgaged or ill-repaired schools which are our first line of defence. Better to kneel on the bare earth, as many of our forefathers have done in Ireland, and have only painted deal for our. altars, than abandon the schools in which the little ones of Christ are brought up in the truths of religion. There cafl be no matter more pressing and serious than this, and I am certain that it requires no urging upon those who are responsible for our educational policy. But this is a layman's and a laywoman's question, and I wish I could make my words heard by all of them, ¿mcl cause them to feel how great is the necessity for us to be up and doing. I am quite prepared to be described as one of the pessimists who are always with us. Well , I hope I may be too pessimistic. * With such knowledge as I possess of the educational field I cannot but feel anxious. Anxious, not hope- less, for I feel certain that if we have a definite r 6 The Education Question policy and an absolute determination at all hazards and at any cost of strife, to. have that policy carried out we shall be successful. But let us see to it that we have the policy, the determination, and the sinews of war. PRINTED AND PUBLISHED BY THE CATHOLIC TRUTH SOCIETY, LONDON. THE RIGHTS OF MINORITIES 1 By THE Rev. JOSEPH RIGKABY, S.J. R h e t o r i c a n d S c i e n c e A GREAT master in science has likewise written a book on rhetoric. He lays it down that a scientific argument is drawn from the nature of the facts under considera- tion, but a rhetorical argument from the nature of the audience to be persuaded, a very different standard to go by. To persuade an audience, you may have to descend to ground which you yourself regard as scientifi- cally untenable, or, at any rate, not tenable without further defences, which you may securely neglect, thanks to the incapacity of the men you have ,to deal with. That : "the audience are a poor lot," av\oi ol atcpoarai, is an axiom, according to Aristotle, of the first importance for the orator to remember. He must not- waste rigid demonstrations upon them, but ply them 1 A paper read at the Catholic Conference, Blackburn, Septem- ber 27, 1905. The Rights of Minorities -If with catchwords that, will " g o down" and suit their stomachs. The practice of the great Roman orator, Cicero, well illustrates this Aristotelian precept. The Cicero of the Speeches, addressing senate or jury, is a very different man from the Cicero of the Letters, uttering his real mind to his friends, I say this not with any reference to the intelligent audience now before me, but with regard to a wider audience, the British public. In their judgement upon questions where religion coiries in, the British public, I fear, are on the whole " a poor lot,"steeped in ignorance, prejudice, heresy and indifferentism, dreading and dis- liking whatever savours of Rome. At such disadvantage, before such a tribunal, do we plead Roman Catholic claims in the matter of education. What shall we, a poor minority, say to the mighty mass of our country- men ? Shall we tell them that the Catholic Church is thé Kingdom of the Word Incarnate ? that she bears His royal commission • to teach all nation?, but most especially those who are of the household of the faith? that dire woe is pronounced from heaven upon all who set stumbling-blocks in the way of little ones who believe in Christ—aye, upon the nation, hciwever great •and powerful, that so legislates as to render the bringing up of Catholic children in the Catholic faith a working impossibility? These things are true; these are the facts which the scientific eye of the Catholic believer regards, and upon which his educational policy is based. The Rights of Minorities -If But the unbelieving and, consequently, in the things of God, unscientific eye of millions of our countrymen is blind to this really decisive aspect of (he education question. We are left in the position of a son who holds a document which he well knows to represent the last will of his father, but which from some technical defect of signature cannot be pleaded in court. We cannot plead before the British public that the Catholic Church is the one true Church of Christ, and that Christ is God, and that God is Lord of all, of States no less than of individuals. We are obliged to descend to lower and less scientific ground. We have to acquiesce, for argument's sake, in the supposition that one religion is as good as another, so that it be not inimical to the interests of the State. We have to argue upon the axiom, generally admitted, that consciences are not be interfered with, except when by some abnormal perversion they come to stand in the way of the decency and order and proper requirements of civil society. And we add that the Catholic con- science, surely as reputable, an organ as the Noncon- formist conscience, cannot endure to see Catholic children driven into schools where everything that a Catholic values as distinctively Catholic is ignored, tacitly set aside,'nay, lies open to downright mockery and formal repudiation. The Nonconformists filled all England with their outcries at the iniquity of having to send their children to Church of England schools in t M 4 The Rights of Minorities -If places where they had failed to build schools of their own. K they had built schools of their own, and a majority of voters, being strong Church of England men, had refused all aid to these Nonconformist schools unless, they came under Church of England manage- ment and were taught by Church of England teachers, one may imagine how the new temple of Nonconformity that is being erected on the site of the old Westminster Aquarium would have rung with indignant complaint, and how " passive resisters " would have multiplied ih the land. Yet that is the exact counterpart of the situation thát . our Nonconformist brethren are endeavouring to create for us. We are threatened with an endowment of Non- conformity, " the Nonconformist on the rates," and nót a mere endowment but a . monopoly. Thè schools which we Catholics have erected out of Catholic money, saving cost to the ratepayers, in the hopes of the con- tinuance of that well-earned subvention from public funds which alone renders the maintenance of such schools possible, will have -to be closed for defect of such . maintenance unless we are prepared to surrender them 'to a purpose the very opposite of that for which they were built. And the justification pleaded for this arbitrary proceeding is the will of the majority. We Catholics are a minority, and we are poor, and therefore we must submit to be hustled and flouted in our dearest interests' by the mass of our countrymen as were the The Rights of Minorities -If Jews in Egypt by the mass of the Egyptians till Moses led them forth. We are not going to secede, but we may well try to persuade our country to treat us better. E n d s of E d u c a t i o n To bring two parties to an agreement or compromise it is useful to specify what ends they severally wish to gain, and upon such specification to consider whether those several ends are incompatible one with another. The end and aim of the Catholic body in all its conten- tion about education is simply this, that the children of Catholic parents may be brought up Catholics. There are those in this land and in every land, France for example, who regard the Catholic faith as a detestable superstition, as the Roman Emperors Decius and Diocletian regarded Christianity. They call for its extirpation at any price. They find the axe, the rack, the wild beasts of the arena unnecessary instruments for their purpose, and gone somewhat out of fashion. They will «do to Catholicism what the Church has sometimes done to a religious community that it wished to suppress, forbidding it to receive novices j they will weight educa- tion with public money, and lay the balance so cunningly that Catholic schools shall heel over and founder, and the Catholic child,"the novice, I • may, call him, of the Catholic Church, in the poorer classes at any rate, shall gradually become an impossibility. With men who con- 6 The Rights of Minorities -If sciously labour to this end, it is useless to argue; we can only expose their purpose and put them to shame. They are endeavouring to subvert that principle of freedom of conscience in religious beliefs, upon which the British Empire has been governed for a century. They are making the State what the State never can be; judge of religion. The State can only be judge of public order and tranquillity. Happily, these our heartiest, our thorough-going opponents, are themselves a minority in the land. We are, I dare say, quite as numerous as they. It remains to inquire what the mass of English folk hope to get as the reward of the money that they are spending and prepared to spend on education, as the product of imperial and municipal care and control of schools. I have thought of four ends contemplated and desired in this light. I state them, not in any order of desire or desirability, but as they have occurred to my ' mind. The first end then is Empire, the second is trade, the third is public health, the fourth is social virtue. If we can convince our countrymen that What we demand on behalf of Catholic schools^ does not militate against any of these ends, which the State has in view in its care for education; if we show readiness heartily to concur in the prosecution of these four ends ; if we insist that we Catholics have in our mind's eye a perfectly compatible fifth end, namely, the theoretical and practical training of our own children in the faith of The Rights of Minorities -If their parents, then the refusal of our demands may be seen to be unreasonable, and therefore—in a govern- ment set up for the good, the ease, the content of all its' subjects—a refusal tyrannical and unjust. I will not weary your patience with arguing that the preservation of Catholic schools is no danger to the British Empire, that we are not disloyal: that we shall place no hindrance to that education of our working classes which is deemed necessary for the products of British manufacture to hold their own in the market against the competition of educated nations on the Continent, say Germany ; that we Catholics have no affection for sewer-gas, and are not, as a body/ opposed to vaccination; that we are lovers of washing, fresh-air and exercise, and are eager to exterminate the deadly microbe according as science shows us the game ; lastly, that we have a modest confidence in our ability to teach social virtue, or, in other words, such honesty, self- restraint and good manners,.as are necessary to prevent the world being turned into a bear-garden. By all means let us promise, while inculcating that higher virtue which fits men for another world, not to be negli- gent of the virtue the absence of which unfits them for this. Possibly, looking at drunkenness and other evils within our fold, we may confess in all humility some failure of educational success on some of these points. If so, we must amend that deficiency. The sobriety, industry, public spirit, and sound frames of the children 8 The Rights of Minorities -If who come forth from our Catholic schools, will go further than anything else to convince our countrymen that Catholic education should be respected and deserves to live. T h e L e s s o n of P a s s i v e R e s i s t a n c e It is difficult to argue the justice of Catholic claims in education without setting forth in particular what Catholics do claim in our present educational crisis. On the other hand, to formulate these claims is beyond the function, not to say beyond the capacity, of the present writer.' I must be allowed to do what I cannot help doing, to speak somewhat vaguely and deficiently and inadequately. The statement of our claims in all their amplitude I leave to others: I will state some part of our just claim. And in stating it I will be mindful of -the Aristotelian distinction between science and rhetoric.— between claims sound in themselves and claims that you can press with effect before a popular jury; in other words, between what we simply ought to have, and what we at once ought to have and are not unlikely to get. In considering these " rhetorically valid " claims, as I may call them, I am apt to think that our friends the "passive resisters" have taught us a useful lesson' and created a valuable precedent in our favour. I am not at all in favour of the policy of refusing to pay our education rates, however much we may dislike and detest the The Rights of Minorities -If purpose to which we know ihey will be applied. By all means let us pay our rates, and give an example of Catholic obedience in contrast with Nonconformist disobedience to law. It is the principle, not the practice of the Nonconformists that is valuable to us. The principle is this,, that it is undesirable for ratepayers to have to pay for schools that they do not want and object to use. Now we Catholics do not want secularist schools, and object to our children going there. Further, what the Nonconformists generally have not done, we have provided schools at our own heavy cost. One claim, then, that we might make, though it does not belong to me to make it, a claim which no passive resister ought to dispute, is to be exempted from paying rates to secularist, or what are called " provided" schools, on this condition^that whatever education rate be levied in the.locality where we live we pay that same rate, thus bearing our fair share of public burdens; and that our contribution be " earmarked " and assigned to the support of Catholic schools. A Catholic school may be defined, so far as elementary schools go, as " a school taught by Catholic teachers." If this claim were allowed, we should at least save our education rates for our own purposes, and not pay education rates for an education which is to us polluted water, which our lips refuse to touch. Whether our own education rates would suffice to keep our schools,. that is another question not belonging to my subject. The answer The Rights of Minorities -If would be various in various localities according to the various number of Catholics in each. Some equality would be found by pooling over large areas. But let that question pass. -We should have to settle it amongst ourselves. Can we urge any further claim upon the justice of our countrymen ? I think we can.