START MICROFILMED 1985 UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA - BERKELEY GENERAL LIBRARY BERKELEY, CA 94720 COOPERATIVE PRESERVATION MICROFILMING PROJECT THE RESEARCH LIBRARIES GROUP, INC. Funded by THE NATIONAL ENDOWMENT FOR THE HUMANITIES THE ANDREW W. MELLON FOUNDATION Reproductions may not be made without permission. CU-B SN 003836 THE PRINTING MASTER FROM WHICH THIS REPRODUCTION WAS MADE IS HELD BY THE MAIN LIBRARY UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA BERKELEY, CA 94720 FOR ADDITIONAL REPRODUCTION REQUEST MASTER NEGATIVE NUMBER 85- q 21 AUTHOR: Gleeson, William, 1822-1108, TITLE: The Commen Schoo! question. PLACE: San Franeseo DATE : ($83 VOLUME F 8s CALL & 3% MASTER 89° NO. NEG. NO. 92.7 F857 Gleeson, William, 1822-1903. «G34 The common school question. A discussion be- tween Rev. Vim. Gleeson ... and Frunk HM. Pixley +... San Francisco, P. J. Thomas, printer, 1883. 66 Pe 23cme 1. Public schools - California. 2. Church history - California - Catholic church. I. Pixley, Frank Morrison, 1824-1895. II. Title. 46711 UCLA Cowan Sister May 23, 1941. rr SO ii. § i juan SEE | k | | | Ea. amet FILMED AND PROCESSED BY LIBRARY PHOTOGRAPHIC SERVICE UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA BERKELEY, CA 94720 ps] REDUCTION RATIO | 8 scl DOCUMENT @ "SOURCE THE BANCROFT LIBRARY eee mT TL — tS uma eT i —— [lio & i ma: LS es =n Il |] E li42 Il 20 = = ls hee MICROCOPY RESOLUTION TEST CHART NATIONAL BUREAU OF STANDARDS-1963-A os EE 4 WAI ESAT FE CFO PE Ta pe STERLING 2 « 3 3 4 5 E 8 SL dl et Sit Lit oft 6 8 2 L| JneaIn idan Los Bw ot 8 8 dS hated | Retake of Preceding Frame — A DISCUSSION BETWEEN REV. WM. GLEESON (OF EAST OAKLAND) AND FRANK M. PIXLEY, EDITOR OF THE ARGONAUT. FOR SALE EVERY WEERE. Price, Ten Cents. SAN FRANCISCO : P. J. Tromas, Printer, 505 Cray STREET, 1883. Retake of Preceding Frame | BANCROFT LIBRARY, ; | ? > NS [IA 23194 \ Ei R30 a \\ 0 * THE COMMON SCHOOL QUESTION. —————————————————— NITY Se SNE OOS YA SE FSH 7 RENTON SSPE SAS MSE St Te A DISCUSSION BETWEEN REV. WM. GLEESON (OF EAST OAKLAND) AND FRANK M. PINLEY. EDITOR OF THE ARGONAUT. THOR SALE BEVERY VW ERR E. — ag @ em Price, Ten Cents. SAN FRANCISCO : P. J. Tooumas, Printer, 505 Cray STREET, 1883. THE COMMON SCHOOL QUESTION. L- A DISCUSSION BETWEEN REV. WM. GLEESON (OF EAST OAKLAND) AND FRANK M. PIXLEY EDITOR OF THE ARGONAUT. SAN FRANCISCO : P. J. Tromas, PrinTER, 505 CLAY STREET, 1883. PREFACE. THE publication of this pamphlet would seem to be neces- sitated by the importance of the matter involved, and be- cause it is possible, and even more than likely, that many persons who take a deep interest in the subject of education may not have read all the material which is now offered them for the first time. A brief history of the causes which led the Rev. Father Gleeson into the contest with the infidel editor of the Argon- aut may be summarized as follows: Mr. Pixley, in his open letter, challenged Father Gleeson to a discussion of the subject of the necessity of combining religious with secular education, and offered the use of the columns of the Argonaut as a tilting-ground for the tourna- ment. Father Gleeson accepted the challenge, and merely bargained for the privilege of a rejoinder,—the closing of the defense, as it might be called, —after Mr. Pixley had replied to his arguments. Instead, however, of attempting to answer the masterly, cogent and superb reasoning and pleadings of his reverend antagonist, Mr. Pixley, in the character of an Ingersollian Don Quixote, evaded every issue which he should have met, and ran full tilt against the windmills, which his own per- verse imagination had construed into giants, by launching into a tirade of abuse against the Catholic Church, of the doctrines and eternal loveliness of which he is as ignorant as is a Comanche Indian of the science of Trigonometry. Mr. Pixley having refused to publish Father Gleeson’s re- joinder in the forthcoming issue of his journal, it appeared, through the courtesy of Col. J. P. Jackson, in the columns of the Evening Post. In order to further show Mr. Pixley’s inconsistency, we append to this correspondence the full text of an editorial published in the 4rgonaut, June —, 1881. AN OPEN LETTER. San Francisco, February 10th, 1883. Reverenp Faraer Gregson, St. Anthony’s Church, Oakland— Dear Sir: The Argonaut would not willingly misrepresent the attitude taken by the Roman Catholic Church in California in reference to our public schools. It can understand that there may be reasons deemed satisfactory to the Church why in Rome, or in Catholic countries, it should be desirable to have Catholic children attend parochial schools only. The reasons why they should not attend our non-secular and free public schools, in which Catholic gentlemen and ladies are employed as teachers, ~ managed by an elective Board of School Directors, of whom a part, and not unfrequently a majority, are Romanists, and under superintendents, as in San Francisco and Oakland, who are quite friendly to the voting population connected with your church organization, is not so apparent. I will not repeat the arguments which I have so often made use of in the Argon- aut. You are familiar with them. My object in writing you this open note is to obtain from you that part of your sermon delivered at Oakland, on the fourth of February, at the dedica- gion of Saint Patrick’s Church, which touched upon our public school system. This sermon of yours, or so much of it as treats upon this question, I will accept as the orthodox views of the Roman Catholic Church for this State, as it was delivered in the presence of his grace Archbishop Alemany, and has, therefore, the sanction of his approval, which is the highest ecclesiastical authority upon this side of our continent. I ask you to send me this portion of your sermon that I may print it in the Argon- aut. In the report of your sermon you are accredited with hav- ing quoted from the Council of Baltimore, which declared that the faith and morals of Catholic children were jeopardized by attending public schools. You are also accredited with a quota- tion from the late Pope Pius IX., on the pernicious influence of the public school; also a quotation from Bishop England, show- ing that, out of five millions of Catholic children in-America, three millions seven hundred and fifty thousand are lost to the faith by reason of public schools. You are accredited with say- ing that there is no virtue in public schools. After having asked the question, you are said to have answered it in this wise: ¢¢ There is none, for no religion or morals are taught there.” I shall be glad to print in full the text, by you quoted, from the Baltimore Council, the Pope, and Bishop England, and your comments thereon, as having the sanction of Archbishop Ale- many. I very frankly declare to you the purpose for which I desire this portion of your sermon. It is, that I may make its Lo] admissions the text for future writings and arguments, in which, of course, I shall undertake to prove that the Church is wrong in being the enemy of the present non-sectarian school system. I have been constantly assailed by most excellent people—good Romanists—who declare that I misrepresent the Church; that the Church is not the enemy but the friend of our school system. With your admission, I shall be spared going over this ground. ‘When once it is admitted that the Roman Church in America is the uncompromising enemy of the public schools, that there is room for but one of them upon this continent, that only one can survive, and that the suppression and annihilation of the Ameri- can free school system ts the political object and spiritual policy of the Roman Church, then the Argonaut may be permitted to take its side of the controversy without its premises being challenged. _ Classic story is full of fabled incidents where one of the con- tending parties is wrapped in clouds, or made invisible by some friendly divinity. That always seemed to me to be but doubtful valor that fought behind an impenetrable disguise, or from within an invulnerable armor. I have no respect for the valor of any part of Achilles but his heel; so in contending with your most venerable Church, I shall be glad if I can find by your admissions some common starting-point for the discussion of this school question. Your Pope, your cardinals and councils, your archbishops and bishops, your common preachers, and many of your journalists, openly admit your undisguised hostility to our free schools. You declare them godless, ruinous to the morals of your youth, destructive to the virtue of our children, leading to immorality, vicious practices and crime. You declare the superiority of your parochial schools, and claim that the result of a church education by priests and nuns is better than one from non-sectarian schools. I am willing to discuss this ques- tion; I think it a practical one, and would do it courteously. But first give me the text of your sermon delivered at the dedica- tion of Saint Patrick’s, so that I may print it and adhere to it, and that your apologists and defenders may not be able to dodge it. To be frank with you, Father Gleeson, I find the dialecti- cians of your Church just the least bit slippery; like one grasp- ing an eel from the fisherman’s basket, a stout grasp upon the fattest one sometimes leaves only a glutinous and slimy sensation to the hand. I should like to nail one of the most wrigglesome of all disputed facts to the counter, and hence, most respectfully, and for no other purpose than fair and courteous argument, do 1 ask you to send to the Argonaut, for publication, what you did say in reference to the free public school system of America. I am, very respectfully, your obedient servant, Tre EpiTorR OF THE ARGONAUT. P. S.—If you do not reply to this I shall assume that your sermon is correctly reported by the Oakland daily Evening Trib- une of February 5th, and shall feel at liberty to comment upon the utterances therein attributed to you. FATHER GLEESON'S REPLY. Eprror AracoNaur: I accept with pleasure the offer you made me in your issue of the seventeenth, inviting me to a friendly discussion of the Common School question. I have already assigned to you, in- my private note, why I could not have attended to this matter at an earlier moment. I quite agree with you that this is a practical subject; it is even, in my opinion, a most important subject, for on the kind of training that the youth of the country receive depends, in a great measure, if not entirely, the future character of this republic. In view of this serious consideration, it is easy to see the tone and temper 1n which a subject of this nature should be approached. There should be an entire absence of passion and prejudice from our reasoning, while a courteous, good-natured, thoughtful spirit should prevail through all our arguments. In a word, we should divest ourselves, as far as possible, of all preconceived notions of the merits or demerits of the system—not allowing party prejudice, sectarian bias, or religious antipathy to influence our minds. Briefly, we should approach the subject in a generous, whole-souled, liberal frame of mind. If we do this—and there is no good reason why we should not, for both of us are now only seeking a common good—something may be done toward helping others to a right understanding of this much-vexed question. And, indeed, sir, from the courteous, gentlemanly tone of your open letter to me, I have every confidence that on your part the discussion will not be marred by any undue expres- sion of feeling; while, as far as I am concerned, if I can answer for myself, I am sure the readers of the Argonaut will not have anything to complain of in this respect. The great difficulty that we Catholics have hitherto labored under has been the unwillingness of our opponents to listen to us on this subject. We have never been able to obtain an im- partial hearing before the bar of public opinion. Our adversar- ies made up their minds that we were wrong—that we had no case; and so, whenever we tried to get a hearing, the people stopped their ears and turned away in displeasure from our pleadings. In fact, strange as it may appear, we have been treated in this matter of the education of our children somewhat in the same fashion as the early Christians were by the pagan Roman authorities. Whenever the first followers of the Re- deemer tried to get a hearing, and endeavored to explain them- selves, they were rebuked by those in authority, and told that their position was untenable. In like manner our case has been prejudged. Men would not look into it calmly and thoughtfully. Po atm em ————— arpa Arete ——— ATA Si 2 RTE sr ma ee Sn PERN [8] They had an abiding confidence in their own judgment that we were wrong, that we had no argument to put forth to sustain our position, and that we should not be heard. In a word, as I have said, mea shut their ears against us, repeating thereby in a wider form the acts of the angry Jewish multitude in the case of Stephen: “And they crying out with a loud voice, stopped their ears, and with one accord ran violently on him.” I hail it, then, with pleasure, as a sign of better times and an altered state of feeling, when a Catholic clergyman is invited to plead his case in the columns of an influential Prostestant journal; for, had you not invited me, I would never have thought of addressing you on this snbject. In saying, as I have above, that we would not be permitted a hearing before the bar of public opinion on this all-important subject, I do not hereby mean to affirm or to insinuate that the Protestant people of this country have been knowingly and will- fully doing us a wrong. We are ready to believe that the country has been laboring under a serious misapprehension in our regard, and that, if we have not been heard, it was owing to the fact that our opponents were satisfied that our position was untenable and our claims inadmissible. But, sir, history fur- nishes numerous examples of the best-meaning men having been grossly deceived under similar circumstances. Indeed, it is a noteworthy fact, and one I am sure you will readily acknowl- edge, that some of the best and purest of mortals and the greatest and most powerful of nations have not unfrequently labored under delusions of this character, and been uncon- sciously guilty of the grossest injustice towards others. As far as individuals are concerned, the case of the Apostle of the Gentiles, before his conversion, when hastening to Damascus, breathing out, as the divine volume assures us, threatenings and slaughter against the disciples of the Lord, may be adduced as an instance. Who will be ready to say that this fiery zealot, this man of blood and slaughter, was not honest in his convie- tions—that he was not impressed with the justice of his cause? Must we not suppose that he thought that the course he was pursuing was most pleasing to God? Nor was it until the scales fell from his eyes that he saw the full measure of the wrong he was doing to the meek followers of the Redeemer. The course adopted by the younger Pliny, when governor of Pontus and Bythinia, as related by himself in his letter to the Roman