Dangerous Schools

Dangerous Schools.—With reference to their danger to faith, schools are of three kinds:

(a) sectarian schools, in which heresy or infidelity is prescribed as part of the curriculum, and assistance at non-Catholic rites is required. Examples are colleges and universities supported by Protestant denominations, sectarian Sunday schools, Bible classes;

(b) neutral schools (i.e., schools in which all religious teaching is forbidden and no recognition given to any denomination) whose spirit and teaching in secular branches is anti-religious or anti-Catholic. Examples are non-sectarian colleges or universities in which materialism is incidentally taught, or in which the faculty are freethinkers or bigots;

(c) neutral schools in which no positive offense is given to religion or the Church. Examples are public schools in which only the profane sciences are taught, and care is exercised that neither the text-books nor the teachers shall be irreligious or interfere with the religious beliefs of others. Reducible to this category are mixed schools, that is, those which are open also to non-Catholics (Canon 1374).

The danger of the foregoing kinds of schools to the faith of pupils is as follows:

(a) in the sectarian schools there is danger of heresy or infidelity, since the pupils are obliged to hear the defense of false doctrine and to join in the services of a false religion;

(b) in the neutral schools of an anti-religious spirit the danger is the same, for the pupils must attend courses in which the interpretations given to history, science, philosophy, letters, etc., are unfriendly to the faith;

(c) in the neutral schools whose spirit is not anti-religious, there is a danger of Indifferentism that arises from the system itself; for the very fact that religion is slighted tends to impress the students with the idea that it is unimportant or unrelated to other matters of life, and this prepares the way for doubt and scepticism. Moreover, since example teaches more effectively than the printed or spoken word, the neglect or contempt of religion by professors and fellow-pupils in mixed schools is a danger to faith.

The lawfulness or unlawfulness of attending or patronizing schools dangerous to faith must be decided according to the principles given above on the occasions of sin (see 263 sqq.).

(a) If the danger to faith is voluntary, the use of such schools is not lawful, for those who are able are bound to seek or provide religious education both in elementary and higher schooling (see Canon 1373). Example: In the town of X there are good parochial and Catholic high schools. Sempronius could easily send his children to these schools, but he thinks that certain select schools offer greater social and financial advantages, and so he chooses them. His conduct is not lawful.

(b) If the danger to faith is necessary, the use of such schools is lawful, provided the needed precautions are duly observed. Example: In the country district of Y there is no school except the public school, and therefore Balbus sends his children to that school. His conduct is lawful, but he must see that his children receive religious instruction outside of school.

The danger to faith is necessary when there is no Catholic school, or none that is sufficient for the needs of individual students, and their parents are unable to send them elsewhere. In such a case it is lawful to attend a school that is neutral, but means must be used to make the proximate danger remote. Such means are the following: (a) religious instruction must be taken outside of school, as in special week-day classes, Sunday school, home study, etc.; (b) special attention must be given to the strengthening of faith on those points that are attacked or slighted in the neutral school; (c) parents, guardians, or others responsible must see that the reading and the associates of their wards in the neutral schools are good, and that they are faithful to their religious duties.

Is attendance at non-Catholic schools sometimes unlawful, even when there are serious reasons in its favor?

(a) It is unlawful, if the schools are sectarian, and then no excuse can justify such attendance; for, in addition to scandal and cooperation in false worship, there is present a proximate danger to faith that is not made remote. Parents or guardians who knowingly send their children to schools for education in a non-Catholic religion are suspected of heresy and incur excommunication ipso facto, reserved to the Ordinary (see Canon 2319). Example: Titus sends his daughter to a sectarian academy because it is nearer and cheaper than the Catholic academy. He claims that she is old enough not to lose her religion, that opposition will make her faith stronger, etc. Titus’ arguments are fallacious and his conduct gravely sinful.

(b) Attendance at non-Catholic schools is unlawful, if the schools are neutral in theory, but so dangerous in practice that loss of faith is practically certain if one attends. Example: Balbus sends his son to an undenominational university which is regarded as a hotbed of atheism, and whose students practically to a man lose all religion.

Absolution should be denied in some cases to those who send their children to non-Catholic schools, if they refuse to change.

(a) Absolution should be denied on account of lack of faith in the parents themselves, if they send their children to non-Catholic schools on account of their own ideas that are contrary to the teachings of the Church. Example: Sempronius refuses to send his children to parochial schools, because he thinks each one should judge about religion for himself, and not receive it from instructors.

(b) Absolution should be denied on account of the danger caused to the faith of the children, when the children are sent to sectarian schools, or when they are sent to neutral schools and sufficient efforts are not used to counteract the evil influence there felt.

(c) Absolution should be refused on account of scandal or cooperation in evil, if, while the parents themselves are sound in faith and prevent all danger of perversion of their children, they send them to non-Catholic schools without sufficient reason, to the grave disedification of others, or the great assistance of unchristian education.

Absolution should not be denied in the following cases: (a) when the parents have a sufficient reason for sending their children to non-Catholic schools (i.e., a reason approved by the local Ordinary as sufficient). It belongs only to the Ordinary to decide in what circumstances and with what precautions attendance at such schools is allowable (Canon 1374; for application to the United States, see Holy Office, 24 Nov., 1875; Council of Baltimore, III, n. 199, in regard to elementary and high schools. As to colleges and universities, see S.C.Prop.Fid., 7 Apr., 1860; Fontes, n. 4649, Vol VII, p. 381; n.4868, Vol. VII, p.405; also S.C.Prop.Fid., 6 Aug., 1867); (b) when the parents have no sufficient reason, but there is no lack of faith on their part, no danger of perversion of the children, no grave scandal or sinful co-operation in evil.

The presence of Catholics as teachers in non-Catholic schools is beneficial, since it lessens to some extent the evil influence of such schools; but there is also the danger that it may cause scandal or create the impression that attendance at Catholic schools is not necessary. Hence, it has been permitted by the Church in certain cases but only when danger of scandal or wrong impression is absent. (a) The secular sciences may be taught by laymen in non-Catholic schools of higher or lower education, if there is no scandal, no unlawful cooperation, and no immediate danger of perversion. (b) Christian doctrine may be taught by priests to Catholic students of neutral schools, either in the school building or elsewhere (as in a church), and certain priests may be appointed as chaplains for this work (Sacred Congregation of the Holy Office to Bishops of Switzerland, March 26, 1866).

In our times the school is a most fertile field both for good morals and sound religious doctrine and for the corruption of all morality and religion. All the enemies of the Church, plainly recognizing this most powerful efficacy of the school, with united forces strive that the Catholic faith and religion be rooted out from the minds of adolescents. Hence it is plainly evident what vehement dangers arise for adolescents from attendance at bad schools.

Non-Catholic schools are of diverse kinds: 1. positively non-Catholic and harmful, in which heresy or infidelity is openly and deliberately taught. Such are the so-called confessional schools of Protestants and unbelievers; 2. neutral (simultaneous, parity, mixed), which in instruction abstract from every positive religion and provide only profane instruction.⁷⁴

⁷⁴ Proposition (48) of the Syllabus, condemned by Pius IX, must be attended to: "To Catholic men that plan of educating youth can be approved which is separated from the Catholic faith and from the power of the Church, and which regards only the knowledge of natural things and the ends of earthly social life alone, or at least primarily" (Denz. n. 1748).

