09/08/2026
A lecture about Education in 1871 in New The Platform New Zealand
LECTURE ON EDUCATION.
The Rev. W. J. Habens delivered an address on " Education " yesterday evening, in the Congregational Church, Manchester street. The attendance was rather limited.
Mr J. Inglis, M.P.C., took the chair, and in introducing the lecturer to the meeting, said that he had great pleasure in presiding on the occasion. He took great interest in the question of education, and in his place in the Provincial Council had done all in his power when the Education Bill was under discussion to get clauses passed—more particularly regarding the religious side of the question—which would be acceptable to all parties. Although he had not been succesful in carrying all his amendments, he had been instrumental in getting the "religious" clauses modified. He believed that next session a Bill would be brought down providing for an undenominational system of education. He had great pleasure in introducing the Rev. J. W. Habens to the meeting. The Rev. W. J. Habens commenced his address by defining the word " Education." He said it meant "a drawing out,'' a drawing forth of the native power of the child, conducting him out of the weakness of infancy and its narrow sphere, into the broader and higher sphere of science, literature, and art. It included all the various influences which went to make up and develop the formation of the character of the child; but his subject that evening was of a much narrower kind, that which simply bore upon the training of the child by the teacher, and he would not touch upon the equally important subject of the education of the child by the parent—simply the schoolmaster's part in the education of the youth. The rev. lecturer quoted an extract from the writings of Ruskin on the subject as bearing upon the broader view of education, and stated that his address would be confined to that which referred simply to the education of the child in his relation to the schoolmaster. The lecturer then went on to give the arguments for and against State education. One of the former was that man had a right to education—that every child had a right to be educated. He was inclined to think, with Dr. Arnold, that they had no such rights. They had all of them duties to perform oue to the other, certainly, and some of them of so imperative a nature as almost to be said to be the due of those they affected. Supposing there was a right, was it against the parent or against the community? If the former, they must compel the parent to do his duty. If it was admitted that the right lay against the State, in that case a great many other rights would be brought forward, such as the right for clothing, the right for food, and others of equal importance. Were that granted, it involved Communism, which was in itself pure and simple, not a bad thing, but French Communism was. But good or bad, Communism was involved in tbe idea that a child had a right to get education from the State. State education was simply, in his opinion, a miserable make-shift for the. doing of our duty to our fellow creatures, In Christian England many people would starve were it not for the interference of the State, but the support given was not given. as a matter of right. Even then no one would assert that tbe State should do more than simply provide the necessaries of life, and not even those things which to a refined mind were absolutely necessary. Another argument, and a safer one, in favor of State education was, that it was necessary for the general well being of society that the child should be educated, as education tended to decrease crime. Another was, that it was the duty of the State to see that education of a proper quality was provided, as many parents were not able to discriminate between a good and bad education. But was it not possible , for the operation of the law of supply and demand, to bring into existenoe a class of teachers fitted for their work without Government interference ; and would it not be better to wait for a natural growth than force it in this way; and did Government, as a rule, manage matters better than private individuals 1 Opposition was a good thing, and private firms generally did their work better than Government departments did. Another argument against State interference, was the danger of such meddling oh the part of Government being carried too far; for instance in the teaching of erroneous political and other doctrines through the means of schools books. Another argument was the danger attending the centralising of any kind of work of decreasing its efficiency. A State education would also develop a selfish spirit, but he would not enlarge further on this part of his address, as State interference in the matter of education was? really a foregone conclusion. In Prussia and France, in America and Switzerland, the tiling was done by rule and method, aud in England also the idea was acted upon. Taking it for granted that State interference was desirable, they were met with the religious difficulty—which was a ; serious one. It was impossible for the State to take that in hand without doing injustice. Most religious people were of opinion that religion should be taught in schools—by that they meant their distinctive creeds. Some did not go so far, but simply said that the master of the school should be a pious man, and that the Scriptures should be read daily for practical ends, and not for doctrinal purposes, but Roman
