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A Lecture delivered at the Opening of the Theological Department of Manitoba College, Winnipeg, Oct. 29, 1889. < The subject of common nchool educa- tion is one which in likely to engage )n the near future the public mind in this Erovince to an extent which it has not itherto done. Important changes are foreshadowed as in contemplation. An attempt is to be made, it appears, to term- inate a system which, however accordant with the views of a section of the inhabi- tents, can never, and especially as it has been wrought, be other than unacceptable to the great majority. The best thanks of the country are due, one need not hesitate to say, to any government which makes an honest endeavor to remedy the exist- ing evils and place the matter of public school education on a more satisfactory basis. The subject is confessedly one of more than ordinary difflculiy, even as it is one of the very last importance. It has not indeed, any very close or obvious connec- tion with the work with which, whether as arts or theological students, we are to be engaged. It is neither a question of philosophy nor of theology, strictly speaking; yet it has claims upon our at- tention at this moment as one of the col- leges of the province, which only a few questions, whether of philoaophv or the- ology, possess. It is at least a live ques- tion and may soon become a burning one. The present lecture is given, not as an adequate or exh austive discussion of the subject, but a - humble aid to its better understanling by the people of this pro- vince, with wnom, it is to be hoped, its ultimate settlement within the limits of Manitoba will be found to rest. Numerous questions are raised when we direct our minds to the considera- tion of this subject. What form should public school education as- sume; education, that is, the details of which are determined and its cost met in part at least by the State? Should it be restricted to tne elementary branches, or should it embrace the higher branches also ? Should it be entirely free or only partially so? In particular, SHOULD IT BE PURELY SECULAR ? or should it be at the same time religious* and if religious, in what form is the reli- gious element to find place ? What I have to say this evening will have reference to the last only of these questions, which, however, is also by far the most impor- tant. A purely secular system of education: one, that is, in which there should be no attempt to cimbine religious instruction or religious influence with the teaching of reading, grammar end other such branch- es, has some strong and obvious recom- mendations, especially in the present divided state of religious opinion. First,- it is in strict accord with what appears to be the modern view of the function of the State. According to this view, it is no part of this function to teach religious truth. That lies wholly within the domain of conscience, a domain which a power wielding the sword may not enter. Civil government, it is claimed, has been instl* tuted for quite other purposes than that of propagating religious opinions, how- ever true and however important. Touse its resources for this end is to misuse them, and in doing so even to render a doubtful service to the truth which it has espoused. Again the purely secular sys- tem of education escapes numberless diffi- culties which are apt to arise, when religi- ous teaching is made to form an integral oart of the system. There is no longer any question of wbat kind and amount of Christian instruction should be imparted. There is no more any room for the jealous- ies of rival denominations, so far as the school system is concerned. No branch of the Church, Protestant or Catholic,can feel that another is getrine the advantage of it, when all are treated alike, the religious opinions of all bein^ equally {|2;nored. Within one domain, at least, there in abso- lute freedom from ccclesia'^tical quarrels, the bitterest of all quarrels as our legis- lators are accustomed to say, with that happy blindness to the character of their own contentions which is so common. Now, even admittinp; that the statement proceeds on a somewhat exaggerated esti- mate of the (ganger to peace and good feeling arising from religious instruction flndinc, a place in the publio school, it is an obvious gain to have in its exclusion the door shut against one element of jeal- ousy and discord. It may be added as another advantage, that with religious teaching relegated to the home and to the church, so much more time is left for tho'se secular branches which all admit ought to form the staple of public school instruction, and wnich in our day have became numerous enough to tax the brain and the time both of teachers and pupils. In the light of such considerations as these, it is not, perhaps, astonishing that a purely secular system of public school instruction, should present itself to many persons as the best, or if not the absolutely best, yet the best practicable in a community where such diversities of religious opinion exist as exists among ourselves. Is it the best, then, or even the best practicable ? Is it good at all ? I do not think so, and ifc will