Who Runs May Read

Newman described “reading the Bible and having it read” as “the national religion of the English”. Yet Biblical knowledge has now gone the way of Classical knowledge, leaving the whole of Western art incomprehensible. As much as anything else, how is anyone supposed to understand a word of Chaucer, or Shakespeare, or Milton, to name but three?

The roots of Biblical ignorance are complicated, although the de-Christianisation of state education is undoubtedly an important factor, along with the drivelling character of the rubbish passed off as RE in Catholic schools.

Whereas the roots of Classical ignorance are perfectly simple: the abolition of the grammar schools (Latin was in fact the “grammar” in question) and the dropping of the Latin requirement for Oxbridge.