Emperor Trajan, is another illustration of this. So con- vinced was he that the Christians under his jurisdiction merited punishment that he says: ¢¢ Without examuring whether what they avowed was criminal, I had not the smallest doubt that at least their obstinacy and headstrongness merited punishment.” Then we know how the prejudices and passions of the most popular writers and historians of that period prevented them from seeing the errors under which they were laboring and the wrong they were inflicting on others. "Who, for instance, is not [9] familiar with the sentiment of Tacitus in his estimation of the Christians in his day? Does he not say that they were branded with deserved infamy ? ¢¢ With this view he (Nero) inflicted the most exquisite tortures on those who, under the vulgar appella- tion of Christians, were already branded with deserved infamy.” And in another place the same eminent writer says: ‘The guilt of the Christians deserved indeed the most exemplary pun- ishment.”” In like manner, the historian Suetonius calls the Christians of that time ‘‘ a sect of men who embraced a criminal superstition.” And as it has been with individuals, so has it also been with States and Empires in this respect. The pagan Roman Empire for three hundred years thought that it was right in attempting to stamp out of existence the noblest form of religious belief that had ever been professed by man on earth. It regarded the followers of the Redeemer as the most senseless of mortals. It could not, or would not, understand why a mere handful of men, on the ground of what they denominated conscientious convie- tions, should separate themselves from the citizens in general, and stubbornly refuse a willing and hearty compliance with all that was ordained bythe laws. Was not Czesar the Pontifex Maxi- mus, and did it not devolve upon him to prescribe for the com- munity the duties to be fullfilled? What was there in the burn- ing of a spoonful of incense before the shrine of an idol? Were not the tutelary deities—the Lares and the Penates—the real benefactors of the country? Did not the empire grow up, ex- pand, and become great under their protecting care? And why under such circumstances should a mere vulgar sect, a ‘‘ genus hominum superstitionis novo ac malefico,” as Suetonius calls them, dare to stand aloof and refuse to join with their fellow men, the community in general, inprocessionsin honor of these beneficent gods? Did not the refusal on their part prove them to be dan- gerous citizens, unlayal subjects, dark conspirators, imbued with the most nefarious and reprehensible principles? This was the reasoning-—this the attitude of the ablest and most enlightened men of that pagan period; and, as.you know, it required no less than three hundred years to disabuse them of these erroneous ideas and the great insufferable wrong they were perpetrating against a large number of virtuous citizens Nor has it been merely in pagan times that such things have happened. I regret to be obliged to confess that like instances of delusions are to be met with in the history of Christendom. Take, for instance, the case of Great Britain and Ireland. Is it not to be held, would it not be unfair to affirm that the gov-. erning powers of England, during what is called the penal times, were unconscious of the wrong they were perpetrating against millions of the people in the enactment and enforce- ment of those terrible laws of which evesy Englishman is to-day heartily ashamed—laws of which that eminent and fair-minded man, Johnson, affirmed that as a sanguinary code it outstripped [19] - in atrocity the Ten Persecutions inflicted on the early Christians by pagan Rome ”—Ilaws which that great statesman Edmund Burke described as ‘“ a machine of wise and elaborate contriv- ance, as well fitted for the oppression, impoverishment, and deg- radation of the people, and the debasement in them of human i as ever proceeded from the perverted ingenuity of man ”’ I think, then, that on this point I may fairly assume that we are fully in accord—namely, that men and states may be, and have been, unconsciously guilty of serious wrong toward others; and that the only security against anything of this nature occur- ring or being continued, when a large and influential body of the community proclaim that they are being injured and their rights trampled under foot, is by giving them a hearing, and listening calmly, attentively, and dispassionately to all they have to say in support of their assertions. Any other course would be like that of the judge who had formed his opinion before taking his seat on the bench. It would be to ferestall justice, to close the lips of counsel, to put prejudice in the place cf reason, and to deprive the individual of that principle of natural justice which requires that a man be heard before being condemned. 1 have deemed it necessary to make the foregoing explanations in order to prepare the minds of your readers for what I am about to say, and to enable them to properly appreciate the anomalous position we occupy to the common schools of this country, which, as we claim, and I think I will be able to make it apparent, are an infringement of our rights, natural and con- stitutional, and an intolerable grievance to which we are neces- sitated to submit. But, as in all similar instances where wrong was unconsciously done,time has rectified the same, so, aiso, in this case I have an abiding faith that this country will yet see the injustice it is inflicting on us in the matter of the forced edu- cation of our children, and will, ‘when it comes to recognize this, admit us to a full participation of our natural and inherent rights. I shall now proceed to the consideration of the matter under discussion and I hope to be able to convince the readers of the Argonaut that much misapprehension exists in the mind of the Protestant community regarding the relations of the Catholics of the country toward this system of national education; that our attitude in its regard is not an unnatural and unreasonable one; that it is a vielation of our most sacred rights and privi- leges; that in it we have a real and substantial grievance; and, in fine, that it is in its nature and workings contrary to that spirit of freedom and liberty guaranteed to us all by the Con- stitution of the country. But, first, it may be proper to state the position of the Catholic Church in regard to the system of public school education as established by law in this country. The Catholic Church has ever held and taught that to be a defective, dangerous system of education, both for the individual and the state, from which the moral, religious elements is wholly []) eliminated. She holds that as man is a complex being, com- posed of body and soul, and having eternal as well as temporal in- terests he should be so trained from his earliest infancy that while being fitted for the attainment of the one he may not be made to lose sight of the other. In short, she gives to education its full, complete and entire signification—that is, a perfect discipline and training of all the mental and moral faculties. And that this can not be attained except by a constant and careful inculcation of the necessary principles, reason and experience sufficiently demon- strate. This is exactly the position of the Catholic Church— this the light in which she regards education. And wherever a contrary system has prevailed, she has uniformly raised her voice against it in her loudest and most emphatic tones, knowing full well from experience the evils that necessarily result to the the individual, to the family, to society and government, from a development of the mental to the exclusion of the moral facul- ties. It is notf then, against the present system of education as an American system that we object, but against every system that would leave the youthful mind a blank in the matter of religions knowledge, and our entire solicitude in this regard is founded on that expression of our Divine Master, ‘“ What doth it profit a man to gain the whole world and suffer the loss of his own soul ?”’ We also maintain, and with the best of reasons, as I shall show further on, that, without the moral element in the educa- tion of the young, you can not have even a satisfactory guarantee for the stability of the nation; but for the present I shall confine myself to the religious view of the question as regards man’s spiritual nature. We maintain, then, that religious instruction, coupled with secular principles of learning, constitute the very soul and essence of education, and that, without such an union, education would be as if ‘“ the play of ‘ Hamlet’ were given with the part of the Prince of Denmark left out.” To this you may possibly answer by saying that religious instruction is in- deed necessary in forming the Christian man, and that the only difficulty is as to where it should be imparted. The church and not the school, you may contend, is the proper place for the inculeation of moral principles. Are you serious in this? Do you believe that a child that is exposed during six days of the week to the adverse influence of a purely secular training, who for six days in the week is not permitted to hear the name of God or a syllable about morality, will grow up a strong and robust member of any Christian denomination? To assert that would be to trifle with our reason and insult our judgment. It would be to affirm what actual experience flatly contradicts by the most undeniable statistics, as I shall presently show. But the State, you will say, is the judge in this matter; it has a right, and it is its duty, to see that the children of the country are properly educated according to their station in life, for upon the enlightenment and education of the people depend the great- | ANS ya a art [12] vess and existence of the nation. Are not the public schools of the country the very palladium of our liberties? Who does not know that public school education is necessary for our republi- can form of Grovernment—that it is the very life and soul of the nation? Is it not an admitted axiom that our Government, more than any other, depends upon .the intelligence of the peo- ple? Did not the framers of our Constitution firmly believe that a republican form of Government could not endure without the enlightenment of the people? The State, therefore, must exert itself to promote and encourage popular educaiion among the masses, and surely there is no more effectual way of accomp- lishing this than by the present system of public instruction, where all are at liberty to drink with freedom and without cost at the fountain of learning. This is the popular phraseology, the transparent sophistry, the vapid declamation, that has been repeated wsque ad nauseam for the last couple of generations and upward in this country. It is in reality the popular cry by which the ear of the multitude is gained, or rather it is the hobby-horse on which ambitious aspirants for office and enterprising editors have been riding the people to power and to wealth for the last half a century or more. For only let a candidate for honors shout lustily in the ears of his auditors a few such meaningless platitudes as those I have mentioned, coupling them, of course, with the veracious asser- tion that the Catholic Church is the deadly and uncompromising enemy of our popular institutions, and he will infallibly succeed in obtaining the suffrages of his dupes. The people never stop nor care to inquire whether or not the Catholic Church is really hostile to the enlightenment of the masses. They take it as granted that such is the case because they hear it from their popular leaders —men of enlightenment and intelligence in whom they have every confidence. But how great would not be their surprise if assured that the Catholic Church is as eager, and more so, than the government of the country, for the spread of education and the enlightenment of the people—the only differ- ence between the Church and the State on this matter being that the former demands more than the latter in the training of youth. We Catholics, then, freely admit that it is the right and duty of the State to see that the children of the country are educated in the necessary branches of learning, but at the same time we emphatically deny that it is the right or mission of the State to assume to itself the office of teacher. It has no right to turn pedagogue, and, armed by the power of the law, to invade the sacred precincts of the family circle, and, dragging thence the little ones from the parental hearths, to say to their natural guar- dians: ‘I will take charge of these children and instruct them in the manner I please.” To do so is to be guilty of the greatest - moral injustice—it is to play the tyrant in the most tyrannical fashion; for, bear in mind, sir, the State has no children, never had any, and never will have any. The children of the country [13 | are belonging to the people of the nation, and not to the gov- erning members of the community—that is, not to the bare ma- jority of the populace. And now, for a moment, let us here inquire what is the State, and why does it assume this sovereign authority in the matter of the education of the youth. The State, as I apprehend it, is merely the executive of the people. It originated in every in- stance in that natural desire of man for the attainment of certain goods, such as peace, protection, etc., which could not be so readily obtained by individuals or limited corporations. In fact, the State is nothing but the people united to accomplish what as individuals or companies they would be unable to do. Its duty, then, is siinply to administer justice, to protect rights, to guard interests, and, in a word, to hold the balance evenly between all parties. This is the Christian idea of the State. The old pagan idea was different, Coesar was then the State; the people be- longed to him, they were his creatures, their lives were in his hands, and he did with them pretty mueh as he pleased—in fact, as you-know, they were ‘“ butchered to make a Ronan holiday.” The same undue assumption of authority was affected in later times by some Christian monarchs. It was embodied in that arrogant expression of a certain King of France, who, on an occasion, said to one of his subjects: ¢ L’étal c’est mot /”—I am the State! The autocrat of Russia is the State in his do- minions, but, thank God, this is not the condition of affairs here. With us the State is the guardian of the rights and liberties of the people, and not their tyrannical master. Hence, whenever the State proposes to do anything which would be an infringement of the natural, inherent rights of the subject, such as the forcing of conscience or the standing between the parent and the child, the State in that case is plainly outstripping the limits of its authority and rendering itself guilty of an atrocious crime. It is assuming to itself duties which the Almighty im- poses on others; it is bringing back again into the world and giving effect to the old feudal system, which made the subjects the slaves and dependents of the masters. In short, it is utter- ing the language of the tyrant: ‘Sic volo, sic jubeo.” Be- tween that and the establishment of a national form of faith, to which we would be all bound to conform, there is in reality only one step; for if the State claims the children of the country, there is no good reason why it should not claim the parents also. In principle and at bottom, then, this school system is tyran- nical, oppressive, and unjust. No pagan Roman Emperor, no Russian autocrat, no oriental despot, ever acted with more ab- solute authority and disregard for the feelings and wishes of the subject than the State is acting in this particular in our regard. The system is also irreligious and sectarian. Persons get angry and annoyed with us when we tell them it is pagan and infidel; but if you eliminate all that is Christian, what, I would ask, can the residue be but pagan and infidel? Doubtless [14] TI will be told that there is a difference between secularism and paganism. This is merely to throw dust in our eyes. Every tree is judged by its fruit, and if the fruit in this case be infidel, or, what is the same, an abandonment of the practice of all Christian duties, the inference is plain that the system is infidel. You can’t have an effect without a cause, and if the effect in the case of the public school teaching is infidelity, the logical conse- quence is that the cause is and must be infidel. But where is the evidence, you will say, to show that the result of the com- mon school teaching is this? On this point, I think, in all fair- ness, that the testimony of six millions of people—that is, the declaration of the entire Catholic population of this country— ought to be considered tolerably satisfactory. As faras our own children are concerned, and I presume that we may fairly infer that it is the same with all others, this is what we have to deplore. For those brought up in the public schools, in ninety cases out of a hundred, cease to be practical members of our church, drift rapidly away into indifferentism, and, if they hold anything at all, end by becoming disciples of such men as Buckner, Spencer, or Augustus Comte. Butif you will not accept Catholic testimony on this point, if you will rule it out of court as being ex parte evidence, I am sure you will at least accept Protestant testi- mony. And I won't go beyond your own city for admissions that infidelity and atheism are rampant in the community, and that the only remedy is the inculcation of moral principles. In 1877, the Rev. Doctor Jewell, deploring the social condition of affairs in San Francisco, was reported in the Call to have said: ¢« The evils which have been experienced in San Francisco, which break out on occasions of agitation, are caused by local faults, atheism, godlessness of the community, and disrespect for authority.” On the same day the Rev. Mr. Peck, of St. Luke's Episcopal Church, said: ‘‘The popular atheism of the day, proclaimed with so much boldness and applause in the public assemblies, is bearing its bitter fruits. There is only one remedy for all this: Remember the Lord thy God.” Again, Doctor Patterson, of the First Presbyterian Church, declared, according to the report of his sermon of the same date, that ‘the fault of the wild, com- munistic infidel feeling which is spreading through the com- munity, is the want of proper education.” And how terrible, and savage, and lawless this spirit of atheism and infidelity which is lurking in the community is, you may judge from the words of that very able and distinguished divine, Doctor Stebbins: ‘‘ And beneath the fair amenities of law, manners, opinion and faith, there lurks a spirit wild and savage and brutal as the Turk before he left his native place in the northern mountains and encamped beside the cities of the south. There are thousands in this city, not yet a great city in modern times, who are Thugs in every fibre of their frame as truly as the robber that threw his javelin or strangled the unwary traveler on the banks of the Ganges.” I will quote only one more—namely, Doctor Platt, of Grace qs] Church. On the 21st of October, 1877, Doctor Platt said in his sermon: ‘‘As Protestants we should Christianize our education; because, first, if our secular schools were instituted exclusively to build up Protestantism they were a great blunder, for they are breaking it down.” Mark that! * Secular schools,” continued the Doctor, ¢‘ in the interest of Protestantism are a fatal blun- Secularism saves nothing—not even itself As to Protestantism, it is only a question of time when our present sys- tem will render it a dead factor. The issue is by these schools narrowing the contest down to Romanism on the one hand and infidelity on the other As American citizens we should Christ- ianize our education when religion fails all fails.” And further on in the same discourse he said: ‘The danger to civil liberty is not from ecclesiasticism, but from those degraded dis- ciples of secularism—those Bible-hating, Sabbath-breaking, God- deriding cormorants of office, who make a trade of politics and live upon what they can plunder of the public taxes.” It is not merely the leading liberal ministers of the day who are opening their eyes to this terrible evil, but the leading jour- nalists and the leading statesman of the time are also sharing their ideas. Not to go beyond San Francisco, one of the fore- most editors, Mr. Loring Pickering, commenting on one of Doc- tor Platt’s discourses on education, said: ‘° With many of the sentiments he uttered the Cull is in full sympathy. The neces- sity of combining-moral education with intellectual education is so apparent that discussion on this point would be superfluous.” In other words, Mr. Pickering acknowledges this principle that we Catholics are contending for. Again, in the Call of the 5th of August, 1877, I read these words: The Call’s usual Sunday letter from Boston stated that a large number of public men had come to the conclusion that the public school system of that city was a failure.” To this I will add the testimony of Mr. Richard Grant White, as given in an article in the North American Review for December, 1880, and entitled ‘‘ The Public School Failure:” ¢ There is probably not oneof those various social contrivances, political engines, or modes of common action called institutions, which are regarded as characteristic of the United States, if not peculiar to them, in which the people of this country have placed more confidence or felt greater pride than its public school system. There is not one of them so unworthy of either confi- dence or pride; not one which has failed so completely to accom- plish the end for which it was established.” And in another place he says: ‘Crime and vice have increased almost pari passu with the development of the public school system, which, instead of lifting the masses, has given us in their place a non- descript and hybrid class.” So you can see that we Catholics are not the only persons who think that the present system of education is an imperfect one, and ought to be ameliorated. You may, however, say that after all this is only very partial evidence, and hardly satisfactory. Very i tN i 7 A EL gn Se pa Ee ee [16] well, then; I'll give you more and more still, until I think you will acknowledge that it is the opinion of some of the most thoughtful men in the Protestant Church that there is little or no hope for the country without combining religious with secular education. In 1870 or 1871—I think it was the latter date— there assembled at Oberlin, Ohio, thirty presidents of American colleges to attend the annual meeting of the Central College As- sociation. All these gentlemen were Protestants, and men of fine culture and ability. Professor Finney, a gentleman well and favorably known in the Eastern States, addressed the meet- ing, and laid it down as an incontrovertible truth that religion must be taught in connection with education. At the close of the meeting the following resolutions were adopted: First.—‘¢ That we note with pleasure the evidences of increas- ing interest in the literary, scientific, and especially the religious education of the youth of our land, believing, as we do, that education not based upon Christian truth is of questionable value.” Second.—‘“ That we commend these interests to the sympa- thies, prayers, and liberality of Christian people and congre- gations, that our schools may be increasingly useful as fountains, not only of sound instruction, but also of earnest, elevated piety.” Again, as far back as 1848, when infiedelity was not as ram- pant as it is to-day, the General Presbyterian Assembly of America resolved upon recommending to their congregations the necessity of erecting primary and other schools, where the teach- ing and duties of religion should be carried on in connection with tbe usual branches of secular learning. To the foregoing I will add only another testimony. It is that which was de- livered at the Convention of the Southern Baptists, held in Marion, Alabama, on the 12th of April, 1881, when it was affirmed ‘that the tendency of the common school system was to foster infidelity,” and that ¢‘ the only hope is Christian educa- tion in our own schools.” I could give you almost numberless other instances of like disapproval on the part of Protestant gentlemen of education divorced from religion; but, sir, I think you will acknowledge from the instances I have adduced that Catholics are not the only persons in the community who object to purely secular education apart from religious instruction. I sincerely hope that the day may not be far distant when Catholie and Protes- tant clergymen will stand on the same platform and fight in the the same lines when battling for the accomplishment of this so much needed educational reform. And unless some such action as this is taken, and taken very soon, too, I most confidently pre- dict that in a couple of generations the grass will be growing before most of the church doors of America, and Bob Inger- soll’s prophesy will be fulfilled—viz., that the public schools will be the future cathedrals of our nation. I have said above that the system of education as established by law in this country is not only irreligious, but sectarian, and [17] even the very worst of sectarianism at that. This may, and doubtless will, sound startling in your ears; for your uniform boast ever has been that the foremost schools of this country have been founded upon and are sustained by the very contrary principle. Let us see for a moment how far this may be true. What is sectarianism ? As I apprehend it, it is an adherence to a particular religious denomination. This, I believe, is the definition generally given of it by lexicographers. Hence, any individual, any government or authority that in the case of con- flicting religious claims would lean more to one party than an- other, that would favor one sect more than another, may be most truly said to be sectarian. And now, sir, this is precisely what the government of this country is doing in the case of the public school system of education. Instead of holding the balance evenly between all. parties, it is, though it- self Christian, leaning to the side of infidelity; it is supporting the infidel sect, for by excluding God and religion from the schools, it is throwing all its weight on the side of those who deny the existence of a personal God. You may tell me that infidelity is not a sect; indeed, sir, it is just as much a sect as the thousand and one that under one denomination or another exist among Protestants. There never was a man that hadn’t some belief. ‘My religion,” said a certain individual, ‘‘is to have no religion ” There is no such a thing as pure negation, absolute unbelief. Even those who are styled the most ad- vanced thinkers of our times have their peculiar tenets and forms of belief. You know, sir, for you are reputed to be a well- read man, what such men as Augustus Comte, Herbert Spencer, and Mr. Mill hold and teach. I don’t put in this category Hux- ley, Tyndall and Wallace, for they have not yet got quite as far as their confreres. Well, is it not true that though Comte flatly denies the existence of any personal God as the creator and pre- server of the universe, he yet belives in the ‘correlation of forces”? Has he not written a catechism of Positive Religion, and even a Positivist Calendar? Does not Mr. Mill, though re- jecting Comte’s God, or collective humanity, maintain that the proper symbol of the ‘‘ grand étre’ is woman, or the sexe aimante 2 Does not Mr. Spencer offer up his orisons at the altar of the great unknown, while good-natured Mr. Huxley would be .satisfied with adoration of the silent kind? Ah, sir, it has been well said that ‘“ God gave us religion, but the devil gave us theology.” So you see that infidelity has its doctrines and its dogmas, and is accordingly as much a sect as any other that exists among Christians. And now, is it fair, is it just, for the State to lend its aid and support to this individual sect in pre- ference to all others? Therefore, I say that the public school system of this country is sectarian in its character and working. And now, looking at this matter in a general sense, is it not a very anomalous position for a Christian State to assume when it undertakes to educate the children of the country in any but a [18] Christian manner? It can not be said that the State-is not Christian, for it is. Of its Christian character it can never di- vest itself. It is Christian in its constitution, Christian in its laws, Christian in its traditions, Christian in its civilization. And yet this Christian State refuses to teach the children of the country in a Christian manner. It proposes to teach virtue with- out religion, morality without dogma. This, sir, is essaylng the impossible, it is attempting what can not be done. As well might one attempt to erect an edifice without a foundation, or to hope for an effect without a cause. We don’t expect a crop without a sowing; neither should we expect virtue without the inculcation of moral principles. Even in a purely temporal sense, apart entirely from man’s spirit. ual interests, be assured of it that this system is a dangerous one and will inevitably sponer or later make itself unfavorably felt. It will undermine the very foundations of the government of the country. There is abundant evidence in the history of the past to show that governments that rested on mere material civiliza- ‘tion had not the proper foundation. ‘What nations in their day were greater than ancient Egypt, Greece or Rome ? Where was civilization carried to a higher point of perfection than at Thebes, Heliopolis, Athens, and Rome? And does not the traveler to- day, when visiting the scenes of these ancient seats of art, see around him on all sides nothing but ruins of former greatness ? Why did they fall ? The plain answer is, their civilization was material, and, being only material, it went down before the rude blows of time. And so shall it be with every nation that builds on the same insecure foundation. ARthorough Christian education is the only security for the stability of the nation. This is the basis on which all the peace, happi- ness and prosperity of the individual, the