This is clearly another proof for what was said in a previous chapter,[1] that the religious state affords many advantages for educational work, at least in missionary countries. Here we must add that the educational labors of the Jesuits in those countries are not confined to higher instruction. Many lay-brothers give elementary instructions in the schools,[2] and the priests give catechetical instruction in hundreds of such schools, which in many other ways are directed by them. In February 1901, fifteen scholars of Paris, Professors in the University or members of the Institut de France, among them the celebrated Paul Sabatier, Dean of the Protestant Theological Faculty, issued a declaration in favor of the religious associations. A list is added about the educational work in foreign countries under the direction of French Jesuits. The total given there is 3,923 schools, or orphan asylums, with 156,256 children, and all this is done by the French Jesuits alone. Of their 193 schools in Syria in particular, the Protestant Literarische Centralblatt of Leipsic says, "that they are now the best in Syria."[3] Therefore, that the Order is doing very great work for civilization, is evident. Of the 15,160 members of the Order (in 1900) about 4000 were laboring in foreign missions; and this work, in most cases, means also work directed toward the education of the native people.
In this connection we may quote the striking tribute, paid by an American politician to the educational work of the Jesuits among the Indians. On April 7, 1900, Senator Vest of Missouri, during the