be my aim in the first part of this lecture to support this opinion in the calmest and most dis- passionate manner in my power. First, then, I ask you to notice, that, when the purely secular system of education is sup- ported on the plea that it is no part of the function of the State to teach religious truth, consistency demands THE EXCLUSION OF ALL -vELIOIOUS IDEAS from the authorized text books, even to that of the Divine existence, which is not only a religious truth, but the fun- damental truth of religion. If there must not be religious instruction in the public school, if the reading of the Bible even must form no part of the exercises, be- cause the State, which sustaines the school, transcends its legitimate and prop- er sphere, when it undertakes to teach re- ligious truth, then.on the same ground,any literature which expresses religious opin- ions or appeals to religious sentiments or enforces rbligioua obligations, must be ex- cluded from the books used in the class- ro6m,or these must be purged of the obtru- sive if not obnoxious element, prior to their admission. The principles of moral- ity, if enforced at all by the teacher, must be enfoi^ed by considerations altogether distinct troci the authorii y, the character or the will of the Creator. The Ten Com- mandments, giving the summary of the Divine will in relation to man and the ba- sis for over three thousand years of hu- man morals, cannot be taught. Such are the conclusions which we are compelled by a resistless logic to accept if we adopt the fundamental principle of secularism. viz., that the State oversteps its proper sphere when it undertakes to teach relig- ious truth, and on that principle argue for the eixclusion of the reading of the Hible or any definite religious instruction from the exercises of the public school. And some have not hesitated to accept them In their entirety. France, logical, if any- thing, has done so. It has not, indeed, adopted the blasphemous atheistic cate- chisms which have been long current among a certain class of the population, but It has, if I am rightly informed, with an unhappy consistency, entirely removed the name of God and the whole group of ideas connected therewith from the text- books which it puts into the hands of its youth. An Australian colony, too, has not hesitated, in conformity with the sec- ularistic principle, whfch it has adopted, to excise from a passage of Longfellow the lines expressive of religious sentiment, before giving it a place in the book of les- bons. The people of Manitoba, I feel sure, are not prepared for any such course in the matter of public school edu- cation. And in rejecting it— in re- garding it with instinctive revul- sion — they must be viewed as at the same time repudiating the purely secular view of the State and its func- tions on which it is based and of which it is the logical outcome. So far, however, the conclusion is a purely negative one. Religious instruc- tion in the public schools is not ruled out by the character of the State aa a civil institution. But even if admissible, is it expedient? Is it requisite? The answer to this question, which is one of the very highest importance, can only come from a consideration of the end contemplated in public school education. What, then, is the aim of the State in instituting and maintaining public schools ? There will probably be very general accord on this point. The aim surely is, or at least ^ught to be TO MAKE GOOD CITIZENS, as far as education can be supposed to make such; citizens who, by their intelli- cence, their industry, their self-control, their respect for law, will tend to bulla up a strong and prosperous State; citizens whose instructed minds, whose trained powers, whose steadfast principles will serve to promote the public welfare. This, and neither more nor less, must be the aim of the public school in the view of the State, and as far as supported by it; not more,— it overshoots the mark when it seeks to develope the purely spiritual qualities, the graces of a religious life, ex- cept as these are subse.'vient to the origi- nation and growth of civic virtues; and not less, it falls as far short of the mark when it is viewed as designed simply to give instruction in reading, arithmetic and other such branches, and thereby to promote intelligence and to train intel- lect. The idea of the institution is most defective, so defective as to be virtually out bett the Ishe to. The Iti^i .s mislesdiug, which makes the school sim- I)ly a place for Imparting knowledge, or u adaition, an intellectual gymuaslum. It should bo beyond question, that the State, in undertaking the work of educa- tion, can only find an aim at once ade- quate and consiBtent in the preparation of the youth, ho far as public education can prepare rheni, for ihe parts they have to play in civil life. In a single word, the aim of the public school is to make good citizens, or to train the youth of the State, that they shaU become good citizens. But to make good citizens, the school must make fcooa. men. Character is at least as requisite as infelligence, virtuous habits as trained intellect, to the proper equip- ment for life. The prosperity, whether of of the