528. Principle. It is never licit to attend schools in which the proximate danger of perversion cannot be removed.⁷⁵

The reason is obvious; for it is not licit to expose oneself to the proximate danger of perversion. - Almost always positively non-Catholic schools introduce such proximate danger of perversion, because in them heresy is deliberately defended, pupils are compelled to recite heretical prayers and to be present at false rites. Hence it is not licit except in great necessity to attend such non-Catholic schools, and indeed with necessary cautions having been posited.

Nor are neutral schools always free from proximate danger of perverting adolescents. For in those schools almost necessarily indifferentism is fostered in the hearts of the pupils, who see teachers and fellow-pupils not caring much about religion or even openly attacking it. Besides, the dignity of religion is diminished in the minds of adolescents if they see it, as lacking public honor, relegated within domestic walls. Then not rarely also the good morals of the pupils are placed in great danger, since it is most difficult without the help of religion to restrain disordered passions so vehement in youth. From this it is clear that even in neutral schools proximate danger of perversion is often present, and therefore attendance at them is evil. Hence deservedly the Plenary Council of Latin America, celebrated in the year 1899, decreed:⁷⁶ "Therefore Catholic parents and guardians of pupils, with every authority by which we have power, we not only exhort but command, to keep away the offspring committed to them from schools in which the authority of the Church and the salutary influence of our religion are excluded, unless perhaps the circumstances are such that, for a sufficient cause approved by the bishop and with opportune cautions and remedies, attendance at schools of this kind in particular cases and for a time can be tolerated." Similar things the Roman Curia established on repeated occasions.⁷⁷ - From these things it is clear that judgment concerning the quality of a school and concerning the sufficiency of causes pertains to the Ordinary of the place, and not to anyone else. Thus also the Code of Canon Law, c. 1374, expressly decreed.

It can scarcely be said in which neutral schools the dangers of perversion are greater: whether in primary and secondary schools, or in Academies and Universities. Nevertheless, since today there are few Catholic Academies and Universities, more easily because of dire necessity are young men excused who attend neutral Universities and Academies. Parents who without sufficient reason send their children into neutral schools sin gravely and are not worthy of absolution. The reason is that they expose their children without sufficient reason to danger of perversion.

The means by which the proximate danger of perversion can be removed are: a) diligently to watch lest Catholic pupils suffer harm from bad books, bad fellow-pupils, irreligious teachers; b) to instruct Catholic pupils sufficiently from elsewhere in religion and good morals; c) to induce Catholic pupils to frequent reception of the sacraments and to a pious life.

⁷⁵ In almost the same words the Instruction of the Sacred Congregation of Propaganda Fide to the bishops of the United States of North America, November 24, 1875, approved by Pius IX, speaks about this matter: "But unless this danger of perversion is made remotely proximate, such schools cannot be attended with a safe conscience. This even the natural and divine law itself proclaims."

⁷⁶ n. 667.

⁷⁷ The cited Instruction of the Sacred Congregation of Propaganda Fide; Instruction of the Holy Office to the bishops of Switzerland, March 21, 1866; Cod. iur. can. c. 1374.

529. Offices in non-Catholic schools. Here the question arises whether a Catholic can licitly undertake the office of teacher or inspector in schools of this kind, non-Catholic or neutral. - In every case a proportionately grave cause is required so that a Catholic can cooperate in those schools so dangerous. In higher schools and in Academies and Universities today in mixed regions a sufficient cause can quite easily be present for a Catholic to assume the office of teacher. Hence in Germany, England, Switzerland, Holland, America, etc., we see distinguished Catholic men as teachers in neutral Gymnasia and Universities. But in Catholic regions, if scandal arises from undertaking such a function, it is not licit for a Catholic to be a teacher in schools of this kind. But in positively non-Catholic schools and in neutral primary schools a Catholic very rarely and not except from a very grave cause can licitly assume the office of teacher, since he is accustomed to cause grave scandal, to furnish cooperation to evil, and to cast himself into danger of his own perversion.

"Whether it is licit for a priest to hand down specially the documents of Christian faith to Catholic pupils of [neutral] schools, whether within their enclosures or elsewhere, as when they have been called together in a church for this, or to perform for them any function of chaplain (aumonier)?" The Holy Office on March 21, 1866, responded: "Affirmatively, and according to the mind: the mind is that care is to be taken that not only priests but also honest laymen of known religion, so far as this can be done, be placed over the schools for handing down Christian faith and also other disciplines; but so that every fear of scandal may cease, the people must be admonished that this is done so that the evils which flow from schools of this kind may be averted as far as can be done; and that this consequently ought not be an excuse to anyone for not sending their children to purely Catholic schools, in which their faith and morals are in no way endangered."⁷⁸

⁷⁸ Collect. de Prop. Fide n. 1286.

Concerning this question, on June 30 (Wednesday) in the year 1875, there was given by the Supreme Congregation of the Universal Inquisition an Instruction to the Most Reverend Bishops of the United States, which Our Most Holy Lord Pope Pius IX, on November 24 (Wednesday) of the same year, deigned to approve and confirm. Indeed I have found nothing in this Instruction by which those things which I taught on this matter in the first and second edition of this Compendium, and in the little work cited at the bottom of this page, are weakened. Yet since those things which proceed from the Roman See have that authority against which it is forbidden to resist, in this edition also of my work I have judged that extracts from this Instruction should be exhibited to readers (p. 471 (b) of this Volume), with certain notes added, by which beginners, confessors, and pastors of souls may be helped to understand it rightly and apply it prudently. - But in this place we resolve the following cases, sufficiently obvious in this region.

435. • Case I. Parents cannot be absolved who hand over children to public schools to be instructed, in which they are compelled to use a Protestant version of the Bible, or to recite hymns or prayers of sects. For faith is not only exposed to danger in schools of this sort, but the precept of confessing the same faith is also violated, or certainly is judged to be violated, through a certain communion in sacred things. Cf. Conc. Plen. Balt. I.³

Case II. Generally parents cannot be absolved who commit children to public schools to be instructed in which, either because of teachers, or because of books, or because of fellow students, their faith or morals are exposed to proximate danger. For they are of the number of those schools which the Holy See, in letters of July 14, 1864, to the Archbishop of Freiburg in Breisgau, declared cannot in conscience be frequented anywhere.

I say: generally they cannot be absolved, because of the exception concerning which we shall treat below.

Case III. Universally parents cannot be absolved who entrust children to public schools concerning which it is unknown whether they are of the number of those about which we spoke in Case II. For it is established that public schools nowadays among us commonly constitute proximate danger because of some one of the three positive causes indicated in Case II; therefore a presumption militates against them; and this presumption yields only to truth, that is, to certainty that this or that public school can be tolerated as not positively harmful. For in moral matters judgment must be made according to what commonly happens.

