RECREATIONS UNDER THE CRANIUM OF AN EDUCATIONALIST.

Globe, Volume II, Issue 125, 24 October 1874, Page 3

RECREATIONS UNDER THE CRANIUM OF AN EDUCATIONALIST.

To the Editor of the Globe. " The Hemp is Growing." Sir, —The campaign is over, the Councfl is prorogued, and now i' th' scabbard, the eword of eloquence rusts in unchargckl silence — Tempora mutant. There would have beeu tixmult and noise astounding enough over that same Council in other days. But the sword, dinted much in wordy warfare of this last session, sleeps undisturbed, unnoticed —no journal in New Zealand in its leader, no fuming correspondent in said journal's letter columns, heed the fact, that for the first time since the L'Dth May, 1660 (a day made holy by Act of Parliament, vide Anglican Book of Prayers), a British legislature, in Council assembled, heard with consent and applause the sentiment "The State has nothing to do with religion." For saying this same thing, Charles the blessed Martyr (as certain Bo >ks of Prayer calki him) in his dear, good, kind, loving way paid Dr Leighton as follows, viz, Charles had the reverend doctor twice publicly whipped, Charles cut his ears out, Charles slit the Doctor's nostrils up, Charles branded bis cheeks with a hot iron, and lastly Charles

the blessed Christen Martyr bored the reverend doctor's tongue through with a red hot poker. How kind it is of the Anglicans to thank the Almighty, in terms of the service for the 29th of May, for the Restoration of the son of the aforesaid Charles ; especially when we consider the great and meritorious services of this second Charles, in turning an English Palace into a cookery and gambling shop, in fact, into so elegant a Bordel, paid for at the expense of Louis XIV., and by much dirty treachery, of the English nation ; when we consider, too, that Charles' bastards by Louise de Querouaille, wear the highest honors of the British peerage at this very day so well, and are acknowledged to be the "Best Society." I say, Mr Editor, it does startle the careful student of history that the fundamental principle of all these actions, a principle that is one of the corner-stones of the English Constitution. —"that the Sovereign is ex officio Head of the Church," a principle emblazoned or embodied in the shape of F. D. on even the copper pennies ; it does startle one that such a corner-stone should be wrenched out of its place sub silontio. The State has nothing to do with religion. The Bible may be entirely turned out of State schools, at" the voice of an uneducated committee. In your columns I read the other day that the coffin of Charles the First was opened a shoi-t time since ; his head was found, excellently preserved, but loose from his body; the king's eyes melted away on exposure. Surely the innocent martyr's spirit must have felt "the coming event casting a shadow before it," and the said spirit must have moved the Resurrectionists to dig him up, in order that his eyes might perish, before they saw the awful fact in the Canterbury Provincial Council speeches that the State has nothing to do with religion. Poor Charles ! he lost his head because he thought the State must have to do with religion. The thin edge of the wedge is in, the hammer of time will drive it duly, England and Europe are that road going, the dead carcase of Church and State will be strung aloft on the tree of fate, to prove it was indeed said truly by Yours, &c, THE HEMP IS GROWING.