The Bible in Schools.

Gisborne Times, Volume VIII, Issue 505, 19 August 1902, Page 3

The Bible in Schools.

(To the Editor of the Times.)

Sm, —I would like to call tho attention of tho advocates of Bible-readiug in schools to a possible danger they are incurring—that is to say if tho teaching of Scripture has the effect on the formation of national character which is claimed for it. Any student of recent history will know that

the Boers of South Africa are most ardent and devoted students of tho Bible. Being tho conservative desoendamts of Calvanistic Dutchmen and French Hugonots, they could hardly bo otherwise. Their President, we aro told, constantly derived inspiration from it, and it was under its direction that he so wickedly declared war against tho British power. Also, as we havo boon so pcrsistontly taught for tho last threo years by the public proas, theso sarno Biblo-loving Boers wore false, treacherous, and cowardly, filthy in their mode of living, and brutal in thoir ignorance ; that they upheld slavory, and withhold freedom of thought ond action, and that therefore thoy wore most justly deprived of their lands, lives, and liberties by tho armies of Britain, who were so ably aided by the apostolic contingents which were, as wo havo been told by the Bishop of Wellington, sent to carry the Gospel of Christ into South Africa. It must be obvious to anyone that modern Imperialism can by no means bo mado to agree with tho twentieth chapter of Exodus, and that if this and other like chapters aro to be taught in our schools with any result that result must bo to destroy tho very idea of the aggressivo Imperialism which seoms to have become the real religion of tho British people. —I am, etc,, Secular.