The Sun.
London, England, 1866-06-11 00:00:00

The Education of the Poor Roman Catholic
Children of London.
PASTORAL FROM THE REV. DR. MANNING.

Yesterday an elaborate Pastoral from the most Rev. Dr.

Manning, the Roman Catholic Archbishop of Westminster,
was-read in all the churches and chapels within the arch-
diocese, in which, after an eloquent explanation of the fes-
tival of the "Sacred Heart of Jesus," which is celebrated
at this period of the year in the Catholic Church, the
learned dignitary referred to the collection that was to be
made that day in aid of the Poor School Committee,
which laboured "to train up children in the purity and
sanctity of the Holy Catholic faith, and to protect them
against the seduction and robbery by which they may be
stripped of their inheritance." "The Poor School Com-
mittee," adds the Pastoral, " was founded in 1847 as an or-
gan of communication in behalf of the Catholic bishops with
her Majesty's Government. It conducted its correspon-
dence with great prudence and success, and the agree-
ments made by it at that day continue as the basis of our
relations with the Privy Council until now. The consti-
tution of the Poor School Committee is that of a Council
composed of 45 members, one- third ecclesiastical and two-
thirds lay persons, nominated by each of the Catholic
bishops of England, and by two vicars apostolic of Scot-
land. It represents, therefore, the whole of the Church
of Great Britain. Every year, at the same time with the
annual assembling of the bishops in London, it holds its
general meeting. Priests and laymen from all parts of
England have then an opportunity of conferring on the
state of Catholic education. If it had no other office
than this—namely, to form a centre in which the 13
diocesses meet—a great value would attach to it. As
the subject of education becomes more and more appre-
ciated in its bearings upon the social and spiritual
welfare of the people, such a body will become of still
greater usefulness: The Pastoral then goes on to say that

he Poor School Committee exercised valuable influence

in connexion with Reforruatory schools, and as no diocese
could alone support the institutions for training masters
and mistresses for the education of the Catholic poor, that
committee assumed the maintenance of them. " The
burden of their maintenance was, therefore, as widely dis-
tributed as their benefit—that is, over the whole Church

in England and Scotland." The Poor School Committee
also assisted the local poor schools in each mission and in
each diocess. " The diocesses of Liverpool, Salford, and
Birmingham," continues the pastoral, " have in activity
a wide-spread and vigorous system of education, the
cost of which is borne by themselves. The schools of
the diocess of Westminster aro 148 in number, the
maintenance of which must cost from £15,000 to
£20,000 a year. The grants to this diocess from the Poor
School Committee, though very liberal in proportion to its
means, amount yearly to about £3OO or £4OO for the build-
ing and support of schools—that is, for the last year, about
a two-hundredth part of what is actually spent in and by
the diocess for its mission schools. It is manifest, there-
fore, that every diocess at this moment has to depend upon
itself for the multiplication and maintenance of its schools.
It is, therefore, to create a central diocesan fund, from
. .

which the missions may be assisted, that you are invited to
attend a public meeting, to be held on Thursday next, the
14th instant, at St. James's-hall. "It is not necessary
at this time to enter into the details of this subject.

t will be enough to say that a trust will be created for
he receiving, holding, and transmitting of funds, and

a council tradvise us in the application of the same.
How urgent is the necessity for some such fund to supply to
the diocess that which is beyond the strength both of the

Poor School Committee and of the clergy of the missions
is too obvious and too well known to need many words.
"We will, therefore, briefly state only the three chief
reasons for its present formation. First, it may be affirmed
that thousands of Catholic children in London are without

education. Two very careful and guarded calculations have
been lately made of the number who may be said practically
to be without education. One of these estimates them at
12,000, and the other at 7,000. We refrain from giving our
own conjectures, wishing to avoid all semblance of ex-
aggeration, and earnestly hoping that we may be mistaken ;
but if there be 12,000, or even 7,000, or so much as 1,000
Catholic children growing up without Christian and
Catholic education, we ought to do penance unless we
make an effort to save them.

" That there are not 1,000 only, but 7,000 at least, may,

we believe, with perfect certainty be affirmed; and if so, it
is a fact sufficiently terrible to tinge all needless self-indul-
gence with bitterness, and to break our indolent peace day

