RELIGION AND EDUCATION.

Dominion, Volume 6, Issue 1836, 23 August 1913, Page 9

RELIGION AND EDUCATION.

SPEECH BY MB. BALFOUB.. Tho Archbishop of Canterbury rcc-cntly presided at: a. aotablo gathering representative of tho clergy and laity assembled at tho meeting of tho NationalSociety at Church House, Westminster. Tho Archbishop said that tho National Society had during its 100 years of lifo faced very many and varied educational' conditions, but through all, in goodi report and ill, it had been steadfast to its principles. They believed in a thw- 1 ougli popular education, and in educational advancei, and they beliovod that English education worthy of tho namo must have faith at its centre. That faith 6a> taught must bo definite ivi character, and must be taught by those who. oould give it genuinely and effectively. Mr. Balfour, who was recedved with' cheers, said great had been tho pecuniary: sacrifices inado by monibcrs of tlioOhurchl of England and great had been tho x>f-i forts they had mado in days when itiho State lagged behind in its d : iity in -tho matter of education. It had had to deal not merely with tho general question of education, but with tho need of supporting that religious training in which surely the Church of England was absolutely representative of the nation in thinking should bo an integral part in tho training of every child in tho land. (Cheers.) Tho peculiar difficulties of religious education liad arisen from tho fact that, although' strongly in favour of religious training, iu religious matters they were" not all at one. People , had got it into their lieadis that religion, however necessary to tho child, was a thing which should be taught at homo, and that the only duty of the State, or, at all oyenls, its fundamental duty was to pj'ovido what Was called secular training' in the Dublio schools. "That division," paid Mr. Balfour, "ibetwecn religious and secular training is fundamentally erroneous. It implies a dualism of objects which I am convinced that no thinking man, whatever his beliefs are, can really approve of. Tho training of tho children and tho young people of tho country is and must be an organic whole. You cannot cut it up into separate compartments, and a school is not, and ought not to be, a p'laco merely contrived to fill to tho brim some unfortunate ohild with what is called secular training. The objcct of education is training, and training is an advisable whole." , If, Mr. Balfour continued, tho whom system of voluntary schools wero to break down, who could doubt that a blow; of the most deadly kind would 'have been levelled and effectually levelled, at the educational ideal of not merely thoso ill', that haU but tllio groat body of publioi opinion throughout tho country, wliichii firmly believed that it was madnoss to, bring up tho irising generation without; some belief in tho worship of tho Unseen?: Nonb could doubt that tho offeot would ba disastrous. Of course, there wero difficulties, and yet lie thought they wero in some respects more hopefully situated!! for their solution than thoy w-ero when l ] ho first entered into publio life. To be-, gin with, he was convinced that thoso. who led the thought of the country were; far less enamoured of tiis secular ideal; than t'hey wero 30 years ago. Ho thought tliey wero in many cases seeing thoso rnat-j ters in a somewhat different parspoctivoj from ivhat they did when ho was a, youngij man, and there was a keener desiro anionjj: tho leaders of the various Churches to' ompliasiso as far as possible those g-rcat verities unon which all Christians wero agreed, and not to attach undue emphasis to those points on which diffcroaces still inovitably remained.