[TO THE EDITOR OF THE " SPEOTATOR.1 SIR,---I observe in
your leader on the Education question that the Dissenters are still flushed with " dictatorial arrogance," and afflicted with "the most wilful blindness." This is terrible. The worst symptom in their case is that they seem inclined to hurl back those epithets on Churchmen with tenfold force ; and con- sidering that they have had to wrest their rights from tho closed fist of power, and then are asked, even 'by a paper so generally impartial as the Spectator, to be grateful, there might seem some justification for the use of such language. I am glad to know that a sense of the justice of their cause makes them eschew phrases of doubtful value..- As for my letter, in your editorial note appended to it your words are, " We deny altogether that the State help given to the schools called denominational is in any sense given for the spread- ing of a religious creed." In your leader you refer to my letter in very " candid " terms, and ask in a tone which shows that you strongly affirm your own question :—" Is arithmetic all that a child learns at school ? Is not almost every lesson in history liable to be penetrated through and through with special religious faiths?" You have most effectually denied your denial ; for assuredly State funds given to support and keep alive denomina- tional schools must in some sense sustain the interpenetration of "special religious faiths " with the ordinary school teaching, or in other words, must in some sense be " given for the spreading of a religious creed." Hence the fact that it is not Pat who proclaims his sacred conscience to the world, but the priest ; not Hodge the labourer, but the parson.
You say, with an emphasis which I admire, that I know "per- fectly well "the scruples which parents have against sending their children to unsectarian schools. I reply with much emphasis that as far as any knowledge extends in reference to the parents con- templated in the Education Act, I know little of these scruples. I am deeply interested in schools on which the founders have volun- tarily spent thousands of pounds without seeking State aid in any form, and I find that the children of Catholics come on the dark winter evenings to be taught in a school avowedly Protestant, but will not come when the days draw out lest they should be seen by the priest. Experience seems to show that parents choose the cheap and good schools, and that they do not exercise their minds very much about denominational differences till these are suggested to them by interested parties.
As for the " few pence " which you dismiss in such a light and easy manner, if they are so few, why insist upon them? and if, as can be easily shown, enormous sums will come out of the rate- payers' pockets' in order to subsidize schools that already draw large grants from the taxes, why not treat this part of the question with the serious attention which its magnitude demands? With the Dissenters, however, it is no mere matter of pence or pounds, but of grave and far-reaching principles.
The Wesleyan postman is a new figure in the dramatis persontu of this controversy. He is heartily welcome. .1 can only say that if he were to use public time to distribute Wesleyan tracts in the letter-boxes of his boat, or if ho were to offer to carry free of charge Arminian pastorale with the morning letters, he would deserve to be instantly dismissed. It is because for the time being he sinks the Wesleyan in the postman that his salary can be paid out of public funds. When the denominational schools take off their sectarian livery, as our mutual friend the postman lays aside Wesley's theology for the nonce in order to do State work, your analogy will be complete. Apologizing for this long trespass on your space, I am, Sir, &c.,
[Mr. Pearson is warm, or ho would see that there was no inconsistency whatever between the two assertions of ours on which he comments, and that the analogy of the Wesleyan postman is
strictly accurate. The Wesleyan postman would certainly not be dismissed for gratuitously burdening himself with and distributing Wesleyan tracts to those who wished to receive them, unless it made him late on his beat, which means unless he neglected his official duties, a condition which does not apply to denominational teach- ing given, under the proper conditions, in denominational schools. But such distribution would be absolutely unrecognized by the Government. That is precisely the ease with the denominational grants. The people who receive them give something gratuitously for which they are not paid by the Government whenever they give religious teaching of any kind,—the evidence being that if they cease to give it they will receive just as much as before, and that the Government have, in fact, no longer any means whatever of knowing whether it is given at all, and do not, even care whether it is given at all, so long as the secular teaching is declared to be satisfactory.—ED. Spectator.]
Previous page