- But before proceeding to do so, I should like to fix a mark in advance, a sort of statute of limitations, beyond which our claims need not be pressed. It is well to reassure our judges beforehand upon the modesty of our pretensions. Supposing, then, it were laid down that Catholics had no right to expect the burden of public taxation to be increased for the easing of their consciences. That principle, rigidly carried out, would bear heavily upon our body, and would deprive us of many privileges that we now enjoy. J u s t i c e or G e n e r o s i t y Economists might point out that one chaplain ought to suffice for the needs of so many huhdred soldiers, or so many score of workhouse inmates, prisoners, or patients. They might prescribe the appointment of one Anglican clergyman accordingly, regardless of the fact that one-third of the said soldiers, or patients, were Catholics, to whom the reverend gentleman's services would be entirely nugatory, and who, consequently, in The Rights of Minorities -If practice would have no chaplain at all. We are better treated than that; and for such better treatment we have to thank a good quality in our fellow-countrymen, concerning which I am here wholly indifferent whether it should be called "generosity" or "justice." We should be amply satisfied if we could secure similar justice, or generosity, in the matter of elementary education, f o r consider. The State has taken- upon itself to see that all its people shall be educated. The rich it leaves to their parents, presuming that no well-to- do father or mother will allow a child of theirs to grow up wholly illiterate and boorish. The poor, too often, are unable or unwilling to pay for the education of their children. Thereupon the State, or rather, under the State, the municipality or commune, builds schools, staffs and furnishes them at public expense, and by authority sweeps all otherwise unprovided children into those schools. Considering our whole number, the per- centage of Catholic poor is extraordinarily large. Taken together, we are a flock of poor people. And we have precisely the same rights as other citizens. What Government does for others, it ought to do for us. We are neither proscribed nor pariahs in the land. Suppose not a penny had been raised for Catholic elementary education, and no Catholic elementary school existed anywhere in England, all our pporer Catholic children would be thrown on the public funds. I have no statistics of the number by me, but it is a large number, The Rights of Minorities -If and their schooling would cost the country a consider- able sum. I presume I may further hope and suppose that of our existing Catholic schools the legal titles of ownership are so secure in private hands that not one of them could be claimed by public authority, as its property. We could, if we chose, sell all those premises for music-halls, or art galleries, or even public-houses : and none of the money so realized would belong to county council or other State educational authority. Thereupon we might demand of the Secularist party a raising of rates all round for the Secularist education of Catholic children. That would be, in some towns especially, a pretty bill to pay. No doubt, part of it is already paid in the shape of grants to Catholic schools, and salaries to Catholic teachers. But such payment is only, partial. There remains a large unpaid amount. That sum represents the gain hitherto made by the public purse from the educational charity of Catholics, from the charity of the poorest class in the community. One would like to know, in this matter of elementary schooling, how much the public purse is indebted to the voluntary contributions of the prosperous Nonconformist tradesman, the Wesleyan and Jewish communities always excepted. When then it is urged that Catholic claims for elementary education involve expenditure of public money upon Catholic schools, we may reply that surely public money ought to be expended upon Catholic children, as much as upon any other children, The Rights of Minorities -If and, if anything, more, seeing that Catholic children are poorer and needier than other children : further, that this expenditure should in reason take such a form as may be acceptable to Catholic parents, and not present to them for bread 'what to their stomachs is a stone : lastly, that the money which Catholic children would cost, were their entire education thrown upon rates and taxes, as in all justice it might be—that this' sum, I say, would amply suffice to cover the entire expenditure which Catholics are now demanding of public authority for the support of an education distinctively Catholic. Thus for education we are keeping within the maxim, otherwise, as I have said, a rigid and stern maxim, and one already set aside in our favour in other departments, that the safeguarding of the Catholic conscience ought not to increase the financial burdens of the State. It is not within my province, nor within my purpose either, to deal with the rule continually quoted against us, that public money involves public control. Public money, as our opponents are always telling us, is given for secular education. We too undertake to provide secular education; and for all the details of that secular education, for which alone public money is given, we challenge the most unlimited public control. We do not take away from education, but we add. We add one whole subject, religious Catholic education; and that subject we claim to have taught in our own way, not in other men's way who do not understand it.. Our educa- The Rights of Minorities -If tion is secular, but not secularist: that is to say, it is not exclusive of those three articles of the Christian creed, God, Jesus Christ, and the life of the world to come. We contend that our children will not grow up less worthy and less efficient citizens of this world for being trained over and above that in the duties of a citizenship that is in heaven. > I am aware that M. Combes and" the Grand Orient Lodge think otherwise. But are they really Liberal ? Are they a model for English politicians ? A G e n e r a l P r i n c i p l e The general question of the rights of minorities in a democratic State makes a nice point of political science. It seems clear that in foreign relations the State must behave as one person: a minority cannot be permitted to levy war on a foreign Power with whom the State as a whole is at peace, nor to remain at peace and refuse to serve against a Power, with whom the State is at war. Nor must a minority create such disturbance as to render the will of the majority nugatory jn what concerns the said majority. Thus if the will of the majority is to hav,e "provided schools," in which no dogmatic religion shall be taught, Catholics are in no position to interfere with the erection of such schools. Let the schools be '' provided " at the public expense, and let the children of the parents who approve of them go there. Catholics The Rights of Minorities -If ask for nothing that could in any way do injury to such schools. Any lover of free trade and fair play, any man who grievously suspects protectionism, monopolies and syndicates, ought, one would think, in this question of education, to feel some sympathy for Catholics. On the general question I have written elsewhere in a Dissertation stamped with an approval that I highly value : "Besides the proper and essential functions of civil au- thority, functions necessary to the conservation of any maturely organized political society, there are other func- tions postulated by public convenience, which government, imperial or local, may take up, if the people by general consent will have it so. This may be called the Principle of Voluntary Public Control. It goes towards clearing up the difficulty which we all feel in fixing the exact bounds of civil authority, what the State may do and what it may not do in the way of abridging the liberty of the individual. State interference can have no legal limits, inasmuch as the State makes the law : only physical and moral limits. It is more important to assert the existence of such limits than to trace them as though one were a member of a boundary commission. The principle of voluntary public control has. this advantage, that it is not too rigid for facts and futurities. According to this principle, there is an inferior and a superior limit to civil authority; I mean, there is a minimum of civil authority which the maturely developed State can never forego, and there is a maximum which the same State The Rights of Minorities -If can never exceed, it being the utmost fulness of power which any State can ever carry. Between these two limits civil authority is just what the people as a whole wills that it shall be. The State thus becomes the organ of public opinion. There is' a clear trend of public opinion to widen further and further still the region of control." To which text the following note is appended : " B u t in spontaneous admissions of State interference, e.g., in the matter of education, special regard should be had for the rights of minorities, where there is a strong minority against interference and tenacious of their liberty" (Political and Moral Essays, pp. 69-71, Dissertation on the Origin and Extent of Civil Authority. Benziger, 1902). Whenever there is opportunity of exercising their civil rights, the Catholic minority should show itself "strong"• and "tenacious" on this point of education. It should know its own mind and voice the same loudly, and enforce it in political and municipal action. A minority that does not cry aloud almost to shrieking pitch, will not be heard for the roar of greater numbers. Above all, the Catholic minority must be united on this one issue. A disunited minority is a nonentity : it has neither cohesion nor force .nor available rights. PRINTED AND PUBLISHED BY THE CATHOLIC TRUTH SOCIETY, LONDON. RELIGIOUS INSTRUCTION IN SCHOOLS BY ROBERT J. SMYTHE THE present trend of educational politics removes the occasion for »prefatory apology in any attempt to simplify the problem of securing religious instruction to the children. In a very literal sense " the old order changeth," and even the most sanguine look uneasily to the development. Amid hopes and fears one thing seems certain : the bulk of the religious instruction and the responsibility for it cannot be placed as heretofore with the teachers. Their earnest- ness and goodwill may remain, but they will be of little avail when effort and desire are restricted and fenced in by the regulations of a rigid governing authority. A gradual weakening of the Catholic position in the matter of religious training became inevitable by the Act of 1902. In a letter addressed to the clergy and laity the late Cardinal Vaughan thus wrote : " A s a result of that Act competition between the world and the Church to control the formation of the young has become visibly and sensibly accentuated in all direc- tions," And to counterbalance " t h e increasing control Religious Instruction in Schools , 15 of the world in the sphere of education to the ultimate destruction of revealed religion as a vital factor in public and private life," he advocated everywhere an intro- duction or extension of Confraternities of Christian Doctrine, whose special function is to co-operate with the clergy in the religious instruction of the young.' Infinitely more hostile to Catholic interests is the prospective Act than the Act of 1902, and, while in many districts it may be sufficient to strengthen and supplement existing means of instruction, in some districts at least the whole work of religious instruction may need to be organized and carried on apart from the ordinary routine of the day-school. In considering any scheme of voluntary effort for teaching purposes, a grave difficulty confronts us at the outset. No subject lends itself more readily than education to discussions of a general character: few subjects are less fruitful and more distressing to the tyro than teaching. The reason of this is plain. Teaching is an art—it is practical. It conforms in its operations to general principles, as do all arts ; yet good teaching is no more inevitably the outcome of an acquaintance with the broad features of educational science, than is the ability to write good poetry a necessary outcome of a knowledge of the principles of versification. Good teaching implies learning, love of knowledge, patience, zeal : the converse of the proposition is of limited application only. A widespread appreciation of this fact is no doubt an explanation of the general practice of leaving religious instruction equally with secular instruction, almost wholly in the hands of Religious Instruction in Schools , 15 professional educators. But while it is true that a wide range of good gifts directed by use are involved in the work of teaching, and that the perfect craftsman is as rarely met with in the school as in the atelier, it is