TOPICS OF TALK.

Mount Ida Chronicle, Volume IV, Issue 206, 7 February 1873, Page 6

TOPICS OF TALK.

The Atbenamm Committee have got as far on with their work as to appoint a Library Committee, to .make enquiries with regard to all sources from which books can be procured. The Gfovernment subsidy of £2OO was granted to the institution on the returned value of the Union Church—£lßs, if we remember rightly—and a further balance of £ls from the manse fund. This leaves about £SO from the manse fund unsubsidised. On the same interpretation of public money which has been accepted as good in the matter of the building, this £SO may be also considered as subsidisable. The public meeting that met together to decide what should be done with the several estates represented by the manse fund and the Union Church, were unanimous in their wish that the ultimatum should be a Public Library or Athenseum. This sum, then, of £SO entitles the Committee to receive £l5O worth of books from the Government — -i.e., value in England. The Superintendent pressed this provision on the attention of the St. Bathans deputation. The Athenaeum Sub-Committee should _ pay very careful attention to this point before making any purchases on their own account, which, however well made, could hardly be equal to the reception of a subsidy of £8 to £l. It is to be hoped that, all tem'porary obstacles and delays having come to an end, very soon this institution will be opened, and that the Committee will show a proper regard to the comfort of the people who they wish to see taking advantage of the Athenaum. The Provincial papers, and probably many others published in the Colony, roll be sent, on proper application, free of charge. A few of the best' English magazines and papers should be added, as also one or two of the leading American papers. A liberally provided reading-room, at a fee like 10s., would be remunerative, quite independently of the subscriptions to the library.

We hear a great deal in these times about education of brain, but verv little about education of body.' No one can visit Dunedin without being struck with the numbers of young fellows who have been educated to a certain amount of understanding as to the few books of Csesar, a book or two of Euclid, a smattering of French, and a fevv barren facts as to the chemical composition of the human body, &c., ancUare growing quickly into men with no r.eally tangible ability to make their own living, as the old catechism says, t; in that state of life in which it has pleased God to call them." Go into any of the large workshops and count the number of apprentices. You will not have much trouble. " Apprentices don't pay," the owners may tell you ; " we are not settled enough,''' &c. There can be no doubt that this is not the prime reason of this continued increase of young; loaferdom. There is—and it is well it should be recognised as being so—a decided feeling prevalent amongst parents against putting their boys in the way uf acquiring honest trades. This is a fact that will make itself powerfully felt through the next twenty years; so much so, indeed, that it may very well be considered seriously whether, if compulsory mental education is to be put into force, her twin brother, technical education, should not be inseparably bound up under the same compulsion.

It is something novel in newspaper literature to publish sectarian sermons of any sort whatever. Certainly if Mr. Peebles' discourses were governed by orthodox principles they would never have been reported m the Diimedin papers. It is as old as Athens for towns containing inhabitants of what are called advanced views, to be always running after some new' thin*. Certainly, it is a fact that without the aid of the Press, no attention would have been attracted to Messrs. Peebles and Co. at all; at any rate, not enough to fill the Queen's Theatre, Dunedui on Sunday last to overflowing. • For ourselves, we should not like to obtain notoriety by on all occasions holdinoup to scorn and ridicule clergymen who., however mistaken they may be in j

some of their views, yet cannot be accused of any departure from a strict line of honest intention, and who. in many cases, have wholly sacrificed their own interests for the good of their congregations ; nor should we care to parade the utterances of such men as Peebles and Smith without, at the same time, a very strong denunciation of the hashed-up views they preach.

It is not difficult for most oi us to remember the effect on a boy's mind of the morning prayers and scripture reading as in practice at most schools. Speaking from experience, we should say the thought through the first few verses of the chapter is a congratulatory one as to having come in a little late without detection; or, perhaps, where this is a doubtful matter, a shivering anticipatory feeling of punishment in store, coincident with the last verse. Other thoughts, perhaps, predominate —as to whether a Latin or grammatical lesson badly learnt will pass muster, &c.; and on all faces an air of indifference ■ and inattention is the rule, only equalled by the rapid gabbled utterance of the reader. A habit of inattention is thus acquired, which is most dimcult to correct in later years, when willingly we wouldif possible, listen to able and well expressed sermons. This system, whiuh is so zealously fought over by some, is one that directly educates the young to at once place themselves in a listening attitude with the ears shut, which anybody who goes to church, and watches the dull eyes of a congregation, may see is never forgotten. ° in some schools, vve have heard, it is the custom to have a boy or girl whose duty it is to watch the other children during- prayers, and report any irregularity that may take place. It is not, of course, considered" necessary that this particular child should pray individually. Could a farce go. much farther ? Nothing could be more healthy for the engendering of true religious feeling than the doing away with this system at day schools. Make •it the direct duty of parents and pastors to see to the religious instruction of children, without giving them the excuse that it is taught at the school; and, if children do not learn what they should, at any rate they will not learn to adopt the cloak of religion without its vitality.