Explanation of Catholic Morals Part 17

BEFORE reaching the age of reason, the child's needs are purely animal; it requires to be fed, clothed and provided with the general necessities of life. Every child has a natural right that its young life be fostered and protected; the giver must preserve his gift, otherwise his gift is vain. To neglect this duty is a sin, not precisely against the fourth, but rather against the fifth, commandment which treats of killing and kindred acts.

When the mind begins to open and the reasoning faculties to develop, the duty of educating the child becomes inc.u.mbent on the parent. As its physical, so its intellectual, being must be trained and nourished. And by education is here meant the training of the young mind, the bringing out of its mental powers and the acquisition of useful knowledge, without reference to anything moral or religious. This latter feature-- the most important of all deserves especial attention.

Concerning the culture of the mind, it is a fact, recognized by all, that in this era of popular rights and liberties, no man can expect to make anything but a meagre success of life, if he does that much, without at least a modic.u.m of knowledge and intellectual training. This is an age in which brains are at a high premium; and although brains are by no means the monopoly of the cultured cla.s.s, they must be considered as non-existent if they are not brought out by education.

Knowledge is what counts nowadays. Even in the most common walks of life advancement is impossible without it. This is one reason why parents, who have at heart the future success and well-being of their children, should strive to give them as good an education as their means allow.

Their happiness here is also concerned. If he be ignorant and untaught, a man will be frowned at, laughed at, and be made in many ways, in contact with his fellow-men, to feel the overwhelming inferiority of his position. He will be made unhappy, unless he chooses to keep out of the way of those who know something and a.s.sociate with those who know nothing--in which case he is very liable to feel lonesome.

He is moreover deprived of the positive comforts and happiness that education affords. Neither books nor public questions will interest him; his leisure moments will be a time of idleness and unbearable tedium; a whole world--the world of the mind--will be closed to him, with its joys, pleasures and comforts which are many.

Add to this the fact that the Maker never intended that the n.o.ble faculty of the intelligence should remain an inert element in the life of His creature, that this precious talent should remain buried in the flesh of animal nature. Intelligence alone distinguishes us from the brute; we are under obligation to perfect our humanity. And since education is a means of doing this, we owe it to our nature that we educate ourselves and have educated those who are under our care.

How long should the child be kept at school? The law provides that every child attend school until it reaches the age of fourteen. This law appears to be reasonable and just, and we think that in ordinary circ.u.mstances it has the power to bind in conscience. The parent therefore who neglects to keep children at school we account guilty of sin, and of grievous sin, if the neglect be notable.

Outside this provision of the law, we think children should be kept at school as long as it is possible and prudent to do so. This depends, of course, on the means and resources of the parents. They are under no obligation to give to their children an education above what their means allow. Then, the apt.i.tudes, physical and mental, of the child are a factor to be considered. Poor health or inherited weakness may forbid a too close application to studies, while it may be a pure waste of time and money to keep at school a child that will not profit by the advantage offered. It is better to put such a child at work as soon as possible. As says the philosopher of Archey Road: "You may lead a young man to the university, but you cannot make him learn."

Outside these contingencies, we think every child has a right to a common school education, such as is given in our system under the high school, whether it be fourteen years of age or over. Reading and writing, grammar and arithmetic, history and geography, these are the fundamental and essential elements of a common school education; and in our time and country, a modic.u.m of information on these subjects is necessary for the future well-being, success and happiness of our children. And since parents are bound to care for the future of their children, we consider them likewise bound to give them such an education as will insure these blessings.

CHAPTER LXII.

EDUCATIONAL EXTRAVAGANCE.

OUR public educational system is made up of a grammar and a high school course, the latter consisting of a four years term of studies, devoted in part, to a more thorough grounding in the essentials of education; the other part--by far the more considerable, according to the consensus of opinion--is expended on educational frills and vanities.

These "tr.i.m.m.i.n.gs" are given gratis, the public bearing the burden of expense, which foots up to a very respectable total.