equally true that fair proficiency in the art is within reach of all. In this paper it is proposed, first, to consider certain aspects of the course of religious instruction usually followed, with a view to a possible simplification ; and, secondly, to set down briefly some of the more obvious conditions of successful oral teaching for the considera- tion of those who are without actual experience of the work, but who may be disposed if need be to do their best in it for the children's sake. I. The range of matter for lessons is so extensive and the time at disposal so short, that the loss is serious where the academic is preferred to the practical, the formal to the real. And it is obvious that in applying the terms just used, a constant adjustment must take place. Selection of matter will depend on (i.) the importance of the information in itself, (ii.) its suitability to the age, capacity, and circumstances of the children. A careful overhauling of values will show how effort may be economized. As an example : One of the diocesan syllabuses used to prescribe as part of the memory- Work for individual repetition the Hymns to the Holy Ghost, the Hymn of St< Bernard, the Litany of our Lady, the Miserere Psalm, and the Te Deum! T h e Religious Instruction in Schools , 15 exercise was unnecessary ; it took up much valuable time ; it was irksome ; yet—so easily do we adapt ourselves to what is-—several geherations of school- children were made to pass through the ordeal ere a reasonable change was effected. In framing schemes and in selecting material for lessons the keynote is simplicity. In case of doubt it is well to err on the side of defect, for an overcharged syllabus induces cram and lessens the disposition to take up the instruction for its own sake as a labour of love. T h e amount of religious knowledge absolutely necessary for children is small: it will, if the treatment he good, produce in later life choice fruit in faith and character. But the issue is obscured and development is arrested when the essential is overlaid with what is at the best of but secondary importance. In the forefront of most Schemes of religious instruc- tion stands the Catechism, and the position has been held so long that there is a tendency to admit a prescriptive right to it. There are some to whom Catechism, learning, and religious instruction are synonymous terms. T o these any suggestion of a modified use of the Catechism may come as a painful surprise. They will recall their young days spent in Catechism lessons and point to a manhood of lusty Catholicity, and into a time sequence read cause and effect. Or they may maintain not less bravely that, since the Catechism is an excellent epitome of religious knowledge, therefore the teaching of the Catechism must be an excellent "means of conveying religious knowledge. In days gone by there was little need to traverse Religious Instruction in Schools , 15 these or other arguments, on which was founded a conviction of the supreme need of mastering as early as possible the whole text of the Catechism, for a wide margin of time was still available for more intimate instruction. But those who are acquainted with the actual conditions of work inside the schools see clearly in the near future—whatever the letter of the law may b e — a considerable curtailment of the study and observance of religion. Let us look into the question more closely. The qualities which give value to the Catechism as a compendium of Christian Doctrine—the completeness of its survey, the precision of its definitions, the logical arrangement of its parts—recommend it but slightly as a text-book for the young. Fulness of matter is without advantage where only a small portion of the whole can be studied ; definition, however exact, is usually of . less value to children than simple description; | and the psychology of the child disposes us to regard as futile the attempt to build up for him' an elaborate system on a strictly logical basis. The Catechism is ungraded in respect either of im- portance of contents pr of difficulty of matter. Much of the earlier sections is pyre theology, of little practical use to the child. The two chapters which are most easily intelligible—those dealing with the Christian's Rule of Life and the Christian's Daily Exercise—come last, and are reached, if at all, at the close of a child's school career. It would be amusing, were the question of religious instruction of less moment, to contemplate the position of 'the seven-year-old child on his trans- ference from the infant department to the senior school. 6 Religious Instruction in Schools , 15 He is able, with assistance, to read words of one syllable and to understand their meaning vaguely -r he can just catch a glimpse of number in the concrete ; he writes a little, and he may be able to take an interest in a simple tale, provided it be within his sphere of thought and well told. With such preliminary training he is set upon the Catechism, and in a 'short time can repeat glibly enough that " Faith is a supernatural gift of God which enables us to believe without doubting whatever God has revealed" ; t h a t " W e must believe whatever God has revealed, because God is the very Truth who can neither deceive nor be deceived" ; that, " God is the Supreme Spirit who alone exists of Himself and is infinite in all perfections " ; and that " A mystery is a truth which is above reason but revealed by God." In days gone by catechism-learning was much in vogue. There were catechisms of history, of common knowledge, of natural science, of philosophy, and specimens may still be found in the lumber-rooms of old houses, or on the shelves of amateurs in literary curiosities. But all these manuals have vanished from the schools. It is generally held to be unnecessary and undesirable to reduce our information on a subject to a congeries of definitions. And to approach a study by means of definitions is to run counter to all the prin- ciples of scientific method. What then must be said of the teaching of such, definitions as those instanced to children of tender years ? T h e teacher is yet unborn who could give them life and meaning. W e may manufacture, so to speak, infant grarfiophones which on the application of due stimulus will tickle our ears Religious Instruction in Schools , 15 with a record intelligible to ourselves ; but the instru- ments will remain dull, cold, and unchanged., The question may be viewed from another standpoint, and the acquisition of Catechism answers in childhood considered as capital for latex years. This is ordinarily the view of those who by the condition of their life and occupation need frequently to refresh their knowledge of the Catechism. But we have to consider the case of the every-day child who satisfies the demands of the Diocesan Inspector, and passes from, the schoolroom to the shop, the factory, or the fields. W h a t is the influ- ence of the imperfectly comprehended exercises of childhood during the perilous years of adolescence ? And how much of the original does the memory retain at a period when wider experience and maturer judge- ment would render it of value ? For an answer to the last question the reader may make a direct examination in typical cases. Or, without leaving his arm-chair, let him endeavour to write out the paradigms of some language learnt at school and since neglected. Then, having, made a deduction in his own case for the influence of favour- able circumstances and a cultured mind, he may look upon the residue as a fair standard of comparison. In spite V)f the drawbacks and limitations inseparable from this form of study, there is so much convenience to the teacher in having to hand a precis of Christian Doctrine, and so much advantage in the general adoption of an authorized expression of religious know- ledge and belief, that there is little likelihood of the Catechism ceasing to occupy a central position in the scheme of religious instruction. But it is of the first importance to ascertain how its study may be made less Religious Instruction in Schools , 15 routinary and its influence more real. Here suggestions arise. Selected portions of the Catechism of practical utility and allowing of explanation to young -children might be studied first, and the more abstract portions left over. Or a shorter and simpler Catechism might be prepared for the elementary school, and the manual at present in use be*reserved for more advanced pupils. There is little need, however, to discuss details now : they will assume a practical form should a modification of the present course be seen to be desirable. Mean- while, we may bear in mind that our aim is to teach the most and the best and that we are not teaching in Utopia. Let us turn from this branch-of religious instruction in schools and ask if values are sufficiently weighed in the department of Scripture History. Here the arrange- ment of matter is usually chronological. T h e seven- year-old child begins with the Creation, and within a period of, perhaps, twelve months he reaches, say, the Tower of B a b e l ; within another period he may come to the Captivity i n , E g y p t ; and, again," he wanders through the Desert to the Promised Land. By dint of custom this procedure is followed without a suspicion < of incongruity, and children will learn to reel off the order of Creation, the names of the sons of Jacob and the plagues of Egypt without hesitation or danger of transposition. W e do not set about the teaching of English history in this crude way. First are taught simple stories of bravery, of duty, of unselfishness, of obedience, which make a direct appeal to the child—stories of the Lion- Heart, of Nelson, of the burghers of Calais, of the Black Religious Instruction in Schools , 15 Prince ; then come salient features of history traced simply through cause and effect ; these again are ex- panded and worked out in detail; and, lastly, if oppor- tunity offer, there is specialization of a given period. W e do not trouble young minds with the complexities of the Saxon Heptarchy, with the Treaty of Dover, or the Constitutions of Clarendon. Might not the same young minds be as considerately dealt with in the teach- ing of Holy Writ ? Instruction in the N e w Testament-leaves little room for comment. T h e parts usually taught in school are within the capacity of children, and of direct value. But there is a tendency even here to subordinate spirit to letter—*to reduce, for instance, the teaching of parables to rote, and their lessons to bald statements. A pertinent consideration comes in here. In every branch of secular instruction there have been made during recent years strenuous efforts not only to popularize the study by a dear and convincing pre- sentation of its^ main features, but there have been equally strenuous attempts to elaborate special methods of teaching the various subjects. For although common principles of method can be seen to underlie all good teaching, the application of these principles is infinitely varied, and distinctive methods are evolved in harmony with the subject-matter and with the special purposes which a subject is meant to serve. And much good, direct and incidental, has resulted to various branches of school-work from this elaboration of method. In religious instruction, however, little seems to have been done ; we are where we were years ago, and the special didactics of the subject have hardly been begun. Religious Instruction in Schools , 15 Some of the defects in the religious instruction of the schools are traceable to the system of inspection which has been commonly adopted. The courses of study prescribed have been extensive, thè tests have been stringent, and schools have been classified according to their examination results. Under such conditions there is small room for surprise if, too often, the teacher has lost perspective and devoted his attention to the word rather than the thing. For some unaccountable reason the inspections have been originally modelled on the lines of the inspectors of the Education Department during the period when school-payments were made according to " result." But whereas in secular subjects a constant endeavour has been made to get away from the ill-effects which that form of inspection produced, many of its evil features are still recognizable in the Department of Religious Instruction. I II. It has been said that an initial difficulty of all organi- zations of voluntary effort for purposes of instruction lies in the naturè of the work. For though good-will and zeal, joined with adequate knowledge of the subject-matter, will go far, they cannot of themselves' suffice in an undertaking which demands a measure bf technical ability. A few simple observations on some of the more obvious principles and conditions common to all successful teaching are here submitted. They may, perhaps, tend to direct effort along lines which might otherwise be overlooked-or ignored, and thus be of service to those who are taking up the task of teaching for the first time. Religious Instruction in Schools , 15 L E C T U R I N G AND T E A C H I N G . The beginner is more apt to lecture than to teach. The two exercises are not wholly dissimilar, inasmuch as each makes a demand' upon clear statement and vivid narration. In other respects they are at opposite poles. With the lecturer the question is, " How much matter can be presented?" with the teacher, " How much may be taught ? " The lecturer obtrudes information ; the teacher seeks to create a demand for it. T h e lecturer is concerned with his own point of v iew; the teacher with the point of view of his pupils. The lecturer assumes