OCR Text |
Show MORALS AND PUBLIC SCHOOLS. Every once in a while some acute observer discovers dis-covers that the public schools are defective either in omission of educational necessities or commission commis-sion of educational faults; and whenever any critical crit-ical study of public school systems is made by a qualified critic he is sure to place emphasis upon the neglect of the spiritual side of the pupils or upon the dissipation of energy through fads and fancies which are unessential to true intellectual development. The most recent wail, one truly pathetic because of its hopelessness, comes from the Rev. Gilbert P. Jennings of Cleveland, a minister who cannot be accused of friendliness toward the parochial school or of hostility to the public school idea. Mr. Jennings Jen-nings deduces from his observations that the pupils of the state are being taught so many branches of knowledge that they learn none of them well. "I do not mean to say," declares the preacher, "that it is because of the incompetency of public school teachers that this is so, but it is because of the system under which they are working. "They are given so many minutes for this subject, sub-ject, and so many for that, with the result that when students complete the course they have a smattering of many subjects and no, enough of any one. "This condition of affairs is growing worse every year. The public school supervisors are introducing in-troducing subjects into their schools which do not benefit the students mentally, and that take time from the more important branches. Athletics and the study of higher branches are given more attention atten-tion every year. At present in the public schools there are actually more supervisors engaged in these unnecessary branches than there are in those studies which are supposed to benefit a student most when he has taken up his work in life." Mr. Jennings might have gone much further and applied his comment truthfully to any public school system in America. He might have said that the moral and spiritual fddo of the child's nature is totally neglected in the public schools; neglected, not by accident or by lack of facilities, but by design, de-sign, as though it were a crime to teach morals to children. He might have said, also, that the boys and girls who survive the national education system sys-tem emerge from their schools without any clear conception of their duty toward their fellow men or toward their Creator although they are duly impressed ' with their duty toward themselves and the necessity for getting their full share of the world's comforts if they can out of the struggle for life. Imagine the result of a system which supervises the child's drawing, his spelling and reading, his mathematics, his very physical exercises, and pays no attention to the growth of his soul, his attitude toward the Divine law and his obligations to his fellow creatures. No wonder the thoughtful men of the nation deplore the grovHh of materialism and selfishness and desire for physical gratification of desire. No wonder that the children of today 4 " - miiiiI m mm .a. ..m '.'iV li... .' jl ", urn , ..I. in i , ; grow up to regard the moralities as a small part of their duty to the Divine Father. Xo wonder, still, that the one significant outcome of state-aided education ed-ucation minus spiritual instruction and guidance is a deplorable disregard of such obligations as come with perception of the spiritual law applied to every-day affairs. The finest mind in the world, trained to the last degree in the arts and sciences, given every opportunity oppor-tunity to develop along intellectual lines and equipped for the struggle with the world would yet be imperfectly educated if it had been given no spiritual uplift by instruction and preparation for the higher life of the soul. There are no fads in morality; either right or wrong governs, and the perception as to what is right and what is wrong, the power to choose the right, the fine inspiration which furnished this power these are infinitely more valuable in education than any other instruction instruc-tion and training that may be given. Man's mind is a wonderful factor in his growth and in the world's great achievements; but man's soul is so much greater, its power is so much more wonderful, wonder-ful, its destiny is so much more important than the ultimate attainments of the mind that it is nothing less than criminal to neglect it as the public pub-lic school system does. The ministers and laymen of undiscerning mind know that something is wrong with the state's system sys-tem of education, but they do not get to the root of the matter. Fads are wrong as any dissipation of energy is wrong; top-heavy supervision is wrong; a multiplicity of studies is wrong. But if all these faults were corrected the great wrong, the fatal defect of the system would still remain so long as the public schools of the country omit the education of the soul while they teach the mind. Therein lies the radical difference between the Catholic conception of education and the national system; and therein lies the reason for choosing the Catholic schools for Catholic children no matter mat-ter what the comparison between them may be in other unessential details. |