It is, indeed [continues Cardinal Gibbons], eminently useful that the intellect of our youth should be developed, and that they should be made familiar with those branches of knowledge which they are afterwards likely to pursue. They can then go forth into the world gifted with a well-furnished mind and armed with a lever by which they may elevate themselves in the social scale and become valuable members of society. It is also most desirable that they should be made acquainted in the course of their studies with the history of our country, with the origin and principles of its government, and with the eminent men who have served it with their statesmanship and defended it by their valor. This knowledge will instruct them in their civic rights and duties and contribute to make them enlightened citizens and devoted patriots.

But it is not enough for children to have a secular education; they must receive also a religious training. Indeed, religious knowledge is as far above human science as the soul is above the body. The little child that is familiar with the Christian catechism is really more enlightened on truths that should come home to every rational mind than the most profound philosophers of pagan antiquity or even than many of the so-called philosophers of our own times. He has mastered the great problem of life. He knows his origin, his sublime destiny, and the means of attaining it, a knowledge that no human science can impart without the light of revelation. God has given us a heart to be formed to virtue as well as a head to be enlightened. By secular education we improve the mind; by religions training we direct the heart. It is not sufficient, therefore, to know how to read and write, to understand the rudiments of grammar and arithmetic. It does not suffice to know that 2 and 2 make 4; we must practically learn also the great distance between time and eternity. The knowledge of bookkeeping is not sufficient unless we are taught also how to balance our accounts daily between our conscience and our God. It will profit us little to understand all about the diurnal and annual motions of the earth unless we add to this science some heavenly astronomy. We should know and feel that our future home is to be beyond the stars in heaven, and that, if we lead a virtuous life here, we shall shine as stars for all eternity."

It is plain, then, that we want our children to receive an education that will make them not only learned, but pious men. We want them to be not only pol ished members of society, but also conscious Christians. We desire for them a training that will form their heart as well as their mind. We wish them to be not only men of the world, but, above all, men of God. A knowledge of history is most useful and important for the student. He should be acquainted with the lives of those illustrious men that founded empires; of those men of genius that enlightened the world by their wisdom and learning and embellished it by their works of art. But is it not more important to learn something of the King of Kings, who created all these kingdoms and by whom kings reign? Is it not more important to study that uncreated Wisdom before whom all earthly wisdom is folly and to admire the works of the Divine Artist who paints the lily and gilds the clouds? If, indeed, our soul were to die with the body; if we had no existence beyond the grave; if we had no account to render to God for our actions, we might more easily dispense with religious instruction in our schools. Though even then Christian morality would be a fruitful source of temporal blessings; for, as the apostle teaches. "Piety is profitable to all things, having promise of the life that now is and of that which is to come.

But our youth cherish the hope of becoming one day citizens of heaven as well as of this land. And as they can not be good citizens of this Republic without studying and observing its laws, neither can they become citizens of heaven unless they know and practice the laws of God. Now, it is only by a good religious education that we learn to know and to fulfill our duties toward our Creator. The religious and secular education of children can not be divorced from each other without inflicting a fatal wound upon the soul. The usual consequence of such a separation is to paralyze the moral faculties and to foment a spirit of indifference in matters of faith.

From the Christian standpoint education is to the soul what food is to the body, The milk with which the infant is nourished at its mother's breast feeds not only its head, but permeates at the same time its heart and the other organs of the body. In like manner the intellectual and moral growth of children should go hand in hand: otherwise their education is defective and fragmentary, and often proves a curse instead of a blessing.

Guizot, the eminent French writer, expresses himself so clearly and forcibly on this point that I can not forbear quoting his words: “In order." he says, "to make popular education truly good and socially useful it must be fundamentally religious. It is necessary that national education should be given and received in

the midst of a religious atmosphere and that religious impressions and religious observances should penetrate into all its parts. Religion is not a study or an exercise, to be restricted to a certain place or a certain hour. It is a faith and a law, which ought to be felt everywhere and which after this manner alone can exercise all its beneficial influence upon our mind and our life."