intelligence, desire, concentration, receptivity: the teacher has to ascertain if these qualities exist, and to what degree, and no small part of his effort lies in inducing, stimulating, and developing these primary conditions of learning. Lecturing is not altogether out,of place in school. With older children and in subjects which kre well within their range of thought, it may be advantageously used. With young children it is of small value,, for the well-ordered information of the adult finds little re- sponse among the fragmentary shreds of knowledge possessed by the child. It is just here that the.teacher comes in. He brings his mind to meet the mind of his pupils. There is fusion of idea, feeling, sentiment. And not for a moment does he lose sight of the fact that if the information he means to supply is to be more than empty words, it must in some way or other be brought into connection with knowledge which already exists, so that the child may recognize in the new matter an expansion or development of his previous Religious Instruction in Schools , 15 store. This seems to be the, true meaning of the much- quoted and ill-used aphorism of method, " Proceed from the known to the unknown." QUESTIONING. In order to ascertain the content of the pupil's mind the teacher resorts to questions—often with but slight success. For owing to difference in concept and in sentiment between the. child and the adult a question and its interpretation may be in spheres of thought which are mutually exclusive. A sympathetic teacher who knows how to keep himself in thé background is usually not long in finding somè idea in common, and then he has only to follow the lead of his "pupils to maintain touch with them. Of special value to him are the questions which children under genial treatment are wont to ask, and the explanations and narrations which they delight to make. The alertness and industry of the pupils show clearly when they are interested in the lesson, and the interest will continue so long as the instruction is within the range of their thought, and their activity is stimulated by constant addition of new matter intimately allied with what has been already assimilated. There is no need here to treat of the questions employed to test the remembrance of facts, for such questioning lies outside the lesson proper. Nor need we dwell on that most difficult form of questioning to which the name Socratic is often given, in which, by skilfully applied questions, the pupil is made to shift voluntarily from position to position, until at last he himself rises to the formulation of the truth which is Religious Instruction in Schools , 15 under discussion. Such questioning is obviously of usé to the teacher of ability ' only, and is a very perfect example of progression from the known to the unknown. But reference may be made to a common practice of interlarding a narrative with points, of interrogation which lead nowhere and elucidate nothing, and serve no other purpose save to disguise thinly a lecture under the trappings of a lesson. A I M AND M E T H O D . How often does the schoolboy marvel at what seems to him the special facility of the teacher in disguising his meaning! Each lead has a blind issue, and the_ web becomes more tangled as the lesson advances. In such lessons the facts are usually correct, but they are used, so far as the class is concerned, in the wrong place. Such misplacement, with its attendant confusion of thought, would be avoided were the teacher to- fix in advance his aim and keep it in mind throughout the lesson. Changes need to be made in his preconceived procedure to suit the circumstances which arise during the instruction; and indeed the soul of good teach- ing is' spontaneity. But every change of procedure must serve to bring out more clearly the dominant • idea. This conscious adaptation of means to end is the basis of method, without which teaching is imworthy of the name. And it should seem that method may be im- paired by either of , two opposite faults. - T h e teacher may keep changing front, in which case the pupils are unable to fix, out of many possible, the goal at which they should aim. Or, he may persevere in his course" Religious Instruction in Schools , 15 without taking cafe that his pupils are given sufficient guidance to enable them to bear him company. INTEREST. Learning proceeds through interest. W h e n the pupils become genuinely interested in the instruction a teacher's difficulties are almost at an end. He need no longer struggle against the resistance of the child-mind to his ministrations. On the contrary, a demand for informa- tion comes from the pupils, and this information they endeavour of themselves to systematize. And as- the mental effort is at such times highly concentrated, the facts of the lesson become fixed in memory more effectively than they would be by any mere verbal repetition. All children are not, of course, equally interested in the same things, and some allowance must be made for individual tastes, preferences, and capabilities. The differences in individuals are repeated in a milder form in classes. Instruction which is suitable to the children of a town school may not appeal to children in a remote village. The bases of interest in .girls are not identical with those in boys. Nevertheless, in all. cases the sum. of agreements in essentials outweighs the differences^-; were it not so, collective teaching would be impossible. Whatever the conditions and circumstances of the children may be, there is in every lesson a spirit of interest if the teacher will but distil it out. That he fails to do so lies most commonly in "his disinclination or inability to come down from his rostrum, to lay aside the cloak of manhood and to be once more a child. T h e acquisitions of advancing years are not all Religious Instruction in Schools , 15 clear profit. W e accumulate fact, perfect inference, and build up system, but in doing so are apt to lose fancy, imagination, and impulse. This loss a teacher must endeavour to repair, for success depends not upon his wealth of fact, the closeness of his reasoning, the completeness of his knowledge, but upon his power of thinking and feeling as children think and feel. It is not a question of whittling down information, as some do, but of selecting elements which are within the capacity of the child, and presenting them in such a way as to be both intelligible and stimulating. It is because the child lives in a world of fancy where the facts of life have an aspect and meaning peculiar to the stage of his development that fables and allegories are of such service' to the teacher in dealing- with junior Classes, and it is because of their revolt against the prosaic that children of all ages accept lessons for their daily conduct in the form of stories. Suitable stories may be met witli on every side, and, above all, in the pages of Sacred Scripture the teacher has material for concrete illustration of every phase of childhood. But the stories should convey their own lesson if they are to produce the full charm and effect. An objection m a y b e raised that it is possible to make learning too pleasant, that rigidity in school is a good preparation for the routine of life, and that children should be accustomed to look on their tasks less as a pleasure than as an unavoidable duty. Such objection can only arise from those who regard character as formed by accretions from without rather than by development from within. There is practical unan- Religious Instruction in Schools , 15 imity among educators that even in the teaching of secular subjects it matters less what we teach than how we teach. T h e facts taught in school can-form only a tiny portion of the sum of knowledge in any direction, and such facts may be forgotten or uncalled for. But in the act of their sympathetic and intelligent study qualities of mind and heart are engendered which persist to thè end. T h e objection is, however, without force for another reason. There is nó royal road to learning. With every effort of the teacher obstacles remain. But obstacles are surmounted more easily by those whose interest has been secured and whose intelli- gence has been evoked. And memorizing is no longer drudgery when motived not only by cheerfully accepted duty but also by the knowledge that it is a means to a desirable end. CONTROL. T h e golden rule for maintaining order in class is to keep the pupils occupied. But this rule is of application only where a measure of disciplinary power already exists. And attention of a mechanical kind which embraces silence and a respectful attitude must be established as a necessary preliminary to the stage of intellectual attention. T h e non-professional teacher endeavours frequently to obtain a leverage by intro- ducing a story or some other detail calculated to arrest the attention of-his class. T h e principle is excellent, but it does not always work well in practice ; for, unless the instruction is developed easily and intimately, the end of the introductory matter is marked by indifference and reaction. Religious Instruction in Schools , 15 It is really not difficult to secure initial attention if the teacher assumes in a simple, unpretentious manner his own position and the co-operation of his class. He will do well to avoid a concessive attitude either at the reli- gious lesson or at any other time. Exercise of power is an instinct in children, and under a weak government they tend to become lawless.1 On the other hand, they are not given to question captiously authority, and their admiration for the strong and masterful makes them willing subjects of,"an unobtrusive yet determined ruler. A capable teacher bears this in mind in the discipline of his class. He uses few words, he imposes few rules, he neither promises nor threatens, he is firm yet kind. He does not expect too much from his pupils, but he insists on a minimum : he allows for the weak- nesses of> child-nature, while taking advantage of its virtues. | The foregoing observations may perhaps serve as a slight introduction to the meaning of method in teaching. Incidentally .they may show that teaching is no mere routinary avocation but one in which exceptional demands are made upon the intelligence, the devotion, the knowledge, and the resource of those engaged in it. T h e progress which has been made in secular studies during recent years is largely the result of improved methods of teaching, and there seems to be no reason to doubt that progress in religious knowledge must be similarly conditioned. Here we put in a plea for a more general reading of 1 There seems to be here an explanation of the fate of many a boys' club, guild, and confraternity. Religious Instruction in Schools , 15 educational science. An inquiry into its principles and their application will be found to open out a néw and fertile field of thought. Nor will the study be devoid of immediate utility. At every turn the tax-payer is confronted with the ideals of correlation, unification, nationalization of education—brave words which may mean something or may be but "vacant chaff well- meant for grain." A study of principles will help to show what he is paying for and whereto he is tending. Parents will be especially benefited by siich reading, for in it is much that will help them in the management, the training, and the destination of their children. T h e introduction of a short course of theoretical and practical teaching may be found practicable eventually in all ecclesiastical seminaries. Such a course would be highly stimulating and of no small service to young priests in taking up work on the mission. This brings us back to our starting-point. The whole work of religious instruction may > in the near future need to be organized outside the school, and it is well to look at the special difficulties of the impending task and to be prepared to cope with them. . Inducements to join in the good work are many and profound, and all who enter upon it in the right way may rest assured their labour will not be in vain. In striving to enlighten others, their own vision will be made more clear. Their nature will be deeply moved, and the best that is in them will come forth in com- munion with the unspoiled souls of children. In watching the growth of the germs of faith and piety which they are privileged to tend, they will find an absorbing interest, and in the affection of their pupils Religious Instruction in Schools , 15 abiding solace. Their reward even here is great, and a greater is promised hereafter. III. In times of impending stress there is ever a tendency to mistake the import of innovation, and it is thus some- what unfortunate that the outline of a possible modifi- cation of the scope and method of religious instruction of the young should need to come under discussion at a moment when our school system itself is seen to be upon a precarious footing. Yet, inasmuch as the trend of events in the elementary school is unmistakable, and by means difect or indirect, motived or unmotived, the portion of the school programme effectively devoted to religion will become inevitably smaller, a discussion is more easily focussed on the necessarily-practical as against the possibly-desirable-but-unobtainable. A first question arises as to the amount and kind of religious instruction which at present obtains in thè schools.. To this question no definite answer can be given. T h e work of a school in this subject depends largely upon the syllabus of the diocese in which the school is situated. A perusal of a number of these syllabuses shows in every case a provision for the learn- ing by heart of