For a certain cla.s.s of people--the people of means--this sort of a thing has not many disadvantages; it is in a line with the future occupation or profession of their offspring. But for the bulk of the children who attend our free schools and on whose parents educational taxes are levied, it has serious inconveniences, is not in line with their future occupation or profession, is not only superfluous, but detrimental. It is for them so much time lost--precious time, that were better spent learning a trade or otherwise fitting themselves for their life work. Herein therefore we discover a double extravagance: that of parents who provide unwisely for their children's future and that of the munic.i.p.ality which offers as popular an education that is anything but popular, since only the few can enjoy it while all must bear the burden alike.

There is much in getting a start in life, in beginning early; a delay is often a handicap hard to overcome. With very few exceptions, our children gain their livelihood with their hands and eyes and ears, and not solely with their brains; they therefore require t.i.tle most practical education imaginable. They need intellectual tools to work with, and not a smattering of science, botany, drawing and political philosophy to forget as soon as possible. Pure culture studies are not a practical gain for them, while the time consumed in pursuing these is so much taken away from a thorough training in the essentials. Lectures on science, elementary experiments in chemistry, kindergarten instructions in water color painting, these are as much in their place in the education of the average child as an ivory-handled gold pen in the hand that wields the pick-ax.

A boy is better off learning a trade than cramming his head full of culture fads; he is then doing something useful and profitable on which the happiness and success of his life will depend. By the time his companions have done dabbling in science and have come to the conclusion that they are simply being shown how ignorant they are--not a very consoling conclusion after all--he will have already laid the foundation of his career and be earning enough to settle down in life.

He may not be able to talk on an infinity of subjects about which he knows nothing at all, but he will be able to earn his own living, which is something worth while.

If the free high school were more of a business school, people would get better returns for their money. True, some would then be obliged to pay for the expensive fads that would be done away with; but since they alone enjoy these things, why should others be made to pay for them who cannot enjoy them? Why should the poor be taxed to educate the rich?

Why not give the poor full value for their share of the burden? Why not provide them with intellectual tools that suit their condition, just as the rich are being provided for in the present system? The parochial high school has, in several places we know of, been made to serve as a protest against such evils and as an example that has already been followed in more than one instance by the public schools. Intelligent and energetic pastors, knowing full well the conditions and needs of their people, offer the children a course in business methods as being more suitable, more profitable and less extravagant than four years spent in acquiring a smattering of what they will never possess thoroughly and never need in their callings in life. It is better to fill young minds with the useful than with the agreeable, when it is impossible to furnish both. Results already bespeak the wisdom of this plan and reflect no small honor on its originators.

Parents therefore should see to it that their children get the kind of education they need, the kind that will serve them best in after life.

They should not allow the precious time of youth to be whiled' away in trifles and vanities. Children have a right: to be educated in a manner in keeping with their conditions in life, and it is criminal in parents to neglect the real needs of their children while trying: to fit them for positions they will never occupy.

In the meantime, let them protest against the extravagance of educational enthusiasts and excessive State paternalism. Let them ask that the burden of culture studies be put where it belongs, that is, on the shoulders of those who are the sole beneficiaries; and that free popular education be made popular, that is, for all, and not for an elite of society. The public school system was called into existence to do one work, namely, to educate the ma.s.ses: it was never intended to furnish a college education for the benefit of the rich men's sons at the expense of the poor. As it stands to-day, it is an unadulterated extravagance.

CHAPTER LXIII.

G.o.dLESS EDUCATION.

THE other defect, respecting education as found in the public schools of the land, is that it leaves the soul out of all consideration and relegates the idea of G.o.d to a background of silent contempt. On this subject we can do no better than quote wisdom from the Fathers of the Third Plenary Council of Baltimore.

"Few, if any, will deny that a sound civilization must depend 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 up of 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.

"It cannot be desirable or advantageous that religion should be excluded from the school. On the contrary, it ought to be there one of the chief agencies for moulding the young life to all that is true and virtuous, and holy. To shut religion out of the school, and keep it for home and the Church, is, logically, to train up a generation that will consider religion good for home and the Church, but not for the practical business of real life. A life is not dwarfed, but enn.o.bled, by being lived in the presence of G.o.d.

"The avowed enemies of Christianity in some European countries are banis.h.i.+ng religion from the schools (they have done it since) in order to eliminate it gradually from among the people. In this they are logical. Take away religion from the school, and you take it away from the people. Take it away from the people, and morality will soon follow; morality gone, even their physical condition will ere long degenerate into corruption which breeds decrepitude, while their intellectual attainments would only serve as a light to guide them to deeper depths of vice and ruin. A civilization without religion would be a civilization of 'the struggle for existence, and the survival of the fittest,' in which cunning and strength would become the subst.i.tutes for principle, virtue, conscience and duty."

