To the effect that there are a hundred thousand children in attendance at the parish schools of Scotland.
‘We are aware,’ says a respected antagonist, ‘that Mr. Miller is no Deist; his argument, nevertheless, rests on a deistical position,––a charge to which Dr. Chalmers’ letter is not liable to be exposed, in consequence of its first sentence, and of what it recommends in a Government preamble.’ If there be such virtue in a preamble, say we, let us by all means have a preamble––ten preambles if necessary––rather than a deistic principle. We would fain imitate in this matter the tolerance of Luther. ‘A complaint comes that such and such a reformed preacher will not preach without a cassock. “Well,” answers Luther, “what harm will a cassock do the man? Let him have a cassock to preach in; let him have three cassocks, if he find benefit in them.’”
It is not uninstructive to remark how invariably in this matter an important point has been taken for granted which has not yet been proven; and how the most serious charges have been preferred against men’s principles, on the assumption that there exists in the question a certain divine truth, which may be neither divine nor yet a truth at all. Wisdom and goodness may be exhibited in both the negative and positive form––both by avoiding what is wicked and foolish, and by doing what is good and wise. And while no Christian doubts that the adorable Head of the Church manifested His character, when on earth, in both ways, at least no Presbyterian doubts that He manifested it not only by instituting certain orders in His Church, but also by omitting to institute in it certain other orders. He instituted, for instance, an order of preachers of the gospel; He did not institute an order of popes and cardinals. Neither, however, did He institute an order of ‘religion-teaching’ schoolmasters; and the question not yet settled, and of which, without compromising a single article in our standards, either side may be espoused, is, whether our Saviour manifested His wisdom in not making use of the schoolmaster, or whether, without indicating His mind on the subject, He left the schoolmaster to be legitimately employed in an after-development of the Church.
Indeed, so entirely in this matter is the Free Church at sea, without chart or compass, that it has still to be determined whether the religious teaching of her schools be of a tendency to add to or to diminish the religious feeling of the country. ‘I sometimes regretted to observe,’ says Dr. Reid, in his Report on the Schools in connection with the Free Presbytery of Edinburgh, ‘that [their lessons in the Bible and Shorter Catechism] were taught rather too much in the style of the ordinary lessons. I do not object to places being taken, or any other means employed, which a teacher may consider necessary to secure attention during a Scripture lesson; but divine truth should always be communicated with solemnity.’ Now, such is the general defect of the religious teaching of the schoolroom. Nor is it to be obviated, we fear, by any expression of extra solemnity thrown into the pedagogical face, or even by the taking of places or the taws. And there seems reason to dread that lessons of this character can have but the effect of commonplacing the great truths of religion in the mind, and hardening the heart against their after application from the pulpit. But some ten or twelve years will serve to unveil to the Free Church the real nature of the experiment in which she is now engaged. For our own part, we can have little doubt, be the matter decided as it may, that experience will serve ultimately to show how vast the inferiority really is of man’s ‘teachers of religion’ to Christ’s preachers of the gospel.
We shall never forget at least the more prominent particulars of a conversation on this subject which we were privileged to hold with one of the most original-minded clergymen (now, alas, no more) our Church ever produced. He referred, first, to the false association which those words of world-wide meaning, ‘religious education,’ are almost sure to induce, when restricted, in a narrow, inadequate sense, to the teaching of the schoolmaster; and next, to the divine commission of the minister of the gospel. ‘Perverted as human nature is,’ he remarked, ‘there are cases in which, by appealing to its sentiments and affections, we may derive a very nice evidence respecting the divine origin of certain institutions and injunctions. For instance, the Chinese hold, as one of their religious beliefs, that parents have a paramount claim to the affections of their sons and daughters, long after they have been married and settled in the world; whereas our Saviour teaches that a man should leave father and mother and cleave to his wife, and the wife leave father and mother and cleave to her husband. And as, in the case of the dead and living child, Solomon sought his evidence in the feelings of the women that came before him, and determined her to be the true mother in whom he found the true mother’s love and regard, I would seek my evidence, in this other case, in the affections of human nature; and ask them whether they declared for the law of the Chinese Baal, or for that of Him who implanted them in the heart. And how prompt and satisfactory the reply! The love which of twain makes one flesh approves itself, in all experience, to be greatly stronger and more engrossing than that which attaches the child to the parent; and while we see the unnatural Chinese law making the weaker traverse and overrule the stronger affection, and thus demonstrating its own falsity, we find the law of Christ exquisitely concerting with the nature which Christ gave, and thus establishing its own truth. Now, regarding the commission of the minister of the gospel,’ he continued, ‘I put a similar question to the affections, and receive from them a not less satisfactory reply. The God who gave the commission does inspire a love for him who truly bears it; ay, a love but even too engrossing at times, and that, by running to excess, defeats its proper end, by making the servant eclipse in the congregational mind the Master whose message he bears. But I do believe that the sentiment, like the order to which it attaches, is, in its own proper place, of divine appointment. It is a preparation for the reception in love of the gospel message. God does not will that His message should be injured by any prejudice against the bearer of it; and that His will in this matter might be adequately carried out, was one of the grand objects of our contendings in the Church controversy. But we are not to calculate on the existence of any such strong feeling of love between the children of a school and their teacher. If, founding on the experience of our own early years, we think of the schoolmaster, not in his present relation to ourselves as a fellow-citizen, or as a servant of the Church, but simply in his connection with the immature class on which he operates, we will find him circled round in their estimation (save in perhaps a very few exceptional cases) with greatly more of terror than affection. There are no two classes of feelings in human nature more diverse than the class with which the schoolmaster and the class with which the minister of the gospel is regarded by their respective charges; and right well was St. Paul aware of the fact, when he sought in the terrors of the schoolmaster an illustration of the terrors of the law. And in this fence of terror we may perhaps find a reason why Christ never committed to the schoolmaster the gospel message.’ We are afraid we do but little justice, in this passage, to the thinking of our deceased friend; for we cannot recall his flowing and singularly happy language, but we have, we trust, preserved his leading ideas; and they are, we think, worthy of being carefully pondered. We may add, that he was a man who had done much in his parish for education; but that he had at length seen, though without relaxing his efforts, that the religious teaching of his schools had failed to make the rising generation under his charge religious, and had been led seriously to inquire regarding the cause of its failure.
Mr. Combe, however, may be regarded as an extreme man; and so the following letter, valuable as illustrating the views of a not very extreme opponent, though a decided assertor of the non-religious system of tuition, may be well deemed instructive. The writer, Mr. Samuel Lucas, was for many years Chairman of that Lancashire Public School Association which Mr. Fox proposes as the model of his scheme:––
TO THE EDITOR OF THE SCOTSMAN.