and night. The ruin and the depravity, or the perversion
and apostacy, of one baptized child is a sorrow which breaks
the heart of a father or a mother. The loss of one soul, and
that one of God's little ones, only the other day innocent
and in union with God, marks a wound in the sacred heart
of Jesus. How is it that we can cat and drink, lie down,
and rise up in unconsciousness and insensibility at the
spiritual death of thousands before our eyes?
" If in any ono place 1,000 children without education
were seen together, wo should be horrified ; but, though
scattered, they exist, and theY are destitute as if they were
all congregated in one of our maze of courts. Being dis-
persed, they are hidden by fives and tens here and there in
our thronging population, and, therefore, escape our eyes ;
and because they are not seen some doubt their existence.
Let us, therefore, lay well to heart that we see but little of
that which, by its very nature, lies withdrawn from the
eyes of Catholics—namely, the Catholics who,, neglecting
their own souls, negleot also the souls of their children.
Such Catholics keep out of our sight.
" There is also a second class of our children for whom
we must provide—namely, those who fall under the opera-
tion of the law for offences, or aro committed as friendless
and abandoned. The late Acts for Reformatory and In-
dustrial Schools enable us to provide for them with greater
facility; the cost of their maintenance being drawn from
the Consolidated Fund, the cost of management is compa-
rativelyehisaet i
timese
eo
dud, re
and t pa oinv
mee
dr
at
nyi
ny, thatof
them
semt
aa
easy to bear. But so many are our poor children of
Int eta
vni
neo
st t
beentbul
sent to,
-e
this class,papn adacneadr.sevsiaotthgt
this
tokee
tions.

"But, lastly, there is a class of our poor children of
which we hardly know how to speak. It is believed that
more than 1,000 of our Catholic children are detained in the
workhouses and workhouse schools of London. They are
draughted for health and for convenience of management
from tho workhouse in Loudon to the workhouse schools in
the country. Within the walls of those schools, the edu-
cation is' exclusively Protestant books, catechisms,
prayers, teachers, worship. And yet every Catholic child
has a right bestowed oa him by God Himself to Catholic
education. In baptism they acquired a personal right to be
trained in the whole and perfect faith of Jesus Christ, and
under the pastors of His Church. To deprive them of it is
a fraud against God. To educate them as Protestants is to
deprive them of it. And they are being educated as Pro-
testants as absolutely and as exclusively as children of the
Protestant poor. It is no answer to say they would not
bo there if their parents did not consent. Their parents
do not consent. Every Catholic father and mother, unless

they be sordid, and sell their souls, object with all their
heart and strength to the perversion of their child. Hun-
ger and thirst and nakedness drive them to the work-
house, and their helplessness may give way under the
temptations of meat and drink and warmth, for which their
children cry around them. They hope to keep their chil-
dren from starvation, in the trust that God will
keep them from perversion. ' There is no consent in
this, nor in the apathy of a man who is faint with
hunger in the midst of hungry children. To take ad-
vantage of such a man is cruelty ; to tempt him to wrong
his own children is indignity added to cruelty. It is to use
him as the instrument to rob his own children of the right
which God has given them as their own. Neither father

nor mother has authority to do this. They have no power
to disinherit the children of God—yet year by year this
cruel and sinful robbery of our poor little ones is per-
petrated. Plead for it who may, and argue for it what wet'
may, the fact stands before God Without a shade to soften
its enormity. A thousand Catholic children, detained by
hunger and practical mal-administration of the law, are
defrauded of their education in the faith, and aro educated
in doctrines contrary to their faith.
" Time compels us to pass over other topics. The agony
and bitterness of Catholic fathers and mothers, who had
rather see their children in a parish coffin than in a Poor
Law school; the anguish of father and mother in the hour of
death, when the light of faith is keenest and the love of
their offspring is most vivid, as their eyes are closing upon
all save the terrific vision of their sons and their daughters,
robbed of the grace which at that hour is their only strength
in the last agony—all this, and much beside, we must pass
over now. We shall ask you hereafter to help us by your
prayers to open the doors of these houses of bondage, and by
your alms to enable us to receive these poor children into
schools of our own. But this must be for the future."
The Pastoral concludes with a stirring appeal on behalf of
the Poor School Committee, whose present useful labours
would, it was urged, be made more useful by the success of
the proposed diocesau fund.

GEORGE GUELPII AND HANNAII LIGHTFOOT. —The
proceedings in the " Princess Olive" case, upon
which we may hereafter comment, have incidentally dis-
posed of a story our grandmothers cordially believed—the
marriage of George 111. to the Quaker Hannah Lightfoot.
The certificates of that marriage were produced, and were
promptly pronounced by the Probate Court to be forgeries,
the clergyman spelling "duly" with an e (duely) and the
Prince of Wales signing himself George Guelph." The
Lord Chief Justice, in describing these documents, said
that if correct the marriage of George 111. to Queen Caro-
line ,was invalid and all his successors ineligible to the
throne ; but is that precisely so ? Would not the recogni-
tion of that marriage as legal in repeated acts of Parlia-
ment legalise it under any circumstances whatever
Spectator.

OLD INHABITANTS.—Of the 5,081 patients in luna-
tic asylums in Scotland at the beginning of the present
year, 292 had been there for more than 20 years, 63 for
more than 30 years, and 12 for more than 40 years. One
will next year complete half a century in a madhouse.
WHO'S YOUR DOCTOR ?-1101IISON'S PILLS.