On Friday week, at the annual meeting of the General
Committee of the Committee for Church Defence and Church Instruction, Mr. Balfour moved a resolution condemning the Education Bill, and charged the Govern. ment with having mixed up with the question of education the desire to injure the Established Church. Mr. Balfour did not deny that the "protoplasmic Christianity" of the Cowper-Temple Clause was of use. He personally would far rather have that than nothing ; but he held it to be- "narrow-minded and cruel intolerance" to deny that a child should realise from the first moment when he began to absorb religious truths that he was a member, not merely of the universal Church, but of an individual Church. In con- clusion, Mr. Balfour declared that, so far from realising the hopes of those who expected that it would injure the Church and discourage her supporters, the Bill, more than anything in his recollection, bad roused and united every section of the Church of England.
Previous page
