out to children and young people by persons often having no real acquaintance with or reverence for its sacred text; and experience shows that the reading of the Bible in this way tends to destroy respect for it, and often leads even to jokes being made upon its words. Lastly, we should always object to having Catholic children forced to obtain instruction from Protestant sources, and to join in prayer under Protestant guidance. We do not force our religion on others, we do not want others to force theirs on us. It strikes us that this is nothing but the liberty to which Americans are entitled.

Another objection that Catholics have to the reading of the Bible in the schools is that it is liable to be accompanied by the recitation of the Protestant form of the Lord's prayer, in which the words "for thine is the kingdom, the power, and the glory, for ever and ever," which we do not recognize as belonging to the sacred text, and which are generally considered by critics to be an addition made by copyists, are found. The omission of the "Hail Mary," a prayer, as has been seen, dating from very early times, is also liable to give scandal to our children. The long and short of it is that we prefer to say our own prayers, and to say them in our own way.

But this whole matter of prayers or Biblereading is in fact, as has been already stated,

a comparatively unimportant issue. The real point is that we do not consider the religious instruction given in this way as at all adequate, though it is, of course, better than nothing, except for the inconveniences already mentioned. We regard religion as the most important part of a child's education.

We are very far from despising the ordinary branches of knowledge taught in the public schools; though, in common with many others, we consider a great deal of the instruction there imparted to be quite useless, simply a stuffing of the heads and straining of the memory of the young with matters of no use except for those who are to pursue some special line of intellectual work in later life. But we consider instruction in the principal points of faith as more necessary than even the most elementary teaching of arithmetic; since it is much more of an advantage to know the way of salvation than to be able to add up a column of figures. We do not wonder that our Protestant or infidel fellow-citizens do not look at the matter just as we do; for as they look round on the world in general, it necessarily seems to them that creeds are simply opinions held on a subject on which certainty is quite unattainable, and that every one will have to form his own opinion after his school-days are over. But it is different with us. The truths of faith are with

us a matter of certain knowledge, not of opinion; they are verities revealed distinctly by Almighty God, and coming down to us, by the wonderful means which He has instituted, unchanged and immovable through these eighteen centuries. They are more certain as well as more important than anything else we can know, for it is God Himself who tells them to us.

We insist, then, that they be not sacrificed to matters of far less value. We do not want to have our children, tired out with mental application during the week, restricted to an hour at most on Sunday for learning these supremely important branches of knowledge. And we desire this not only as Christians, but as patriots; for we know that the teachings of the Catholic religion are the best that can possibly be given to make good citizens. A Catholic who believes what his religion teaches cannot be a socialist, an anarchist, or a free-iover. Indeed, all the real dangers now threatening the social fabric come, as we know very clearly, and as others would also know if they would only try to find out what we really do teach, from the neglect of Catholic doctrine.

It is, then, no more than reasonable, since we cannot expect that these truths, salutary as they are, should be taught in the public schools, that we should use all lawful means

to secure them at least for our own people. We do not want to force them on any one else, but we do not want to lose what we have, and what our children ought to have after us. And also it is reasonable that we should protest and vote against all compulsory schemes of education which would prevent us from teaching adequately these most important matters to those who, by the faith they have, will firmly believe and act upon them. And it is also perfectly reasonable that we should endeavor to have the public-school funds assigned to us in such proportion as our numbers and our contributions to those funds warrant, so that we, while teaching all that can rightly be expected that the graduate of a school shall know, and being willing that the State shall see that we do this, shall also teach these other matters that the State itself cannot teach.

Now, I say that we are willing that the State should see that we teach the common branches of knowledge which all should have, such as reading, writing, arithmetic, geography, history, and the more elementary portions of mathematics and of physical science. But there is, no doubt, a difficulty here.

It is with regard to history especially. We are not willing that distinctively Protestant education on this matter should be given to our children, We are not willing, for instance,

our

that they should be taught that Luther began his Reformation because the Church was selling people permission to commit sin. We do not blame you for teaching that to your children, if you really believe it; but we know that it is false. We know that an indulgence is not a permission to commit sin; that every Catholic would be horrified at the idea of a permission to commit sin being given under any circumstances, and much more that it should be sold. We cannot tolerate instruction being given to children which falsely represents the Church as a monster of iniquity. And so with regard to other matters which Protestants hardly notice, and which, perhaps, slip in here and there in connection with almost any subject, so much have they been accustomed to take false statements against the Church for granted, and even to consider them as selfevident truths. As, for example, the common representation in geographies of countries as being "enlightened" simply because they are Protestant, while Catholic ones are barely recognized as "civilized," if even that courtesy is allowed them. We want our children to learn facts, not opinions. We do not want to fling mud at Protestants, or represent them as holding doctrines which they themselves disclaim; and if any such statements can be found in our books, we are ready to expunge them in