om of this
plan and reflect no small honor on its originators.

Parents therefore should see to it that their children get the kind of
education they need, the kind that will serve them best in after life.
They should not allow the precious time of youth to be whiled' away in
trifles and vanities. Children have a right: to be educated in a manner
in keeping with their conditions in life, and it is criminal in parents
to neglect the real needs of their children while trying: to fit them
for positions they will never occupy.

In the meantime, let them protest against the extravagance of
educational enthusiasts and excessive State paternalism. Let them ask
that the burden of culture studies be put where it belongs, that is, on
the shoulders of those who are the sole beneficiaries; and that free
popular education be made popular, that is, for all, and not for an
elite of society. The public school system was called into existence to
do one work, namely, to educate the masses: it was never intended to
furnish a college education for the benefit of the rich men's sons at
the expense of the poor. As it stands to-day, it is an unadulterated
extravagance.

CHAPTER LXIII.
GODLESS EDUCATION.

THE other defect, respecting education as found in the public schools
of the land, is that it leaves the soul out of all consideration and
relegates the idea of God to a background of silent contempt. On this
subject we can do no better than quote wisdom from the Fathers of the
Third Plenary Council of Baltimore.

"Few, if any, will deny that a sound civilization must depend upon
sound popular education." But education, in order to be sound and to
produce "beneficial results, must develop what is best in man, and make
him not only clever, but good. A one-sided education will develop a
one-sided life; and such a life will surely topple over, and so will
every social system that is built up of such lives. True civilization
requires that not only the physical and intellectual, but also the
moral and religious, well-being of the people should be improved, and
at least with equal care.

"It cannot be desirable or advantageous that religion should be
excluded from the school. On the contrary, it ought to be there one of
the chief agencies for moulding the young life to all that is true and
virtuous, and holy. To shut religion out of the school, and keep it for
home and the Church, is, logically, to train up a generation that will
consi