“‘Man delights not me,’” answered Gildea, “‘No, nor woman neither, though by your smiling you seem to say so.’” The smile broke out on Hawkesbury’s face too. It was soothing and very pleasant to find these two talking in his presence of such an intimate matter as that alluded to here: he was not accustomed, in the company of, what in Australia and even England goes by the name of, ladies and gentlemen to this complete absence of social and individual constraint.
Then Edgar, Gildea’s valet, ushered in someone else, Mr. Fitzgerald, and there was a movement and introductions between Maddock, Hawkesbury, and the new-comer, the three being left alone for a moment while Gildea was giving some directions to Edgar about domestic arrangements.
Maddock and Fitzgerald fell almost immediately into a conversation, Hawkesbury playing the part of silent member. The Doctor was interested in finding out what the impressions of a cultured Roman Catholic were of Australia and more particularly of Victoria and New South Wales. He asked a few questions, the answer to which, he thought, would show him whether Fitzgerald had observed things with care and sympathy, and was answered with a gentle readiness that pleased and satisfied him. The two men felt themselves to a certain extent on common ground, and, Fitzgerald touching incidentally on the education question, they began to parallelise each other’s views with cordiality.
“We quite recognise,” said Fitzgerald, “all the difficulties of the case—the danger of the unfair influence of catholic teaching over protestant children, or vice versa, just as each happens to be stronger in the particular place and school. But we would accept this danger—accept it, even supposing we were the losers by it—rather than have the present state of things continue. As our Archbishop said only the other day at Leichardt: ‘Besides the faculties of intellect and of reason, there are certain passions of the soul,’ and to develop the former and wholly neglect the latter is to send a boy out into the world with only one eye. You have prepared him for the temporary business of life, and unfitted him for the glorious service of eternity: you have given his ship fine sails, and forgotten to add a rudder! He may be an acute man of business, but he will be a bad citizen; for, in taking away from him his sense of religion, you will take away from him his sense of morality, of honesty, of integrity! We can, at the present stage, see for Australia no future save that of corruption—a corrupt political life, a corrupt national life, the unlimited worship of Mammon!”
“I agree with you to a large extent,” said Maddock, “and we all know that, practically speaking, the talk about ‘religious education at home’ is mere verbiage. If the education of a child is secular, his spiritual lungs, so to speak, end in being able to inhale no other air and thrive on it.”
“And,” Fitzgerald said, “the education is secular! Every effort is being made to drive the voluntary schools out of the field. Their state aid here in New South Wales is withdrawn: in England it is reduced to a pittance and hedged about with annoyance. And this, although the educational reports, drawn up by a secular commission, show that, at any rate the catholic schools educate on the average both better and more cheaply than the state-schools do! We only ask for fair play, and now it has come to this pass that we cannot get it! All over England the protestant voluntary schools are failing and disappearing. But we, we Catholics, who cannot, as Protestants do, console ourselves with the reflection that the atmosphere of the state-schools, if secular, will be tempered by that of our own beliefs—we will not fail and disappear! We are the poorest of all religious bodies in England; but I will venture to say, that not a single case can be found of a catholic school which has surrendered itself up, as these others did, into the hands of the Secularists. Our educating priests and laymen have to suffer much privation: I know, shall I say hundreds, of them who deny themselves all but the bare necessities of life; but—we stand our ground!... You see,” he added smiling gently, “we Catholics cannot labour under any delusion here. We recognize that this is a stupendous crisis in the world’s history. We will have no compromise and secular tempering of the wind to the shorn Christian. We will stand to our guns, and, if we must perish, perish there!”
Maddock was impressed, and so even was Hawkesbury. This man’s enthusiasm was so quiet, so clear, and yet so radiant. Gildea returned and joined them.
“We were speaking of the popular education,” said Fitzgerald, turning to him, “and I would persuade Dr. Maddock that his cause and ours are here identic.”
“I need no persuading,” said Maddock, “I have for some time been persuading myself!”
“And yet,” Fitzgerald put in gently, “the alliance between us and you seems farther off than between us and the Dissenters.”