prayers, hyijins, and catechism, for an explanation of doctrine, and for a knowledge of the Scriptures. But when we come to look at the matter which is detailed, we find—except in the case of the Catechism, which is everywhere prescribed in its entirety —very varied estimates of what is considered desirable for children to know and possible for them to learn. In one place the commonest prayers only are asked Religious Instruction in Schools , 15 for, in another are added forms, which from their difficulty, or from the fact that they are meant only for occasional use, might well be sought for, when needed, in a manual of devotion. T h e requirements in Bible history vary greatly. T o take the Old Testament, for example : in one case the instruction is to cover the period from the Creation to Josue, in another case it is to be continued to Solomon, and in a third a knowledge of the whole book is required. In the matter of doctrine the variation is not less marked, ranging as it does from simple courses embracing merely the common truths of faith and the ordinary practices of piety to elaborate schemes which might almost stand as synopses of a complete course in dogma. It is admittedly a difficult matter to find the normal child for whom these programmes of instruction are framed, and local circumstances, such as irregularity of attendance, half-time, and age of leaving school, have no doubt complicated the search ; but it is not easy to trace the connection between these circumstances and the courses as they exist. And, it should seem, an intimate inquiry- into what an average child under ordinary conditions' can be reasonably expected to acquire, would be of service in laying out the courses of the different classes. T h e influence on school work, of ah elaborated syllabus is usually of doubtful value. The gain which results from the orderly plotting out of the field of study, finds a counterpoise in the routine character of a teaching effort which is felt to be in part vicarious. And when a syllabus presupposes a capacity which pupils do not possess, or sets forth more to be learned Religious Instruction in Schools , 15 than time permits; and when, in addition, progress is tested by a rigid examination, little of good can result. For under such circumstances the natural order of learning, which lies in a separating (from the manifold) of elements which are seen to be allied to and an extension of already-existing knowledge, gives way to a haphazard piling up of facts which may not in any - way correspond to the pupil's experience. And leisure, too, is lacking for the exercise of the selective faculty, working in sub-consciousness, whence springs our idea of congruousness and our first appreciation of inherent value. No small portion of the confusion of word and thing, of means and end, of process and result, so apparent in the ordinary work of the schools, and the consequent uselessrness of school education for after-life has had its rise in the demands of syllabuses and inspectors. And in the department of religious instruction the remark applies with not less force. Here, moreover, the wide- spread practice of labelling schools as " excellent," " very good," " good," " fair," " moderate," and the need of obtaining a high percentage or-correct indi- vidual answers as a condition .of satisfactory classifi- cation have accentuated the evil. An unhealthy rivalry has been set up among schools and departments of schools, a species of charlatanry has been fostered, and the happiness of pupils has been lessened. The insist- ence, in particular, on an individual and \yord-perfect repetition of a long list of prayexs, and of the three or four score pages of a technically-written Catechism, has impaired the teaching, and has been also the fruitful source of mental and physical suffering to those from Religious Instruction in Schools , 15 whom Nature has withheld the gift of av quick and retentive memory. In taking up the teaching of any subject of the school, curriculum it is well to realize in advance not only the special value in itself of the information we may convey, but also its probable effect upon the children. And this effect will largely depend upon the way in which the instruction is given. The careful teacher chooses such matter as may be intelligible to his pupils and in harmony with their feelings and interests. He prepares their minds to receive the lesson profitably by evoking the knowledge cognate to it which they already possess, so that his facts may not stand loosely out of context, but be recognized by the pupils as a development and amplification of what they already know. And in the act of presenting the subject-matter of his lesson he aims at the vividness and earnestness which secure attention and stimulate the children to make for them- selves a further advance in knowledge. It is to be feared that the caref-ul pedagogic treatment accorded to secular subjects, which accounts for the progress made in certain directions during recent years, has been for the most part overlooked in the teaching of religion. Yet , surely, it is just here that we have most carefully to weigh what we teach, and with much greater solicitude than in the case of seciilar instruction must we look to the effect to be produced in the process of teaching : for it is here not merely a question of an advance in intellectual fitness but, of nourishing a living faith, of inducing a true piety, and of strengthening the moral fibre. T h e religious instruction of the schools is usually ill- Religious Instruction in Schools , 15 calculated'to the attainment of these high ends. It is given indeed with vigour and devotedness, but the exercise of these qualities apart from a true perspective may produce little that is of benefit. And it must be said that the energy of the teacher is largely and inevit- ably—at times without a consciousness of perversion on his part—de voted, to the production of a merely verbal accuracy. Thus religious instruction tends to fall into place as one of a score of subjects of the school curriculum with little to differentiate it from the others save its monotony and its difficulty. • The disadvantage to the child of learning his prayers under these conditions is patent to all. We turn to the Catechism. And here we enter upon debatable ground. For while some urge that the completeness and precision of the Catechism entitle it to a centralposition in'any scheme of religious instruction, others who have carefully observed the effect of the every-day Catechism teaching of schools are dubious of its utility. T o hold the latter view is of course in no way incon- sistent with the keenest appreciation of the Catechism as an epitome of Christian Doctrine, for the little book was not written from the standpoint which the teacher of young children is bound to adopt if he means to bring his mind really into-touch with the minds of his pupils. An analogy may make the matter clearer. Those readers who are so unfortunate as to have already reached middle life will remember their schoolboy attempts to extract a meaning from a certain confusing and indeterminate writer named Euclid. But they will admit to-day,that these adjectives—or their school- boy equivalents—were undeserved, and that Euclid is Religious Instruction in Schools , 15 both clear and precise from the standpoint of the adult from which he" wrote." And a new generation of teachers is taking this difference into account, and is endeavour- ing to frame a simpler and more concrete method of teaching the principles which he taught. With care and patience it may be found possible to devise a procedure whereby the learning of the truths of religion may be in accordance with the child's capacity and development, and fruitful to him. Such a procedure does not lie in the Catechism as it is usually taught. Leaving out of count the hardship involved in the memorizing of it, the .time—at least one half of the amount available for religious instruction—spent in the process and the lack of permanence of the matter learnt, two objections at least remain. One of these is the extreme difficulty of making actual to young minds any piece of knowledge by beginning with the definition — w h i c h is in the nature of a finished product of thought —and explaining the phraseology of its parts.. The other lies in the fact that while the Catechism is un- graded in regard to difficulty of contents it is used as a school-book by all children alike from seven- years of age to fourteen. T o the reader unused to actual teaching, this matter of gradation may not immediately appeal. A somewhat grotesque illustration will serve to bring home the point. Let him imagine the state of a school where the series of reading-books, which begin with the infant primer and advance almost impercept- ibly in difficulty through the succeeding years of the school course, are all laid aside and extracts from standard authors used in all classes, where simple addition, the rule of three, and square-root are taught to Religious Instruction in Schools , 15 all pupils promiscuously, and where children, without preparation, are immersed in technicalities of botany and physics ! A careful grading of the material of knowledge, so as to adapt it to the stage of advancement of the children is a main concern of the teacher. And if we Start with an understanding that development is mainly from within we Shall at once lay hold on an important truth pi method, viz., the inadvisability of (i.) presenting information to a child for which he is not prepared, oi of (ii.) stating in the rigid terms suitable to a cultured mind that which is understood best by the child from his own standpoint. W e do, as a matter of fact, make a concession not only to vocabulary, but also to concept, in our common dealings with the little ones. For instance, we allow the policeman to stand merely a.s the friend of the good and the foe of the wicked : we do not seek to present him either as, a humble necessary instrument in a complex system j of government, or as an embodiment of our innate striving for that which in the social order is best. W e do not interfere with the literature of the nursery, for we recognize that the stories of giants and fairies and dragons are real to the child and show forth truths which it were labour lost to. define for him. Indeed, the child allows to pass unchallenged fictions, obvious to him as such, for he is able intuitively to place them in a perspective in which an underlying truth shows most clearly to the immature mfnd. T h e wolf speaks to Red Riding Hood, and the frogs to the boys who throw stones into the pond, for in the one case the dominating idea is the danger of consorting with evil Religious Instruction in Schools , 15 company, and in the other the inevitable protest of the weak against the tyranny of the strong. T h e subject is interesting : it has a. counterpart in one direction in the myths of primitive peoples, and in another direction in the peculiarly metaphorical treatment of physical fact which we are forced to jj employ whenever we attempt to give an account of physical process. But we must not digress. T h e principle to be grasped is that true instruction is according to the stage of development at which the pupil has arrived, and that in every stage the effective organization of his knowledge must-be in terms of his own understanding. In other words, the dominant note of our teaching must be reality—reality as felt by the child. Now, there are some who have come to feel, in a way, a need for reality, but, from the fact that they have not gained the children's standpoint, construe the term as meaning no more than scientific exactitude. " W h y ?" for example, ask those of this school, " why do we allow a perpetua- tion of the fiction of angels 'wings ? " W h y not ? It is true the appendages do not bear a close inspection from the adult, scientific point of view. But it has already been shown that the child often gains his truest concept under conditions which have but little to do with fact, and it should seem that to substitute in this case a technical definition of angel in place .of the commonly accepted fiction " would be to walk back- wards from reality, and in our regress to unclasp the hand which has guided childhood through all the ages. It follows as a corollary to reality that the teaching should usually be positive. A teacher has asked the Catechism question, " What is God ? " T h e children Religious Instruction in Schools , 15 have replied, G o d is the supreme. Spirit who alone exists of Himself and, is infinite in all perfections," and their reply is, perhaps, treated in some such way as the following A spirit is a living being. It can think and know, and it has free-will. But it has no body ; it cannot be seen by us, or f e l t ; it needs neither food nor drink nor house to live in as \ve do. T h e angels are spirits. G o d is the supreme Spirit—Supreme Spirit, that is the highest or greatest of all the spirits. N o one is so high, so great,' as God—alone exists of Himself, lives, continues to be, without help from any one. W e need help in order to live, help from our parents w h o provide us with home and food and clothing, and help-especially from God, by w h o m all these good things are in the first place given. But G o d needs no help from any one. And there is no other but God who , can thus exist of himself—infinite, without end or l imit— infinite in all •perfections, there is no end or limit to the good qualities, or attributes, of G o d — t o His wisdom, His goodness, His power." This explanation, which is not unrepre- sentative of its class, can hardly