Luxemburger gazette. [volume] (Dubuque, Iowa) 1871-1918, 1893-11-21
Archbishop Hennessy's Address
ON TIE
SCHOOL QUESTION,
AT TIE
WORLDS FAIR, EDUCATIONAL DAY,
SEPT. 2, 1898.

upon the subject, as well as from the
practice Of the Church in her schools for
children.
To obtain a clear and correct idea of
education, it is necessary to consider
who is to be educated, his condition, his
destiny, the means and aids provided to
attain it, and the obstacles in the way,
If any. God and man and their relations
TO one another must be considered, also
the dignity of man, his fall, and that of
the angels, and the effects of both on
him, the mysteries of the Incarnation
and Atonement, the institution OF the
Church and its purpose, her mission, her
prerogatives and possessions, and the
result of her labors. All these are so
closely related to the question of educa-
ton that without a thorough consdera-
ton of them the subject itself cannot be
understood, nor it's Importance and diff
Guilty duly appreciated.
God made all things for man and man
for Himself. He made him in His own
image and likeness. He created him in
grace, the masterpiece of omnipotence.
Everything else He made by a word in
an apparently careless manner, man by
the joint effort of the three divine per-
sons after consultation over their work.
In creation made up of spirit and matter,
substances by their nature far removed
one from the other, man is the bond be-
tween them and also the link in the
chain OF beings by which
o DRAWS ALL THINGS TO HIMSELF
and holds them together in the mystery
of the Incarnation. In the Church he is
a new creature. A member of the mys-
tic body of Christ, the temple of the
Holy Ghost, a sharer OF the divine ma
ture, an adopted son of God, a brother
and co-heir of Jesus Christ. His nature
in the persons of our Lord and His
blessed Mother occupies the highest
place in heaven next to God. The edu-
cation Of such a n should be, as indeed
it is, exceedingly important. Mar is
not as he came from Gods hands. He
is fallen by his own fault. Oh, what a
fall! Who will measure its depth and
the ruin it effected. The terrible SEN
tence of two-fold death, death OF soul
and death of body, pronounced by God
on man, such a sentence as human ears
never heard, and the mode OF reparation
adopted by Him, throw a lurid light on
the terrible wreck. God might have
forgiven the outrage, He might have ac-
cepted any reparation and reinstated
man. He did not do so; He demanded
full satisfaction and that of man, the
offender. Hence the need of a man who
could make an infinite atonement and
thus satisfy the most rigorous eXactions
of Divine justice. After Gods Son had
descended to the depths of our degrade
ton and by a sort of humiliation of self
become M OF us, q sigh, a tear, a pray
er, a wish of His. would have satisfied
Justice. yet was His life demanded to
mark the anger of God and the enormi-
ty of the outrage. Thus did sin take
the life of God incarnate, as it had at
tempted to do from the beginning, but
attempted in vain till he put on a body.
God annihilated himself, as it were, to
come in contact with our humanity that
He might seize it with both His hands
to lift it, God dead in the effort to rein
state it, serves to show, if anything can
show US, the depths of our degradation
and misery in His eyes. Add to this
the wicked work of the fallen angels.
Their anne is legion they are Of all the
choirs of the hierarchy; they are intelli-
gent,
CUNNING, DECEPTIVE, TiRELEss AND
UBIQUITOUS.
They hate God with all the intense
m~alignity of their depraved condition,
and this hate, impotent against him, is
turned on man in all it's fury, to thwart
and defeat, as far as in them lies, the
reparation in him of Gods image and
likeness. "The devil goeth about like
a roaring lion, seeking whom he may
devour," says st. Peter, and st. Paul
says our wrestling is not with flesh and
blood, but with pr~incipalities and pow-
ers. Thus revelation teaches us the
spirit and mission of the rebel angels,
whilst the records of history and daily
experience attest aloud their ruinous
success. BY order of the Holy Father,
every morning after Mass the priest
prays to st. Michael to defend us in the
day of battle, to be our safeguard against
the wickedness and snares of the devil,
and by the power of God TO thrust down
to hell the wicked spirits that seek the
ruin OF souls. To repair the ruin of our
nature, to help us defeat the machina-
tions of the evil one, to guide h~omewards
men of good will, God instituted His
Church and enriched her with His mer-
its. The work assigned her and faith
fully performed by her is eminently that
of education.
To educate is to draw out and develop
the latent or feeble powers OF u given
subject in relation to its end. Man be-
longs to God and was made to enjoy His
society forever. Soul and body he should
tend towards his destiny. In his soul
there are various faculties, namely mem
DRY, imagination, intellect, free will, also
appetites. The soul and all these pow
ers should live and work for God. They
have a beginning, a growth, a develop
ment. To aid this growth, to advance
it and direct it to its proper end, this is
education. Any action on the soul or on
any of it's powers or faculties that has
not this aim is not education, bu. the
reverse.
EDUCATION BUILDS UP y TO
PERFECTION,
/ never obstructs or pulls down. ed
dcation," says Webster in his dictiona-
", 'is properly to draw forth, and i'm
piles not so much the communication of
knowledge as the discipline of the intel
lect, the establishment of the principles
and the regulation of the heart. Instruc-
ton is that part of education which fur
nishes the mind with knowledge" An
integral education" says Johnson in
his cyclopedia, must include at least
five branches,-physical, moral, intel
l~ectual, aesthetic and religious. The
tendency" he says, lis to remove all
purely religious teachings from all insti-
tutions of public instruction, leaving it
to the family and the Church. Hence
the great development of the Sunday
School," Education, according to both,
embraces a religious element. "To fur
nish the mind with knowledge is but a
part OF education" says Webster, who
seems to lay stress on the principles that
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