The Sun.
London, England, 1845-01-14 00:00:00

the strength and protection of its worst errors. It was
not merely a question of the amount of good which was
to be done by retaining the Bible in its proper place in
the education of the poor—though it would have been
painful to give up this means of doing so much good to
the Roman Catholic children, to whom (commended as
they are in so many ways to their sympathies) the
clergy, in general, have the power of doing so little;
but there was still a graver question of the amount of evil
which would result from the change, and the part which
the clergy were to take in effecting it. The principle of
the sufficiency of the Holy Scriptures,' as it is main-
tained by our Church, is a fundamental principle of the
most momentous importance. It is by means of it that
truth has been guarded and handed down to us by those
who have gone before us. And it is by means of it we
are to preserve this deposit of truth, and to defend and
transmit it, pure and unmutilated, to those who are to
come after us. While, on the other hand, it is by re-
jecting this principle that the Church of Rome is able
to retain and to defend its errors, its superstitions, and
its usurpations. It is well known that our Church exacts
from all its ministers an express declaration of their
belief of this great doctrine, and a solemn promise that
they will regulate their ministrations in conformity with
it. And the steady maintenance of it is still further
bound upon our clergy, when they are, by God's Pro-
►idence, placed in circumstances in which they have to
carry on a continual contest for the truth—not merely
for the deliverance of those who are in error, but for the
preservation of those who are more immediately com-
mitted to their care—and in which it is plain that their
prospect of success in either object depends altogether
upon their adherence to this principle, and that when it
is in any degree allowed to become obscure or doubtful,
in the same degree the cause of truth is weakened, and
that of error strengthened in the land. And they could
not doubt that if they connected their schools with the
national system, and thereby entered into a compact to
dispossess the Bible of the place which it had hitherto
occupied in them, they would be, in the eyes of the
young and the old of both communions, practically ad-
mitting the false principles of the Church of Rome, and
submitting to its tyranny, and abandoning the great prin-
ciple of their own Church, concerning the sufficiency and
supremacy of God's Holy Word.
" It would seem that the board,`,to which the manage-
ment of national education is committed, has not been
insensible to the force of this grand and primary objec-
tion. It changed the offensive, but true ground, on
which the exclusion of the Scriptures from its schools
was originally placed, for another which was more spe-
cious and popular ; and parental authority was brought
in to occupy the post at first assigned to the authority of
the Church of Rome. Those who were acquainted with
the state of the country knew that there was no real
objection on the part of Roman Catholic parents, speak-
ing generally, to read the Bible themselves, or have it
read to their children, but the contrary. And, in fact,
when ecclesiastical authority was first exerted to put
down scriptural education in the country, it had to en.
counter very stubborn resistance from parental autho-
rity—a resistance whieh undoubtedly would have been
successful, if it had been aided, as it ought to have been,
by the St ate. But a renewal of this;struggle was not to
be looked for. However true it be that Roman Ca-
tholics in general would prefer that their children were
taught the Bible, this desire is seldom so enlightened or
so strong as of itself to arouse them to a contest with
the authorities of their Church. Under former
systems they resisted the despotic power which
forbad their children to read the Bible, chiefly
because their submission to it would have involved
the loss of an improved method of secular educa-
tion. But when, in consequence of the establishment
of the National System no such loss could ensue, it was
not to be expected that any considerable number would
persist in opposing the mandates of the clergy, or that
the latter would find any difficulty in constraining the
parents, from whom they were able to withhold the
Bible, to forbid the use of it to their children. This
being the case, it must he felt that, under all the modi-
fications which have taken place in the rule, the matter
remaiLed in substance and fact unaltered ; and that the
parental authority which is put forth so prominently, is
really the authority of the Church of Rome, exercised
on and through the parents of their children.
" It is still further to be considered, that parental
authority, like civil and ecclesiastical, and all other
lawful authority, derives all its force from the authority
of God ; and therefore can possess none, when it is
exerted in opposition to the Divine authority on which
it rests. And although a child, who, from tender years
or false training, is unable to see clearly the opposition
which may exist between his parent's will and the will
of God, or to apprehend its effect in releasing him
from the duty of submission, is not to be instructed
or encouraged to resist the authority of his parent,
even when it is unlawfully exerted ; yet that
parent has no right to require others, who clearly
perceive this opposition, and understand its effects, to be
his instruments in enforcing an unlawful exercise of his
authorily over his child ; and others have no warrant to
become his instruments in such a case. The distinction is

obvious. Our clergy wfluld, and ought to abstain from

any direct efforts to excite resistance, or even to en-
courage it on the part of a child, until they had good
grounds for regarding that resistance as intelligent and
conscientious. But they could not recognise such an
exertion of parental authority, as if it were lawful, and
lend their assistance in enforcing it. So that, even if it
were voluntarily exerted in forbidding the Bible to be
read, our clergy could not consent to bind themselves to
aid in giving effect to such an unlawful command.
But when they regard the parent as himself in bondage
to the usurped authority of the Church of Rome, and as
not exercising his own free will, but obeying as a pas-
sive agent, in binding the same yoke upon his children,
the duty of refusing to co-operate with him is

