body with definite views and aims. A man must either believe that God exists or that He does not exist, or that His existence is unknowable, or possibly knowable, but to him unknown; and each one of these beliefs constitutes a dogma, and one pregnant with the most momentous consequences. Similarly, as regards a future life, a man must hold either that he has, or that he has not, grounds sufficient for acting in this life with a direct view to the next. One of these two beliefs is just as dogmatic as the other, both will be fruitful in effects; while to bring up children in silence as regards a future life, is equivalent to teaching them that the second belief is the true one. It is in this way that the cry for "unsectarian education" really means education of all and at the expense of all, in the tenets and dogmas of one inconsiderable body-viz. the Secularist sect. The many amongst our non-Catholic fellow-countrymen accept this cuckoo-cry from really good motives-viz., zeal for instruction, for social amelioration, and the diminution of vice and crime; but they fail to consider the true meaning of the phrase, which, if apprehended with accuracy, would deter multitudes from advocating it, as they would see how really fatal it is to the benevolent ends they have in view.

But in truth it is to be feared that too many members of the Secularist sect are as dishonest as they are narrow and bigoted. A large amount of instruction might, no doubt, well be given in a colourless way as regards religion by conscientious men who felt bound to abstain from proselytism, and so the evil, though considerable, would yet be negative. But, in fact, this scrupulous abstinence would be rare indeed. A conspicuous example and warning has been lately exhibited to us by one who in a public address at a noted College, in London, presumed to go out of his way to insult, we hope, the great majority of his hearers by the utterly uncalled for assertion that the word "soul" ought to be banished from the English language!

This negatively dogmatic spirit would surely show itself on the part of those narrow sectarians, the Secularists. They can be fair indeed in dealing with the question of rival Christian creeds, which they can afford to treat with perfect equality, since they contemplate them with the same indifference and ignorant contempt. But once let it be a question between irreligion and faith, and their partisanship and bigotry are plainly revealed. That in speaking thus we are not stating exclusively the views of Catholics, but merely drawing out what on examination must be evident to all unprejudiced minds, is well shown by some of the recent utterances of our periodical

literature. Thus Mr. Henry Holbeach, in the number of the "Contemporary Review" for last April, well observes:

The great majority of scientific men at the present time pursue a purely Positive method, and the primary assumptions of that method are fatal to all theological conceptions. It should not need much argument to show that they are, at lowest, fatal to any theological conceptions such as those upon which Christianity as a system is necessarily engrafted. Now a professor might preach an orthodox sermon every Sunday, subscribe Sir Roundell Palmer's pledge ex animo, and have Christian prayers before and after class, and yet, if he taught science after the manner of Büchner, he would be opposing not only Christianity, but Theism, with the whole stress of his mind, and his pupils would, at the best, turn out sceptics. . . . . Those, if any, who imagine that these characteristic features cannot and would not of necessity be introduced into the "secular" teaching of the young under State sanction-who think that an anti-theological animus cannot be made effective in the instruction given to children-are very much mistaken. . . . But besides all this, it is certain that the scientific teaching all over the world is so. . . . . Vain is it to reply, these are not questions brillantes. They are not, and they are; and if they are decided in favour of state-applied education on the secular basis, they simply introduce the thin edge of the wedge; and after the whips will come the scorpions; after the deeds in the green tree the deeds in the dry. And we should have, already, this state of things:Paid for in part by the religious classes, compulsory secular teaching, that is necessarily pervaded by a spirit which they regard as anti-religious.

These considerations naturally bring us to the second term of our phrase, which term is but too generally imperfectly apprehended even by us Catholics; but, of course, comprehended much more vaguely by most of those who are unhappily outside the Church.

It is therefore to our non-Catholic fellow-countrymen that we especially address the following remarks, though we confess to a hearty wish that we could feel more assurance than in fact we do feel, that it is superfluous to place such reflections before the eyes of Catholics.

The term we refer to is "Education." An ambiguity clings to it similar to that which we have seen to attend the adjective part of the popular phrase "unsectarian education," to the substantive part of which we now address ourselves.

Education means the cultivation of the whole man, body and soul, and the latter in its entirety-emotion and will as well as sense and intellect. No one can deny that religious dogmas have often a powerful effect for good or ill in stimulating the emotions and the will. No one therefore can deny that education without religious dogmas is necessarily defective and im

perfect though each may have his view as to what those dogmas should be.

As regards the intellect itself, no education can be regarded as truly effective which does not tend to stimulate its highest powers. But education mainly carried on by physical science, tends to an undue preponderance of the senses, that is to say, of the lowest faculties of the soul. The highest intellectual activity, philosophical science, cannot, of course, be directly taught in poor-schools. Nevertheless it is difficult to see why the highest results of philosophical science should not be imparted as well as the results of other sciences, e.g. astronomy.

No one would deprecate the imparting to poor children rational conceptions of the starry heavens on the ground that they cannot be taught to examine and calculate for themselves, so as to have an independent knowledge of astronomical laws and phenomena.

Now religion brings down to the popular apprehension and embodies the highest results of philosophy. Those, therefore, who would exclude it from our schools, would deprive the masses of such share as is open to them of the highest truth. A parallel folly would be to insist on each man working out for himself his own astronomy. As religion, however, has infinitely more to do with practical life than has astronomy, it is plain that to exclude it is an infinitely more momentous matter.

