Sacramento daily record-union. [volume] (Sacramento [Calif.]) 1875-1891, 1880-05-22
DIR. pLArr AND THE PUBLIC SCHOOLS.

W e print to-day a leIIer lroni III. ID ~
in regard to the question of religion in the
public schools. 1t will be seen that he
favors the abolition of the State system OF
education, and the substitution for it of
sectarian schools. He proposes, sPe-
officially, that the State should con6ne
itself to the maintenance of primary
schools, and would have no tax levied
"for any school higher than the primary
Yet he admits that this arrangement does
not satisfy him This is not altogether as
q would have it, for the Church ought to
"have access to children in their earliest
''school days, and keep it, and in most
cases would have it." Here we have the
admission that DR.. Platt really believes IN
the complete control of education by the
Church and that though be is content to
leave the State the primary schools, he
only offers this compromise because he
thinks it would not prevent the Church
from securing most of the younger chill
dren also. This is a very serious topic,
and we shall treat it with due gravity.
DIR. Platt has flung down the gauntlet and
denounced the American public school
system as prejudicial to the best interests
of the country He claims that the
Church, not the State, ought to have the
supreme charge over the education of the
- "A 20 II an, +boE ba ,,aano x,ha
he says he has deliberately advised parents
to remove their children from the public
schools. In the name of freedom of intel
lectual development, of true progress and
civilization. we accept this challenge, and
we undertake to prove that Dr. Platt's
position is wholly untenable; that it is
ininlical to Liberty; that it is calculated
to foster wretched and debasing supersti-
lions alone and that his methods could
only issue in the degradation of the people,
and in the production of a race of foolish,
credulous, priest slaves, incapable
of advance and expansion, bigoted as
Spaniards, and stagnant as Chinese. And
in the first place we will ask why it is
that he wants the Church to have control
of youthful minds, and why he is not will
ing to let religion be put upon the same
basis as science in the educational course !?
His answer to this is that 60 Science per-
g tains to material phenomena, and the
colder the mind the better; religion per-
''tains to the feelings and sentiments, and
"the younger the mind the better" Dr.
Platt ought not to require to be told that
this is mere verbiage, and no definition,
much less an explanation. The truth is
that he wants the Church to have control
of the youthful mind because he knows
that such beliefs as the Church deals in
can only be implanted upon passive and
plastic mind, being so contrary to expe-
rience, and so deficient in evidential sup
port, that minds which have been trained
in the ethics of belief of necessity
reject them. Religion in the young,
ne says, SIS love, trust, and
awe, apart from any Judgment of
g the reason, but which is afterwards sub
united to the reason" Religion in the
young, that is to say, is blind, IN
questioning acceptance of whatever fam
tastes and fables are presented to the crude
childish mind. Being so accepted without
question, these beliefs become settled habits
of thought, and the time, with the major
ity of such victims, never comes, when the
creed is fairly submitted to the reason.
The habit of regarding certain matters as
true, without any investigation, will in
capacitate even the strongest intelIects
from subsequent scientific analysis of these
beliefs, and this is why SO many otherwise
Discriminating men have found it possible
to retain the grossest superstitions side by
side with the most advanced scientific
knowledge. The Christian missionary who
goes to India finds no difficulty in detect
ing the fallacy of the religions he there
encounters. He smiles in conscious su
periority at the idea of the immaculate
conception of Sakya Buddha, at the le-
gendary history of Krishna, at the reputed
miracles and supernatural interferences.
And he marvels how it is that men should
credit such conspicuous and undisguised
fctions, and is all the time blind to the
complacent and illimitable credulity in the
same direction illustrated III his own per-
son and mission