be looked upon as satisfactory : it is made up largely of negations, and the central idea is obscured by the prominence given to its parts. But even should the instructor manage to steer clear of the bare rock of negation, yet is there—so long as he limits his effort to the explication of Catechism terms—-imminent danger of being caught in the vortex of verbalism. H e is dealing with, for instance, the last clause of the definition just quoted. He shows first a school-book which has seen some wear : pages are missing—it is not perfect; then a penknife, of which a Religious Instruction in Schools , 15 blade is broken : it, too, is imperfect ; next, he draws freehand, on the blackboard, a; simple geometrical figure ; he trims it with care, and eventually, by use of ruler and compasses, he evolves the square or circle. Here, indeed, in a sense, is perfection realized and made visible. Ai)d yet the explanation has done little or nothing to supply the child with an answer to the question, " W h a t is God ? " ' T h e lesson may have been excellent as a lesson in English or geometry, but such instruction is not religious instruction. How far removed is all this from the kind of teaching made use of by our Lord, who in parable, in miracle, in illustration .from nature and every-day occurrence, makes the truth patent, concrete, and real, even to the simplest of His hearers. In place of definition, He gives us description : Gód is a Father whose care extends even to the meanest of " His creatures ; and He is our Father. He is a King besides ; His kingdom is Heaven, where the blessed do His will, as we, too, must do if we would enter into the kingdom. All we can have is from God, and we are to ask Him for all that we need—for our daily bread, forgiveness of our sins, deliverance from the wiles of the wicked one, and from every evil. It seems clear that under existing conditions the ordinary every-day teaching of Catechism in the schools tends not a little to obscure the true purport of religious instruction. Some remedy may be found practicable in the substitution of a simplified «form more adapted to the capacity of children, and by the omissión of the more, difficult sections from the courses of the younger pupils. And still more if instructors Religious Instruction in Schools , 15 can be made to feel the need in their lessons of work- ing up to the definitions, and of having them then memorized as a formulation of what has been taught. For, indeed, to begin with the ready-made definition and to comment loosely on its grammatical parts, is a slipshod method only too readily adopted by those who are inclined to make use of the labour of others in order to save themselves the trouble of thinking out suitable lessons. The question of Catechism teaching merits the careful and first-hand study of all engaged in the religious training of the young. And it is, without doubt, a question of how the Catechism may be used with the greatest advantage, and not of its employment as against other possible forms of instruction. For at any moment the teacher may need an exact statement of the truth which he is attempting to explain, and he must have to hand also a concise and authoritative exposition of the whole field of Christian Doctrine. And this means of guidance will become even more necessary if the efforts made in certain directions to restrict the work of the day-school staff to the teaching of secular'subjects should meet with any measure of success, for in that case the religious instruction will have to be given largely by imperfectly trained volun- teers. Not less necessary is it, too, that the child should have his information fixed and made precise and should have stored up in his memory a form of words by which he can upon occasion express un- mistakably that which he feels and knows. T o summarize. Present circumstances call for Religious Instruction in Schools , 15 special effort in safeguarding and improving the religious instruction of the schools. In view of a reduction of the time available for direct religious training it may be well to modify existing schemes, so as to' limit the field of instruction and to concentrate effort on what is of most importance. Success in teaching depends on the kind of pro- cedure employed. T h e methods of imparting secular knowledge have improved greatly, but not much has been done to improve the procedure of religious instruction, and it is for the most part routinary and antiquated. An exercise of skill in the teaching will mean simplicity and interest in the process and reality and permanence in the result. All this, however, goes a part of the way only. In dealing with the ordinary subjects of the school curri- culum it is no small part of the teacher's aim to prepare the pupil to display his knowledge for the credit of the school and as a means of advancement in after-life. In the religious instruction, on the other hand, these considerations can have but an obscure place. The attitude of the teacher should make manifest the difference, and should bring- before the child the sacredness and dignity of the subject. And the whole trend of the teaching should be towards an! apprecia- tion of religious truth and the formation of a lasting habit of virtue. As conducing to these ends it is well to connect closely the daily religious instruction with the spiritual life of the children. T o take a rough illustration : the fixing in memory of the common prayers will be sought in the devotional every-day repetition of them as a Religious Instruction in Schools , 15 religious exercise* rather than in a formal drill where rigidity of expression takes the first place. Other forms of prayer will be best learned at times when their use is seen to be necessary or fitting. If, for instance, the Litany of our Lady is publicly recited on her feast- days, and as occasion arises, the De profundis for the souls of departed relatives and friends of the children, the amount of learning-by-rote will be lessened and a truer meaning of the prayers will become apparent. And the " drill " which may be necessary as a supple- ment will then be looked on by the child not as a mere task, but as a means to enable him at fitting times to do that which he sees to be desirable. The application of this principle is even mtire striking in the treatment of hymns, and, indeed, there is hardly a phase in the religious instruction of schools into which it may not effectively enter. PRINTED AND PUBLISHED BY THE CATHOLIC TRUTH SOCIETY, LONDON. EDUCATION, TRUE AND FALSE' BY WILLIAM SAMUEL LILLY, HONORARY FELLOW OF PETERHOUSE, CAMBRIDGE. I SUPPOSE no one will deny that liberty, popular govern- ment, and the power of public opinion, if they are to prove a blessing and not a curse to any country, require the elevation of the people generally in ethical qualities and tone of mind. " We must educate our masters," said Lord Sherbrooke. The familiar dictum seems like the very voice of the Zeitgeist. Indeed, there is nothing upon which this age of ours prides itself more than its educational activity. The schoolmaster is abroad, and has been for a great many years past. The expenditure upon popular Education is a heavy item in the budget of every civilized country and is daily becoming heavier. " Educate, educate, educate," is everywhere the cry | I only educate enough and we shall in time get a blessed new world and bring in the golden age." No shibboleth of the day is more frequently repeated, or more highly honoured than this of Education. Nor can there be a doubt that the zeal for it is excellent and worthy of all commendation. But I may be permitted to doubt whether it is always, one might, perhaps, say often, a zeal according to knowledge : whether 1 By the kind permission of Messrs. Chapman and Hall, these pages are reprinted, with a few alterations and omissions, from the Author's work On Shibboleths. io Education, True and False it is not frequently expended upon what is not Education at all, but a mere counterfeit thereof. The point is worth discussing. What then is, as a rule, meant when Education is spoken of? What but the instruction, in greater or less degree, of the intellect ? Every one is now taught some things, be it only the three Rs, although, in most countries, the primary schools have got far beyond that. In schools of a higher grade the number of things which a scholar may learn, and is encouraged to learn, is very great, the usual result being his acquisition of a large amount of small information at the cost of much cerebral fatigue. In the Universities, Professors lecture on all things human and divine, and the whole field of human knowledge is open to the student. It is an age of universal instruction, and it is an age of universal examination. The examiner extracts what the schoolmaster has put in, and satisfies us that we have the worth of our money. Now I am far from denying that from the humblest schools, as from the highest colleges, many youths are sent into the world who are educated in what I must account the only proper sense of the word: a sense which I shall presently indicate. But I do say that a student may answer with absolute correctness the questions set to test his proficiency in the subjects wherein he has been instructed, that, in Lord Tennyson's phrase, he may be "gorged with knowledge," and yet be quite uneducated. Mere instruction is not sufficient even to form the intellect. Still less sufficient is it to form the character. But the formation of the character is the true end of Education. I lay no claim to originality in putting forward this view. I find it expressed, clearly enough, in a verse of the Book of Proverbs, as rendered by King James's translators: " Train up a child in the way he should go, and when he is old he will not depart from it." A youth that is so trained is educated. He is fitted for the work appointed him in this world, whatever it may be, which, indeed, is a matter of comparatively little importance. io Education, True and False " Honour and shame from no condition rise; Act well your part: therein all honour lies." And so the majestic words of Milton : " I call, therefore, a complete and generous education that which fits a man to perform justly, skilfully, and magnanimously all the offices, both public and private, of peace and war." The true ideal of Education is the right development of all the human powers and faculties, its function being, as Herbert Spencer well says, " t o prepare us for complete living." This development must be simultaneous and harmonious, for the undue predominance of one power or faculty is necessarily attended by the degeneration or atrophy of others. Hence Plato, Aristotle, and the philosophers of the Porch were led to place virtue—man's distinctive ex- cellence and perfection—in a mean, that is, in a proper balance or accord of all his endowments. " All that makes a man " should be recognized in manly Education. " Mens sana in corpore sano "—a sound mind in a sound body— was the aspiration of the Roman poet; and it was not unwise. Physical culture is important as the instrument of that corporal soundness which enters into the virile ideal. " To remove the original dimness of the mind's eye; to strengthen and perfect its vision; to enable it to look out into the world, right forward, steadily and truly; to give the mind clearness, accuracy, precision; to enable it to use words aright; to understand what it says; to conceive justly what it thinks;" 1 is, according to Cardinal Newman, the object of intellectual Education : an object which every teacher, from the village schoolmaster to the University Professor, should keep in view. But much more than this enters into the conception of the sound mind. Man is not merely an intellectual but also a moral being. That is his distinctive prerogative separating him, far more decisively than physical or mental differences, from the lower animals, and crowning him with glory and worship. Of all the ideals that man can set before him, the moral idea comes first, because all other ideals, the ideal of knowledge among ' The Idea of a University, p. 322 (Third Ed.). io Education, True and False the rest, hold of it. In every circumstance, action, or emotion of life, there is an ethical issue : Am I right in being here ? in doing this? in thinking that? There is no situation that has not its duty. The moral ideal embraces our entire being: all other ideals but segments thereof. It is at the very centre of consciousness, for, only as an ethical being is man a person. And the supreme end of educating a child is to educe his personality, " t o make a man of him," as we are wont to say. That only satisfies the philosophical conception of Education— " Where all, as in a work of art, Is toil, co-operant to an end." Let us pursue the matter a little further. What is the first lesson that should be taught a child ? Yes : and the last too? We may call it the Alpha and Omega of Education. Surely it is reverence. Reverence for what is highest above him. Reverence for what is highest in him. And it is a lesson which the child is naturally disposed to learn. It corresponds to a primary instinct of human nature. An opinion has largely prevailed— attributable, I suppose, to the Calvinistic doctrine of our total depravity—that man is born entirely under the dominion of egoism, of self-seeking, of covetousness, and that Education consists in revolutionizing his innate character. But this view is the outcome of false dogma and superficial observation. It is as erroneous as the Rousseauan view that man is by nature altogether good He is neither altogether good nor altogether bad. He is imperfect: able to