family and the country must rest. The evil education of a child is one of the greatest afflictions that could be visited on a parent. The story told of Dionysius the Tyrant will serve as an illustration of this. The philosopher Dion, it appears, had given that monarch mortal offense by some observation or other, and the king was determined to be revenged on him. He could have slain the philosopher, but he did worse. He took his son and entrusted him to an infidel teacher; and when the youth had learned his lesson, and had become proficient in impiety, he sent him back to his father, that he might be a source of sorrow and grief to the old man all the days of his life. The moral is this, that bad children are the greatest affliction a parent or a nation can suffer. Don’t say that this reasoning is beside the question; don’t say that to exclude religion from the schools is not to exclude it from the country; for, as « the child is the father of the man, i you exclude it from the former, you will inevitably exclude it from the latter. If you exclude it from the schools, you exclude it from society, from the laws and from the country. Are you prepared to do this? You will not surely say so; for the most L 19 ] eminent and enlightened statesmen would be against you. Let me give you a few instances. Guizot, than whom few could be regarded as better authority on such matters, when Minister of Public Instruction in France, under Louis Philippe, makes this remarkable admission: ¢¢ In order to make popular instruction truly good and socially useful, it must be fundamentally religious.” Mark that. I do not simply mean,” continues the same emi- nent authority, ¢* that religious instruction should hold its place in popular education, and that the practice of religion should enter into it; for a nation is not religiously educated by such petty mechanical devices. It is necessary that national educa- tion [now, sir, note this] should be given amd received in the midst of a religious atmosphere, and that religious impressions and religious observances should penetrate into all its parts.” Now, could any priest, bishop, or Pope speak stronger than that in favor of religious combined with secular instruction ? And that eminent Protestant Minister of Public Instruction was only echoing what another equally eminent and enlightened minister of instruction had affirmed before him. I refer to Por- tallis, who acted in the same capacity under the first Napoleon. s¢There is no instruction [says this gentleman] without educa- tion, and no proper education without morality and dogma. We must take religion as the basis of education; and if we compare what the instruction of thé present day is with what it ought to be, we can not help deploring the lot which awaits and threatens the present and future generations.” Need I quote any more ? But perhaps it may be useful to add hereto the words of the Father of our Country. In his farewell address the first Presi- dent of the United States, the immortal Washington, addressed the following never-to-be forgotten words to the people of this country: “Of all the dispositions and habits which lead to political prosperity, religion and morality are indispensable sup- ports. In vain would that man claim the tribute of patriotism who should labor to subvert these great pillars of human happi- ness—these firmest props of the duties of men and citizens.” And again he says: ‘Beware of the man who attempts to incul- cate morality without religion.” And yet, in the face of that, we have men calling themselves patriots, true American citizens, lovers of their country’s independence, laboring with all their might and main to support a system of secular education, which in its character and tendencies is most admirably fitted for pull- ing down these props of human happiness. 1 think I have now sufficiently shown that we Catholics have abundant reason for objecting to the present school system. Do not reply to this by saying, as you did in your open letter of invitation to me, that we seek the suppression and annihilation of the present school system. We do nothing of the kind, and when you wrote those words I am sure you did not understand our position, for I feel satisfied that you are too upright and honorable a man to knowingly and willfully do us a wrong. All [20] we want, all we ask, is that we be not forced into accepting & system which we know, and which we have the most abundant evidence at hand to prove, is undermining and destroying the the faith of millions of our children. A few years ago, & Methodist minister openly boasted that in twelve years we had lost, through the agency of the public school, as many as one million nine hundred thousand children! And a certain Doctor Clark, of Albany, asserted that multitudes had yielded to the in- fluence of these institutions. In fact, there are statistics to show that we have lost in this way the enormous number of eighteen millions of souls. To be consistent and logical, the advocates of the system should freely and without hesitation ac- knowledge that the tendencies and workings of the institution are unquestionably destructive of Catholicism. Then we could readily understand our opponents, and our position would be properly defined. But to tell us, in the face of the facts that are before us, that the public school system is not injurious to our interests, and ought to.be approved by our Church, is to in- sult our reason and to treat us as fools. Are we reasonable, then, in asking and expecting a change ? Put yourself in our place, and see how you would feel and act. If, instead of being in the majority, you Protestants were here in the minority, and we inaugurated a system of education which, from experience, was shown to be destructive of the faith of your children, how, I ask, would you regard such a system ? Would you consider it just, fair or honorable? Would you ap- prove it and appreciate it? Would you not rather condemn it, stigmatize it, and denounce it as tyrannical and oppressive in the highest degree. And now may I not here aptly adduce the old and vulgar truism, ‘ what is sauce for the goose ought to be sauce for the gander.” If every ome would act on the princi- ple, ‘“‘do unto others as you would be done by,” there would be less oppression, less bigotry, less intolerance in the world. It is a great pity that men don’t try to understand each other better. We Catholics are not the persons that some would make us, and that many eminent Protestant writers represent us. I have often been astonished while perusing the writings of such men, to see the amount of misapprehension and misconception of our po- sition and doctrines that exists even among the most intelligent and enlightened of the Protestant community. I have encountered these things in the works of such writers as Scott, Macaulay, Disraeli, Carlyle, and others. In fact, such is the cloud of preju- dice that hangs before the eyes and envelops the mind of our non- Catholic brethren in our regard, that they see us and our doctrines in a wholly distorted light. They take us and our belief for some- thing that we are not and that it is not. Take, for instance, at random, any dozen educated Protestant gentlemen of San Fran- cisco, and ask them what the following simple doctrinal ques- tions mean, and, in all probability, they will give you such an- swers as these: What, is papal infallibility ? What are indul- [21] gences? The first means that the Pope can’t sin or can’t lie; and the second, of course, implies a license to sin, or, at least a pardon of sin. Now, you know that that is not correct—that itis not what Catholics hold on these points. It is indeed a pity that men don’t try to dnderstand one another a little better, and to rid themselves of that odious mental delusion called prejudice But what is strange, too, in this respect, is that the very men who think, and say, and write these hard, bitter, unkind and cut- ting things of us are oftentimes, in their social capacity, among the kindest, gentlest, and most indulgent of persons—men who vould not for the world do anyone knowingly and willfully a wrong. How are we to account for this state of affairs? Surely the world ought to have outgrown this mental weakness. But vet there is the humiliating fact that it has not; and in view thereof, we can readily understand how the first Christians got the credit of being the worshipers of the ass’s heads, of devour- ing infants, and yielding themselves to the most lascivious inter- course in their religious assemblies. Ah! life is too short to be quarreling about creeds. We should all try to be liberal- minded, whole-souled and unprejudiced toward others. I have lived among Turks Jews, Mohammedans and Idolators, and I trankly declare that their forms of faith have never embittered my mind; for as long as a man does not interfere with my re- ligious convictions, he may, if he please, believe that the moon is made of green cheese. We Catholics are not the persons that some would make us. Our holy religion forbids us to bear animosity or hatred to any one. We always try to have kindly and generous feelings for all, and if we declaim against the present system of education which is forced on us, it is because our faith is being injured. As far as the Protestant community is concerned, we have no ob- jection in life that it should retain the common school system if it think well of it. Our objeet is not to pull down, nor destroy, por annihilate, as we get credit for trying to do. The antagonism, then, between us and this system is not of that nature of which you spoke when you said, in your open letter of invitation to me, that there is room in America for only one or other of these sys- tems—namely, Catholicism or the public school system. This is 5 mistake, a great mistake; there is quite room enough for both without any clashing of interiest within the limits of the Re- ublic. Only let us withdraw; do not compel us to send our children there any longer, and you may be assured of it that you will never hear a word from any among us against the sys- tem. We will let time prove to you what its character is, and we are ready to abide by its decision. You may say: We don’t force you; you are free to send your children or not, just as you please. Are you really serious? You don’t, indeed, force us to this at the point of the bayonet or the mouth of the cannon, but you do force us in a hardly less effectual manner, by taking ad- vantage of our poverty and refusing to give us any other system —. ARETE SE [22] of instruction, so that we have to choose between leaving our children utterly ignorant or accepting what you offer us. In fact, you act toward us as a Turkish official acted toward a community of Israelites on a certain occasion, For a reason best known to himself, but certainly not from any liberal motive, he made the children of Abraham purchase a certain quantity of pork. In vain they protested that they had no use for it, that it was not suitable to them, and that their religion forbade them to use it; but purchase it they had to. Now, sir, the public schools of this country are the chunks of swines’ flesh that the authorities throw us Catholics. = Vainly do we protest that we do not want this nauseous stuff, that it does not agree with us, and that it makes us sick at heart. But the only reply we get is that curt and surly one: ¢ Take it or go without; that’s all you'll get.” Itis certainly hard to see how this is consistent with the spirit of lib- erty and freedom that is supposed to exist in this country. The present system of common school education, then, as es- tablished in this land, is plainly contrary to the spirit of the constitution of our nation; for does not that document say that ¢ no human authority can control or interfere with the rights of conscience”? And if it be not an interference with the rights of conscience to compel six or more millions of people to pay for and maintain a system of education which they loudly pro- claim and prove to be hostile and dangerous to the faith and morals of their children, I don’t know what interference with conscience can mean. But you may say to me: If the system be what you say, how can you conscientiously avail yourselves of it at all ?—are you not in doing so traitors to your own consciences? Not exactly. There are many things that circumstances will justify, which, without them, would be condemnatory. A man, for instance, is justified in risking his life to save another, whereas to expose himself to such peril without any such cause would be exceed- ingly criminal. If we send our little ones to the public schools, this only proves in what estimation we hold education when we are ready even to expose their eternal salvation for its attain- ment. Would, indeed, that all liberal and enlightened Protes- tants would take the same calm and impartial view of this mat- ter that Judge Taft, of Ohio, did some years ago, when, treating. on the affair, he said: ‘‘ These Catholics (paying their propor- tion of the taxes) are constrained every year, on conscientious grounds, to yield to others their right to one-third of the school money, a sum averaging at the present time about two hundred. thousand dollars every year. That is to say, these people are punished every year for believing as they do, to the extent of two hundred thousand dollars; and to that extent those of us who send our children to these excellent common schools become beneficiaries of the Catholic money. What a shame for Protes- tants to have their children educated by money robbed from Catholies |” [28] Judge Taft was speaking only of his own State when he said that the Catholics were punished to the extent of two hun- dred thousand dollars a year. How, heavy then, is not the pun- ishment with which the Catholics of the whole country are visited annually ! Just for a moment look at the workings of this system in my individual case. There is in this parish of Brook- lyn only a very small Catholic population; we number hardly one in five of the Protestants of all denominations. All told, we are not more than about eight hundred persons, young and old; and I need hardly tell you that we are not among the richest of the community. Well, sir, how do we stand in respect to the public schools? This is our position: believing as we do, that we could not conscientiously avail ourselves of the system of which I speak, we vigorously went to work and erected educa- tional establishments for our boys and girls, at the cost of fifteen thousand dollars, which, for us, was a considerable amount, but trifling in comparison to the drain upon us to support these schools. We have, under instruction, over two hundred child- dren, and thereby save the State about four thousand dollars an- nually, for if these children were not with us they would have to be educated by the State. Now, sir, do we get any credit for this? Far from it. We have to pay our taxes as usual for the support of these schools that we don’t use. Not only that, but we are taxed for our own schools, that are saving so much to the State. Now, I put it to you as an honest, honorable man, is that a fair and equitable system? Well, but you