CHAP. XIII.] CONSEQUENCES. 



407 



Mr. Henry Holbeach may be cited as an unprejudiced 

 witness in this matter. He tells * us : 



&quot; The great majority of scientific men at the present time pursue a 

 purely positive method, and the primary assumptions of that method 

 are fatal to all theological conceptions. It should not need much argu 

 ment to show that they are, at lowest, fatal to any theological concep 

 tions such as those upon which Christianity as a system is necessarily 

 engrafted. Now a professor might preach an orthodox sermon every 

 Sunday, subscribe Sir Koundell Palmer s pledge ex animo, and have 

 Christian prayers before and after class, and yet, if he taught science 

 after the manner of Biichner, he would be opposing not only Chris 

 tianity, but Theism, with the whole stress of his mind, and his pupils 



would, at the best, turn out sceptics Those, if any, who 



imagine that these characteristic features cannot and would not of 

 necessity be introduced into the secular teaching of the young under 

 State sanction who think that an anti-theological animus cannot be 

 made effective in the instruction given to children are very much 



mistaken But besides all this, it is certain that the scientific 



teaching all over the world is so Vain is it to reply, these 



are not questions brulantes. They are not, and they are; and if they 

 are decided in favour of state-applied education on the secular basis, 

 they simply introduce the thin edge of the wedge ; and after the whips 

 will come the scorpions ; after the deeds in the green tree the deeds in 

 the dry. And we should have, already, this state of things : Paid for 

 in part by the religious classes, compulsory secular teaching, that is 

 necessarily pervaded by a spirit which they regard as anti-religious.&quot; 



An attempt has recently been made to meet this difficulty 

 by the Rev. William Mackintosh,! who proposes T^RCV. 

 the introduction of an ethical teaching apart from Mackintosh. 

 religion a moral catechism divorced from theology. He 

 indeed throws overboard the absurd notion of teaching the 

 Christian religion in general, but no special form of it in 

 particular. He says : 



&quot; If by way of removing all ground of complaint and offence we 

 eliminate from the teaching of Christianity all debatable matter con 

 cerning which the sects take different views, there remains little to be 



communicated in the name of religion It would be easy to 



demonstrate that the chimerical character of so-called unsectarian, or 

 undenominational teaching cannot be remedied by leaving its ad 

 ministration to the discretion of the teachers, as has been proposed.&quot; 



* Contemporary Review, April 1872 



f See Contemporary Review, January 1874. 



