EDUCATION IN VICTORIA.

Tuapeka Times, Volume V, Issue 252, 28 November 1872, Page 5

EDUCATION IN VICTORIA.

A country clergyman has struck the right key pn the education question. The Rev. T, X, M&eMiUan made a speech at Hamilton last" week i» which he put forfti some facts which are worth quoting. He Baid:— "l know a district of the Colony with some fifty schools in which there was no religious instruc ion-imparted. I believe that people are under a delusion if they suppose that religious instruction is given in our common schools. Even. in denominational schools the imparting of religious /instruction is the exception and not the rule. ■ Under these circumstances there should be no oppotition to the present measure. Nay, under these circumstances, it is becoming that-^denomi-national schools should no longer betauffer d to continue, seeing that they do not serve their purpose as denominational schools, and tibit they should now,; j&cgordingly, . be

merged in the generous school system of the country. Even supposing we had no religious instruction whatever in the public schools, I do not believe children would suffer in consequence. The arrangement by which religious instruction is imparted in the Sunday schools throughout the Colony is, lam glad to say very complete. T 1 ere is, I understand, at least one Sabbath school in every township throughout the country. In fact, wherever ten or twelve children can be got togt j th"r, there we find a Sabbath school. From the latest returns which I have received from the Kegistrar-Geneial, I find that there are 100,049 children attending the Sabbath schools of the Colony, which is a considerably larger number than that attending the common schools. The number of th se Sabbath schools is continually increasing, and I feel assured that, through these institutions, the religious instruction of the children in this country will be carefully attended to." Here is an organisation fer the express purpose of imparting religious instruction to the youth of the Colony — an organisation that is doing its work admirably ; why interfere with it? It is evident if the church and the clergy did their duty in this respect, they would never think of calling upon the secular teacher to help them.