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The Pamphlet Collection of Sir Robert Stout: Volume 1

The Only Book Interdicted

The Only Book Interdicted

in our schools. You may teach the religion of Confucius or of Brahminism—the whole of the ancient mythology, including everything about Jupiter, Mars, Venus, and their loves, and so on—ad nauseam—but you are on no account to let them know that there is a God in Heaven or to mention the name of our Saviour. I may be told that we we have no National religion. That is true in one sense—we have no State Church—the State does not identify itself with any special form of religion, but the identification of the nation with the Christian faith is complete; and I appeal to you, Sir, to say whether the book in front of you, from which the prayer is read every day, is not a proof that we area Christian nation." He then pointed to the example of the New England States, France, Prussia, and New South Wales, and the success of Mr Forster's English Bill, which has been in operation twelve years. In the London Board Schools 200,000 children were being educated by the State, and there had been a withdrawal of only 1 in 4000 under the conscience clause. In reply to the statement that the parents could do it he said, "Anybody who knows anything of the rising generation must be aware that a proportion of