individual or of the State, rests on a treacherous basis, which does not rest on Integrity and self-control. It is often the precursor of ruin. Against that ruin, learning whether of the school or of the college, is but a feeble barrier. Nay, learn- ing divorced from morals, disciplined in- tellect disengaged from the control of vir- tuous principle may only make that ruin more speedy and more complete, may have no other result than to giveH us more skil- ful swindlers, or more expert thieves. In this way, the school instructing the mind and cultivating the intellectual facilities while disregarding the moral nature, con- ptitutes a real danger and may become a positive injury both to the individual and to society. lu any case it must be obvious that the good man is necessary to consti- tute the good citizen, and the education therefore, which is to promote th'5 society and welfare of the state must be capable of forming good men— it must at least aim at-doing so. But to make good men there must be moral teaching and moral training; that is, there must be both Instruction in the principles of morality and the effort to see that tliese principles are acted out by those in attendance on the school. The virtues of truthfulness, purity, gentleness, self-control-— the virtues which go to make good men— if in any sense native to the soil of our fallen nature, find much in it to retard their growth. They need to be culti- vated. The opposite vices, falsehood, selfish- ness, angry passion, will shew themselves more or less in every school room, and every play ground. They will need to be wisely but firmly repressed. The school, if its aim be to make not simply expert arithmeticians, correct grammarians, but truthful and upright men, pure ntiuded and gentle women, carnot disk'egard the workings of the moral nature, as these come out from day to day within it no v on their betterside,nowon their worse. The better must be fostered and encouraged, the worse checked and in some cases pun- ished. The conscience must be appealed to. The sense of duty must be cultivated. The habit of obedience must be taught. It is true that the public school is j NOT PKIMAKILY A SCHOOL OF MORALITY any more than it is primarily a school of religion, but a teacher charged with the oversight of children for flv6 or six hours a day during the most formative period of ;.ife, may not ignore the moral nature, as it reveals it- self every hour in his presence. He must j rebuke or punish indolence, falsehood, j rudeness, malice, even as he must encour- age diligence, truthfulness, purity and gentleness. For him to be indifferent or neutral in the conflict between good and evil, which goes on in the school-room and the play-ground as really as in the busi- ness mart or the legislative hall, of which the heart of the youngest child is the seat, as undeniably as that of the busiest adult, is virtually to betray the cause of right; and in mercy at once to the child and to so- ciety, he must make his sympathy with goodness, with right character and right conduct, clearly and decisively felt. At any rate, if the public school is to be the seed- plot of noble character, of generous vir- tues, and. not simply of scholastic attaio- ments, if It is to furnish society with good citizer s and not simply with smart arith- meticians or possibly with apt criminals, there must be found in it, not only meth- odical instruction and careful intellectual drill, but amid all else, as the occasion of- fers oi' requires, moral teaching and moral influence. The presiding genius in every school, a genius which may be often silent but which should never sleep, ought to be a lofty and generous morality. But (and this forms the last link in the argument against a purely secular system of education) moral tea'cbing, to be eflfec- tive in the highest degree, or in any de- gree near to the highest, must lean on re- ligion and be enforced by Its considera- tions. It is this, position especially that the apologist for a purely secular system refuses to accept. It is claimed that It is possible to teach morality, and morality of a hitjjh kind, without introducine: the religious element in any form. Every- thing turns here on what Is meant by the teaching of morality. If by this Is meant simply, pointing out in words what Is proper and dutiful in human conduct, de- fining the duties which men owe to each other, then it is possible. The summaries of morals which are found in the agnostic literature of the period, not the less excel- lent that they are, in good part, borrowed without acknowledgement from the Bible, demonstrate Its possibility. But to how little purpose are duties pointed out in the school-room, or anywhere else, if there are no considerations presented, enforcing their performance, no sanctions of a high and sacred kind to secure them aeainst neglect or violation. The whole end con- templated in the teaching of morality, is TO BRINQ THE TEACHINO INTO PRACTICE, to have the precept translated into action. And the main dimculty in the attainment of this end, as everyone knows, has al- ways been in connection, not with the rule, but with the motive ; it has always been, not to point out the direction in