Catholics would not be satisfied with that. Another class objected to the teaching of Scriptures on the ground that the Bible was a mere remnant of superstition and a collection of fables. There were several ways attempted to meet the difficulty, one of which was that the State should support all those views but he had one objection to that, viz, that it virtually pledged the State to a declaration that its creed was latitudinarian. that one creed was as good as another. There were churches to which he would not contribute one farthing, and he considered it was wrong to take the money of a. whole community to distribute in such a latitudinous way. That was what he meant by the current endowment. He did not*intend?" discuss the exclusive endowment seW, } 9 i which one religious body should harc'tV I full and exclusive charge of schools., |he considered it was too i at g r 3 the day to entertain such an idea -rv a opinion of the world was now in f a y 0T * Ue separation of Church and State. He waL** favor of the establishment of schools T secular instruction alone Many p* thought it was dreadful not to teach re'iri in schools. He did not think so. R e Ji!| not mind whether he received his pood from Christian tradesmen or not; nrovidfri lie received goods of an equal quality ru did not see why parents should object tl grammar or other subjects taught by Chris tian teachers or the opposite, as lo nt , as ?* was taught, properly. After all it " absurd to make so much of the matter of religious teaching. He would like to know how many teachers were fitted to tncadle with religious teaching, or to put their hand to the work. It was little better than a farce to think that they could gj ye su . a It was also a question whether the discin! line that was necessary on the part of teachers would have the proper elect in bringing the truths of Christianity homo to the minds of children; besides, he did not see that teachers had the time at their disposal to give the children such religious j n . struction as would benefit them. H e should not be sorry to see religion left out of th e teaching of a school if the teacher were not a Christian man, and he should not be aorrr to sec the reading of the Bible omitted if ft were an offence to any one. , Xhs purely secular system might not be practicable. His idea was that tho Government should have nothing to do with denominational schools, but that it should confine its attention to teachers, and let all such as had been approved, enrol themselves as officers of the State. Let the Government fix a minimum of salary, and let any school that required a master engage such from the Government, guaranteeing to pay to the Government one-half of the salary of the teacher. It should not be the business of the Government to enquire as to the Teligious opinions of the masters, hut simply as to their character ; and if the denominational schools wanted masters, they should take cara that some of their own body were trained for the task. The objection against thedenooi. national system was, that the energies of half-a-dozen masters were wasted on the same number of schools, whereas half-a-dozen masters in one largo school would do much more. That was the reasoa why he wished to see municipal schools established. It was a great pity—and it prevented the proper carrying out of education —that those religious differences existed, The rev. lecturer then read an extract from a work recently published—" Ginx'g Baby" —to support his view, and 'to show the extreme length to which some people went in the matter of religious differences in education. With regard to com. pulsory education, he thought that if the State was compelled to provide education, parents should be compelled to send their children to school. The rev, lecturer then proceeded to notice the qualificationa requisite in a good teacher; for instance, that he should be a well-informed man, patient, kind, firm, consistent, judicioas, able to discriminate character, just, free from pro* vincial peculiarity, a gentleman, and able to lower himself to the intellects of the children under his charge. Thelecturernexttou.'.hedoi the stipend of teachers, and argued that co one should be paid a less salary than „150, with a bonus to those teachers who wera qualified from their attainments for Mgte branches than those taught in the piwrj | schools. The lecturer then proceeded aS some length to speak of school studies, tk ! methods of instruction that should bs followed by all teachers, and the class of school books that should be used. HocoiapbM that many of the text books now used ia schools were inaccurate in many of their details, were too lengthy and expensive, all oi which were obstructive to the spread of education. He considered that what tos urgently wanted were good teachers, asd cheap, good, and compendious text hooks. Mr Inglis said that although there wee many points in the address in which they might not concur, they must feel obliged to the lecturer for departing from his ordinary course, and meeting themoaa week-day evening to enlighten them. He was sorry that regarding the recent debates in the Council on the subject of education, the press did not report what had been does so fully as other matters, and the public at large were really almost ignorant of the to state of the case now.
A vote of thanks to the rev. lecturer, proposed by Mr Jameson, brought the meeting to a close.
https://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/newspapers/CHP18710818.2.14
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