The weekly Minnesotian. [volume] (Saint Paul, Minn. Territory) 1852-1858, 1856-02-02

The Modern Abominu.ion Of Fee schools.


a fan3ticsms and free follics, free farms FIRE
labor, free nigeers, free society, free WILL fire
thinking free love. free wives, free childrel
AMI free schools. all belonging to tie sam
brood Of damnable isms whose mother il
, Sin and whose daddy is the Devil-are al
TIE PROGENY OF that prolific monster whic!
greeted Satan, Oh his arrival at the gates q
hels-wkica
--'.S-eE, d woman 10 the waist and :a,r
bat ended foul in MANY scaiy rrId
Voluil nous and sasf. t r.,rr.I
with mortal strE about her 1aicd.. rouni
A cry of heil-hoGnds Hever caasng barsei
VIII wide, Cerberesn M ,utis full loud many
hideous peal; yet when they list woud creep,
| II aught disturbed their noise into her womb.
AMI kennel there; yet there still tarked and howled
Within unse \ y =
But tie worst Of all these nominations
because, when once installed, it becomes the
lot-5ed propagation of all-is The nsoaeqn sys-
tenn Of free sch5ols. We forget who it is that
has charged and proved that the New Eng
land system of free schools has been the
cause and prolific source of all the horrible
infiielities and treasons that have turned her
cities into Sodoms and Gomorrahs, and her
falr land into the common nestling-place of
bowling badlamites. We abominate the sys-
tenn because the scholars are free, and because
they make that which ought to be the re-
ward of toll, and earnest, and almost super
human individual effort, cheap, common
place, priceless and uninviting. AS there is
no roy4I road to learning, So there ought to
be no mob road to learning.
A little learning is a dangerous thing
to the Individual, to society, to learning it.
self. to all conservatism of thought, and all
stability in general affairs. The sole func-
ton OF the fiee-schocl is to supply the 0little
learning; )" and thus it is charged to the brim
with iliccndiarisms, hegesies. and all the eX-
plosive clements which uproot and rend and
desolate society.
Free schools are only another namc for
GoUe7naaeaG schools and both natural and
revealed law make it the duty of tic parent
to educate his children, and not the duty of
Government. 1t is as much the business of
tie father to instruct tie mind of the child
as to ELL its belly; and it is no more the
duty of Government to furnish free educa-
ton for children than free soup, free butter
milk, and free bonnyclabber-no more its
duty to furnish governesses and redagogues,
than grannies, wet nurses, and baby,jumpers.
1t is the duty of parents to support and
nurture their children and if the task is
burden to them they are apt TO fOrego the
having Of children at all-which is much
better than havin. children to lie bun
died OIL upon the cold charities of the public
for nurture and instruction. It is alike their
duty to educate their children in the rudi-
ments of knowledge, and if they feel them
selves unequal to the burden, in this case too
they will be apt to forge the having of chill
dren. The responsibility of parents for their
children is the well-spring of parental hap
pincss, and every effort to divcst them Of it
dries up the home affections. undermines the
institution of the family, fills society with
reprobate ruffians, and approximates the
nature Of the human species to that of the
brutal and careless crocodile, which deposits
its eggs upon the sand, leaves them to be
hatched by the sun, and the brood to be
reared by the tender mercies of the ele-
ments.
Care and anxiety arc the sources of affec-
ton; and as you divest parents of these for
their children, you cut the tie by which God
has bound the home circle. 1t is the duty
of the parent to nurture and instruct his
children, and it is the duty of the Govern
ment to make the people do this, as much
for the parents as the chldren's good
When you destroy the recollection of the
Child, the youth or the man, for mother and
for father, upon what an awful abyss of IL
centiousness and crime do you not launch
him? Shall the State IN the name of benev-
olence or any other name under heaven with
iron grasp, tear the infant from home, father
and mother without ncurring the vengeance
Of outraged Nature? Whom God las Joined
together, let no man put asunder.
Our Virginia fathers establi she'd the best
system Of government which ever the wit OF
men conceived; and every departure from
their system has involved us in labyrinths OF
trouble. They handed down to us three in
stitutiOns as distinct as the Godhead, and
each alike essential to the well-being of soci-
ETY.. They hedgcd each of these institutions
around with strong barriers, to prevent their
mutual interference or entanglement and in
every instance in which modern "reform''
has leveled one of these barriers, have we
had deep and lasting reason to repent the
vandal impiety and FOLLY. These institutions
are:
l. The Federal Government charged with
tie entire and exclusive management of ma
tionll affairs.
2. The State Government, charged with
the entire and exclusive control of municipal
Affairs:
3. The domestic plantation government
charged with the entire and exclusiyeeknan-
agcMent OF OOmcStlC AFFAIRS.
l These three institutions--.hc Con!edera-
ton, tie State and the Family-our fathers
planted as distinct, independent, sovereign
and sacred institutions. In proportion as
we have restricted each within its sphere at
the South, we have enjoyed blessings Of
peace, quiet, stability and conservatism. To
the respect we have paid them at the South
do we owe all those favorable conditions in
our society which have distinguished our lot
from that of tie afflicted, beleagured and be-
deviled North. To the fact that tie North
have not appreciated or upheld the family in
stitutio&5but allow the State to invade it
with Free Schools, anti-Liquor Laws, Incor-
porated Factories, and thousand and one
associations" of males and of females, for a
thousand and one specious and absurd pur-
poses-are attributable ali the social disor-
ganization and decentralization which have
blghted as a moral Sirocco every square mile
Of its surface.
i Terrible are the ravages and ruthless the
inroads committed upon "The Family" by
the improvements and empiricisms of the
Northern States Children look elsewhere
. than to their parents for the right of instruc
ton, and sustain to them but the animal re
lation of pups to the bitch that has weanet
them. The trades take off the bov to b,
reared by the task-master mechanic, or t.
become an apprentice of the factory and
! companion of the machine. The factory en-
tices away the girl from genial and virtu
'oas home, to become . stranger, hircline