may say: What can we do to accommodate you? You surely don’t expect us to go and build separate estab- lishments for you Catholics. You don’t expect us to pull down these institutions which we have raised at such cost, and in which we have such faith. Most assuredly this is not our demand nor de- sire; we are not so unreasonable. We are ready to meet you more than half way in the settlement of this important matter. We will go this far; we will put up the schools we need, and will furnish them in a manner to suit you at our own expense. The teachers we require we will take from those you have already appointed, in every instance where they are of our own faith; and if ‘we can not find the necessary number in this way, we will present to your boards candidates for the position of teacher, so that you may have an assurance that the instructors in our schools have the necessary qualifications. Furthermore, we will willingly allow your inspectors to examine our pupils to see that they are preficient in their studies. Ina word, we will give you all that you are getting now, and a great deal more—that is, moral training, together with secular instruction. And for all this we only ask what you are paying under the present system. Again, I ask, what is there unfair in that? Does not that system prevail in England, Ireland and Scotland? Does it not prevail in Upper and Lower Canada? Does it not even prevail in a part of this country—namely, in Richmond County, Georgia? { k i { | | { mc rr foc A [24] And if it has been found to work admirably in those places, why not here ? A great deal more might be said on this very imp rtant sub- ject; itis by no means exhausted; but, for the present, I feel I would be trespassing too much on your space were I to continue any longer. N In conclusion, I hope that you will weigh carefully and atten- tively the arguments that I have advanced, and that you will not allow either passion or prejudice to interfere with you in the reply that you are expected to give. Bear in mind that my position is this: First, that the govern- ment of the country has no right to step in between the parent and child, and to assume, in regard to the latter, the obligations which the Almighty imposed on the former. Secondly, that we Catholics are losing immensely by this system, and, conse- quently, that it is entirely unfair to force us to accept it, in- asmuch as it is striking at the root of our church. And, thirdly. do not forget that my position maintains that without the incul- cation of religion in the schools you can not have a people thor- oughly Christian. W. GLEESON, "Rector of St. Anthony’s Church, Brooklyn. [From the Argonaut, March 10, 1883.] ¢«« Semper eadem” is the proud and not unfounded boast of the Church of Rome. It has never given its assent to any de- feat that it has met from any other hand than that of science. To some of the unquestioned demonstrations of science it has yielded—-yielded to the inevitable; and never then except when to surrender a part enabled the Church to save the remainder. There are many reasons why Father Gleeson and the Argonaut should not engage in an unprofitable discussion over our com- mon schools: First, because it is unprofitable. Father Gleeson will never be convinced that the Roman Catholic Church is not of infinitely more importance to the world and humanity, to America and its institutions, to California and its citizens, to the moral and spiritual well-being of our boys and girls, and to their temporal interests in this world, and their eternal welfare in the world to come, than the free common schools, or any schools, or any education other than religious. The Argonaut does not be- lieve that the Roman Catholic Church has accomplished as much good as evil in its past history. The world would have been much better off if it had never existed, and humanity would have been spared all sorts of misfortunes, persecutions and tyrannies. The human race would have escaped the horrors of many wars, the stripes of many rods, and the heat of many [25] fagots; it would have heard less clanking of chains binding men in dungeons, less groans of bursting hearts, less outery from torture of inquisitorial rack, boot or thumb-screw. Science would-have been more advanced, and there would be less of in- tolerance, bigotry and ignorance in the world to-day, if the Apostolic Roman Church had never been organized. In com- parison with this ancient and illustrious Church, with its con- spicuous achievements of more than ten centuries of recognized -existence, its pompuous ceremonials,, and its arrogant preten- sions of divine origin, we contrast our American system of free schools and of liberal education, where no creed finds place and no priest finds opportunity, as much the grander and more beneficent institution of the two. If either is from God and planted by a divine intelligence, it is the school. If there is in all this world an enduring rock, it is the corer-stome of the free ~ school-house. If there is a hell, and hell has gates, and if these bronze - barriers of the damned ever come forth for conflict, the only thing in this world that they will not preval against is the non-sectarian school-house, where are laid, broad and deep, the foundations of a learning so liberal that it may dare to doubt, inquire, investigate, and act. The Argonaut has no sort of confidence that it can bring * Father Gleeson around to think in his way, and the Argonaut is quite sure it will never be convinced that the Roman Church is of divine authority; that its head is the vicegerent of God; that he carries the keys; that he is, by virtue of his spiritual office, the superior of all in civil authority; that he is infallible or impeccable; that he has any authority in America, or any right to exercise any authority or influence in the making or execution of our laws; that he or his subordinates in spiritual employment have any right to interfere in our schools, or that any of the doctrines or dogmas of the Church of Rome have any right to be taught therein. This controvery is the more unprofit- able because it has been fought over and over again in this country, in nearly all of the States, and the church has always been defeated. The real point at issue is to secure such a dis- tribution of school moneys as will secure Catholic schools, with Catholic teachers, where Catholic pupils can be taught the Catholic religion, or, as Father Gleeson expresses it, “We will go this far: we will put up the schools we need and will furnish them; the teachers we requir: ws will take from those you have already ap- pointed. * * We will allow your directors to examine our pupils to see that they are proficient in their studies. In a word, we will give you all that you are getting now and a great deal more—that is, moral training, together with secular instruction. And for all this we only ask what you are paying under the present system.’’ Native of New York, we know more about this controversy there ‘than elsewhere. From the first planting of the germ of the free-school system in New York, and before the century mm rr BAM Sat S [26] began, the religious congregations demanded a division of the public money in aid of their Church schools. In New York, the Baptists, and not the Catholics, were the first to make this claim. About the year 1825, the Catholics had become a political power in New York, when the authority of that Church asserted its claim to a division of school money. In 1840, this controversy culminated in a splendid debate before the Common Council of the City of New York, in which Bishop Hughes, Theodore Sedgwick, Hiram Ketchum, Doctor Bond, the Reverend John Knox, Nathan Bangs, and the Reverend Gardiner Spring took part. It was carried into politics, and involved Governor Seward and the Honorable John C. Spencer, Secretary of State for the United States, in its discussion. It figured in the State Legislature, and became the subject of animated public discus- sion. Petitions, memorials, remonstrances, and protests were thick as leaves. Catholics and Protestants help public meet- ings—the one to express disapprobation, and the other to uphold the public-school system. The question was carried to the Legislature, and in the City of New York the Catholics ran a legislative ticket. In Carroll Hall, Bishop Hughes made a re- markable speech in answer to Hiram Ketchum, which occupied three evenings in delivery. This subject was then ably, elo- quently and exhaustively considered. It was settled—and, for the United States of America, definitely settled—till the time shall come, if ever, when the Roman Catholic Church in America has the power and the opportunity to unsettle all that American republicans hold sacred and inviolate. The Argonaut concedes that, while it is the privilege of the Church to teach religion and morality, dogmas and doctrines, it is the duty of the State to instruct in those branches of educa- tion which fit boys and girls to become bread-getters in the struggle of life, and properly to discharge the responsible duties of citizenship. The school does not interfere with the church nor come between the parent and the priest. The school de- mands but six hours out of twenty four, five days out of seven, it has but ten months out of twelve, and it averages less than seven years out of the allotted seventy. It gives the parent and spiritual guide all the rest of the time from the cradle to the grave. We do not admit that, by the exclusion of sectarian teaching from the schools, they necessarily become godless. ‘« Experience,” says Father Gleeson, ‘‘ has demonstrated the evils resulting from a development of the mental to the exclu- sion of the moral faculties.” The statement is at best a plati- tude, and demands proof. It is not applicable to our educa- tional system, because it does develop the moral faculties; and, if this assertion means that the kind of education provided by the Catholic Church, and in Catholic countries, by Catholic mas- ters, priests, or nuns, is better in results than a non-sectarian [27] education under the American system, we deny it. We declare that the world is better, and its morals purer; that it enjoys more freedom of conscience and greater liberty of intellectual devolopment; that it has attained a higher scientific position; that it has more bread to eat and clothes to wear; that less men are persecuted for conscience sake, less are killed in battle or have become the slaves of social and political conditions; that there is less governmental tyranny, less of religious intolerance, less of ignorance and bigotry, and less of crime and poverty, since the civilized nations have begun to emancipate themselves from the teachings of the Roman Catholic Church. Nor do we admit that the young men aud women who graduate at our public schools are either godless or immoral. We claim that, in these respects, and in the possession of all the qualities which go to the make-up of intelligent and honorable men, and culti-, vated and virtuous women, they are equal, if not superior, to the men and women who, in childhood, have been educated in sectarian schools, or who, in youth, have been molded by the hand of priest or nun. We see no philosophy in turning boys over to the manipulation of childless priests, or putting girls under the control of women to whom the womanly. instinct of love and maternity is forbidden as a sin. We declare that in America there are no Catholic schools at all comparable with our free-school system; that Jesuit priest and Christian brother, hooded nun and lay sister, are not, in general culture, in practical sense, in honorable deportment, in virtuous lives, in moral excellence, in imitative example, or healthful influence, in any respect superior to the gentlemen and ladies who teach in our public schools. With indignant contempt we deny the vile slander so often and so covertly insinuated from Roman pulpit and Catholic journal, that the young women of our public schools, our female seminaries, and our institutions of Protes- tant or liberal learning, are not equal in virtue and dignity of womanly pride, to the graduates of parochial or convent schools. It is not from the dormitory or play-ground of monastery or nunnery that the most honorable of men or the most exemplary of women are produced. It is from the free, common and non- sectarian schools of America that the best American citizens, both men and women, come. We state this proposition from our reading of history, our observation in foreign travel, and the familiar statistics of our criminal and eleemosynary institutions. That the Bible, which is claimed to be the fountain-head and source of all moral instruction, is not to-day read in our schools, is chargeable to the efforts of the Roman clergy who caused it to be excluded. No one opposed its use more earnestly than Bishop Hughes of New York. We need not discuss the ques- tion why it was excluded. We further deny that our school system does not teach morality. Our children are taught the underlying principles of justice and charity, and that it is wrong to lie, or steal, or bear false testimony. It teaches the laws of [28] chastity, temperance, and moderation in sensual indulgence, through the laws of health, nature and physiology. It teaches honor to men and virtue to women. It instructs in the highest code of morals when it teaches the rights of personal liberty, the freedom of conscience, the protection of property, the in- violability of domicile, obedience to the law, respect for courts and magistrates, and the duties of citizenship. The criminal and civil codes are lessons in morals. The discipline of the school room is a moral lesson which teaches obligation to uphold and maintain order in society, and that it is the duty of all to obey the law. This is the only kind of education that the State is interested in, and the only kind it feels authorized to provide. We believe that to grant the demand of the Church for partici- pation in our system of education, would be to broaden the . foundation of an ecclesiastical establishment which is now en- : gaged in educating men and women to unrepublican principles, fo beliefs which do not recognize the law, the magistrates, and the courts of the country as its highest authority; and which would, in time, bring about a connection between Church and State which would have for its ultimate object the subversion of the State and the supremacy of the Church, and would at- tempt to bring the Government in subordination to the ecclesias- tical power of the Church of Rome. We believe that a division of our school moneys, and their appropriation to parochial or other ecclesiastical, denominational, or sectarian schools, would destroy the unity, efficiency and usefulness of our present most admirable system, and set up a class of schools which would tend to encourage race and class distinctions, and raise a crop of petty and contentious theological institutions, with narrow-mind- ‘ed bigots and pedants for teachers. If Bible-reading is so indis- pensable to moral teaching, and morality is impossible without religious convictions, it may be well to remind our opponent in this discussion that the Bible was