St. Paul daily globe. [volume] (Saint Paul, Minn.) 1884-1896, 1890-07-13
NO AGNosTICIsM THERE,

NO AGNOSTICISM THERE.
The statement is made upon high
clerical authority that our public school
system is the hot-bed of infidelity, and
that its whole tendency is toward the
spread of a demoralizing agnosticism.
Is it true? This is most serious ques-
ton, and should be considered thought
fully.
To-day the common school is the pop
ular American idol. The people hold
it in more veneration than they do their
household gods. and it is exerting more
influence upon American character
than press and pulpit combined. Hence
it becomes, "a matter of most serious inn
portance to determine whether or not
the influence radiated from the common
school is elevating or demoralizing in its
tendencies.
We deny the proposition submitted
by Archbishop IRELAND, in his address
before the educational convention last
week, that the exclusion of religious in
struction from the public schools neces-
Sarily encourages the growth of infidel-
iGy; but before entering upon discus
sion of this question we wish to empha-
size the fact that in their idolatry of the
common school system the American
people are blind to many of its defects.
Among other things they are permitting
it to become so top-heavy there is actual
danger that the whole structure will
topple over. In their ambition to build
up system of higher education they
are sacrificing the interests of the COM
mon schools. In thus removing the
structure from its original foundations
they menace the perpetuity of the sys-
tenn.
But to return to our argument, we
deem it duty to Yindicate our existing
educational methods from the charge
that they are breeders of infidelity.
The common school systemsis part and
parcel of the machinery of state gov
eminent, nothing more, nothing less,
and operated for wise and useful pur-
pose, just as we operate any other de-
partment of our complex political
machinery. 1t would be just as reason
able to demand that religious instruc-
ton be made part of the duties of the
railway commission as that lt-be incor-
porated III the state schools. Both are
organized and operated for secular
purpose exclusively, and when either
passes beyond the domain of secu-
larism it gets beyond the reach
of state control. Under our Pc
o,,1ior nf
eminent the state has no right to
NEEDLE in any matter where conscience
is involved. The very purpose for
which free government was established
on this continent was to secure to the
Individual citizen the freedom of con-
science in all matters of social, politi-
cal and religious nature. For the state
to attempt to establish any sort of re-
liglous instruction in any department
of its governmental machinery would
be subsersive of the very object for
which our government was founded.
So that whatever may be the effect or
tendency of our educational system in
regard to religious matters, the state
has neither the power nor the right to
change it's attitude in this particular.
There is no middle ground, no c0mpro-
mise; for the secularism of the common
schools must be maintained, or the syS-
TEN must be abolished. That is the
only alternative that can be presented.
We fail to see why the acquisition of
secular knowledge, the only knowledge
the state has the right to impart, should
tend to lnfidelity. Religion is an in
herent trait of human nature, common
to all races. 1t is as true to-day as when
HORACE wrote it: "You may pitchfork
Nature out, but she will ever return"
1t is impossible to eliminate the relig-
ious element from man, and if our
educational methods embodied course
of agnostlcism to be taught in the
schools, it would fail to turn mankind
from a belief in God. The Creator of
the Universe has too indelibly i'm
pressed Himself upon His works to adj
NIT of the conclusion that He can be
obliterated from the minds and the
hearts of men.
It is a denial of Gods omnipotence to
assume that it is necessary to invoke
the power of human government in
order to establish His power and do
minion The fact that men reject
dogma is no evidence that they are ire
ligious. If the spread of seoul
knowledge has tendency to eliminate
dogma, then it is all the more proof that
dogmatic faith ought to be eliminated.
The mistake that is being made by many
who advocate religious instruction in
the public schools is that they confound
dogma with religion. and wish to es-
tablish human creeds in place of the
laws which God Himself has written
upon the minds and hearts of mankind.