In this country the citizen happily enjoys the largest liberty. But the wider the liberty the more efficient should be the safeguards to prevent it from being abused and degenerating into license. The ship that is destined to sail on a rough sea and before strong winds should be well balanced. To keep the social planet within its proper orbit the centripetal force of religion should counterbalance the centrifugal motion of free thought. The only effectual way, Catholics hold, to preserve the blessings of civil freedom within legitimate bounds, is to inculcate in the minds of youth, while at school, the virtues of truth, justice, honesty, temperance, self-control, and those other fundamental duties comprised in the Christian code of morals. (See Our Christian Heritage, Cardinal Gibbons.)

GROWTH OF PAROCHIAL SCHOOLS,

It is for these weighty reasons that the Catholic Church from its first beginnings in the United States has had parochial schools. In the early days these schools were few and rather poorly equipped. The buildings were not attractive and oftentimes unsuitable for school purposes. The basement of a church and sometimes the church itself was used as the schoolhouse. There was a dearth of teachers in those early days, for the teaching religious communities were not yet widely established. The school was not always well graded, and too often it was overcrowded. The results, except that the religious faith of the children was preserved, were not entirely satisfactory. There was in certain quarters, too, a disposition on the part of parents to ignore the directions of the church and to send their children to the public schools. There was, moreover, a strong popular feeling against the parochial school on the ground that it was un-American. Notwithstanding these difficulties-that the church was hampered for means, despite the popular outery against such schools, and the dissatisfaction here and there of some Catholics-the parochial school system went on extending itself into every diocese throughout the country.

SCHOOL LEGISLATION.

When the Catholic bishops of the United States met in the third plenary council of Baltimore, in 1884, one of the most important questions they had to discuss and legislate upon was the subject of parochial schools. Laws and regulations for the establishment and management of these schools were laid down with great care and definiteness. In every parish, where it was possible, a parochial school was to be established. Catholic parents were directed to send their children to these schools. The local rector was urged, as well as the teachers, to make these schools equal to the best. Courses of studies were prescribed; there was to be a school superintendent appointed in each diocese; local school boards of competent laymen were to be selected; in fact there was nothing to be left undone to effect a thorough organization of the whole parochial school system. The rapid growth, the educational strength, and singular success of the parochial schools date from this decided action of the Catholic hierarchy.

THE BISHOPS' PASTORAL LETTER.

Here let me quote from the pastoral letter of the American Catholic hierarchy, issued at the close of the council, to the clergy and laity of the United States. Regarding this subject of Christian education, it says:

Popular education has always been a chief object of the church's care; in fact it is not too much to say that the history of the church's work is the history of civilization and education. In the rude ages, when semibarbarous chieftains

boasted of their illiteracy, she succeeded in diffusing that love of learning which covered Europe with schools and universities; and thus from the barbarous tribes of the early Middle Ages she built up the civilized nations of modern times. Even subsequent to the religious dissensions of the sixteenth century, whatever progress has been made in education is mainly due to the impetus which she had previously given. In our own country, notwithstanding the many difficulties attendant on first beginnings and unexampled growth, we already find her schools, academies. and colleges everywhere, built and sustained by voluntary contributions, even at the cost of great sacrifices, and comparing favorably with the best educational institutions in the land for completeness of equipment and thoroughness of training.

CHURCH FAVORS POPULAR EDUCATION.

These facts abundantly attest the church's desire for popular instruction. The beauty of truth, the refining and elevating influences of knowledge are meant for all, and the church wishes them to be brought within the reach of all. Knowledge enlarges our capacity both for self-improvement and for promoting the welfare of our fellow-men; and in so noble a work the church wishes every hand to be busy. Knowledge, too, she holds is the best weapon against pernicious errors in the affairs of church or state. It is only "a little learning" that is a dangerous thing.