One of the things the Catholic Church fears least in this country is Protestantism. She considers it harmless, moribund, in the throes of disintegration. It never has, cannot and never will thrive long where it has to depend on something other than wealth and political power. It has unchurched millions, is still unchurching at a tremendous rate, and will end by unchurching itself. The G.o.dless school has done its work for Protestantism, and done it well. Its dearest enemy could not wish for better results.

Popular education comes more and more to mean popularized irreligion.

The future struggles of the Church will be with Agnosticism and Infidelity--the product of the G.o.dless public school. And without pretending to be prophets or sons of prophets, we Catholics can foresee the day when G.o.dless education, after making bad Christians, will make bad citizens. And because no civilization worthy of the name has ever subsisted, or can subsist, without religion, the maintenance of this system of popular and free government will devolve on the product of Christian education, and its perpetuity will depend upon the generations turned out of the religious school.

The most substantial protest the Catholic Church offers against G.o.dless education is the system of her parochial schools; and this alone is sufficient to give an idea of the importance of this question. From headquarters comes the order to erect Catholic schools in every parish in this land as soon as the thing can be done. This means a tremendous amount of work, and a tremendous expense. It means a compet.i.tion on educational grounds with the greatest, richest and most powerful nation in the world. The game must be worth the candle; there must be some proportion between the end and the means.

The Catholic Church has the wisdom of ages to learn from; and when she embarks on an enterprise of this kind, even her bitterest enemies can afford to take it for granted that there is something behind it. And there is. There is her very life, which depends on the fidelity of her children. And her children are lost to her and to G.o.d unless she fosters religion in her young. Let parents share this solicitude of the Church for the little ones, and beware of the dangers of the G.o.dless school.

CHAPTER LXIV.

CATHOLIC SCHOOLS.

THE Catholic school system all over this land has been erected and stands dedicated to the principle that no child can be properly, thoroughly and profitably--for itself--educated, whose soul is not fed with religion and morality while its intelligence is being stocked with learning and knowledge. It is intended, and made, to avoid the two defects under which our public school system labors--the one accidental, the other fundamental--namely, extravagance and G.o.dlessness. The child is taught the things that are necessary for it to know; catechism and religion take the place of fads and costly frills.

The Catholic school does not lay claim to superiority over another on purely secular lines, although in many cases its superiority is a very patent fact; it repudiates and denies charges to the effect that it is inferior, although this may be found in some cases to be true. It contends that it is equal to, as good as, any other; and there is no evidence why this should not be so. But it does pretend to give a more thorough education in the true sense of the word, if education really means a bringing out of that which is best in our nature.

Neither do we hold that such a training as our schools provide will a.s.sure the faith and salvation of the children confided to our care.

Neither church, nor religion, nor prayer, nor grace, nor G.o.d Himself will do this alone. The child's fidelity to G.o.d and its ultimate reward depends on that child's efforts and will, which nothing can supply. But what we do guarantee is that the child will be furnished with what is necessary to keep the faith and save its soul, that there will be no one to blame but itself if it fails, and that such security it will not find outside the Catholic school. It is for just such work that the school is equipped, that is the only reason for its existence, and we are not by any means prepared to confess that our system is a failure in that feature which is its essential one.

That every Catholic child has an inherent right to such a training, it is not for one moment permitted to doubt; there is nothing outside the very bread that keeps its body and soul together to which it has a better right. Intellectual training is a very secondary matter when the immortal soul is concerned. And if the child has this right, there is a corresponding duty in the parent to provide it with such; and since that right is inalienable, that duty is of the gravest. Hence it follows that parents who neglect the opportunity they enjoy of providing their offspring with a sound religious and moral training in youth, and expose them, unprepared, to the attacks, covert and open, of modern indifferentism, while pursuing secular studies, display a woeful ignorance of their obligations and responsibilities.

