Page:President of the Czecho-Slovak Republic, Thomas G. Masaryk.pdf/17

 vied poverty". "Ethics do not require only that a teacher be good, but also that he be given what belongs to him by right."

In the "Social Question" Masaryk transcribed St. Paul's famous hymn on love into the social language of modern man.

But behold, because Masaryk was a religious man, the reigning church stood up against him. In the Catholic papers he was constantly called a godless individual and a Free Mason, because the church cannot endure anyone who comes with God and Christ and does not come with the Pope and Bishops. Schönborn, the Archbishop of Prague, hastened to the EmporerEmperor [sic] Franz Josef with the accusation that Masaryk was undermining religion, advocating suicide and seducing the young. He was not successful, but the efforts to remove Masaryk from Prague did not stop; as is well known, three hundred eight priests, gymnasium instructors of religion, brought suit against Masaryk, who came before the law as a disturber of religion. (1910.)

Masaryk was a good pedagogue, worshipped by his students. Notwithstanding, officially the university behaved in an unfriendly manner towards him from the beginning.

Masaryk was not a friend of German philosophy, but was introducing French and English philosophy into Bohemia. He came into conflict with the "national philosopher" Joseph Durdík. The first anonymous accusation of Masaryk was sent to the ministry by an unknown mother who was afraid that he would spoil her son morally, because in Masaryk's practical philosophy he heard discourses on marriage, and even on prostitution and other evils of modern life.

At the time of the dispute over the genuineness of certain supposedly old Czech manuscripts, Masaryk came into conflict with the whole set of old-world authorities, not always of blameless characters. They denounced him in Vienna. They even expressed their suspicion of Masaryk's connections with Russia, when twice in succession he undertook trips to Russia for purposes of study and visited Tolstoy. The Austrian ministry only too willingly punished Masaryk disciplinarily and materially. Though at the time of his coming to Prague the government had agreed to make him a definite professor within three years, he did not become one till sixteen years later. His own pupils passed over his head. The worse was he persecuted by the government later, when as a member of a delegation he exposed to Europe the Austro-Hungarian disorders in Bosnia and Hercegovina and when 9