Seattle University - Aegis Yearbook (Seattle, WA)

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13 EDUCATIONAL MORALITY ests of society. And notwithstanding the records of antiquity, history bears eloquent evidence of the sagacity of her educational policy. Let us hope that this broad nation of ours, great in accomplishments, great in the prospect of a still more glorious future, will harken to the eloquent voice of the august teacher of ( hristendom and secure the favors and blessings, of a true democracy for the generations yet to come, by freely bestowing on every child the advantages of a Christian education. 'file Church and the home should enforce the work of the school, but the class room which rules by far the greater part of the child’s active mental life is the only channel to which we must look for that moral and intellectual enlightenment, that supremeness of design and that loyalty to duty which should characterize the American citizen, and which religious education alone can bring forth. As long as our educational system forgets the soul in trying to perfect mind and body, crime will increase, for where there is no God, there is no conscience. Xor can educators afford to forget that “when Christ our Master comes for the final examination he will not ask how well we spoke and disputed, but how we lived,” “Xon quid legimus, sed quid fecimus, non quam bene diximus, sed quam religiose viximus.” JOHN F. DOUGHERTY, ’15.

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12 SEATTLE COLLEGE ANNUAL animal, which sees in the human mind nothing but another “aspect” or “phase” of the animal organism, and consequently denies the spirituality and immortality of the soul, such despicable philosophy cannot assign any other end and object of man's life than some form of hedonism or utilitarianism. Unfortunately such philosophy has exerted a disastrous influence on many modern educational theories. It has led to the separation, more or less complete, of education from religion, but a solid moral training is totally impossible without religion. There is only one system of philosophy which can form the sound basis of true pedagogy and that is genuine Christian philosophy, that philosophy which is in perfect harmony with the revealed truths of Christianity. This philosophy alone gives the correct answers to the questions, Whence and Whither? It tells us that the soul of the child is a spirit, created by a personal God to His own image and likeness, and destined for eternal happiness in heaven; it tells us that this life is not man’s goal, but a journey to another, higher life, that “we have not here a perpetual city but that we seek one that is to come.” A system of pedagogy firmly based on this solid Christian philosophy will widely differ from those systems which are built upon modern philosophy, be it German Pantheism, French Positivism, or English and American Agnosticism. The most essential difference will be this, that in the Christian system the intellectual training is considered secondary to the moral and religious training whereas all other systems aim at purely secular learning to the utter neglect of moral training. Down through the long avenues of the Christian ages, the Catholic Church has guided men onward and upward in the highway of progress bv the light of the Gospel of Christ; she has taught him that the grace and the beauty and the honor of life lie in its conformity with the eternal laws of God; and she has protected and strengthened and developed the civilization which she founded by the combined forces of religion and intellectual enlightenment. With the experience of ages before her, she insists today that religion and secular learning must go hand in hand in the work of education, if we are to safeguard the most vital inter-

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(Eamm flatrirk £ ljpH)ait, 0.0. X the death of Canon Sheehan Ireland has lost one of her greatest and most loyal sons. His life and work were typical of the true spirit which binds together in one most sacred brotherhood, all whether priests or laity who belong to the spiritual body of Christ, the Church. He was the possessor of a great mind, world-famed, yet in the simple village of Doneraille no child was unknown to him and every little face brightened as it saw the parish priest coming along the road, or in the school room, when each day he came to bid the children welcome. Nor were the poor unknown to him, for every one came with his sorrows to Canon Sheehan as to a true priest, a wise and most generous friend. It is related by the late Canon’s own bishop, that the deceased priest had arranged with him for the distribution amongst the poor of all the profits from his literary works. But Canon Sheehan's great literary power was fully on a par with his piety and remarkable devotion to his priestly duties. His contributions to literature were many and great, and consist principally of Irish characters. Among the many who have written on Ireland and her people Canon Sheehan stands in a class apart. He entered into the feelings of the people and sounded the utmost depths of the Irish heart. “He was of their very own, kindly Irish of the Irish. His faith was their faith, his inspiration was their inspiration, his aim was their aim, while his land was their land.” He believed in the written word and hence he wrote. His voice could reach but a few in his little village of Doneraille; he could reach thousands with his pen. The ideal which Canon Sheehan cultivated all through his literary career and to which his pen was true to the end is ably stated in the following words: “Our fiction, our poetry, our drama and our art must be above all things pure; a Catholic writer would rather put his right hand into the fire than write much that passes for art and literature in our days.”