excluded from the schools at the instance of his Church, and that its presence could not be endured, even if read without note or comment. Bible-reading, except under interpretation of priest or canonical teacher, is not, we believe, generally encouraged; nor as a rule is the sacred volume regarded as safe in the hands of youth. In fact, the Church of Rome objects to the use in our public schools of very many of the historical narratives of the last ten centuries, because on every page of impartial history is recorded—some- times in blood—the crimes which it has perpetrated to secure for itself political and dynastic power. Its history is a history of aggressions, violence, criminal deplomacy, and unscrupulous use and abuse of power, in assertion of the political supremacy of its spiritual head. The papal power has arrogated to itself not only the right to govern men’s conscience and to demand unqualified submission to its opinions, but to exact from all countries and all men an obedience to the Pope in all matters of civil and governmental power. These claims the American [29] people reject as arrogant and presumptuous. They resent their assertion, and, so long as the Roman Church puts them forth, our Government and its people must be the enemy of the Church. These questions of civil power and of the exercise of civil authority are so interwoven and entangled with religious and. spiritual questions, that it is impossible to teach the one with- out the other. It would be impossible for the clerical mind to keep them apart. When spiritual and civil problems get mixed —Rome being the, teacher—the spiritual comes to the top. Whenever the American school-house shall be turned over to the Roman Catholic teacher, under the direction of the Roman Catholic Church, American youth will be taught the civil su- premacy of a spiritual power as the first and fundamental axiom of government. Holding these views, the Reverend Father Gleeson will hardly expect the Argonaut to sympathize with him, because the Church of Rome has in America, and within half a century, lost eigh- teen millions of its precious souls who have wandered from the faith, and now are sailing down the great, broad educational current, which, taking its source in the American school-house, finds its way to the greatjocean of liberal thought, whose restless. waves are ever beating and surging against the iron-bound shores of religious intolerance, bigotry, and ignorance. In the face of this admission, it is not necessary to question the truth of the Bishop of Rochester's assertion that Protestantism is in its decadence, or of Doctor Ferdinand Ewer, that it is a failure; for, if in half a century the free school house, the free press, and laws which, favoring no religion, protect all, can in our country extort the admission of the loss of eighteen millions and the preservation of only six millions, we can fold our hands, and bide our time when this splendid ecclesiastical fabric shall, in spite of Macaulay’s prophecy or priestly interpretation of apos- tolic utterance, disappear from the face of the earth. We can afford, when an occasional Tom Noddy of an English lord or a society woman of San Francisco takes the sacrament, to patient- ly endure the clerical rooster as he crows over an accession to Rome, and we may console our unregenerate souls when we con- template the emancipation of so many men and women from their loyalty to a power which, in self- preservation and self-de- fense, finfls it necessary to attempt to destroy the free schools of America. The cause of this defection and loss of eighteen mil- lions is not that the schools have omitted to teach religion. The cause is a secondary one. This flight of millions from the Church of Rome in America—the same causes are operating over all the European world—is because our boys and girls have been taught to read and think for themselves, and have, been permitted to act in obedience to their own convictions, and by the law protected therein. Our schools have so emancipated, [30] them that when they become men and women they have the moral courage to think for themselves, defy the thunders of the Church, despite its threats of eternal torture, and laugh at the spiritual pretentions of what they could not fail to observe was an organized industry for earning money and securing power. The Church of Rome waited ten centuries to have it demonstrated __in America—that it could not survive a peaceful and fair con- test with a free school-house, from which the priest and his re- ligious teachings should be excluded. We thank you, Father Gleeson, for your frank admission that you ‘‘are losing im- mensely by the school system 2” and we, in turn, will be frank as ou: The Argonaut, ‘‘ without hesitation, acknowledges that “« the tendencies and workings of the common-school system are sc unquestionably destructive of Catholicism.” We confess this in the very language you provide us, and we admit that it is this idea that which makes us overlook its many imperfections, and which prompts us to declare that it is the one institution which Americans most cherish, and in defense of which they would most freely imperil their lives. They hold it as most sacred, and look to it as the most impregnable of their defenses, in pre- servation of the free institutions, laws, and liberties of the re- publican government under which they live. The Church of Rome as at present constituted (and 1t will not change—it is semper eadem) can not live in the presence of liberal thought. Tt can not survive within the shadow of free schools, a free press, and a government which will give it no favors not conceded to Turk, infidel, Mohammedan, or Jew. FATHER GLEESON’S REJOINDER. The Editor's Inconsistency on the Subject Shown up. Brooxryn, March 15th. Epiror Post: I would feel very grateful to you to allow this and the accompanying letter to appear in the Saturday edition of your paper. The letter was intended for the Argonaut, but Mr Pixley could not make it convenient to give it insertion in this week’s issue of his journal, and, as I do not care to throw the matter back, I have recourse to this method of disposing of it In an interview I had with Mr. Pixley yesterday, in his office he declared that he did not invite me to the discussion of ‘the school question at all, but only to one phase of it—namely, its - morality. In answer to that, I refer the gentleman to the words of his challenge, as made to me in his open letter of Februar 17th, in which the following sentence is to be found: y ““I shall be glad if I can find by your admissions some com- mon starting point for the discussion of the school question.” Since my last interview with Mr. Pixley, I have come to under- stand his real position. Hitherto, I was always under the im- pression that I had to deal with a Christian man, but Mr. Pixley red has frankly saswered to me that he is not a Christian, but an infidel. He does not, he says, believe in the existence or of the soul. This, of course, fully explains why the 62 god man does not want any religions instruction in connection with the education of the youth of this country. And the simple reason is because it would be most damaging to his principles For there is no greater barrier against infidelity than proper re- ligious training. In reality, then, though perhaps the gentle- man does not see it, he is an intolerant sectary, for he wants all sects to yield up their rights to him, so that his infidel prin- ples may be advanced. Of course, no one has any right to blame Mr. Pixley for being an infidel, if he thinks it best to be such; but what seems to me strange is that he hasn’t the courage and manhood and independence to come out boldly be- fore the community and openly declare his infidel principles. I have very little respect for a man who shoots from behind a hedge. I always admire a frank and independent opponent while on the other hand, I do not think much of the man who, with the mask of Protestantism, is infidel at heart, and, though writing ostensibly as a Christian, is yet all the while seeking to indoctrinate others with his infidel notions. R [32] Mr. Pixley said to me in his open letter that he had ‘‘ no re- spect for the valor of any part of Achilles but his heel.” I am perfectly in accord with him in that. I always like a man to show himself, and to stand by his colors. He also said to me that he found the dialecticians of my Church ‘just the least bit slippery.” The public can now judge who is the slipperier character, Mr. Pixley or myself. In short, the gentleman wants us all, Catholics and Protes- tants, to sail with him in the same infidel boat, thinking, no doubt, that we would be safer there than elsewhere. But what- ever others may think on the matter, I must frankly acknowl- edge that I consider Mr. Frank Pixley’s infidel craft a very un- seaworthy vessel, and one of which I would not like to intrust himself. I am, sir, yours truly, W. GLEESON. Epiror ArcoNauT: It is always understood, when a gentleman challenges another to a discussion on any subject, social, moral, political or otherwise, as the case may be, that he is prepared to en- ter on the same. This is why I was much surprised on reading your reply to my letter, which appeared in your issue of the 3d, to see in the very second paragraph the following sehtence: ¢« There are many reasons why Father Gleeson and the Argonaut should not engage in an unprofitable discussion over our com- mon schools.” . And the reason you assign for this is ‘‘ because it is unprofitable.” To some minds this would not seem a reason at all, for a reason is a proof; and to say that a thing is so, because it is so, is no proof. Further onin your editorial you say that ¢ this controversy is the more unprofitable because it has been fought over and over again in this country and in nearly all the States, and the Church has always been defeated,” while again in another part of your reply, referring to what took place in New York about forty years ago, in connection with the school question, you say ‘it (the school question) was (then) settled, and for the United States of America definitely settled.” Now, sir, it does seem strange to me—and I have no doubt it will seem strange to a good many of your readers, too—that a gentleman who believes as you do, that a discussion of this nature is unprofitable, the matter, as you affirm, having been definitely settled as far back as forty years ago, should have in- vited me, in an open letter, to discuss it. When you pub- lished your card of invitation to me, why did you not then think as you now do? I never sought to engage in this discussion at all; I never desired to obtrude myself on the attention of your readers, and never would; but you challenged me, and I accepted your challenge. For, bear in mind, sir, that it was not I but you, yourself, who proposed, in your issue of the 10th ult., the discussion of this matter. In your open letter, addressed to me, [33] of that date, you professed yourself most anxious to debate this question in a calm, thoughtful and gentlemanly way. For, as you said, ‘“ You would not willingly misrepresent the attitude taken by the Roman Catholic Church in California in reference to our public schools.” And therefore you added, ‘‘ Iam willing to discuss this question; I think it a practical ene, and would do it courteously.” You even said, in a communication that passed between us on the matter, ‘I am anxious to discuss this ques- tion.” And now in the face of these protestations, after drag- ging my name before the public, you say it is an unprofitable question to discuss, and that the matter has been definitely set- tled more than a generation ago! How am I to interpret this seeming contradiction; how am I to explain your sudden change of sentiment? Two weeks ago you were willing and anxious to discuss the matter, because you considered it ‘ practical,” and now you are unwilling, because you consider it ‘‘ unprofitable.” Is it the same gentleman that is editing the Argonaut to-day who was conducting it a fortnight ago? Indeed, sir, this seems to me little better than trifling with a’ very serious subject. I think I had a right to expect different from this. I met you in the very best of faith. I believed you were sincere when you pro- posed the discussion of this matter, and I never for a moment questioned the integrity of your declaration, for I did not sup- pose it possible that a gentleman occupying such a prominent position as you do would propose for public discussion a serious matter of this nature, and immediatly after declare it to be un- profitable. Had I, under the plea of debating the common school question indulged in censurable and offensive strictures on the character and workings of the Protestant religion, what would your readers think of me? And does your position war- rant you in doing and saying what, under like circumstances, would be entirely unallowable for me? In short, sir, I cannot help saying that this proceeding of yours looks very like beating a hasty retreat or hoisting the white flag the very moment the first broadside has been cast into the enemy’s intrenchments. I must, however, acknowledge that this rapid change of senti- ment is not foreign to your character when dealing with the public school question, for, while you are loud in your praises of this system, declaring it to be the one institution which Americans most cherish, and for which they would most freely imperil their lives, a few years ago you held the very contrary opinion, going so far as to declare that the school system of this country was a sham and a fraud. If you look into your issue of the 24th of August, 1878, you will find that you then used this very remarkable language: ““ The whole system of common school education, as now con- ducted, is a sham and a fraud.” Mark that, sir; the whole system is a sham and a fraud. How has the system been so materially altered since 1878, that, while it was then a sham and a fraud, it is now the ne plus ultra of [34] perfection? Is it Mr. Frank Pixley who speaks now, and who spoke then? The voice, indeed, is the voice of Jacob, but the hands are the hands of Esau.” Ah, sir, well may I say, * Con- sistency, thou art a jewel,” but thou dost not abide in the Argonaut office. Doubtless you never thought, when you came out in your late role as champion of the present public school system, that the public remembered that you had written the above. But some men have longer memories than you would give them credit for. Indeed, there is such a thing as a man digging his own grave, and you know what the psalmist has said: ‘ He had opened a pit and dug it, and he is fallen into the hole he made.” Some- times men lay traps and snares for others, but somehow or other, instead of catching their victims, they unwittingly manage to get very unpleasantly entangled themselves. But, sir, you said more in condemnation of the school system than what I have quoted. On the 13th of July of the same year, writing about the training ship Jamestown, you said: «« We regard the whole sham as a piece of wicked profligacy out of which able politicians may steal from the tax-payers a luxurious living for a few wretched