Page:My Life in Two Hemispheres, volume 2.djvu/311

 only deny Catholics religious liberty, but deny them civil liberty if they could, a companionship in which he could hardly feel comfortable.

Mr. O'Shanassy, who had ordinarily conducted the Education contest of the Catholics, was still absent in Europe, and the Bishop had gone on a visit to Rome. Father Dalton, the Superior of the Jesuits, came to consult me on what was fit to be done. Mr. Higinbotham, I replied, is trying to do what Henry the Eighth and his son and daughter could not do. He proposes to compel Irish Catholics by a penal law to attend schools where some religion which is not theirs is taught. The proposal is folly, he cannot do it, and he shall not do it. We summoned a meeting of Catholics at their principal Church in Melbourne, which was attended by delegates from all parts of the country. I opened the case of the Catholics, which was further dealt with by various ecclesiastics and laymen. The proposed measure, we said, was one the Catholics could not accept under any conditions. They had resisted such a system for two hundred years in Ireland, and they would not accept it in this free country. But what they asked was not much and was not unreasonable. It was simply to leave standing the system which had existed from the foundation of the colony, or if a new system were adopted for those who approved of it, let the Catholics have the proportionate share of the public money they were entitled to, and they would be content that their schools should be placed under the strictest inspection as far as the qualification of the teachers and the management of secular education were concerned. If more funds were necessary they must, of course, supply them themselves. To deny them this was to violate religious equality, which was a recognised principle of the constitution. What they asked was practically what had been conceded in England. When Mr. Foster established a general system of education on a common basis, the denominations who preferred to teach their own children as their conscience directed, not only had their schools preserved intact, but they were granted additional endowment that the training of -their pupils might be as effective as in the common schools. If the result of the measure was to give the same sort of complete control to