THE EDUCATION QUESTION.

New Zealand Times, Volume XXXII, Issue 4958, 12 February 1877, Page 3

THE EDUCATION QUESTION.

TO THE’EDITOR OF THE NEW ZEALAND TIMES. ■ Sir, —As you have gone out of your way to censure two resolutions, passed by the Church of England Synod at Nelson, on the matter of religious education in State, schools,': I trust that you will allow me space for a few' remarks on your strictures. i You say, in . the first place, that “ the subject of general public education is one ; with which religious-bodies, as suclb,.,haye nothing to do.” L am constrained to give that, .proposition the flattest denial. It is a mere begging of the question, it rests on the assumption that general public education should be purely secular, that is, Godless., , But I reject such an assumption, with many of the leading minds of the day, and the vast majority of Christians throughout the world. “Religion,” says Lord Derby, “ is not ,a thing apart from education, but is interwoven with its >vhqle system, it is a principle wtich ,)contfols i : and ; regulates the whole mind.,and, happiness of. the people.”General public x education ought not to be purely secular ; and, if not, who,has;a;better right than religious bodies to see that it should not become the expense of violated religious liberty.— - Again, youl,Say, with an. implied sneer, that “ Olergymenjas a rule are slow to recognise the spirit of thelage, and slower still'to admit the teachings of: science.” : I'answer that clergymen are among the first to recognise the spirit of the age, though happily not the first, and, we trust, not even the last,' to follow it when it is bad ; especially when its .tendency is unmistakably c towards infidelity'and the destruction of religion. In such slowness there is no shame, but glory. Besides, I defy you to allege and prove a single instance of any certainly ascertained fact of science not being gladly accepted by clergymen ; for they know that truth'cannot be opposed to truth,,because the God of religion and the God of; science are one.

Further, you say that “ we have to. a large, extent got rid of the denominational system, with its attendant evils ;” and you have got a despotic secular system ’ with ; still 1 greater attendant evils, already appearing in the present, and reserving a fearful harvest of crime for the future. Read what is stated by competent authorities, American bnd European, : §bout the results of the 'secular' system- of education in the United you say, upon the good sense of to nip in the bud any proppstfi )fbr. its reyival?7 Parliament would take a,strange way to show its good sense ! We' were)always. led to think, that a fair Government would always wish to' favor efficient education ’wherever I it was. found ; would be opposed to harrow land unfair State monopoly ; would foster a healthy state of competition ; that, , provided any school, public or private, came up to the State standard of efficiency, it would' be entitled to encouragement, and to a grant in proportion to its success, and the consequent benefit it confers on the community - at large, by efforts,and without draining the public treasury. Now it appears,’according to you, bhat what the State really wants is, after all its Roasted spread of enlightenment; hot education, but ignorance—unless that education be Imparted in schools of its own, to. which large denomi : nations reasonably object,' and from) which they are debarred by sincere and well-grounded, conscientious motives. What the State wants —or rather these who call themselves . the State—ia a system which violates freedom of conscience. Vast numbers of good parents belonging to more than one denomination do,, and ever will, object to pay taxes for a system ofeducation which they cannot enjoy without a breach of, conscience. The attempt to force it upon them is State despotism and odious -tyranny. It is rank sectarianism—only here the sect happens to be the seculars—a mere fraction of the community. In another place you say that “ the question of public instruction is one of vast importance, before which all, others sink into utter insignificance.” Very true ; and consequently it is sovereignly important that it should not be wantonly handed over to the tender mercies of irreligion and unbelief. “ It is not the duty,” you say in your first proposition, “of the State to provide religious instruction for the people.”. But surely it is not the duty—nay it ia the crime—of the State to deprive the people of religious instruction ; which it practically does by enforcing the

purely secular system. What you add about giving religious instruction elsewhere than in the school is mere sophistry, or shallow talk, utterly opposed to daily experience. “ Popular education,” says Guizot —no mean thinker—“to be truly good and socially useful, must •be fundamentally religious.” The essential element of education—its pith and marrow, so to speak—is the religious element. By excluding it from the schoolroom, the State has committed a crying injustice to the rising generation, and one of the worst, if not the very worst, of crimes against society. It is not one portion of the “ triple man,” but the whole—the physical, intellectual, and moral being : the body, the mind, the head—that must be cultivated and “ brought up.” Neglect any one part of man’s nature, and you at once disturb the equilibrium of the whole, and produce' disorder; educate the body at the expense of the mind and the soul, and you will have only animated clay; educate the intelligence at the expense of the moral and religious feelings, and you but fearfully increase a man’s power to effect evil. You store the arsenal of his mind with weapons to sap alike the altar and the throne; to carry on a war of' extermination against every holy principle, ’ against the welfare and the very existence of society. Science without religion is more destructive than the sword in The hands of unprincipled men ; it will prove more of a demon than a god. . ■ There are rnauy other points ini your leader which I would fain touch upon, did space and ■ time permit—there is sq much of the sophistical and shallow, so; little of argument and sound reasoning. I will conclude by expressing my surprise : that, in an age which; boasts so loudly of its liberalism, memshould be found so narrow-minded and illiberal as to object to the fair and moderate demand of the Synod, that the government should “give grants in aid of denominational schools' which come up to the required standard in secular education.” The State has no right to claim more than that the youth of the country should reach the required standard in secular education. It can obtain this—and more cheaply than in any other way—through grants' to denominational schools. Why will it not do so, unless it pre--fers public ignorance to the highest education accompanied ,with religion ? Buy adulterated bread at’my shop, it says,'or starve.—T am, &c,, ,'•■■ .■ j • . Observer.