436. • Case IV. Unless otherwise they sufficiently provide for the Catholic instruction of their children, parents cannot be absolved who hand them over to public schools to be instructed, even if certainly not proximately dangerous, in those places and adjuncts in which they can commit them to some Catholic school. For the precept of instructing offspring as Catholics is not only negative, or prohibiting lest they be committed to proximately dangerous schools, but also affirmative, namely prescribing that some means, and an apt one, be employed by which Catholic instruction of this sort may be obtained. But parents of whom there is question in the case are supposed to neglect or not to employ a means of this sort. Therefore they cannot be absolved.

I said: 1) Unless otherwise they sufficiently provide for the Catholic instruction of children. For a Catholic school, although it is the best and ordinary means for obtaining this end, nevertheless is not the only one; therefore parents cannot be compelled under denial of absolution to employ precisely this means, supposing that on one side the public school is not proximately dangerous, and on the other that the children are sufficiently instructed in Christian doctrine either by the parents themselves or by others. But whether that instruction can be judged sufficient which is handed on once in the week in Sunday schools, or by the priest in church, will have to be judged from the adjuncts. For less suffices for an intelligent and diligent child, especially if he has parents by whom he is duly stimulated and helped in learning, so that he may arrive at a congruent knowledge of Christian doctrine, than for one undiligent and left to himself alone. Yet generally, and according as the condition of things is in most places, this single instruction in the week must be called insufficient.

I said: 2) In those places and adjuncts in which they can commit them to some Catholic school. For there is no obligation of impossible things. But in the matter of which we are treating, not only that which cannot be done physically is called impossible, but also that which cannot be done morally, or without grave difficulty. You have a case of the former, or of physical impossibility, in places in which, or in whose near vicinity, no Catholic school is had; or, if there is question of poor parents, in places in which Catholic schools either are not free, or are absent, or are not present in sufficient number. An example of the latter, or of moral impossibility, occurs in parents for whom that which they earn by daily labor scarcely or hardly at all suffices for bearing those double expenses which civil power exacts for public schools, and the Church for Catholic ones.

437. • Case V. Parents cannot be absolved who, without a proportionately grave cause, commit children to some public school, although not proximately dangerous, in those adjuncts in which this cannot be done without grave scandal. Suppose, for example, a Catholic man conspicuous among his fellow citizens by wealth, authority, or any other cause, in whose parish a Catholic school coexists with some public school. This man, if by his example, and especially if, as is customary for such persons, by praises also directed to the public school, he would induce others either to desert the Catholic school or not to approach it, would certainly be guilty of grave scandal, and consequently not to be absolved.

Yet I said: who without a proportionately grave cause would commit children to a public school, although not proximately dangerous, and this because of the exception concerning which we shall treat below.

Case VI. It can be doubted whether parents can be absolved who commit children to schools in which a Catholic teacher, from some Protestant version of the Bible (which nevertheless the children do not use), reads aloud only those things which are conformable to the Catholic version. And indeed the reason for doubting is that he who uses a Protestant version seems both to acknowledge its authority - since he is judged to read it aloud as the Word of God - and to propose it to children as a norm. Yet if either the children are unaware that he uses a Protestant version, or from the explicit protestation of the teacher, or from the adjuncts, it is sufficiently clear that he does not acknowledge its authority and acts in this way compelled by hard necessity, I would deny absolution neither to the teacher nor to the parents; for then the reason for doubting brought forward will no longer subsist. Yet I suppose that the school is not to be avoided for other causes, and I assume that the benign mind of Mother Church is not to wish to urge the prohibition of Protestant Bibles in such a way that in those adjuncts also in which her law would become harmful it would not be licit even materially to hold them in the hands, so that those things which are conformable to Catholic Bibles may be read aloud from them.

438. • Case VII. What if children are compelled to recite hymns or prayers of sects, but only such as contain nothing heretical, for example the formula of the Lord's Prayer with the addition: "for thine is the kingdom," etc.?

Parents who hand over children to be instructed in schools of this kind cannot be absolved, if hymns and prayers of this kind are employed as the object of a religious act, and not, as hymns often are, as the object of recreation or of natural doctrine. Yet attendance of a school of that sort could be permitted to children who would abstain from every cooperation in these prayers and songs; for by acting thus they would protest against them. But who would expect this from children?

Case VIII. What if children, in places where there is no supply of a Catholic school, could not even learn the art of reading or writing unless they are sent to some public school? I answer by distinguishing. If the children are taught in some school which is not proximately dangerous, absolution cannot be denied to the parents. But if, because of one of the causes indicated above in Case II, it is proximately dangerous, it will again have to be distinguished and the case resolved according to the principles of a necessary proximate occasion. Namely, either the danger which threatens the faith or morals of the children can be rendered remote from proximate, and in reality is rendered remote, or not. If the former, they will be able to be absolved; if the latter, they will not be able. Yet in children that danger can only with greatest difficulty be rendered remote from proximate, since that tender age is almost always imbued with the principles and morals of those whose teachings they constantly hear, or whose familiarity they use. I confess indeed that it seems rather harsh that children be deprived of the opportunity of learning the art of reading and writing; for this is of greatest moment to them, especially today, not only in any social condition which they will sometime obtain, but it can also be very useful to their faith and piety. But if that art cannot be learned without damage to faith or morals, the words of Christ the Lord in Matthew¹ hold good: "What doth it profit a man, if he gain the whole world, and suffer the loss of his own soul?" St. Alphonsus² resolves an analogous case in the same way, treating of girls who would be taught the art of reading and writing (privately, of course) by men. "Nor should the confessor indulge these girls," he says, "that they be taught to read by men, and much less to write. How many simple girls, who learned to read, have bewailed the ruin of the soul!" Therefore he teaches that neither are mothers to be absolved who would permit this.

439. • Case IX. What if children cannot learn in some Catholic school those things the knowledge of which they will sometime need in their social condition, for instance some language, commercial accounting, mechanics, chemistry, medicine, jurisprudence, and other things of this kind? The case occurs either because no Catholic school is present in which children are taught these things, or because that school cannot be approached except with expenses to which the parents are not equal.

The response given to the preceding case holds entire for the present case. Yet judgment concerning the lesser or greater possibility of removing danger will necessarily be various according to the various adjuncts. Thus in adolescents who are going to devote themselves to higher disciplines in some non-Catholic school, there must be considered not only a stronger or weaker character, and a mind protected more firmly or less firmly by the principles of Religion, and also childhood passed honorably or less honorably, but also the lesser or greater care, vigilance, and authority of parents; and likewise the distance of the place in which he applies himself to studies from the paternal home. For the farther the son's residence is distant from the dwelling of the parents, the more difficult it will be for them to watch over him and to exercise authority and influence upon him. Attention must also be given to the condition of the school itself and of the place, since this renders the danger more or less proximate, or increases or diminishes the difficulty of removing it. Finally, the greater or lesser gravity of the cause by which parents are impelled to hand over children to schools of this sort for instruction must be kept before the eyes; and, with all these things weighed, confessors will have to be either stricter or more benign with parents of this sort. In a word, the solicitude of Holy Mother Church concerning mixed marriages is to be held as the norm by confessors. For just as she never permits those marriages unless precautions have been employed by which the Catholic instruction of the offspring to be born from them is secure, so also confessors should in no case permit children to be committed to schools where the proximate danger of perversion is not removed; and just as absolution is to be denied to the Catholic party who is at fault that offspring is not instructed as Catholic, so also it is to be denied to parents who by their own fault either expose or leave exposed offspring in schools of which we are treating to danger as to faith or morals. Those things which we have said are consonant with what the distinguished Craisson writes in the periodical Revue des sciences ecclesiastiques,¹ and likewise with the Statutes of the Synod of Columbus, 1873.