discern and to admire the things that are more excellent: unable, through defect of will and nature, adequately to follow after them. Consider a child, as everyday experience reveals him—nay, much as children differ, through the influence of heredity, I would almost say any child—and what is its strongest motive ? Surely the desire for esteem. And that desire may well be considered the original spring of right action. It first displays itself in the wish to be thought well of by those who naturally command the child's reverence. The approbation of his parents, and io Education, True and False in particular—which is noteworthy—of the less tender of the two, the father, is necessary to his peace of mind. It represents to him, Hegel well says, his own better will, and therefore it has a rightful claim upon his obedience. Their judgement mirrors him to himself. It reflects his own worthiness or unworthiness. As years go on, the judge- ments of others, of his tutors and governors, his companions and friends, come also to weigh with him. The note of virile maturity is that the rule and measure of self-respect is transferred from without to within. He finds his standard, not in the praise of men, but in the idea of the Right, the Just, the True : in the testimony of his conscience, in his thoughts accusing or else excusing one another, as he falls short of, or corresponds with, that idea. Hence culture of the will is a far more important part of Education than culture of the intellect, for will is of the essence of person- ality, in virtue of which man is man. Duty is, as Kant excellently teaches, the obligation to act from pure reverence of the moral law. And a good will is a will self-determined by that law. " Self-reverence, self-knowledge, self-control— These three alone lead life to sovereign power." The truly educated man, be he peasant or prince, is he who has learned to know his duty, and whose whole powers have been disciplined and developed to the utmost for its accomplishment. That is the ideal of virile maturity. Doubtless, it is never entirely attained. The very nature of the ideal forbids that complete objective reality can ever be given to it by man. We must account of it as the type to which we can but approximate, more or less nearly. And just in proportion as any one does approximate to this idea of virile maturity is he " man, and master of his fate.' Just in that proportion is he educated. But in the popular conception of Education this moral element, this discipline of the will has no place. I have described that conception as being " the instruction of the intellect, in greater or less degree"; an instruction, in io Education, True and False many cases, wholly or chiefly directed to the attainment of what Lord Goschen has called "saleable knowledge." And, what is most singular, from such instruction ethical results are confidently expected. Ignorance is held to be the root of all evil. Knowledge—literary, scientific, aesthetic—is exhibited as an universal remedy or panacea, as a quickening, regenerating, organizing power, able to transform individual and national character. All which appears to me gross and irrational superstition. It passes my wit to understand how moral improvement is to be the outcome of merely intellectual culture; of knowledge, how- ever wide and exact, of arts or literature or physics. How can such knowledge affect character ? It cannot minister to a mind diseased. It cannot convert the will from bad to good. The utmost it can do is to minister to an en- lightened selfishness. It leaves you ethically where it found you, unless, indeed, its effect has been to illustrate the Apostolic dictum, g Knowledge puffeth up." That such is the usual effect of instruction divorced from reverence cannot, indeed, be doubted. I remember John Ruskin once saying to me that, in his judgement, what is commonly called Education is little better than a training in impudence. It ministers to the excessive individualism of an age when the man in the streets supposes himself qualified, by his modicum of elementary instruction, to give sentence on all things in heaven and earth, and resents it, as flat blasphemy, if the sufficiency of the purblind private prejudice which he calls his judgement is so much as questioned. More than fifty years ago, Flaubert, in one of his letters to George Sand, prophesied, "Free and compulsory instruction will merely increase the number of fools." The event, in France, has proved the correctness of his prediction. This by the way. My present point is, that instruction of the intellect has, in itself, no moralizing tendency. It may turn crime into different channels, and render it less easy to detect, it may make a man more decent, but it does not change his natural propensities or his proneness to gratify them at the expense of others. Physical science, literature, art, may refine the judgement and elevate the taste. * But io Education, True and False here their power ends. The utmost they can do is to minister to an enlightened selfishness. Knowledge of them is, in fact, power, and nothing else. Its practicar effect is to make the good man more powerful for good, the bad man more powerful for evil. And that is all it does or can do. If ever there was a safe truth, it is this. And I know of few things more curious than the blindness to it exhibited by many who are accounted, and in other respects justly, among our wisest. I remember, upon one occasion, hear- ing a very learned judge pass sentence upon two criminals, one a country doctor, the other an agricultural labourer, who had been equally concerned in an offence the monstrous turpitude of which must be patent even to the simplest. In sentencing the doctor the judge said, " You are an educated man, and ought to have known better: I shall therefore award to you a longer term of penal servitude than to your fellow-prisoner." As though the possessor of medical and surgical knowledge might equitably be punished for not attaining to a higher ethical standard than the pea- sant. It was a striking instance of the belief that moralizing effects may reasonably be expected from intellectual instruc- tion : a belief which, as Herbert Spencer well points out in his Study of Sociology, while "absurd a priori," is " flatly contradicted by facts." Criminal statistics exhibit more crime among skilled than among unskilled labourers. The less instructed peasants in the fields are, it would seem, better morally than the more instructed artizans in the streets. The schoolmaster, abroad for so many years, has not proved the moral regenerator that he was expected to be. Let us see how the expectation arose. It appears to me to have directly arisen from the Utilitarian philosophy, which resolves .morality into self- interest. " Honesty," the teachers of this school insist, " is the best policy; and a thing is honest because it is supremely politic." The practical conclusion is that, virtue being enlightened selfishness, men will be virtuous out of regard for their own interests, if the eyes of their under- standing are only sufficiently opened to discern what.their io Education, True and False true interests are. And so John Stuart Mill apparently regarded the end of Education as being, "to diffuse good sense among the people, with such knowledge as would qualify them to judge of the tendencies of their actions."1 The conception of Education held by Utilitarians is essen- tially mechanical. How should it embrace the culture of the will if, as they one and all teach, from Bentham down to Herbert Spencer, the freedom of the will is an objective and subjective delusion ? It looks without, to mechanism, for what can be effected only by dealing with the springs of action within. The Utilitarian philosophy de-ethicises Education, as it de-ethicises everything else, by banishing the moral idea. For Utilitarian morality, in all its shapes and forms, is not moral at all. From agreeable feeling, the laws of comfort, needs personal or racial, the interests, whether of the individual or of the community, it is im- possible to extract an atom of morality.2 Right differs from expediency in its very essence. S I ought," never does and never can mean " i t is pleasantest for thee, or for me, or for all of us." The only morality derivable from pleasure is the morality of money, for which pleasures of all kinds, intellectual and physical, may be purchased. The moral law is dethroned by Utilitarianism. The Almighty Dollar is exalted in its place, in the schoolroom as in the market-place. Mammon is the present deity: and " P u t money in thy purse," is his gospel generally received and believed by this generation. " The idols of the Gentiles are silver and gold, the works of the hands of men. Let them that make them become like unto them, and all such as trust in them." In such an age, I hold it of the utmost importance to insist upon the true conception of Education. To Education, that is really such—a stern, high, ethical dis- cipline—must we look for the cleansing of the land from 1 Principles of Political Economy, Book II. c. xiii. § 3. 3 I have pursued this subject, at some length, in chap. ii. of my work On Right and Wrong, and in chap. iv. of my work The Great Enigma. io Education, True and False that debasing Mammon-worship which strikes at the root of the qualities specially needed by a democracy. " To make the people fittest to choose, and the chosen fittest to govern, will be to mend our corrupt and faulty education, to teach the people faith, not without virtue, temperance, modesty, sobriety, parsimony, justice."1 These golden words of Milton should be inscribed on every schoolhouse in the kingdom. Universal Education is the natural consequence of popular government. It is only just to the leaders of the great Revolution which ushered in the present era, to say that they discerned this truth. The National Assembly declared teaching a sacred function and the schoolmaster the equal of the priest. It affirmed that the first charge upon the public revenues should be public instruction ; and the Convention voted fifty-four millions of francs for this purpose. It is true that the vote was mere waste paper, for the' money was not forthcoming. But the intention of the Revolutionary legislators was thereby put on record: and who can deny its reasonableness ? All men, in virtue of their fundamental equality, should start, as far as may be, equal in the race of life, each with his fair chance to make the best of himself: to secure the benefit of that most righteous principle, " a career for talents." A man is not really free in the present state of society to develop his faculties to the greatest advantage of himself and of the community, without teaching of a much higher kind than would have sufficed for him in a simpler age. Nor, again, is he qualified for the exercise of that political power which modern democracy puts into his hands, save by Education in the complete sense for which I have been contending. Mere intellectual instruction is not sufficient. Herbert Spencer justly notes, in his volume from which I have already quoted, " the ample disproof, if there needed any, of the notion that men are fitter for the right exercise of power by teaching." Power is a trust, for the due fulfil- ment of which it is not enough that a man know rightly. He must also will rightly: that is, his volition must be 1 The Ready Way to Establish a Free Commonwealth. io Education, True and False determined by the moral law. Ethical culture, the very keystone of Education, is, from the political point of view, absolutely necessary. And this brings us face to face with one of the most momentous practical questions of the day. How is it possible to ensure for a country that moral and intellectual discipline which shall " make the people fittest to choose and the chosen fittest to govern " ? That this is a matter of vital interest to the social organism, and that therefore it ought to be cared for by the State, is certain. " Do you imagine," said Plato, " that politi'es grow on a tree, or on a rock, and not out of the moral dispositions of the men who compose them ? " " The first element of good government," echoes a philosopher of our own day, " being the virtue and intelligence of the human beings comprising the community, the most important form of excellence which any form of government can possess is to promote the virtue and intelli- gence of the people themselves."1 Certain it is that the nation, as an organic whole, is most deeply interested in the Education of its children. That to undertake it is not, primarily, the proper function of the State, is no less certain. It is the duty and prerogative of parents, and especially of the father, as the head and personification of the family, to ensure for a child that degree of moral and intellectual culture which shall enable him to quit him like a man in the business of life. The doctrine of the patriapotestas is no figment of superannuated superstition. However rude and stern the forms which it assumed in antique civilizations, it is rooted and grounded in the nature of things. The father is, by divine right, the Priest, Judge, and King in his own family. Of all jurisdiction exercised in this world, his is the mbst sacred, for he is the direct and indefeasible repre- sentative of Him "of whom all paternity in heaven and earth is named." Tyrannously as his authority may have been exercised in the archaic family, it is now the bulwark of liberty. True is the instinct which leads our Courts of * Mill, On Representative Government, p. 31. io Education, True and False Law so jealously to guard it, that by no agreement, however