which the lite should move, but to cause it to take this direction, in spite of the deflecting forcn at work. The failure of Pagan systems of morality was far more due to defective sanctions, than to wrong rules of conduct, and the vice and crime which are found In every Christian country to- day are in only a am"!! de(2ree the result of ignorance of what is right. They are mainly due to sinful dispositions, some of them inherited, to unbridled appetites, and to the force of bad example. Now t\ e problem is, to find and to bring into play a motive or a cluster of motives powerful enough to overcome these forces of evil, and to carry the life in spite of them to- wards what is good. In the absence of religion, with that sphere closed, where is the public school to And such a motive ? Denied access to those which religion supplies, by what considerations is it to enforce obedience to the moral rules which it lays down ? There are, of course, considerations of expediency, of self-re- spect, of the authority of the teacher, and the fear in extreme cases of the rod which he wields, to which appeal can be made, but who would expect noble and generous character or action as the re- sult? It is undeniaDle that the highest and most powerful motives of right con- duct lie within the religious sphere. Even If it does not require the idea of God to render the conception of duty intelligible —to ground It— as many think it does, it is certain that the being and character and moral government of God give to the word duty a new force, and invest the whole details of duty with a new sacredness, presenting them as the embodiment of the Creator's will. It is not less cer- tain, that added hatefulness and terror gather round falsehood, selfish- ness, injustice, all that is unduti- ful and wrong, when it is viewed as the object of His displeasure "in Whom we live and move and have our being ;" while a whole circle of moral excellencies, patience, meekness, gentleness, consider- ate regard for others, self-denial, do not BO much gain added charms, as they al- most come first into distinct sight, when they are enjoined in the words and dis- played In the life of the Saviour of man- Kind. There may be a select few— persons of philosophical thought, who can dis- pense wich these sanctions of morality or who think they can; whoso observance of duty rests on some other grounds, but to the great bulk of mankind, and very specially to children, they furnish the strongest and most appreciable motives to virtuous action— they are the indispens- able supports of right conduct. To me, therefore, it is as certain as any moral truth can be that to shut out religion from the public school, and thus to refuse to the teacher the employment ol! these sanctions, is to render the moral teaching weaK and ineffective and therefore to de- feat the very end which alone justifies the State in maintaining the school, the train- ing of good citizens, or at the very least, to make the attainment of that end far less complete than it might be. Even Huxley says "My liellef is that no human being and that no society composed of hu- man beings ever did or ever will come to much unless their conduct was governed and guided by the love of an ethical idea, viz., religion. Undoubtedly your gutter child may be converted by mere intellec- ual drill into the 'subtlest of all the beasts of the field,' but we know what has be- come of the original of that description and there is no need to increase the num- ber.* THE NKCK88ITY OF PELIGIOUS TRUTH to effective moral teaching would be ad- mitted by some, not by all, of the advo- cates of a purely secular system of public education. It would be more or less fully admitted by most of them who are pro- fessedly Christian men. Hut the eround is taken, that while the knowledge of re- ligious truth is desirable, even indispens- able, It is best, especially in the divided state of opinion on religious questions, that religious instruction should be com- municated by the parent and by the Church, and that the school should con- fine itself to instruction In the secular branches. This is plausible; it is no more. I believe the position I.0J be essentially un- sound. For, first, if moral teaching, en- forced by religious consideratious, is re- quisite In order to make good, law-abid- ing cit izens, that is, in order to promote the security and the well-being of society, the State ought to be able itself to furnish it, and ought to furnish it in the schools which it maintains. It is not denied for a moment, that there is a kind and amount of religious instruction which is more competent to the parent and to the Church,tl)at there are aspects of religious truth, as for example, the nature and the necessity of regeneration, the work of the Holy Spirit, with which perhaps these alone should be expected to deal, but the more general truths of religion, as the ex- istence, the character and the moral gov- ernment of God— such truths as, we have seen, add to the sanctions of virtue and strengthen the sense of duty— these it must be competent for the State to teach, otherwise it does not possess the means for its own preservation and for the pro- tection of its own