Case X. If, the non-Catholic father compelling it, a child is committed to a public school to be instructed, the Catholic mother will be able to be absolved even in the case in which the school would be proximately dangerous, provided: 1) she yielded only to violence; 2) she opposes according to her powers the depraved influence of the school; 3) she has care, according to her ability, for the Catholic instruction of the child. Thus almost the praised Synod of Columbus.

440. • Those things which we have said concerning absolution to be denied or not to parents who commit offspring to public schools hold also, proportion observed: 1) concerning Catholic teachers teaching in them; 2) concerning those who are being instructed for the office of teacher sometime to be undertaken in public schools; 3) concerning all who have care of souls and are not solicitous, according to their power, concerning the Catholic instruction of youth; 4) concerning Catholic curators of public schools (members of the school-board). It is helpful to note a few things concerning each.

1° Teachers cannot be absolved who in school use, or read aloud to children from, books which are dangerous to faith or morals, or recite with children hymns or prayers of sects, or order children to recite them. There are some who secretly substitute a Catholic Bible for the Protestant version of the Bible, or certain Catholic sheets, or in books which they are compelled to use and which are not expressly opposed to Religion, amend depraved passages either by opportune explanation or omit them; and these, with those things observed as to Bibles which I said above n. 437, do not seem to be disturbed.

2° Resolve the same concerning those who are being instructed for the office of teacher sometime to be undertaken in public schools, unless they firmly propose, in undertaking it, to abstain from those things from which we just said a Catholic teacher ought to abstain. But if they do not seem likely to be tenacious of this purpose, they are earnestly and prudently to be exhorted that they should rather give themselves to another office or art.

3° Those who have care of souls ought diligently to weigh these words of the Second Plenary Council of Baltimore:

"The Fathers of this Plenary Council cannot but voluntarily acknowledge and openly profess that the care to be spent on forming the more tender age and adolescence in Christian morals is to be counted among the principal parts of Pastoral solicitude; and this the more, in proportion as the present enemies of our Religion strive to bring all their arts together, that they may deprave the minds of the young even from their first age."¹

Wherefore pastors are admonished:

a) "That with every zeal by which they are able, they provide for the Christian and Catholic education of Catholic children, and diligently watch lest they use a Protestant version of the Bible, or recite hymns or prayers of sects. Therefore it will have to be watched lest books or exercises of this sort be introduced into public schools, with danger to faith and piety. But everywhere constant and moderate resistance must be made to these efforts of the sects, with the aid of those who have authority to apply an opportune remedy implored."¹

b) That, since this seems to remain "the best, indeed the only" remedy "by which the gravest evils and inconveniences" which are accustomed to exist from public schools "may be met," "in each diocese, near almost every church, schools be erected in which Catholic youth may be imbued both with letters and liberal arts, and with Religion and upright morals,² ... and if there shall be need, and the adjuncts of things allow it, let pastors provide" that from the revenues of the church to which the school is annexed, suitable teachers be had in it.³

c) Let them also "seriously admonish parents" "that they watch more and more over their offspring, and diligently consult and labor earnestly for its right instruction; that they piously conspire with their Pastors, and generously pour out their resources, so that Catholic Parochial Schools may be erected and sustained as quickly as possible."⁴

d) "But since in all parishes exclusively Catholic Schools cannot yet be had because of narrow circumstances, ... Catecheses and Schools of Christian doctrine should be instituted. Let Pastors call boys and girls into their own church on Sundays and other feast days, and sometimes even more often, so that they may studiously and diligently teach them the elements of Christian doctrine."⁵ "Nor should he" (the pastor) "execute this office through others, as the more negligent are accustomed to do, but by himself. For the burden of instructing children in the rudiments of Christian faith is so joined with the pastoral office that he who from sloth or idleness is unwilling to bear it, or casts it back upon others, can in no way avoid the penalties of violated office. This is recalled to memory in express words for all to whom it pertains by the Fathers of the preceding Plenary Council."⁶

And these things indeed, as is plain of itself, are of such a kind that if any one of those who have care of souls should neglect, or be unwilling to furnish, even one of these things - may it be absent! - he would have to be held unworthy of absolution. For what parents are bound under grave sin to furnish from the office of piety, this certainly pastors of souls are bound to furnish from justice. Nor indeed can it be conceived why it would be licit for a confessor to be more benign with a pastor of souls than with parents. For the rest, in many cases it will be difficult for the confessor to judge what a pastor of souls can or cannot do in the special adjuncts in which he is placed, and the penitent will have to be left to his own conscience. Yet woe to this man if, as to this his most grave office, he shall have deceived himself!

4° Unless a founded hope is present that by their influence they will render them notably less damaging, Catholic curators of public schools which are proximately dangerous cannot be absolved; but of the rest, they cannot of themselves be called unworthy of absolution, indeed they are worthy of praise if they accept or retain the office for this end, that books and teachers which are dangerous to the faith or morals of Catholic children may be kept far from the school. For the rest, this class of men in some places causes pastors much work, and generally brings no little detriment to the Church.

When the so-called public schools must be deserted as proximate occasions was said n. 435. The cases to be treated here pertain chiefly to Catholic colleges, schools, etc.

1460. - The dangers of schools can be reduced to two principal classes. For some are found within the schools themselves; others while boys approach them, or return home from the same. Concerning these latter dangers it must only be said that depraved companions are to be avoided by young persons, and that a grave obligation can fall upon parents of procuring that under the custody of some upright man the children approach school and be led back home from it; for there can be a very great danger lest the children be wholly perverted, if on that occasion they are left without custody.

1461. - Dangers of the former kind - some have place because the teachers themselves furnish scandal to the disciples, or at least are touched by no care concerning the morals of the disciples; - but others, although the teachers are upright and satisfy their own duty.

In the former hypothesis, the gravity of the danger standing, ordinarily there is one remedy only, namely either to desert the school, or, if there is question of a Catholic school, to open the matter by oneself or through the parents to the Pastor; or, if of a public [school], and a remedy is hoped for thence, to some one of the school Trustees, or to another who can provide.

In the latter hypothesis, as if, e.g., a boy is tempted by some companion sitting at his side, recourse must be had to the teacher for a remedy.

1462. - This obligation is much more present if the author of seduction were bringing scandal to several other fellow-disciples, unknown to the teacher; for then there would be question of public scandal, which can be so damaging that it must be impeded even with grave inconvenience. - This rule is valid not only for schools, but also (and much more) for colleges, seminaries, etc., and St. Alphonsus openly adheres to it.