In days like ours, when error is so pretentious and aggressive, everyone needs to be as completely armed as possible with sound knowledge, so as to withstand the noxious influences that are at work in society. In the fierce combat between truth and error, between faith and doubt, an important part of the battle must be waged by the laity, and woe to them if they are not well prepared. And if in the olden days of vassalage and serfdom the church honored every individual, no matter how lowly his position, and labored to give him the enlightenment that would qualify him for higher responsibilities, much more now in this era of popular rights and liberties, when every individual is an active and influential factor in the body politic, does she desire that all should be fitted by suitable training for an intelligent and conscientious discharge of the important duties that may devolve upon them.

And then the bishops go on to lay down in what sound education consists. A sound civilization depends upon sound popular education. But education in order to be sound and to produce beneficial results must develop what is best in man, and make him not only clever, but good. A one-sided education will develop a one-sided life; and such a life will surely topple over, and so will every social system that is built upon such lives. True civilization requires that not only the physical and intellectual, but also the moral and religious well-being of the people should be improved, and at least with equal care. Take away religion from a people and morality will soon follow; morality gone, even their physical condition will ere long degenerate, while their intellectual attainments would only serve as a light to guide them to deeper depths of vice and ruin. This has been so often shown in the history of the past, and is, in fact, so self-evident that one wonders why any difference of opinion should exist about it. A civilization without religion is a civilization of "the struggle for existence and the survival of the fittest," in which cunning and strength become the substitutes for honor, virtue, conscience, and duty. As a matter of fact there never has been a civilization worthy of the name without religion, and from the facts of history the laws of human nature can easily be inferred.

Hence education, in order to foster civilization, must foster religion. Now, the three great educational agencies are the home, the church, and the school. These mold men and shape society. Therefore each of them, to do its part well, must foster religion. But many, unhappily, while avowing that religion should be the light and the atmosphere of the home and church, are content to see it excluded

from the school, and even advocate as the best system of education that which excludes religion. Few, surely, will deny that childhood and youth are the periods of life when the character ought to be subjected to religious influences. Nor can we ignore the fact that the school is an important factor in the forming of childhood and youth-so important that its influence, when not harmonizing with the influence of home and church, is often found to outweigh and neutralize them both. It can not, therefore, be desirable or advantageous that religion should be excluded from the school. On the contrary it ought to be there as one of the chief agencies for molding the young life to all that is true and virtuous, holy and good. To shut out religion from the school and keep it for the home and the church is, logically, to train up a generation that will consider religion good for home and church, but not for the practical business of daily life. Religion, in order to elevate a people, should inspire their daily conduct, rule their whole life, govern their relations with one another. A life is not dwarfed but ennobled by being lived in the presence of God. Therefore, the school, which principally gives the knowledge fitting for practical life, ought to be preeminently under the guiding influences of religion. From the shelter of home and school the youth must go out into the busy ways of trade or professional life. In all these the principles of honesty and fair dealing should animate and direct him. But he can not expect to learn these principles in the workshop or office or the countingroom. He has to be well and thoroughly imbued with them by the joint influences of home and school before he is launched upon the dangerous sea of life.

A GROWING DEMAND FOR THE RELIGIOUS ELEMENT IN EDUCATION Other denominations are to-day awakening to this great truth which the Catholic Church has never ceased to maintain. Reason and experience are forcing them to recognize that the only practical way to secure a Christian people is to give the youth a Christian education. The avowed enemies of Christianity are banishing religion from the schools in order to eliminate it gradually from among the people. In this they are perfectly logical, and we here in America may well profit by the lesson. Hence the cry for Christian education is going up from the religious bodies throughout the land.

The Rev. Mr. Geer, vicar of St. Paul's Church, New York City, has recently declared that "The logic of Bible, prayer book, and tradition in the Church of England and in the daughter church, which we call Protestant Episcopal in this country, is, and always has been, Christian education at its best for her children, and on every day in the week, in the school as well as in the home." And this prominent Episcopalian clergyman continues:

There can be no effective teaching of morality without personality. We can not teach patriotism without George Washington and Abraham Lincoln. No more can Christian ethics be effectively taught independently of Christ and His church, or Jewish ethics without Moses, David, and Isaiah. Codes, commandments, and moral recommendations of any description, without personal life and power behind them, are dead matter to the soul.