well-being. Second, the restriction of the school to purely secular instruction with the relegation of religious instruction and even moral on its religious side, to the home and the Church glvea no security that the latter will be supplied at all in many cases. There are not a few parents, even in our favored land, who are too indifferent to impart moral and religious teaching to their children, not a few whose own character and habits ren- der them quite incapable of effectively doing 80. AnA while < he churches, Pro- teHtsnt and Catholic, are active, there are no doubt many childron and young p«r- sons not found in attendance on the Sab- bath schools with which they have dotted the surface of out- vast country. The scattered nature of the settlements renders attendance in these more ditllcutt, and. In any case, the churches have no authority to enforce it, if the youth are In- dlflerent or indisposed. Make public edu- cation strictly secular, and it can scarcely fall to happen, that in cases not a few the youth of the proviiif*) will get their arith- metic and grammar from the school, their MORALS FROM THE STREET CORNER or ihe saloon. That is not a result which any thoughtful and patriotic citizen can cont«»mpltUe with satisfaction. And lastly on this point, the division of in- struction into secular and sacred, with the relegation of the one to the public school and of the other to the home and the Church, which is the ideal of some who should know belter, proceeds upon a radi- cal misapprehension of the constitution of man's being, in which the intellectual and moral nature are inseparablv Intertwined, and in which both parts are constantly operative. It ignores the fact that man is a single and indivis- ible entity. It is possible to divide the branches of knowledge, but it is not pos- sible to divide the child to whom they are to be taught. Above all it Is not possible to keep the moral nature in suspense or inaction, while the intellectual is being deaJt with. This is the point on which the whole question before us turns. The opinion of one who has not taken it into account is really worth very little. The child can pass from one branch of secular Instruction to another. He can be taught arithmetic this hour, grammar that, and In learning the second he ceases to have anything to do with the first, but in learn- ing the one and the other he continues to be moral; he cannot cease to be this any more than he can cease to breathe and yet live. During the whole six or seven hours daily that he is withdrawn from under the eye of the parents, who are supposed to be primarily if not exclusively respons- ible for his moral andrellgious training (for the two in any effective sense must go to- gether) amid lessons and amid play his moral nature is operative, sometimes very actively operative, the principle and habits of a life time are being formed un- der the teacher's eye. Has the teacher any responsibility in the premises: Must he nor, hear the profane word in the play ground ? Must he not observe the false- hood ihat is spoken in the class-room ? Mast he look with indifference ou the dis- play of selfish feeling as he naiuht look upon a wart on a pupils hand ? Who will say 80 ? The very idea Is abhorrent to every right mind. But if he has responsi- bCity for the moral development of his pupil, then there must not be denied to him the most effective iustrii'Mcnt, if not for correcting improprieties of conduct, yet for evoking noble and virtuous action, religious truth, the truths of our common Christianity— in other A-ords, the edu- cation must not be absolutely secular. The welfare of the child and the welfare of the State alike forbid it. The consideration that recommends a purelj secular system of education to many notwithstanding its obvious draw- backs is, if I mistake not, the be- lief that only through its ado[)tion can the separate schools of the Roman Catholic church be abolished without even the show of of injustice to their sup- porters. The belief is in ray humble opin- ion a mistaken one; but even if it were not a mistaken one— even if it were a fact that separate schools could only he equit- ably got rid of through the entire secularl- Ration of our public school system, much as this end is to be desired, I COULD NOT CONSENT TO PURCHASE IT at such a cost. If the thing is wrong In principle, and likely to be pernicious In operation, is it necessary to say that a right minded man will feel that he has no liberty to employ it to accomplish any end, however desirable. Truth and right dis- dain the aid of such weapons. The Roman Catholic church errs, indeed, as most Pro- testants think, in claiming the absolute right to regulate and control the education of its youth. It is a claim which the State, If it would preserve its Independence, can- not afford to concede— cannot allow to be put in operation in schools supported by public funds. But that church has hold of a great truth when it asserts every- where and always that education should be religious, that instruction in the funda- mental principles of morality should go hand-in-hand with instruction in reading and arithmetic. As a Protestant, I am unwilling that It should be left to it to