Page:Australia and the Empire.djvu/304

 public schools, and that one hour in five shall Le available for the special religious instruction of the children belonging to the church of the visiting religious teacher. Common Christianity is thus taught by the schoolmaster; special dogmatic teaching is given by the clergyman. The Roman Catholics, however, object strongly to any secular instruction, even of the simplest kind, being given to their children except by Roman Catholic teachers."

Hence it is that Sir Henry Parkes' well-meant compromise has met with no more approval in that quarter than the frankly secular system of Victoria. It was recklessly denounced by the late Archbishop Vaughan as "godless." In the course of an admirable speech on the question, Sir Henry Parkes himself observed: "I cannot comprehend why Roman Catholic parents cannot send their children to our public schools. I cannot see, when we have of necessity to grow up together, to perform the same duties in society, to drive at the same ends in life—I cannot comprehend how it need interfere with the religious faith of the Roman Catholic child, when he attends school, to read, to sum up figures, to understand a little of the geographical features of the earth, with Protestant children—how that can unfit the child for receiving his religious faith. We must rub shoulders together, we must work in