clearer. The clergy -may be able to do but little
towards delivering their Roman Catholic country-
men from such bondage, but they can at least keep
themselves free from th guilt of becoming instruments in
rivetting its chains upon them ; and this, accordingly,
they resolved to do . in which resolution—as in all that
they have done in this matter—they had the full con-
currence and support of the lay members of the Church.
" The exclusive appropriation of the Parliamentary
rants for education having left the Church destitute of
its accustomed aids for the instruction of the children of
the poor, the clergy and laity, to supply the want which
had been thus created, united in forming the Church
Education Society for Ireland. The immediate and
chief object of this Society is to afford the means of re-
ligious education to the poorer children of our own com-
munion. But an earneat desire being felt to extend the
benefits of the ;schools to other communions also, not
only is the freest access given to all, but everything is
done which can be done consistently with principle, to
take away every hindrance to their availing themselves
of the advantages which they afford. While the reading
of the Bible forms a portion of the business of the
schools, in which all children, when qualified, are ex-
pected to take a part, the formularies of the Church are
required to be learned by none except the children of its
own members. And although the attendance of Roman
Catholic children at the schools of the Church Educa-
tion Society fluctuates considerably, as ecclesiastical
authority is more or less actively exerted to restrain it ;
yet on the whole there appears no room to doubt that
united e a.ucation has been effected in a much higher de-
gree in tt e schools of this Society than in th ,se of the
National Board.

" The very limited resources of the Society, however,
being inadequate to the full attainment of its objects,
diocesan and other petitions were presented to Parlia-
ment, praying for such a revision of the question of
education in this country, as might allow the Established
Church to share in the funds appropriated to the educa-
tion of the poor. These petitions having been unsuc-
cessful, the operations and wants of the Church Educa-
tion Society were is the same way brought before the
Legislature, with the view of obtaining a separate grant
for the maintenance of its schools. And afterwards, an
application was made to the Government, soliciting that
the Irish part of the United Church might be allowed to
participate with the English in the grant of money from
which the latter annually draws support for a system of
education in conformity with its own principles. These
appeals have been hitherto unsuccessful, but we cannot
bring ouselves to think it possible that the striking in-
equality of the measure which has been dealt towards
the Established Church of this country in the important
concern of education, and the great hardship of the posi-
tion in which it has been thereby placed, can fail ulti-
mately to attract towards it such fair consideration as
may procure for it due sympathy and redress. We, on
the contrary, entertain a confident hope that, whatever
be the hindrances which have hitherto obstructed that
fair consideration, they are but temporary, and that they
will pass away, leaving the Government free to afford
the assistance which is greatly needed by the Church
Education Society, and to which its objects and its cir-
cumstances give it so strong a claim.
" To all, then, who are interested in the maintenance
and extension of the schools of the Church Education
Society, we recommend steady perseverance, and the
employment of all suitable effimts to bring its case calmly
and effectively before the public. And we cannot believe
that our brethren in the faith in England will look on
with apathy, while the Church in this country, faithful
to its high office as a witness and a keeper of Holy
,Writ,' is struggling, unaided, to discharge its most pres-
sing duties, first to the children more immediately com-
mitted to its care, and then to all whom God has placed
within the sphere of its influence. But this will be as
God pleases. Let it be the aim of those who are en-
gaged in this sacred cause, by His help to do His will,
leaving the issue of their labours—the time and measure
of their success—altogether to His wisdom. And let us
not be weary in well-doing, for in due season we shall
reap, if we faint not.'
" JOHN G. ARMAGH.
" CHARLES KILDARE.
" ROBERT P. CLOGHER.
" J. KILMORE, &c.
• RD. DOWN and CONNOR and DROMORE.
" S. CORK and CLOYNE.
" LUDLOW KILLALOE and CLONFERT.
" J. T. OSSORY and FERNS.
" ROBERT CASHEL, &c.

" January, 1845."
The following prelates have withheld their signatures
from the protest :—The Archbishop of Dublin. the
Bishops of Meath, Tuam, Limerick, and Derry.

REPEAL.—THE EIGHTY-TWO CLUB.
The Freeman's Journal contains the following:—" It
is no slight evidence of the approaching maturity of a
party, to find the principles of that party commingling
themselves with the social re-unions of the elite of its
members ; but what will those who have chanted the
dirge of Irish nationality say, when we tell them that 1
over one hundred gentlemen—some men of rank and
property, all men of social position and refined and cul-
tirated tastes, many of them not members of the Repeal
Association—have, under the title of The 'B2 Club,' 1
a title hallowed by the most glorious associations, adopted I
as their charter toast The Legislative Independence of
Ireland;' as their costume, the national green ; and pro-
mulgate, as their profession of faith, That. the object of
the Club is to facilitate the repeal of the mum], to secure