favorites. Our common school system is of the same cloth.” That is, as I understand your meaning, a sham and a piece of wicked profligacy. Then you continue thus: “We spend in San Francisco one million dollars annually to over-educate and mis-educate our children. The average graduate of our high schools, both boys and girls, 1s, by the system, rendered unfit for the station in life to which he or she is born.” And this is the magnificent system for which you now tell us the American people are ready to die—a system which, according to you, unfits persons for the stations in life for which they were born. There is a very apt expression which I think may be well applied here: << Bx ore tuo te judico”—out of thy own mouth I convict thee. Tt is a very dangerous thing, sir, for a public man to have two strings to his bow—to play fas} and loose, saying one thing now and the contrary to-morrow. Such a man can never have any weight or authority even with the least scrupulous, for no matter what men’s character and principles may be no one ever likes to indorse contradiction. Again, in another part of your editorial of the date I refer to ou also said: ‘The present educational system is destructive of all respect for physical labor. If the statistics of our San Fran- cisco schools could be ascertained, we are confident that the children who have graduated in crime out-number those who have accepted a life of physical labor. We are producing a class of use- less boys and unprofitable girls.” Did I, sir, or any other Catholic priest on this coast, ever speak as hard or disparagingly of the public school system as that? If we did, what a howl of virtuous indignation you would raise against us, and what a handle you would make of [ 35] our words! The old saying is, indeed, quite true, that men can sec a mote in others’ eyes, but not a beam in their own. ‘‘Medice cura teipsum ’—physician, cure thyself. Before you ever again undertake to laud the public school system of this country, you will have to explain these words, and you will have to do s0 in a somewhat different manner from the way in which you met my arguments by merely saying, ‘“ We declare * * | we declare ~* x, we assert * kag if your declaration and asser- tion amounted to a satisfactory proof. Let ‘me continue; for extracts of this kind, of which I have now given a sample, will I think, sir, prove interesting to many of your readers: “If it were not for our immigrating class ey asauans pan come to a deadlock.” Again I ask is at-the system for which American i i ir Tix ps ans should imperil their lives ¢“ The time will come when in America, and in Californi fact will assert itself, that our present school system us ie of the class of working people. Nor do we believe that the kind and degree of education given at our high grade free schools is calculated to preserve either the virtue or the honesty of our rising generation.” Good, sir; admirable! No man could utter truer words. Now, at least, we are in accord. Neither the kind nor the degree of education given in the common schools is calcu- lated to preserve either the virtue or the honesty of the rising generation. These golden words should be treasured up and handed down to posterity with the most jealous care, so that all men may know that in the year of our Lord, 1878, the editor of the Argonaut pronounced ex cathedra that the common school system of America is not calculated to preserve the virtue or honesty of the rising generation. I think some of the friends of the school system will now be inclined to cry out, in the words of the poet, ‘“ Non tali auxilio, nec defensoribus istis.” Argonaut, July 20, 1878: ¢ Our boys are milksop-educated nerveless, cowardly hangers-on upon their mothers’ apron- strings. * * * Who expect to live upon their fathers’ earn- ings. Our girls are a worthless set, becoming each year more worthless, and it is not their fault. We are educating them to become the wives of rich men, playthings and ornaments of luxurious homes; and if they fail and we fail, then God help them. Society is strewn with the wrecks, and the tempest has just begun.” So it has, sir; and a terrible tempest it will be when it rises to its full height, and sweeps this continent from shore to shore, as it inevitably will, unless measures are taken and that very soon, to avert the awful calamity. ‘In another a or two, the American born will be a pitiable, helpless ing. Well, indeed, sir, may your readers rub their eyes and inquire is this man really quoting from Mr. Pixley? Surely the editor of the Argonaut did not say these things. If any one doubts my veracity, I refer him to the files of your paper, which are on hand in San Francisco. | | | [ 36] In your issue of the 24th of August, 1878, I find an exceed~ ingly just statement. The position taken by the Archbishop in reference to the attendance of Catholic children of our un- sectarian schools seems to us to be entirely appropriate.” In- deed, sir, it is most appropriate. “If a religious education is of higher importance than a secular one, if the salvation of the: soul 18 to be imperiled by a neglect of Christian teaching, then, clearly, it is the duty of the Catholic pastor to warn those under his religious care, not to imperil the future of their ehildren by exposing them to the influence of a system of education con- spicuous for the absence of religious and moral training. To punish the contumacious parent by withholding from him the Church sacraments, as a penalty for disregard of the counsels of the Church, seems also to be highly logical and proper.” Bravo, sir; bravo! Your never in your whole life reasoned more logically than when you wrote these words. Again, under the same date as I have given last, I also find the following judicious and thoughtful sentiments: “The free common schools that we would have, should graduate all their’ pupils at fourteen years of age. Teachers should be women. The boy or girl who, by his own or her own exertion, could pre- pare for a higher education, we would aid through the State University. We would thus in San Francisco make a practical saving to the taxpayers of nearly a million of dollars, and, what is better, we would then turn thousands of half-educated and overstuffed dunces into honest workingmen and women. Our whole common free school system has departed from ils original scope and purpose, Or, rather, it has been diverted by dema- gogues, jobbers and place hunters from its original design.” I think your readers have now sufficient to convince them that the estimation in which you held the public schools in 1878, differs somewhat from that in which you now held them. It won't do, in explanation of this, to have recourse to the Grecian method of solving the difficulty, by appealing from: Philip drunk to Philip sober, for you are notably an abstemious and temperate gentleman. I leave the explanation, then, en- tirely to yourself, and I shall be very happy to learn the extra- ordinary change that has taken place within the last few years im the common school system, so that what four years ago was & cham and a fraud, is now about the most perfect of institutions, and the only thing that can successfully defy the power of hell. “The only thing in this world that they (the gates of hell) will not prevail against is the non-sectarian school-house.” Another, whose assurance I would much prefer to accept, has said that the gates of hell shall not prevail against the Church. But of course, this is merely a matter of taste, and these who feel so disposed are perfectly at liberty to place the most un- bounded confidence in the prophetic utterances of the editor of the Argonaut. But, for my part, I would prefer to believe that it is a little more difficult for the powers of hell to prevail [37 | against the Church of God than against the common school sys- tem of this country; for I find in the divine writings an assur- ance for the one but not for the other. I must, however, admit sir, that, in one sense, I think you are correct in saying that the powers of hell won’t prevail against the common school system of this country. For persons don’t generally seek to destroy what is most useful to them; every man cherishes what is ser- viceable to his own cause, and, in this respect, I believe that even Beelzebub himself is not an exception. He certainly would be a very great fool if he were, and he is not generally accredited with being indifferent to the advancement of his own interests “This is why I think you are correct in saying that the powers of hell won’t prevail against this system. Your editorial is supposed to be an answer to my letter, but how far it can be satisfactorily regarded as such—that is "how far it has met the points at issie—I am quite willing to leave to your readers to say. I think it will be seen that you have not rebutted one single statement in my whole communication. In- stead of grappling with the arguments, you have entertained your readers with entirely irrelevant matters; you have filled your eolumns with strictures and censures of my Church. What bearing, for instance, has the following sentence on the subject under discussion: ‘If there is a hell, and hell has gates, and if these bronze barriers of the damned ever come forth for con- flict,” etc. What, I ask, has this to do with the merits of the school question? Just as little as the man in the moon has to do with our terrestrial affairs. I didn’t undertake to discuss whether there is or is not a hell. That is a matter we will find out hereafter and perhaps too soon for some of us. Such writ- ing is wholly irrelevant; it is foreign to the subject and has nothing to do with the matter under debate. No doubt some may consider it a very fine specimen of English, while others on the contrary, might be inclined to regard it merely as high- falutin or tall talk. What a Ruskin or a Carlyle would think of jt I don’t know, but I do know that it has no immediate bearing on the subjact proposed for discussion. You begin your answer to me by saying: “¢ The Argonaut does not believe that the Roman Catholic Church has accomplished as much good as evil in its past history.” Again I ask is that the matter we proposed to discuss? Did we undertake to debate the amount of good or evil wrought by the Catholic Church? I once heard of a young man who was asked if he could sing. 4¢ No,” said he, ‘ but my brother is the devil at the French flute!” To talk about the amount of good or evil done by the Catholic Church while the question under consideration is the school question of this country, is about as unreasonable an answer. here are some persons who, when you ask them anything they are sure to answer you by asking a question in return. This is peculiarly an idiosyncrasy of a certain class, but I did not know that it was much adopted by those who regard themselves as of the true American stock. 1 | [38] Jumping from one thing to another, and answering one thing by introducing another, is always the trick of the controversial juggler—it is the artifice of a Proteus. Mille adde catenas effigiet tamen heee sceleratus vincula, Proteus.” In every legislative Assembly there is an official entitled the Speaker, whose business it is, when a member happens to forget himself and to stray away from the main question under debate, to call him to order and request him to talk to the point at issue or to resume his seat. The same rule should be applied to all discussions wherever conducted. A man should either speak to the point or acknowledge the force of his adversary’s arguments. Side issues should never be introduced; doubtless they are very convenient at times, for they serve to cover a man’s retreat, 1 his opponent is silly enough to follow him, and thus allow him to draw off attention from the main question; but such shifts always evince either a lack of argument, an illogical mind, or & weak cause. Again, you say, ‘‘ The world would have been better off if it [the Catholic Church] had never existed.” That, sir, is merely an cpinion, and one which may be very fairly contested, taking even for our guide Protestant testimony. For such eminent Protes- tant writers as Guizot and Hallam have not been slow to recog- nize the services rendered to the world Ty Catholicism, the for- mer having gone so far as to say that if the Church had not existed the whole world would have been delivered over to mere brute force. But, anyhow, I never said the world would not be better off in such a case. I have my own opinion on that point just as you have yours. What I object to is that it has nothing to do with the question at issue. Why go outside the field of debate in this fashion? Why not rather answer my arguments; or, at least, make some pretense of doing so? 1 stated, and I gave proof for my statement, that the system of education that does not embrace the religious element is defective. Did you take me up on that? Did you refute my arguments ? What did you say? Nota syllable. I also stated, and I backed up my statement with ample proof, that the education which is devoid of religion is dangerous to the nation. Did you rebut that? Did you disprove it? What did you say to it? Nota syllable. Then I proved that the State had no right to stand between the parent and the child, and how did you answer me ? Certainly in a very extraordinary manner, by asserting that the State does not stand between the parent and the priest—as if I asserted that it did. And now it might be proper to inquire why you did not take up and refute at least some of my arguments. For in every debate, at least the principal arguments of an opponent are made the main object of discussion, and whenever they are thrown in the back-ground and wholly ignored, the plain and undeniable inference is that they are irrefragable. I, therefore, conclude that you found yourself unable, under the [39] circumstances, to answer the arguments e ied i x . ; mbodied in st pas ” you must hous in the most sovereign rls gence of your readers if you imagined that they regard as a satisfactory refutation of m iti a X ; tion such vagu inapplicable sentences as that ‘the eh Bon : would h better off had the Catholic Church never existed; that oe § en race would have escaped the horrors of war; x % % R that science w oul d have been more advanced,” etc. I assure ~ you, sir, I had a much higher opinion of your tact and ability as a reasoner, and I feel wholly disappointed to find i : that OE * En should have thus run into es matters. a to deal with a young ine i y ou Ie Bo ea ny for ets ey g to do with a veteran editor, a man of large rience and much legal acumen, I must frankly WE , 7 J have take entirely by surprise. If you had te a ot th i to a philosophical vi of the supremacy of the State oh it n : Ss ar : State, s absolute right i Teri, I could have appreciated your argument; a wy Es 3 id about chains dungeons and thumbscrews, and such he! a be ouly ie i that either you have not seriously ur mind to the i BL A S usstion at all, or that you are not the nd now, sir, I think I may ver i , Sir, y aptly introduce h a- ya from Charles Reade’s little ny ‘“The nes ile 22 - oo should always be faced. The champion of truth neither S yi s nor succumbs. Either