What I wish to do here is to touch upon some points in the intellectual and cultural situation in South Africa. This means that I must confine myself to a picture of what Europeans are doing, since the disadvantages under which non-Europeans are labouring have not made possible for them much acquisition of the natural goods. The Church in South Africa is above all an African church. Europeans, and especially European Catholics, are in a minority. Hence I shall be dealing with a minority which has largely monopolised the privileges of education and which must therefore be held peculiarly accountable for the use of the treasure which it has appropriated. My further reason for thus confining my field is the large part being played in the conversion of South Africa by the Dominicans who are so well versed in grafting the Faith upon the higher activities of the natural man.

In estimating the influences which have formed the mind of South African Europeans one must be careful to give full weight to the positive contribution of Calvinism, especially the Calvinism of the Dutch Reformed Church. The original colonists were Dutch and French Protestants, and the great majority of their descendants still hold to that confession, seriously and conservatively, as a rural population will. It is a tradition which has fostered Bible-reading, a strong and genuine family life, and the virtues enjoined by the Decalogue. It has been favourable to the formation of a legalistic and patriarchal temper of mind, and has kept alive a strong antipapist animus. It is not within my province to estimate the religious situation, but rather to call attention to certain repercussions in the cultural sphere.