solemn, can he divest himself of it. For it exists not only for his own sake, not only for the sake of his children, bit for the sake of the community as well. The whole of social life is based upon the family. Nor in this age of dissolvent individualism can we insist too strongly upon the sacredness and inviolability of those paternal rights which form its foundation. But sacred and indefeasible as are, in theory, a father's rights and prerogatives in respect of his children's Education, what if he neglect the duties involved in those rights and make no account of those prerogatives ? That this fre- quently happens is matter of the commonest experience. Nor can it be otherwise, by reason of the abject poverty and deep degradation in which so many families exist. I need not enlarge upon what is, unhappily, too familiar. Certain it is, that if the Education of children were left entirely to their fathers, who are primarily and directly responsible for it, a vast number would remain wholly uneducated, and so unfitted for their life-work in general, and, in particular, for the discharge of their political duties in a democratic polity. Equally certain it is, that this is opposed to the best interests of the social organism; that it is a mischief which the nation, in its corporate capacity, should strenuously combat. The State is bound to undertake the Education of children who, without its intervention, would receive no Education. But how can the State teach "virtue, temperance, modesty, sobriety, parsimony, justice" ? How can it supply that moral element which is the most vital part of Education ? Is there, as a matter of fact, any other instru- ment of ethical culture possible for the mass of mankind, but religion? I admit, or rather I strenuously maintain, that the fundamental doctrines of morality are independent of all religious systems. They are the necessary and eternal truths of reason. But so viewed they are merely intellectual? They are diagrams. In order to vivify them, there needs emotion ; there needs enthusiasm ; there needs celestial fire. I am not here considering Education as it affects man's prospects and destinies beyond the io Education, True and False grave. I am viewing it from the standpoint of this life only. And so viewed, I say that religion is a sort of centre of gravity of human knowledge. It is the greatest source of moral authority in this world, because it is, according to Kant's admirable definition, " the repre- sentation to ourselves of the moral law as the will of God." Can morality work upon the world at large without such representation ? Can we banish the vision of the Creator, Witness and Judge of men, from our schoolrooms and not enfeeble, yes, emasculate, the whole of the teaching given there? M. Renan, an unsuspected witness, thinks not. " T h e peasant without religion," he declares, " i s the ugliest of brutes, no longer possessing the distinctive token of human nature."1 And this confronts us with a grave practical difficulty in an age of religious disunity. In the present day a common creed and a common cult no longer supply the bond of states and the rule of legislation. Religion is no' longer the great objective fact, dominating all relations of life. "Religions," said Turgot, "are opinions, and there- fore there ought not to be a dominant religion. Right and justice for all alone should dominate." This declaration, regarded when it was made, in the eighteenth century, as a perilous paradox, is now accepted as the tritest of truisms. And the State has everywhere been secularized in accord- ance with it. Religion is regarded as a private thing for every man's conscience. He may have any variety of it which he prefers, and as much or as little of it as he pleases. But the State, qua State, has no religion, although maintaining the free exercise of all religions. It professes itself (in the French phrase) incompetent in the matter of cults, and displays, or affects to display, benevolent neutrality towards them all. I, for my part, do not pretend to admire this condition of things, so loudly eulogized by many as the ripe fruit of liberty, a high stage of progress, a magnificent conquest of the modern mind. VAvmir de la Religion, p. 487. io Education, True and False It appears to me, as a student of history, that a national religion is a great national safeguard, and, as a student of philosophy, that it is necessary to the perfection of the social organism. And 1 believe that, as time goes on, the want of it will be increasingly felt in every country. But whether I am right or wrong in so thinking, certain it is that one great problem lying before modern society is to reconcile the authority of religious convictions with the Agnosticism of governments. And how, to speak merely of our present subject, is it possible for the State to obtain the aid of religion as an instrument of ethical culture, while maintaining its attitude of religious neutrality ? It has been observed, not without truth, that if you wish to recommend any course of action to Englishmen generally, there is no better device than to commend it as a middle course. The solution adopted by us of the religious difficulty in Education given by the State possesses this recommendation. To banish religion altogether from the " provided" Schools was repugnant to the in- stincts of piety, happily so strong in the English people. On the other hand, to teach there any existing variety of Christianity was clearly impossible. And so a new variety which, it was supposed, would not hurt the most sensitive Nonconformist conscience, was invented. It permits the Bible to be taught, but excludes-fell formularies. It is, in truth, Theism plus a certain amount of Christian sentiment. And its special recommendation is held to be that it is undogmatic. As a matter of fact, it is not so. The total banishment of dogmas would mean infinite conjecture. The existence of God, or the authority, in however attenuated a form, of the Bible, is as much a dogma as Transubstantiation or Justification by Faith alone. But the dogmas of this new religion are few, and they are not obtruded. I suppose its practical effect is to instil into the minds of children that sense of Divine Providence, that habit of endeavouring to trace it in all events, which are distinctive of the Hebrew Scriptures, and to familiarize them with the sacred scenes and pregnant precepts of the Evangelical history. I by no means incline to undervalue io Education, True and False such Biblical training. It seems to me that, as a matter of fact, it brings home, more or less effectively, to many who receive it the highest and most operative ideals. Those august lessons from beyond the grave, uttered, as it were, from the realms of eternity, can hardly fail to introduce an element of poetry and morality into many lives. I am, of course, very far from allowing that such religion is a satis- factory substitute for the definite instruction in faith and practice which every Christian community more or less fully and precisely gives. But I do assert that, as compared with no religious teaching at all, it is something considerable: and that it is more than a State, which has ceased to be dis- tinctively Christian, if acting within its logic, could fairly be expected to give to the children whose Education, through their parents' default, it is itself obliged to under- take. Assuredly, however, the State has no right, directly or (which is much more likely) indirectly, to impose this religion upon any children whose parents prefer more definite teaching. It is for the parents, not for the State, to choose what religion their children shall be taught. The Denominational system (as it is called) is the only system possible in this country which is consistent with the father's rights, which respects his religious liberty, i But those rights and that liberty are not absolute. They are con- ditioned by the rights and needs of the social organism. The same principles which warrant the State in under- taking the Education of children who, otherwise, would not be educated at all, also warrant it in requiring that the intellectual instruction of the nation shall come up to a certain standard. " A government," to quote John Stuart Mill, " is justified in requiring from all the people that they shall possess instruction in certain things, but not in pre- scribing to them how, or from whom, they shall obtain it."1 Does it, however, follow that Education thus enforced by the State should be paid for by the State? By no means. The function of the State is to define the public 1 Principles of Political Economy, Book V. chap. xi. § 9. io Education, True and False duties of the subject. Upon the subject lies the obligation of performing those duties, at his own proper cost and charges. But unquestionably the principle of social soli- darity requires that those who, while doing their best for the Education of their children, are unable to comply with the legitimate requirements of the State should be assisted from the public funds in the fulfilment of that duty. The cry raised against the aid thus given to Denominational schools as an indirect endowment of religion is absurd. —With religion, as a Divine revelation, the unreligious State is not concerned. With religions as teachers of morality, it is deeply concerned, and such teaching it may justly subsidize. The great practical difficulty arises in the endeavour to discriminate between those who cannot and those who will not help themselves in the Education of their children. The true justification of "Free Educa- tion " is that it is the best possible solution of that and other difficulties, and a boon which, in virtue of social solidarity, may very properly be conferred upon the poorer classes, at the expense of the community at large. Again, the right of the State to satisfy itself as to the quality of the Education given in elementary schools does not primarily arise from its pecuniary grants in aid of them. The true reason for the public control of Education is not that public funds are used for it, but that it is a thing of vital im- portance to public interests. Nor, in my opinion, can such control be properly entrusted to Local Boards. The matter is of imperial concern, and should be as directly ordered by the State as are the Army and Navy, or the various departments of the Civil Service. So much may suffice to indicate what appears to me the true principle which should regulate this matter of such vast importance to the public weal. But I would not pass away from the subject without noting how necessary it is, in the highest interests of the body politic, that the func- tions of Government in respect of Education should be jealously restricted within the limits which I have, as I trust clearly, however roughly, traced. The replacement of the io Education, True and False Denominational system by what is called " a national system," sometimes advocated in the name of liberty, would really be a deadly blow to liberty. It would bring about a liberty which is not liberal : a liberty à la Fran- çaise. There are certain weighty words of John Stuart Mill so well worthy at being pondered in this connection, that I cannot end better than by citing them : " That the whole or any large part of the education of the people should be in State hands, I go as far as any one in deprecating. All that has been said, of the importance of individuality of character, and— diversity of -opinions and modes of conduct, involves, as of the same unspeakable importance, diversity of education. A general State education is a mere contrivance for moulding people to be exactly like one another : and as the mould in which it casts them is that which pleases the predominant power in the Government, whether this be a monarch, a priesthood, an aristocracy, or the majority of the existing generation, in proportion as it is èfficient and successful, it establishes a despotism over the mind, leading by natural tendency to one over the body. An education established and controlled by the State should only exist, if it exist at all, as one among many competing experiments, carried on for the purpose of example and stimulus, to keep the others up to a certain standard of excellence. Unless, indeed, when society in general is in so backward a state that it could not or would not provide for itself any proper institutions of education, unless the Government undertook the task—then, indeed, the Government may, as the less of two great evils, take upon itself the business of schools and universities, as it may that of joint-stock companies, when private enterprise, in a shape fitted for undertaking great works of industry, does not exist in the country. But in general, if the country contains a sufficient number of persons qualified to provide education under Government auspices, the same persons would be able and willing to give an equally good education on the voluntary principle, under the assurance of remuneration afforded by law rendering education com- pulsory, combined with State aid to those unable to defray the . expense. " T h e instrument for enforcing the law could be no other than public examinations, extending to all children, and beginning at an early age. . . . Under this system the rising generation . . . would be brought up either Churchmen or Dissenters as they now are, the Statç merely taking care that they should be instructed Churchmen, or instructed Dissenters." 1 1 On Liberty, chap. v. There is a striking passage to the same effect in Mill's Principles of Political Economy, Book V. chap. xi. § 8 PRINTED AND PUBLISHED BY THE CATHOLIC TRUTH SOCIETY, LONDON