1463. - Query. Is a disciple who is in no way tempted by a fellow-disciple, but himself from his own frailty tempts the fellow-disciple, and, other means having been tried in vain, is placed in continual danger of sinning, nor can contain himself because that fellow-disciple sits at his side, held to reveal his own frailty to the teacher, so that he may change the place for the aforesaid fellow-disciple?

Note. The resolution to be given is valid also for similar cases perhaps occurring in colleges and seminaries, as, e.g., if a collegian or seminarian from his own weakness is placed in danger on account of another collegian or seminarian remaining in the same room. Say the same of a young man or girl who cannot withdraw himself or herself from grave danger unless by revealing his or her own frailty to the father or mother, etc. These things having been noted:

Resp. Before all things the confessor must weigh whether it is to be presumed that the Superior can and wishes to apply that remedy; and in the affirmative case it must also be weighed whether the remedy can be applied so cautiously that the penitent is not going to suffer public infamy. For if public infamy of this kind were going to arise for a penitent enjoying a good name, he could not be compelled to undergo such infamy, because in such a case there would be question of a necessary occasion. But if the whole inconvenience consists only in revealing one's own frailty to the Superior, then the confessor must weigh whether such a revelation constitutes a grave or light inconvenience. Without doubt there are cases in which a revelation of this kind cannot be made by the penitent without the greatest and extreme difficulty, as if, e.g., he enjoys great esteem with the Superior, or is very timid and ashamed; for shame can be so great that some would choose rather to be damned than to manifest their own sin to such a person, as St. Thomas wrote: whence it is no wonder if several are going to have a most grave difficulty in manifesting a shameful sin to the Superior, and much more to father or mother, with whom they must converse daily. But while this great difficulty stands, the penitent is not to be obliged to undergo so great a burden, because then there would be question of a necessary occasion. Sometimes, on the contrary, he would have to be obliged to this revelation, because sometimes cases are given in which a revelation of this kind can be done sufficiently easily, e.g. if other sins of the same kind of the penitent are already known to the Superior; if the penitent has an open temperament and one easy for manifesting sins; if it is easy for him by letters or through a third person to render the Superior more certain concerning that matter, etc. Nevertheless the confessor, as much as possible, will avoid taking upon himself the burden of denunciation of this kind.

Caius, a Catholic merchant in a certain large city of England, sends his son daily to a neighboring non-Catholic school. There is indeed a Catholic school almost equally near, in which an almost equally good education in letters and sciences can be had, as successful results in public examinations attest; nevertheless Caius, although asked by Julius, the parish priest, does not wish to send his son to it, because the non-Catholic school is more distinguished in fame and name, and also more celebrated for the number and condition of its pupils. In these circumstances Julius doubts whether he ought to keep Caius from the sacraments of the Church. Hence it is asked:

1. What are the obligations of parents toward their children?

2. What power does the Church have concerning the education of the faithful, and whence does she have it?

3. What does the Church teach concerning education in non-Catholic or mixed or neutral schools?

4. What is to be said of the case?

1. See answer to this question in “Manual of Moral Theology,” vol. i, p. 274.

2. See this question answered above, p. 212.

3. What does the Church teach about education in non-

Catholic or neutral schools?

The Church teaches that such education is in the highest degree dangerous to faith and morals; that, as a rule, it is gravely sinful to send a child to such schools for education, and that only necessity can make it lawful, provided always that the dangers be made remote and the defective religious training otherwise supplied. The declaration of the English bishops, Sept. 17, 1905, was given above, p. 213. In answer to a question put by Cardinal Vaughan concerning secondary non-Catholic schools in England, the Sacred Congregation of Propaganda, Jan. 23, 1899, wrote: “The frequentation of public schools of this kind can not be without a grave danger to faith and morals, or be held consistent with the use of those means which the Church properly prescribes for the sanctification of souls; and that therefore an obligation is incumbent on Catholic parents, not to expose their sons to this grave danger.” See “Tablet,” June 22, 1901, p. 991. Other declarations of the Holy See and of the bishops are given in Fourth Council of Westminster, decree 17, and in the Third Plenary Council of Baltimore, pp. 99, 279.

4. The case. Caius, a Catholic merchant of a large city in England, sent his son to a non-Catholic day school, though there was an equally good Catholic school as near. Julius, his parish priest, asked him why he did not send his son to the Catholic school. Caius answered that the non-Catholic school had a better reputation and that the number and standing of the boys were higher. These reasons do not justify Caius in his action, all the less because it may give scandal to others. But as was said above (p. 214) Julius should not deny him the sacraments without consulting the bishop.

Let us now suppose the young men educated under the present Public School system fairly launched into the world, and, for the first time, thrown on their own resources. They are all well, indeed over-educated. The greater part of their families are necessarily in poor or moderate circumstances. Will their learned and accomplished sons take the humble and laborious trades or occupations of their fathers? I fear not. We should not expect more from human nature than there is in it. All these fine young public school graduates cannot get nice situations as clerks, professors, editors, teachers, etc., etc., and the professions are all full to overflowing.

You must remember that, as I have said, not one of the boys have ever been taught the first principle, prayer, or moral duty. They are, as far as the Public School-training went, perfectly ignorant of the Divine law as rule of our life; they are, in fact, but educated apes or animals. How can this young man reconcile "poverty and wealth," "labor and ease," "sickness and health," "adversity and prosperity," "rich and poor," "obedience and authority," "liberty and law," etc., etc. All these are enigmas to him, or, if he affects to understand them at all, he thinks they arise from bad management or bad government, and can and ought to be remedied by repression or sumptuary legislation. He will be a tyrant or slave, a glutton or miser, a fanatic or libertine, a sneak-thief or highway robber, as circumstances may influence him. Think you that the common "fall back" on principle of self-interest—well or ill understood—will ever restrain such a one from doing any act of impulse or indulgence, provided he thinks it can be safely done? He will look on life as a game of address or force, in which the best man is he who carries off the prize.

He will look upon power as belonging of right to the strongest; the weak, or those who differ from him in opinion, he will treat with contempt and cruelty, and will think they have no rights he is bound to respect. In power, such a man will be arbitrary and cruel; out of power, he will be faithless, hypocritical and subservient. Trust him with authority, he will abuse it; trust him with money, he will steal it; trust him with your confidence, and he will betray it. Such a man—Pagan and unprincipled as he is—may nevertheless affect, when it suits his purpose, great religious zeal and purity. He will talk of "Philanthropy" and the "Humanities," have great compassion, perhaps, for "a dray-horse," and give the cold shoulder to the houseless pauper or orphan.