be the only witness for this important truth —important alike to the State and to the Church.and that the Protestant churches, through their abandonment of it, should be to that extent placed at a disadvantage in the conflict, whether with sceptical thought or with depraved conduct. In the interests of Protestantism, therefore, as well as of the public well-being,! would veniure to ask those whom my words can reach, or my opinions can Influence, to think twice before they give their consent to the banishment of the Bible and religi- ous exferr. il to / My ac(|uaintance with the teachers of the province 1. not suflldently large to enable me to answer this question. Some of them, I know, are among the b<:st, the most consistent aud earnest incml)ers of the several churches, and it others are of a different character— if the religious princiules or the habits of any of them are of sucn a kind as to make the conduct of public prayer by them, or even the public reading of the liible, an iucon* gurulty, somethin[j; like a farce, then in any case, whether there are religious exercises or not, they are obviously not flt persons to superintend the intellectual and moral training of the yoiith of this or of any other p.ovince. It is not the least important consider* ation connected with this question, though it is often one lost sight oi, that the mode of its settlement nmst have a very marked influence on the character ot the public school teachers as a class. Eliminate tho religious element entirely, make the relation of the teacher to his pupil, just such as that of the tradesman to nis apprentice, only that the one teaches reading, writing and arithmetic, the other a trade or handicraft and the general character of those In the profession will be lowered. There will still he thos. en- gaged in it of high moral and religious principle, but the prospect of exercising the profession and the actual exercise of it will no longer furnish the same incentive to the cultivation of such principle. Al* most the reverse. Religion will be a sort of disciualiflcation, or at least inconveni- ence, inasmuch as the teacher's mouth must be shut %vithin the school, not only on all which he holds most sacred, but on all which ho has found most heloful to his own goodness. Now the real attainment may fall below the standard, will often fall below it in this imperfect world. It will seldom rise above it. With the standard changed, with the position of the teacher lowered by the elimination of the religious element from his sphere, the character of the profession as a whole will be in time lowered also to the invar- iable injury of the youth and, therefore, of the country. THE 1 INAL SETTLEMENT OF THE QUESTION, which is now agitating the community, may he remote. It is possible it may be the work of years. Let us cherish the hope, that, when it is reached, it may be one which will not signalize the triumph of any Dolitical or ecclesiastical party, but one in which good men of all parties can take pride, and as the result of which the care and training of our youth shall be- come an object of greater solicitude to the people of the province, and the profession I T T T-1-r rtn ijw;:;; io of the teacher, accordltiKly rise In (i;enoral eHtiinatiou. Gentlemen of the college— whether In the theoioRical or in the arts course, be prepared to contribute your part in accomplishing such a settlement. Your experience in this institution may perhaps throw ■valuable light on the ques- tion to you, as it lias helped, if not to shape, yet to i^trengthen, my convictions on the subject. On the lienchea of this college there liave sat during the eix years of my connection with it, as there sit to- day, representatives of almost all the re- ligious denominations in the province, Episcopalian, Methodist, Baptist, Roman Catholic, and, of course, Presbyterian. The Bible has been read every morning and its teachings hava been enforced, as occasion oflferea or seemed to require. In addition you have been led in prayer by the members of the staff in tuj.'n. No one, so far as I know, has tAken offence. No one haM asked to be excused at- t^eudance at the religious exercises od con- bcientiouH grounds. Wo have all,I am sure, been helped by these exercises. The tone of the college life has been assuredly rais- ed thereby. Why tal^e away then alto- gether from the public school that which we have found at once so inoffensive and so useful. Let the politician give us some better answer than this, that the Roman (Jatholic church or her priests at least, de- mand that we shall either tolerate her sectarian schools or expel the Bible— their Bible as well as ours, from the public schools, and expel it from the public schools with what result 7 To make It pos- sible for them to recommend or even sanction the support of these schools by their people? Not at all; their avowed principles would forbid it; but to give them obviously and undeniably the god- less character which will go far;to justify their condemnation and rejection of them. on con- in sure, tie tone y rais- Q alto- ilch we md so > aome Roman ast, de- ,te her (—their public public ) it poa- >r even )0l8 by ivowed to give le god- juatify if them.