citizens the tree with its fruits--the Public School system in
broad daylight. All who call themselves Christians, or who consider
themselves men of common sense, and warm promoters of the happiness of
their fellow-citizens, will agree with me in saying that the Public
School system is a tree of which we must say what God said to Adam of
the tree standing in the middle of paradise: "Of the tree of knowledge
of good and evil thou shalt not eat. For in what day soever thou _shalt
eat of it thou shalt die the death_."--(Gen ii. 17.) It is now time for
me to speak as a priest of the Roman Catholic Church. It is the duty of
the Catholic priest to teach the children of the Catholic Church the
language of their spiritual Mother--the Church. This language is no
other than that of the Supreme Head of the Church--the Pope. Now the
language of the Vicar of Christ in regard to godless education is very
plain and unmistakable.

Jesus Christ, our Divine Saviour, has said: "What doth it profit a man
if he gain the whole world, and suffer the loss of his own
soul?"--(Matt. xvi. 26.) What will it profit you or your children to
gain all knowledge, and to attain the greatest success in this world,
if, through your fault, and through your exposing them to the danger of
evil education, they suffer the loss of that faith, without which "it is
impossible to please God"?--(Heb. xi.)

_Teaching of the Syllabus._

Guided by this principle, our Holy Father, Pope Pius IX., has declared
that Catholics cannot "_approve of a system of educating youth
unconnected with the Catholic Faith and the power of the Church, and
which regards the knowledge of merely natural things, and only, or at
least primarily, the ends of earthly social life_."[H] Catholic parents
cannot approve of an education which fits their children only for this
life, and ignores that life in which the soul is to live forever. As
faith is the foundation of all our hopes for eternity, and as faith
without good works is dead, we cannot choose for our children an
education which would endanger their faith and morals, and consequently
imperil their eternal welfare.

_Teaching of Pope Pius VII._

This is no novel doctrine, as some assert. In the beginning of the
century, the illustrious Pius VII., in an Encyclical letter addressed to
the Bishops of the Catholic world, July 10th, 1800, thus writes:--

"It is your duty to take care of the whole flock over which the Holy
Ghost has p