The heart of such a man is cold, insincere, destitute of every tender chord for a tender vibration, of every particle of right or just feeling or principle that can be touched; on the contrary, it is roused to rage, revenge and falsehood if interfered with. How is such a heart to be touched or moved, or placed under such influences as could move it? Indeed, it would require a miracle! Nay, even a miracle would fail to make a salutary impression upon such a heart. A French infidel declared that, should he be told that the most remarkable miracle was occurring close by his house, he would not take a step out of his way to see it. Pride never surrenders; it prefers rather to take an illogical position than to bow even to the authority of reason. Furious, beside itself, and absurd, it revolts against evidence. To all reasoning, to undeniable evidence, the infidel—the man without religion—opposes his own will: "Such is my determination." It is sweet to him to be stronger, single-handed, than common sense, stronger than miracles, than even the God who manifests Himself by them.

Such a man is always in favor of strong government, provided he can get to run it. He will talk loudly of loyalty and the "life of the nation." He worships the State, because, to his gross animal understanding, it represents power, and makes money his God, because it gives him this power. Such a man may be called civilized, but he is only an accomplished barbarian. His head and hands are instructed, his heart, and low passions and appetites, unbridled and untamed. Such a man can never be made to understand the beautiful and benign principles of our republican form of government. Like all brutes, he relies on force, and tries and judges every issue by success. What he calls "the final arbitrament of arms" is to such a one a righteous decision, provided always it be in his favor. He may affect the demagogue, and talk loudly about the power of the people, but you will observe that this refers to them en masse, in the whole or concrete. He cannot understand the individual man as entitled to any consideration or rights (unless he happened to be made rich) independently of the State. Indeed, he looks upon poor men as made for the State, and it can be only on this ground that he claims the children as its property—"children of the State"!! He insists on educating them by the State, and for the State, and not for the comfort and support of their fathers and mothers, nor that they should thereby fulfil the immortal destiny for which they were created. He holds the life, the dignity, the comfort or happiness of the family or individual as nought in the balance against "the life, the power, the wealth and glory of the nation." "Perish the People—live the State"; this is his motto, and such have ever been the principles and motto of all Pagans from the beginning.

What I have said in the preceding chapter is but a faint picture of the bad effects of what is called polite education, as given in the Public Schools, on the male portion of society. It is with some reluctance that I am now going to trace the same evil influence in its still more injurious consequences on the female portion. It is very difficult to treat this part of the subject with the necessary freedom, not only on account of its intrinsic delicacy, but also because of that false (and indeed to themselves injurious) idea that there is nothing wanting to the absolute perfection of our women.

Let it not be said, that in calling public attention to these evil consequences on the female portion of the community, we are overstepping the boundaries of propriety or decency. There is a license for the poet; a license for the stage; a license for the bar; a license for the writer of fiction; a license for the press, and why should there not be a license for a Christian writer? It is high time for true modesty to take the place of that false modesty which has driven virtue, like an exile, out of the land, and peopled it largely with Fourrierites, Owenites, and other socialists and free-lovers.

Now, whatever success a "godless system of education" may have on boys, I think all must admit that it must prove not only a failure, but a positive injury, to girls. It is not that moral and religious education is not equally required by both, in a spiritual sense, but that women, in an especial manner, have certain duties assigned them, in the Order of Providence, of so high and holy a character, that it requires, in some sense, a special education to fit them for the faithful discharge of these duties.

Let us remember that the Public School-girls of to-day will be the mothers of to-morrow. Mothers are called by God to take particular care of the bodily and spiritual life of their children. This care is a heavy, a very heavy burden indeed, and mothers cannot carry this burden without a tender love for their children. Now God has made the love of mothers for their children a necessary love. It is for this reason that there is no command in the Divine Law for parents to love their children, whilst, on the contrary, children are commanded to love their parents. Love towards one's own offspring is a love so deeply planted in the heart by Nature herself, that the wild beasts never fail to love their young. It is said that even tigers, hearing the cry of their whelps when they are taken by the hunters, will plunge into the sea to swim after the vessels where they are confined.

A mother's love is proverbial. Indeed, there is no love so pure and so thoroughly disinterested as the love of a good mother for her child. Her love knows no change; brothers and sisters have forgotten each other; fathers have proved unforgiving to their children; husbands have been false to their wives, and wives to their husbands, and children too often forget their parents; but you rarely hear of a mother forgetting even her ungrateful, disobedient children, whose actions have lacerated her heart, and caused dark shadows to glide before her eyes, and enter her very soul. Still there are moments when her faithful heart yearns towards them; there are moments when the reminiscences of the happy past obliterate the present sorrow, and the poor wounded spirit is cheered for a while, because there is still one of the fibres of the root of hope left in her forlorn breast, and a languid smile will flit over her wan and prematurely faded face. Yes, she forgives, though there is no River Lethe for her to drink from in this life; showing that her love is the most pure in this world, and the nearest approach to the love that God has so graciously bestowed upon her.

Some years ago a vessel sailed from the coast of Ireland. It was filled with passengers who were coming to this country to better their future. The vessel set sail with a favorable wind. The sky was clear, and the sun shone gayly upon the sparkling sea. But suddenly the heavens grew dark. A fierce storm arose. The winds howled madly around the vessel. The ship was hurried on—on, till it was dashed against the rocks. The wild, surging waves dashed over it. The vessel split in twain. Part remained hanging amid the rocks, and the rest sank, with those on board, beneath the waves, far down into the depth of the sea. The storm continued to rage for several days. At last, when the wind had died away, some hardy fishermen, who lived on the coast, took a skiff and rowed out to the wreck. They entered the part of the vessel that remained hanging amid the rocks. They broke open the cabin door. They heard distinctly the feeble wail of a child. They rushed in. They found a little babe lying upon the breast of its dead mother. The child was eagerly sucking the blood which oozed from a large wound in its mother's breast. The mother had died of cold and hunger; but, even amid her fearful sufferings, she did not forget her child. She took a sharp knife, and, with the wonderful love of a mother's heart, she made a deep gash in her breast, in order that her child might preserve its life by drinking her own heart's blood!

And when the darling child of the Christian mother is on the point of death, ah! how tender is not her prayer to the Author of Life that He spare the child.

"Oh, God of mercy," she prays, "spare my child! Heaven is already full of light and gladness. Do not then take to heaven the light and joy of my heart. Thou art ever happy, O my God! do not then deprive me of my only happiness. God of compassion, O leave me the sweet babe whom Thou hast given me! my love, and all my happiness, is centred in him. Since he has come to me, the earth, and sea, and sky, the whole world around has grown doubly beautiful. The air seems filled with light, and song, and sweetness. Ah, do not take my child away, for when his tender body lies beneath the sod, my heart and life shall lie there with it, and this whole world shall grow dark and dreary as one vast gloomy graveyard. O God! remember I am yet so young. I am not used to tears. Deal gently with my poor weak heart! I have never yet known what it is to lose a friend, a relative, or beloved one. O God! shall, then, the first that teaches me the dread meaning of grave and shroud be my own, my first-born child? O Jesus, I conjure Thee, by Thy wounded Heart—wounded for love of me—do not crush my tender heart, for Thou hast made it tender. Thou hast made me a mother; oh, spare my darling child!"

