Fort Worth daily gazette. (Fort Worth, Tex.) 1882-1891, 1890-04-12
TRUE EDUCATION.
A Comparison Of the Common Schools
and Schools not Common.
To Have Government Of For and By the PEG.
pie, the Voter Must Understand the
Needs of the Whole People.

/ COMMON SCnOOl, IN comparison WIN hi
| schools not common consists in the COM
munity life there awakened and nour-
ished, which makes up the indispensable
! foundation OF q republican form OF gov
eminent. In order TO vote justly and to
make good laws, and to exercise the
| right influence one must have an abiding
sense of the character aud needs of the
| people Of whom he forms an integer and
for whom he lives. In order to have a
| government ''of the people, for the
people and by the people, 1.-THE sovereign
unit of the people, the voter, must un-
derstand the needs of the whole people.
Thus the social factor in q republican
education stands above all other factors
in importance No course of study,
however elaborate, no methods or teach
ers, can instruct pupils in their dLties
toward all without the presence in the
school OF q representative of all grades
of society, and of all phases of religious
and political thought. The common
school is the practice and preparation
school of the nation; it is the govern
menr in embryo; the infant republic.
Virtue becomes living and active only by
yirtuous acts The poor are not cal
ways with a high class private school.
Human sympathy, which springs from
mutual understanding, lies at the fOun-
datiOn of our government, and the gar
den and nursery of that sympathy and
understanding is the common school.
The real danger of all schools not COM
mon below the college, both parOehial
and private, is the segregation of one
class of children in q community. The
product of such segregation is lack
OF true sympathy - misunderstanding.
Glass building has for it's inevitable Sc
quence dislike, hate and bigOted intOl-
erance, all of which make q true demo-
cratic feeling impossible. There is no
danger whatever in the religion per 50
taught in any private school; the sole
danger springs from the lack of active or
applied religion, which consists in the
doctrine taught by the Master: ''Little
children love one another. y Convincing
proofs of the effects of segregation Of
classes are not far to seek-they fill the
world 8 history.
indeed, the segregation OF classes in
the same community has always been the
one tremendous problem Of all absolute
monarchies and centralized governments
in the preservation of their power. So
long as civilized opinion allowed it, the
simple ana cheap plan of keeping the so
called Flower classes III utter ignOr-
ance produced the desired result. When
Germany, the first nation to lead, gave
her people public education the difficulty
became far greater. It was overcome,
however, by class schools making free
kind of pauper school called the ''VOlks
ShuIe. - Thus, the stratified condition
OF the people, upon which alone u mon
archy can rest, was perpetuated. Com
mon schools would change any monarchy
on earth into q republic in two genera
tons. A people can be intellectually
educated by segregation out of all
sympathy for each other.
Moral or true education is only posi-
Bile in schools where the demands are
constant for the exercise of every virtue
known to the highest Christian or ethical
life. Our fOrefathers, with q divine
preseience, laid the foundations of the
one system of schools that can in any
way overcome the bigOtry, intolerance
and hate that have filled human life with
misery, and made history the record of
one long, bloody struggle.
No one can cross the line into Cdnada
without feeling the sharpest change in
the moral atmosphere. The air Is filed
with intense sectarian hate that looks
and feels like war. Canada has excel
lent public schools but they are not COM
mon. In a fatal hour the government
divided the school fund between Catho-
lies and Protestants, and the result is
that the one thing that children learn
with all their hearts is TO hate the other
side. 1t is readily seen that q republic
of Canada is impossible Just so long
as this sad state of things continues.
Either the means Of democratic growth,
the conditions for strong central power
or internecine war must come.
To any student of progress our own
nation furnishes countless examples of
the effect of common schools. A few of
the most evident may be given.
Fifty years ago believer in woman s
suffrage was looked upon as the rankest
kind of a fanatic, al abolItiOnist not eX-
cepted. To-day there are few inteIH-
gent men in this great nation who do
not believe that women have as much
genuine right to vote as men; there are
exceptions, to be sure, and it would be
TO know whether such men
ever attended mixed schools. What has
wrought this wonderful changer Sitting
and working side by side, boys and girls,
in the common schools. All the elO-
quence of an Anthony, a Stanton or a
Willard cannot equal the immense prae-
Llcd1 NdiUC VI sCuOOA AAACs
where the equality of the sexes IS praeti-
cally argued day by day and week Dy
week.
1t would be hard to find Catholic IN
this country, the son or grandson OF an
educated in our common
schools (ard there are millions), who is
not Jealous supporter of our common
school system. II is a great mistake to-
suppose that the majority of Catholics
are opposed to common schools and it is 8
still greater mistake TO think that any
religion is at the bottom of the opposi-
ton to common education. The Oppo7
sition is a genuine product of old world
ideas, ideas that have dominated tho
world for ages. II has its origin deep ii
the roots of time. II IS the representa-
tive on this continent OF central govern
ment versus democracy. The aristo-
Gratis, parvenu and hereditary, carry
on the same exclusIyeness by privata
schools. IL is unfair 70 put the burde1
Of opposition upon Catholic Every pa
rent who has son or daughter too good
to mix with the 90 oi pOlloi is a prae