180 



ARTHUR GALTON, M.A.^ ON 



Now ifc should be self-evident that a liberal State and a 

 reactionary church cannot live in peace together. When it is 

 realised, further, that the lioman Court is chiefly a political and 

 financial organisation, administered by diplomatic methods and 

 principles, and only masquerading as a religious or theological 

 institution, it is easy to see that there will be perpetual friction 

 between chvirch and State. In France, the battles caused by 

 this friction have always turned ultimately on education : for 

 obvious reasons. The State has said, with undeniable justice, 

 universal suffrage postulates an educated electorate ; therefore 

 education must be compulsory. If it be compulsory, it must 

 also, in justice, be gratuitous ; and, in a country of various 

 theologies and conflicting sects, it must also be unsectarian and 

 neutral with regard to all such controversies. The logic of all 

 this reasoning is unassailable, and is of universal application. 

 The church, on the other hand, not only claims a monopoly in 

 even the secular education of its subjects, but it challenges the 

 claim of the State to educate at all. In practice, it has never 

 had what we should call a right of entry without abusing it, 

 and misusing education for political purposes. The clergy, and 

 above all the religious orders, have inculcated principles which 

 are absolutely opposed to the existing institutions, to the social 

 and political ideals, of modern France. Moreover, they have 

 seen in education a means of biassing the electorate, of 

 influencing voters, and so of undermining the institutions of 

 their country. Hence, the whole conflict between church and 

 State, under the Third Eepublic ; and, especially, the defensive 

 legislation of the Ptcpublicans against the teaching orders. 



Usually, the extreme clericals have combated the Eepublic 

 directly and openly, either as agents or as dupes of the 

 monarchical and reactionary parties. This was the policy of 

 Pius IX. Leo XIIL, with greater wisdom and astuteness, since 

 he was a statesman of very unusual capacity, advised rallying 

 to the Eepublic : by which he meant an ostensible peace, a 

 quiet, stealthy acceptance and utilising of the educational and 

 legislative machinery, so that the electorate might be leavened, 

 the public service, the learned professions, and by degrees the 

 Chambers, packed with clerical adherents, and thus legislation 

 and administration would pass into ecclesiastical control ; and 

 then in due time the Ee}iublic would have been either mended, 

 in a papal sense, or ended. This was an astute and a very able 

 policy. It very nearly succeeded, I don't say in victory, but 

 in producing a revolution. It was helped enormously by the 

 'follies and factions of the Eepublicans themselves. It was 