Ah! who can measure the depth of the wonderful love of a mother's heart! But this natural love of a mother for her offspring, in order to be persevering and untiring, must be cultivated—must be ennobled and supernaturalized by religious education; otherwise this love will decrease, and be lost in the end, and with the loss of this love the Christian woman has lost her divine calling. Now as no religious education is imparted to the girls in the Public Schools, can we wonder to see thousands and thousands of them who have lost their divine calling—can we wonder that we hear of a countless number of unnatural crimes, committed under the veil of marriage, that are becoming so common at the present day? Dr. Storer, of Massachusetts, declares that increase of children in Massachusetts is limited almost wholly to the foreign population. Mr. Warren Johnson, State Superintendent of Common Schools in Maine, reports to the Legislature a decrease of 16,683, between the ages of four and twenty-one years, from the census of 1858. Total decrease from maximum of 1860 is nearly 20,000. Mr. Johnson asks: "Are the modern fashionable criminalities of infanticide creeping into our State community?" Dr. H. R. Storer, of Massachusetts, in 1859, declared that forced abortions in America were of frequent occurrence, and that this frequency was increasing so, that from 1 in 1,633 of the population in 1805, it had risen to 1 in 340 in 1849; and Dr. Kyle, of Xenia, Ohio, asserted that abortions occurred most frequently among those who are known as the better class; among church members, and those generally who pretend to be the most polite, virtuous, moral and religious. And, without mincing matters at all, this eminent physician boldly declares that "a venal press, a demoralized clergy, and the prevalence of medical charlatanism, are the principal causes of the fearful increase of this abominable crime." The paucity of children in the families of wealthy and well-to-do Americans has been publicly noticed and commented upon time and again; but the true cause thereof, if known, was carefully concealed. And can we wonder that the crime has descended from the highest to the lowest, and now pervades all classes of society? Statistics have been frequently published to show that in certain States of the Union, and in certain districts of those States, the births did not, and do not, equal the deaths; and were it not for the foreign population among us many of those districts, and not a few of those States, would be depopulated in a few years. Massachusetts and New York lead the van in this criminal record. Dr. T. A. Reamy, of Zanesville, Ohio, in 1867, wrote, that after a careful survey of the field he was ready to say that "to-day no sin approaches with such stealth and dangerous power the altars of the Church as fœticide; and, unless it can be stayed, not only will it work its legitimate moral depravity and social ruin, but (he believed) God will visit dreadful judgment upon us no less severe, perhaps, than He did upon the Cities of the Plain."

In 1865, Dr. Morse Stewart, of Detroit, Michigan, declared that few of either sex entered the marital relation without full information as to the ways and means of destroying the legitimate results of matrimony. And among married persons so extensive has this practice become, that people of high repute not only commit this crime, but do not even blush to speak boastingly among their intimates of the deed, and the means of accomplishing it.

Dr. Nathan Allen, of Lowell, Mass., at a meeting of the Social Science Association, Boston, entitled "Wanted—More Mothers," remarked "that the increase of population for twenty-five years has been mainly in cities and towns, and it will be found to be largely made up of foreign element; and in the smaller villages, chiefly American, the stock has hardly increased at all.

"We find there are absolutely more deaths than births among the strictly American children; so that, aside from immigration, and births of children of foreign parentage, the population of Massachusetts is really decreasing.

"Another fact developed by report is, that whereas, in 1765, nearly one-half of the population of Massachusetts was under fifteen years of age, it is believed that, at the present time, not more than one-fifth of the purely American population is under that age. In an equal number of American and foreign families, the births will be nearly three times as many in the latter as in the former. In some of the old towns, the records of a hundred years do not show a single instance of a married couple without children. The New York census of 1865 shows that, out of nine hundred and ninety-three thousand two hundred and thirty-six married women, one hundred and thirty-seven thousand seven hundred and forty-five had no children, and three hundred and thirty-three thousand only had one or two.

"In the small town of Billerica, there are ninety families with ten or more children; five of these had fourteen, and one twenty-one: the total in the ninety families is ten hundred and ninety-three. The birth-rates show that American families do not increase at all, and the inspection of the registration in other States shows that the same remark applies to all."

Many parts of Vermont are undergoing a gradual depopulation. Sandgate had a population of 1,187 in 1810, and 805 in 1860.

The town of Rupert had a population of 1,848 in 1800, which had diminished to 1,103 in 1860.

The town of Arlington was settled in the year 1762. In the year 1800 all the arable and pasturage land was occupied, and the inhabitants numbered 1,569. In 1830 the number had decreased to 1,207, and in 1860 to 1,146.

Mrs. A. B. Boone says, in her book "The Increase of Crime," "I have frequently heard women say 'I don't mind having one or two children, but no more for me.' When I first heard these expressions I thought it merely a joke, but eventually I found out they meant what they said, and I was amazed. And when these women do condescend to have one or two children, what sort of a lifelong inheritance are they giving their offspring? ill-health even unto death. Frequently I come in contact with women of thirty, and even twenty-five, so debilitated that they are far more fit for hospitals than to fill the sacred office of either wife or mother.

"I am sorry to add that the crime of child-murder is carried on to the greatest extent among the wealthy. In Cambridgeport, a medical lady informed me that she was continually applied to for this purpose, and always refused in the most decided manner; but, to her knowledge, one woman performed, on an average, from a hundred to a hundred and fifty cases in a week. And yet churches abound in this place.

"The Rev. Dr. Todd has written two most truthful lectures, one entitled 'Fashionable Murders,' and the other 'A Cloud with a Dark Lining.' His revelations with regard to the determination that the Americans evince not to have children, is fearfully true, more especially among the women.

"Speaking of having children, reminds me of a circumstance that happened some fifteen years ago. I had a letter of introduction to a lady who wished to engage my children to read at a party she was about to give. She received me with an air of melancholy politeness, at the same time informing me that the gathering was postponed, as dear little Fanny was 'real sick.' I saw a wine-glass and teaspoon on the table by the side of the sofa, which had a small blanket on it bound with sky-blue ribbon, covering up something that I supposed to be a sick child. I approached, and gently drew aside the blanket. I jumped back—it was a poodle-dog, whose black eyes winked at me as if about to cry: a sort of appeal for sympathy shone in its glowing orbs. I was almost convulsed with laughter, it was so unexpected. When able to speak, I said, 'Pardon me, madam, for laughing; but I thought it was a baby.' She replied indignantly, 'Oh, dear, no! I never had a baby; nor I don't want one either!' And it would be a blessing, I say, if such women as these never became mothers. When I was a young girl, and heard people say they hated children, and saw them fondling dogs, and feeding kittens with a spoon because the old cat was too weak to attend to so many, and knew, at the same time, that poor human mothers were compelled (just as slaves once were) to separate from their husbands and children when poverty demanded that they should go into the 'Union,' or, rather, _Dis_union—I say, when I pondered on these things, thoughts would flit through my mind, whether, when death severed the body from the souls of these people, that their spirits were not instantly infused into cats and dogs, and that they came back in those shapes as a penance for their brutality to mankind, and their loving-kindness to brutes. However, we never went to the party. The woman remarked to a friend that she thought me devoid of all feeling, to laugh at a little, sick, innocent dog!

