The Author’s Inquiry into the Matter.
Its Results.
Being well aware of the extreme skill with which false impressions are conveyed in England, I said to myself that it would be interesting to institute a little inquiry into this matter, and did not rest till I had got to the bottom of it. “The public schools” is a very comprehensive expression, including and at once suggesting the lycées, so I began my inquiry in them. The result was as I expected; no such question and answer were known in the lycées, or had ever been heard of there. My next move was to cause inquiries to be made in the elementary schools. There, also, the question and answer were wholly unknown; but the masters added that since many manuals were used, no single manual being imposed by the Government, as implied by the newspaper statement, there might possibly be some school in which a manual might contain something resembling the question and answer quoted.
Mr. Arnold’s Answer.
A Simple Fact.
Finally, I wrote to Mr. Arnold himself, hoping to get from him the little scrap of truth on which the falsehood had grown. Mr. Arnold could not give me the name of any school in which anything resembling that question and answer had been heard; he only remembered that “in some school in Paris” he had made a note of the matter. Finally, Mr. Arnold frankly acknowledged that the word “State” (l’État) was not used at all. The word really used was le Pays, which is not an abstraction but a reality—the land of France with all its inhabitants. The question and answer seemed to Mr. Arnold to exhibit “the superficiality, nay silliness, of the French in treating religion and morals.” I see in it nothing but a truthful account of a matter of fact. The children were reminded that they owed their education to the country as a reason for serving the country when the time came.
Scott’s Denial of the Authorship of Waverley.
Lying in Self-defence.
Defences against Impertinent Curiosity.
Robert Chambers.