he lets hostile facts convert him or he meets them with more facts and weightier. The same with J inents ; to mis-state, or even understate, an opponent’s case bs g e practice of the many respectable rogues controversy breeds: bs ’ is more cunning than wise; for these are the known arts of 5 5 280d, a, ig gains nothing by them. Truth can state r side fairly, yet still prevail; si it 1 Ea Y, y prevail; since, to put it in Shakes- A k# : Good reasons must, perforce, give place to better.” ” gain, you say that the Argonaut is quite it wi be convinced that the IR Church of — ho! Th og that its head is the vicegerent of God; that he carries ee keys; that he is by virtue of his spiritual office the superior to all in civil authority; that heis infallible and ond, ete Now, once more, I ask, did I ever seek to convince you of any o Hose hinge oa 1 vey try to persuade you that the Bore peccable ? did, I would be guilty of a offense, and one for which my 3 Le mat vem my call me to an account. For, by propounding so utterly ae reasonable a heresy, and trying to imbue therewith so respectable a gentleman as the editor of the Argonaut, I would be laying my self open to the charge of having fallen from the faith. No i) sir, I never, for a moment, thought of making you believe ‘that the Pope is impeccable, for this is a matter that neither I nor any other member of the Catholic Church ever held or imagined [40] You say that being a native of New York you know more about the workings of the system there than elsewhere, and then you go on to give an account of the system in its origin. Itis a pity you did not give your readers all the facts, but, as you have not done so, with your permission I will supply what has been omitted. For, indeed, I consider it very important that your readers should be informed on this head. For, if I mistake not, there is a very great misapprehension existing 1n the minds of many regarding the origin of the common school system of this country, the people generally believing that it is now what it was at first. This, however, is a grievous mistake. The system 1s just about as different now from what it was when first started as any two systems could possibly be. For, at first, it was a fair, honorable and praiseworthy enterprise, undertaken in behalf of the needy, and having for its object the enlightenment of the indigent poor without any attempt at interference, either directly or indirectly, with their religious convictions. In fact, at first, and for a considerable time, the moneys appropriated to this use were disbursed on the denominational plan, to the various reli- gious societies for the purpose of education. The real origin of the common school system of the country, then, is this: About the beginning of the present century a few noble hearted, phil- anthrophic gentlemen of New York Laving at their head one whose name will ever stand prominent in the annals of this country—De Witt Clinton—formed themselves into a society, the object of which was to look after and educate the poor little waifs of the city who were neglected by all. In the first charter of the society the object was stated in these _words—viz: “The education of the children of persons in indigent circumstances, and who do not belong to or are not provided for by any reli- gious society.” And then, in the subsequent paragraphs of the act of incorporation, are set forth as follows the means by which the society hoped to reform their charge: ‘““ And, whereas, the said persons have presented a petition to the Legislature setting forth the benefits which would result to society from the educa- tion of such children by implanting in their minds the principles of religion and morality, and by assisting their parents to provide suitable situations for them, where habits of industry and virtue may be acquired, and that it would enable them more effectually to accomplish the benevolent objects of their institution if their association were incorporated.” a = So you see, sir, that the public school system in its origin em- braced the very principle which we are now contending for to- day. How is it that you forgot to mention this very important circumstance when you undertook to inform your readers of the origin of the system? In its inception, then, the public school system was a private scheme, and one which commended itself to every benevolent Christian mind. It was incorporated in 1805. under the title of “A society instituted in the city of New York for the establishment of a free school, for the education of [41] poor children who do not belong to, or are not provided for by any religious society.” Three years later the name of the society was changed. to that of the ‘“ Free School Society of New York,” its powers being also extended. It was not, however, until 1826 that it received its present title, or ¢‘ the public school system,” and it was at that date that the State took it under its control, assumed its management and began to act in its regard as the Pontifex Maximus The system, then, has departed from its original programme, for at first it was private, denominational and religious, having for its object, by the coupling of religious with secular instruc- tion, the amelioration of the poor, indigent, abandoned children of New York. Why now, sir, I would ask has the system been altered? Why has it been found necessary to discard the prin- ciples of religion and morality? From all that is generally said and written about it the community was led to believe that it was never different from what it is at present, whereas the contrary is the fact. And so infatuated and intolerant did men become in its regard that up to’ almost the present it was dangerous for a man to open his mouth against it, a Catholic clergyman having been tarred and feathered in Maine some years ago for havng dared to express an adverse opinion on its merits. In fact, the thing became associated in the minds of many with a kind of supernatural creation, and was regarded with as much awe and veneration as if it had been an incarna- tion of Vishnu or Buddha. But it is now refreshing to think that it is being regarded as something less sacred than it formerly was in the eyes of its worshipers, and though for a period it donned the trappings of an imaginary deity, the ugly idol is at last beginning to appear in all its naked and hideous deformity. Then you go on to say ‘ we do not admit that religious teach- ing is indispensable. * %* * We do not admit that by the exclusion of sectarian teaching,” etc. Of course I know that you don’t admit these things, and what was the need of telling me that ? Does the fact of your not admitting the mat- ter settle the question? If you think so, you must have a very exalted opinion of yourself. Indeed, sir, I would seriously recommend to your attention that axiom in logic, “ Quod gratis asseritur gratis negatur.’” You know, of course, what that means. It is not, then, what you admit or don’t admit that is the question, but what there is reason to show should be admitted. If your ipse dixit were to be taken in this matter for proof of whatever you are pleased to affirm or deny, there would be no use in arguing the question at all. I wonder what a judge on the bench would think of a lawyer who would take a case so arbitrarily into his hands as to say to every argument of the opposing counsel, ‘We don’t admit that—we don’t admit that.” Were such a reason admissible, it would be exceedingly easy to settle every question. Then again, you go on to say: ‘‘ We declare that the world is better. % % % We declare that in America [ 42 ] there are no Catholic schools at all comparable,” etc. Now, sir, without at all meaning the slightest discourtesy, allow me to say that I don’t care one fig for your declarations. One single, solid reason would weigh more with me than all the declarations and asseverations you could make in the course of a year, and I be- lieve that, in this, your readers generally share with me the same sentiments. But for the interest of the reader it may be well to hear your entire declaration. Well, here it is: ‘“ We declare that the world is better off * * * that it has more bread to eat and clothes to wear * * * sgince the civilized nations have begun to emancipate themselves from the teachings of the Roman Catholic Church.” Well, sir, bread and clothes are certainly very good things, but I think there is something better. I be- lieve it is said in a certain book, ‘‘ not in bread alone doth man live.” I believe it is also said in the same volume, ‘‘ seek first the Kingdom of God,” and again, ‘‘ what doth it profit a man to gain the whole world and suffer the loss of his own soul.” I wonder what good will bread and clothes be to a man who fails to find his way to where all virtuous people expect to go. A man won’t always want bread and clothes, but he will some- thing else. Again, “We declare that in America there are no Catholic schools al all comparable with the public schools.” That is a mere assertion. Isit possible that youhave your readers in such a state of absolute subjection that your mere declaration is suffi- cient to guarantee the certainty of all your statements? To many men a little proof would be exceedingly gratifying, par- ticularly in a case like this, when we find many Protestant parents preferring to send their children to Catholic convents or Catholic colleges, rather than to Protestant educational estab- lishments. Does it not strike you, sir, as rather singular that they should do this if they thought with you, that the free schools are the best in the country ? ¢¢ It is not from the dormitory or playground of monastery or nunnery that the most honorable of men and the most exemplary of women are produced.” That again is merely an assertion, and to be accepted by all, would require a little more than your asseveration. No doubt your position is one which carries con- siderable weight with it; you are generally regarded, I believe, as an authority by those for whom you write, but, somehow or other in this enlightened age, men don’t like to be led by the nose. They like to have some reason given them, however small, for what they are expected to believe. ‘It is from the free, common and non-sectarian schools of America that the best American citizens, both men and women, come. We state: this proposition from reading of history, our observation in for- eign travel, and the familiar statistics of the criminal and eleemosynary institutions.” It would take an exceedingly pene- trating eye to discover an infinitesimal particle of proof in this. [43] Like all other assertions, it is mere assertion and nothing more, and consequently cannot weigh with any logical or inquiring mind. It is, indeed, to be regretted that you did not unbend a little and give a few instances from your ‘‘ historical reading,” or some cases in point from your ‘foreign travel.” The latter, especially, would be exceedingly interesting to the writer, as he has happened to have traveled a little in his day, and perhaps even more than the editor of the Argonaut, yet somehow or other he has never encountered or been able to discover in all he has seen and traveled over, though he has been in the four quarters of the globe, any evidence or proof tending to convince him that it is from the common schools of this country that the best men and women come. Some men, indeed, see double, while others imagine they see things which they do not. Asan instance, I once heard of a gentleman, who, happening for the first time to pay a visit to Rome, and seeing on one of the Church doors a notice stating the amount required for the use of chairs during divine service, took it for a tariff for the re- mission of sins, and, of course, on returning to his own country, indignantly declaimed against the horrors of so debasing a system. There is only one more paragraph in your editorial to which I wish to refer. It is your admission thatthe public school system is destructive of the faith of our children. “You even rejoice at this, for, after quoting my words to this effect, you say ‘‘ we confess this in the very language you provide us, and we admit that it is this idea which makes us overlook its many imperfec- tions, and prompts us to declare that it is the one institution which Americans most cherish, and in defense of which, they would most freely imperil their lives.” I would be unwilling to think that there are many Protestant gentlemen in San Fran- cisco who share with you so intolerant and bigoted an assertion. For what can be more intolerant, bigoted, sectarian and narrow- minded, than to cherish, love and be ready to die for an insti- tution, because, that in its working and tendencies it is destruct- ive of the faith of others. This surely is not the sentiment of the American people as a people; it is rather the sentiment of a little clique of sectarian know-nothing bigots. Hence, we Catholics should never cease in pressing home this all-important question until the nation comes to understand our position and the hardships that we are laboring under, and as sure as we are faithful to our principles, so sure will we ultimately succeed; for sooner or later, reason will prevail, and right will triumph. Others, too, will be with us in this matter, for their interests as well as ours our at stake, and numerous Protestants are now be- ginning to see that something must be done to stem the torrent of infidelity that is at present rolling over the country, In fine, sir, your entire article is of that character which fully justifies your assertion that it would be wholly unprofitable to discuss this matter with you in your columns. It would, indeed, [ 44 | be unprofitable to attempt to discuss any subject when the points at issue are slurred over and entirely irrelevant matters dragged in. I cannot, however, conclude this letter without ex- pressing my regret that, after having accepted your invitation to discuss the affair, in a calm, temperate and courteous manner, you should have made it the occasion of a severe and bitter at- tack on my Church. I met you, as I have already said, in the best of faith; I believed you were anxious to discuss the ques- tion, because you said so, and I never imagined for a moment, when you offered me that invitation you considered the matter an unprofitable subject for discussion and a settled question. : : Should you then in future, from any motive or other, deem it your duty to address an open letter to me, inviting me to a dis- ‘cussion on any subject, I will be necessitated to respectfully de- cline the same. I am, sir, yours truly, W. GLEESON. [ From the Argonaut, April 7.) When we asked Father Gleeson to furnish for publicatian his sermon upon our public schools, he sent us a fifty-page manu- script argument in favor of a subdivision of our school moneys to the parochial schools of his Church. His leading argument was: ¢ The free-school system is destroying our Church, and ¢¢ we have already lost in America eighteen millions of Roman « Catholic souls.” Our reply was: “We are glad of it. The ¢¢ Roman Church is the enemy of republican government; the << papal power is inimical to liberty and dangerous to our institu- ¢