"Three doors from the rooms I lived in is the stylish house of Dr. and Mrs. Grindle, where there are hundreds of 'fashionable murders' committed yearly. And twice the papers have teemed with accounts of the unhappy mothers dying, and on the last occasion the child was not to be found, although born alive—and nothing done to either the doctor or his lady!"

A gentleman of one of the smaller towns of Connecticut writes to the Independent as follows: "I have just read, with great interest, your editorial on the 'Murder of Helplessness.' The paper will go into hundreds of families where the crime is practised, to bear witness against it; for, thank God, it is fashionable to take the Independent. For more than a year it has been on my mind to write to you upon this question. You will have the thanks of every well-wisher of the human race. But you make a great mistake when you speak of the crime of fœticide as being confined to the large cities. It prevails all over the country. I dare not tell you what I know—and the information has been given me unsolicited—in reference to this horrid practice in the land. I do not believe there is a village in the New England States but this crime is practised more or less. There are men who make it their business, with medicine and instruments, to carry on this slaughter. And even M.D.'s (physicians) in good and regular standing in the church have practised it. Men are making here, in this highly moral State, $3,000 and $4,000 a year in the small towns alone, at this business. Their patients are from the highly religious and fashionable to the low and vicious. Their scale of charges is according to the cupidity and size of purse of the victims. Delicate females go, in the dead of night, dressed in masculine attire, to avoid detection, to obtain the means to hide their shame. The cause of the evil lies in 'lust, which is as near to the murder as fire to smoke.' The demoralization of the people at large, in the practice of licentiousness, furnishes a topic of the greatest anxiety to the philanthropist. When American women lose their shame, the race is lost—church-membership is no bar. The continence of man and the chastity of woman is the only hope."

Trustworthy physicians assure us there are not less than sixty ghouls (gules) in New York City, who grow rich by killing infants. We have seen the number stated at six times sixty. Those who have passed through Fifth Avenue, New York, must have noticed a magnificent dwelling, or rather palace, in the neighborhood of the Central Park. It was built by a certain doctress who has acquired her wealth by the murder of helpless innocents.

The unhappy victims of these ghouls are not generally of the low and debased sort. Most of these illegitimate mothers are of the educated classes, many of them, shocking to say, under the age of fifteen; many of them delicate, sensitive females, who make use of these unhallowed means to hide their shame from the eyes of their friends and relatives.

The number of marriages (outside the Catholic Church) has largely decreased within the past few years. The crime of infanticide is largely increasing. A certain species of it is practised in the first families, and the drugs and implements for committing such murders are publicly sold everywhere. Physicians advertise publicly, offering their services to enable people, as they say, "to enjoy the pleasures of marriage without the burden." At least 25,000 fœticides are annually committed. How to preserve their looks, and how to avoid having children, seem to be the chief aim of many women nowadays. In the upper classes of society, in some of our large cities, a lady who is the mother of more than two children is looked upon as unfashionable.

The author of the book "Satan in Society" writes, on page 130-131, as follows: "A medical writer of some note published, in 1861, a pamphlet, in which he declared himself the hero of three hundred abortions." He admits, in a work of his, that he only found abortion necessary to save the life of the mother in four instances, thus publicly confessing that in an immense number of cases he has performed the operation on other grounds; and yet, in the face of all this self-accusation, several attempts at his expulsion from his county medical society have been defeated, and he is accounted "a brother in good standing" of several learned bodies, and holds an enviable position in a fashionable church and fashionable society. This rascal walks unhung; for this the "Medical Code" is primarily responsible, and after that the "ministers of the Gospel," the "worshippers" in the churches, the dwellers in "south fronts."

I have said above that the love of children has always been deemed a sign of superior intelligence—of noble manhood. Affection for its offspring is a quality possessed alike by all animals, with scarcely an exception; and few indeed of the millions of the animal creation seek to destroy their own offspring after birth, or to so neglect them as to leave them liable to destruction by other bodies or forces. It was left for human intelligences to encompass the death of their children, both before birth and after, and it was left to the anti-Christian civilization of this nineteenth century also to discover and adopt the most revolting and barbarous means to accomplish this end. The crime of fœticide, or infanticide, is not of recent growth. Like every other crime, it has had a venerable existence, but its beastly development among us has been mainly the work of a few years. Thirteen years ago its prevalence attracted the attention of medical jurists in all parts of our country, and essays, tracts, and bound volumes were issued against it. But the crime grew apace, and its deadly and dastardly fruits appear before us to-day, sickening to the moral conscience and religious sentiments of the nation.

And in view of the alarming increase of this crime of child-murder, the prediction of Dr. M. B. Wright to the Medical Society of Ohio, in 1860, will soon be fulfilled, namely: "The time is not far distant when children will be sacrificed among us with as little hesitation as among the Hindoos, unless we stop it here and now."

The frightful increase of immorality, of unnatural crimes, in these latter years, and especially in those very States where the common school system of education is fully carried out, as in New England, proves, beyond doubt, that there is something essentially wrong in this system. Some years ago the public were startled by the shocking developments of depravity in one of the female Public Schools of Boston; so shocking, indeed, as almost to stagger belief. The Boston Times published the whole occurrence at the time, but after creating great excitement for a few weeks, the matter was quietly hushed up, for fear of injuring the character of the common schools.

Only a few years ago other startling transactions came to light in New York, involving the character of some of the leading school commissioners, and some of the principal female teachers in the common schools. These scandals became so notorious, that they could be no longer blinked at or smothered, and several of the leading papers came out openly, to lash vice in high places. The Chicago papers assert openly that the Public Schools there are assignation houses, for boys and girls above a certain age.

"It is but six or seven years ago that Mr. Wilbur H. Storey, who owns the Chicago Times—the paper, at that time, of largest circulation in Chicago—published in his paper, and sustained the assertion, that the Public School system in Chicago had become so corrupt, that any school-boy attending, who had reached fourteen years of age, was whistled at by his companions as a spooney, if he had not a liaison with some one or more of the Public School-girls!

"The Daily Sentinel, of Indianapolis, quoted Mr. Storey's articles, and said, with great regret, that it was only too true of Indianapolis also, judging by the wanton manners of troops of the girls attending Public Schools in Indianapolis."

And there are but too many cities to which the same order of remark applies. Far be it from me to say that all the children of the Public Schools of any of these cities are corrupted. It is marvellous how some are protected from even the knowledge of vice, in these hot-beds of pollution. But the system of schools without the control of positive religious teaching and discipline, tends only to one vile end. We are assured, as to the City of New York, that smart girls, even of most immature years, show their discontent at their neglected fate, from hearing girls only a few years older tell what "nice" acquaintances they have made on the streets, or in the cars, going or coming, and what delicious lunches they have taken with these "gentlemen" at restaurants of most unquestionably bad repute. These things I have learned from a friend who heard them from members of the City Police, and from others that could not avoid the unhappy knowledge of the facts indicated.

The moral character of the Public Schools in many of our cities has sunk so low, that even courtesans have disguised themselves as school-girls, in order the more surely to ply their foul avocation.