Nor is it enough to say that the church and the home must attend to the religious instruction of the young, because, in their influence over children, both church and home are being weakened and slowly undermined by our "madly perverted system of secularized education. As for the average Sunday school, everybody knows that but little religious instruction can be given in it, and often it does more harm than good by keeping the children from taking part with their parents in the services of the church. They graduate from the Sunday school without being promoted into the church.

And he concludes by declaring that

The Roman Catholic Church is winning and holding the love of her children by reason of her great sacrifices for their moral and religious as well as for their mental training. How is this shown? By the record of the attendance of her people on divine worship, which is far ahead of that of Protestant churches.

The Rev. Dr. Morgan Dix, rector of Trinity parish, New York City, a man conspicuous for his patriotism, learning, and conservatism, in his Thanksgiving Day sermon of this year of grace 1903, asks:

What can be done to stop extravagance and display and show? What can be done to make very rich people economical and modest in dress and conduct, and saving, in order to give abundantly where gifts would help the community? What can be done to stop fools from running after each new light and taking up each new gospel? What can be done to stop married people from putting away each other as soon as they get tired of each other, and adding to the sin of unfaithfulness the fresh sin of rushing into the arms of the partners of their guilt?

And the only means this worthy man knows of to stop this flood of evil is "to put religion into our education." Nothing else, he insists, can safeguard the morals of our American society.

Rev. Dr. James M. Buckley, the well-known Methodist divine and author, shows in the December number, 1903, of the Century Magazine how fanaticism has run riot in the United States, notwithstanding the prophecy made fifty years ago by a distinguished American statesman "that in less than half a century Americans would be so transformed and unified by information and training that it would be impossible for it to spread." "It might start," went on to predict this statesinan, "but, like a spark without fuel or air, it would glitter for a moment and disappear." Doctor Buckley proves that there is not, nor ever was, a country so cursed with "fanaticism" of every variety and kind as the United States, notwithstanding our system of universal public education. For here we have scores of communities of fanatics whose doctrines are based upon ideas incompatible with morality.

"SOUND EDUCATION IS RELIGION, AND TRUE RELIGION IS ALWAYS SOUND EDUCATION."

One of the leading magazines recently asked a number of distinguished clergymen and laymen their opinion of the above statement.

Some of the replies are the following:

Education and religion are not synonymous. Sound education can never conflict with true religion. True religion will always uphold sound education. Education without religion is destroying morality and civil liberty in the United States. Lorenzo J. Markoe, Minnesota.

Sound education is religious in basis. I can conceive of no sound education not founded on Christian ethics, and Christian ethics are rooted in nature and revelation. As to education being religion, I can not see it that way. Education is a process; faith is a gift of God, not a process at all.-Maurice Francis Egan.

There is no sound education that is not dominated by religion. Personal religion that is in the broadest sense true includes or implies every element of a sound education.-Willis J. Beecher.

The

No religion is worth the name that does not lead the whole man up and on. No education is real education unless it leads out the real man, the higher man. all-round educated man must, in the last resort, be profoundly religious.-W. S. Rainsford, New York.

Right education should be religious, and true religion is necessarily educative.— Bishop Spalding.

Of all sound education religi n must be the central element, for only that is sound education which develops the entire man; and the religious element in man, which includes his ideals and his highest loyalties, is the royal part of him. That true religion implies sound education is also obvious. Religion unites inspiration and education, open vision and trained faculty. Their action is reciprocal; each is conditional for the other.-Washington Gladden, Columbus, Ohio.

This statement is too vague, too sweeping, and therefore open to misinterpretation. I would rather say: Education is not sound without religion, and true reli