This natural right of the child to a religious education, and the authority of the Church which speaks in no uncertain accents on the subject go to make a general law that imposes a moral obligation upon parents to send their children to Catholic schools. Parents who fail in this simply do wrong, and in many cases cannot be excused from mortal offending. And it requires, according to the general opinion, a very serious reason to justify non-compliance with this law.

Exaggeration, of course, never serves any purpose; but when we consider the personal rights of children to have their spiritual life well nurtured, and the general evils against which this system of education has been judged necessary to make the Church secure, it will be easily seen that there is little fear of over-estimating the importance of the question and the gravity of the obligations under which parents are placed.

Moreover, disregard for this general law on the part of parents involves contempt of authority, which contempt, by reason of its being public, cannot escape the malice of scandal. Even when the early religious education of the child is safeguarded by excellent home training and example and no evil effects of purely secular education are to be feared, the fact of open resistance to the direction of Church authority is an evil in itself; and may be the cause of leading others in the same path of revolt--others who have not like circ.u.mstances in their favor.

About the only person I know who might be justified in not sending his children to Catholic schools is the "crank," that creature of mulish propensities, who balks and kicks and will not be persuaded to move by any method of reasoning so far discovered. He usually knows all that is to be learned on the school question--which is a lie; and having compared the parochial and the public school systems in an intelligent and disinterested manner--which is another--he finds that the Catholic school is not the place for his children. If his children are like himself, his conclusion is wisely formed, albeit drawn from false premises. In him, three things are on a par; his conceit, his ignorance and his determination. From these three ingredients results a high quality of asininity which in moral theology is called invincible ignorance and is said to render one immune in matters of sin. May his tribe decrease!

CHAPTER LXV.

SOME WEAK POINTS IN THE CATHOLIC SCHOOL SYSTEM.

SOME parents claim that their children do not learn anything in the Catholic school. It is good policy always to accept this statement as true in all its parts; it may be true, and it is never good to deny the truth. All are not equally endowed with brains in this world. If a child has it dinned into his ears that the school he attends is inferior, he will come to be convinced of the fact; and being convinced, he will set to work verifying it, in his case, at least.

Heredity may have something to do with it; children are sometimes "chips of the old block,"--a great misfortune in many cases, handicapping them in the race of life. It is well, therefore, not to claim too much for our schools. We concede the point.

Another parent thinks that because he went through the public schools and kept the faith in his day, his children may be trusted to do the same. This objection has a serious front to it. It does seem strange that children should not walk in the footsteps of their worthy parents; but the fact is, and facts are stubborn things, the fact is that they do not always act thus. And they might tell you, to justify their unseemly conduct, that the conditions that obtained in life in olden days are not the same as at present; that there were no parochial schools then to offer a choice in matters of education and that kind Providence might have taken this into consideration: that it was the custom in those days for children to imitate the rugged virtues of their parents struggling against necessity on one hand and bigotry on the other; but that through the powerful influence of money, the progeny of the persecuted may now hobn.o.b with the progeny of the bigot, and the a.s.sociation is not always the best thing in the world for the faith and religious convictions of the former, unless these convictions are well grounded in youth. The parent therefore who kept the faith with less had a very considerable advantage over his child who apparently has more privileges, but also more temptations and dangers.

The objection does not look so serious now.

Of course there is the question of social standing--a very important matter with some parents of the "nouveau riche" type. A fop will gauge a man's worth by the size of his purse or the style and cut of the coat he wears. There are parents who would not mind their children's sitting beside a little darkey, but who do object most strenuously to their occupying the same bench with a dirty little Irish child. A calico dress or a coat frayed at the edges are certainly not badges of high social standing, but they are not incompatible with honesty, purity, industry and respect for G.o.d, which things create a wholesome atmosphere to live in and make the world better in every sense of the word. There is no refinement in these little ones, to speak of, not even the refinement of vice. There is something in the air they breathe that kills the germ of vice. The discipline considers sin a worse evil than ignorance of social amenities, and virtue and goodness as far superior to etiquette and distinction of manners. If a different appreciation of things is entertained, we grant the inferiority of our schools.

"But then, it is so very un-American, you know, to maintain separate schools in opposition to an inst.i.tution so intensely American as our public school system. This state of affairs fosters creed prejudices that it is the duty of every true American to help destroy. The age of religious differences is past, and the parochial school is a perpetual reminder of things of the past that were best forgotten."