5. How in the mere natural, as distinguished from the Christian order, the provinces of marriage and education should be divided between the civil and the religious power, is perhaps not a very profitable enquiry. The only use of it is a polemic use in arguing with men of no Christianity. Among all men of any religion, marriage has ever been regarded as one of those occasions of life that bring man into special relation with God, and therefore into some dependence on God's ministers. Education, again, has a religious element, to be superintended by the religious power. Education has a secular element also, the general superintendence of which cannot be denied to the State. Though children are facts of the domestic order, and the care and formation of them belongs primarily to their parents, yet if the parents neglect their charge, the State can claim the right of intervention _ab abusu_. It certainly is within the province of the State to prevent any parent from launching upon the world a brood of young barbarians, ready to disturb the peace of civil society. The practical issue is, who are _barbarians_ and what is understood by _peace_. The Emperor Decius probably considered every Christian child an enemy of the _Pax Romana_. But the misapplication of a maxim does not derogate from its truth. It also belongs to the State to see that no parent behaves _like a Cyclops_ ([Greek: kyklopikos], Ar., _Eth_., X., ix., 13) in his family, ordering his children, not to their good, as a father is bound to do, but to his own tyrannical caprice. For _instruction_, as distinguished from _education_, it is the parent's duty to provide his child with so much of it as is necessary, in the state of society wherein his lot is cast, to enable the child to make his way in the world according to the condition of his father. In many walks of life one might as well be short of a finger as not know how to read and write. Where ignorance is such a disadvantage, the parent is not allowed to let his child grow up ignorant. There, if he neglects to have him taught, the State may step in with compulsory schooling. Compulsory schooling for all indiscriminately, and that up to a high standard, is quite another matter. _Readings_.--Suarez, _De Legibus_, III., xi.; _ib_., IV., ii., nn. 3, 4: St. Thos., 1a 2æ, q. 93, art. 3, ad 3; _ib_., q. 96, art. 2; _ib_., q. 98, art. 1, in corp.;_ib._, q. 99, art. 3, in corp.; _ib_., q. 100, art. 2, in corp. SECTION XI.--_Of Law and Liberty_.