The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1842-12-16 00:00:00

education in the Corporation Sch

enemy was by the active c

vative auxiliaries, the rem]

Jeration of some Uor

is the triumph of principle and the r

diency; the ascendancy of truth over

errors of cornorolnis

There is a lesson in the majority of Wednesday

ill have an effect in certain quarters wl

', tor it

axation

'e such an

intimation was necessary.
We congratulate our fellow-to'

men on this fur-

ther victory, not only on account of the stable founda-
tion on which it rests, but on account of its practical
utility. It will shew the opponents of scriptural edu-
cation that the Bible is more than a match for their

lophistries however ingeniously reasoned ; it will con

vince them that truth not only will prevail, but that it

has prevailed

We congra;u

4nlate the country, too, upon

the issue of this confli

t, because there is now no hope

for the religious education of our poor juvenile popu-
lation being assailed by masked infidelity through a

Liverpool medium

The debate

vas long, and not destitut

of the ani-

mation which usually pervad

s oratorical warfare ; but

there was little or nothing advanced in the course of it

to call forth special remark. The speeches of Mr.
North and Mr. Samuel Holme, which are given in full

elsewhere, were the principal features in the discussion.
Both took the very highest grounds, and both pro-
duced the best effect. Mr. North's was full of vigorous

eloquence, with a mixture of graceful sarcasm. That
from Mr. Holme, advocated the authenticity of the

Scriptures, and impressed upon 'the council the practi-
cal inferences of that authenticity. The combination
of the two produced a strong feeling—and, indeed,
after Mr. Holme's had concluded the effect was so
great, that the cry of " Vote" wasimmediately obeyed.
On the other side the question there was only one
address worth notice, and that was the expanded ora-
tion of Mr. Blackburn, who seemed to be speaking
against time. He asserted that the Bible was not ab-
solutely necessary in the schools, because the children
could not avoid collecting a great deal of moral and
religious information from their copies and their ordi-
nary reading books. This is an idea so puerile, that
we wonder how the mighty mind of Mr. Blackburn
could retain it. All we can say to it that if it is worth
while to sanction the teaching of the disjecta membra
of religious truth, it must be much more worth while
to sanction the teaching of the whole. He also stated
that by Protestant principle he understood only uni-
versal charity, peace, and good will. Very true, those
virtues enter into and form a component part of Pro-
testant principle, as we recognize it ; but is there
nothing more ? Why, what does the very name de-
note ? Does it not exhibit to us, besides the virtues
enumerated, the primary duty of protesting: against
error ? Mr. Blackburn, then, has no valid claim to
the title of Protestant if he admits only the least part
of its meaning. We are not Protestant because we
profess to have the Christian graces, although to be a
genuine Protestant includes them, but because we pro-
test against all error which militates against the great-
ness and the majesty of our God and our Redeemer.

It is somewhat curious that the majority which
rejected Mr. G. H. Lawrence's famous amendment,

of our

3 worthy