The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1844-09-24 00:00:00

CHURCH OF ENGLAND SCHOOL SOCIETY.

The Rev. Hugh M'Neile preached a charity sermon,
on Sunday morning, at St. Jude's church, in aid of the
Church of England School Society, upon the merits and
origin of which he enlarged at some length. He reminded
his hearers that it was established in consequence of the
municipal authorities of the town having introduced the
Irish system of education into the Corporation schools
and persevered with a continuance of that system, despite
the remonstrances and entreaties of the Protestant portion
of the community. It was, he said, under such circum-
stances that himself end others of the clergy had felt it
their bounden duty to come forward and expose its hol-
lowness and call upon the Christian public to establish
schools in which the unrestricted use of the word of God
should be recognized as the distinguishing characteristic.
Had the Irish system been introduced into seminaries for
the education of the children of the wealthy and influential
classes of society the clergy would not have interfered,
because they considered those classes fully competent to
form a judgment as to the soy t of instruction, temporal and
spiritual, which it was desirable that their offspring should
receive; but, when that system had been introduced into
schools for the education of the children of the poor, it
became the manifest duty of the clergy to put the public
on their guard. The consequence was, that, though they
failed in producing any effect upon the municipal body,
they succeeded in arousing the town to a sense of the
danger, and, as the result, the Church of England School
Society was established. In the outset those schools
were most liberally supported ; but now they were de-
manding efficient aid, He regretted to think that they
were not upheld, at present, with the same generous hard
as at the' outset of their career. Some of the original
subscribers had " fallen asleep ;" their successors had rot
considered it their duty to continue the annual subscrip-
tions; the church subscriptions, which originally amoun'ed
to £550, had, last year, fallen to £200; and, notwith-
standing the expressed wishes of the rectors and committee,
some of the local clergy (why, he knew not, they best
knew themselves) would not, he believed, make any
collections in their churches for the institution in the
present year. In all there were twelve schools in con-
nection with the Society, and the average attendance
was 1,880 children. He earnestly hoped that failure in
the end would not ensue : if it did, it would cover the
original promoters of the scheme with disgrace, as far as
failure could do so. He called upon the Protestant public
of Liverpool to remember, that this institution was the
banner under which the battle for scriptural education was
fought and won; that this was the Ebenezer they had
set up ; that this was the column they had erected; and
that to sustain this banner, to maintain this Ebenezer,
and to repair this column was their bounden, their in-
' cumbent duty. The collection, at the close of the ser-
mon, amounted to £53 18s. Charles Kemble, Esq., was
amongst the audience.