Thus the movement in favour of education, however excellently intended in the abstract, tends in the concrete to be perverted, with calamitous effect, through misapprehension of the true meaning of the word; and in this way aspirations worthy of all praise, and a zeal which cannot be too much commended, run the risk of producing effects the very opposite to those really aimed at by the great body of those so interested in the cause we are discussing.

All who have at heart the welfare of their country must desire the wide diffusion of a spirit of self-control and rational subordination, and the depression of the more selfish and brutal instincts of our nature.

Men are moved to action by a variety of motives; such as,1. Their admiration of what is virtuous. 2. Their admiration for what is beautiful. 3. Their admiration for what is true. 4. Their sympathy for some or all of their fellow-men 5. The desire of their own greatest good. 6. The hope of reward. 7. The fear of punishment, and 8. The gratification of their instincts and passions.

This being so, let us see what is likely to be the effect of a wide-spread belief that an absolutely perfect omnipresent, omnipotent and all holy God will distribute to every one, in a future

life, rewards and punishments exactly proportionate to every deed, word, and thought for which in this life their will is responsible-that will having the power of self-determination.

1. The admiration of virtue, goodness, and truth is intensified and rationalized as of the essence of the ALL-PERFECT-a reasonable object for our utmost love.

2. Sympathy for our fellows acquires a basis which else it lacks, and this belief can never be the reason of that sympathy resulting in an unjust action, as, under the governance of an all Holy God, we cannot really benefit a friend by any evil, though, in a sense, kindly-intentioned act.

3. The natural desire for our own greatest good is thus seen to coincide absolutely with the law of "right."

4. The hope of reward and fear of punishment are intensified and again directed to a coincidence with the same law of "right."

5. The gratification of our instincts and passions, in contravention of the law of right, is opposed by a consensus of motives, which are at once the highest and the most powerful.

On the other hand, if we are so unhappy as to disbelieve in God and a future life, we then have but a subjective support for our intuitions of truth, goodness, and beauty, and no certainty that we cannot benefit those we love by evil actions, if such appear desirable to us; moreover, we then have no motive for loving our neighbour, or forgiving our enemy, beyond what our spontaneous disposition prompts us to love or to forgive. In the same way, such disbelief deprives us of any certainty that "the right" is "necessarily our greatest happiness," rewards and punishments become confined to this world, and merely such as we may hope to obtain without real merit, or to evade. In the same way, again, we cease to have any motive to restrain our instincts and passions beyond the degree to which selfish considerations prompt us to restrain them.

Place two men, in all things equal, save that one accepts, and the other rejects the belief referred to. Let them be exposed to temptations. It is as certain as any mathematical truth that such beliefs will operate in promoting virtue, and in repressing vice in the one who accepts them.

What then must be the effect of education in which these supreme truths are ignored? What must be the effect of an "amelioration" of the condition of the masses which should, at first, give them increased physical comfort indeed, but which should tend to make such considerations as temporal welfare the all-important or primary one?

The objects aimed at by the present movement, "goodness" and "truth," would indeed fail to be attained; for "the increa }

welfare of the masses" cannot be promoted by anything which weakens their few remaining religious convictions; nor can truth be served by the removal of the only effectual barriers against lying. God is the one great keystone by which are upheld the multitude of complex arches which constitute the vast fabric of human life. That keystone removed, the abutting ends of the severed arcs may stand for a time in perilous and unstable equilibrium, but the oscillations of secular change will soon prostrate them in utter and irreparable ruin.

Physical philosophers who oppose Theism, often speak of the supreme importance of truth. It would be interesting to know on what ground they could support their conviction that truth is necessarily a good, without the belief that the great Cause of all things is at the same time the God of truth. Experience may show that truth has been generally beneficial, but it can never make its beneficence axiomatic, or render it impossible that in certain cases ignorance may not be bliss, and deceitfulness true wisdom.

Certainly, if the views of Mr. Herbert Spencer concerning freewill were true, the only hope of humanity would be that it should "believe a lie." For, as human moral progress has been effected under the belief in moral responsibility, it is unquestionable that were men universally convinced and able fully to realize that such responsibility is a delusion, and that their every thought is absolutely predetermined, a general paralysis of moral effort must necessarily ensuc.

As to the consequences of the wide acceptance of his own views, that writer admits:

Few, if any, are as yet fitted wholly to dispense with such [religious] conceptions as are current. The highest abstractions take so great a mental power to realize with any vividness, and are so inoperative upon conduct unless they are vividly realized, that their regulative effects must for a long period to come be appreciable on but a small minority. . Those who relinquish the faith in which they have been brought up, for this most abstract faith in which science and religion unite, may not uncommonly fail to act up to their convictions. Left to their organic morality, enforced only by general reasonings imperfectly wrought out and difficult to keep before the mind, their defects of nature will often come out more strongly than they would have done under their previous creed. ("First Principles," p. 117.)

These à priori teachings as to the necessary tendencies of religious convictions are supported by many à posteriori considerations. It is a widely-spread notion that ignorance and crime go hand in hand; but the most notorious and conspicuous criminals of late years have been far from uneducated men,Rush, Palmer, Pritchard, Traupman, occur to the mind at