THE CHILD 
 GOD'S CHILD 
 
 CharlesW Rhhell 
 
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 C0P5fRIGHT DEPOSIT. 
 
THE CHILD 
 
 AS 
 
 GOD'S CHILD 
 
 BY 
 
 Rev. Charles W. Rishell, Ph.D. 
 
 Professor of Historical Theology in Boston University 
 School of Theology 
 
 New York: EATON&MAINS 
 Cincinnati : JENNINGS & GRAHAM 
 

 LIBRARY Of CONGRESS 
 Vwu Copies rteceivtMi 
 
 JAN 19 1905 
 
 CUi^S OL, AXc. Not 
 
 COPY B. ' 
 
 Gjpyright, 1904, by 
 
 Eaton & mains. 
 
DEDICATION 
 
 To 
 
 MY WIFE 
 
 Who shares the views expressed 
 
 in the folio wing pages, and 
 
 To 
 
 OUR DAUGHTERS 
 
 Who exemplify the beneficent 
 
 results of her training according 
 
 to the ideas here advocated 
 
TO THE READER 
 
 This book is a plea for the religious rights 
 of the child. 
 
CONTENTS 
 
 Chap. Page 
 
 I. The Possibility .... 9 
 
 II. The Propriety . . . . 17 
 
 III. The Presuppositions . . .29 
 
 IV. The Training .... 44 
 V. The Teaching . . . .62 
 
 VI. The Baptism .... 77 
 
 VII. The Church Membership . . 93 
 
 VIII. The Parents .... 109 
 
 IX. The Sunday School . . .123 
 
 X. The Critical Period . . . 145 
 
 XI. The Ideal 160 
 
 7 
 
THE CHILD AS GOD^S CHILD 
 
 CHAPTER I 
 
 The Possibility 
 
 Can a child be religious? It is a strange 
 question in an age when not a few are ready to 
 predicate religion of animals. And especially is 
 it surprising in view of the very general recog- 
 nition in modern thought of the religious 
 instinct as a constituent element in human 
 nature. But the religion of animals and of 
 untutored men is vague and indefinite. It ex- 
 ists rather unrecognized than recognized. Can 
 a little child be religious in the definite sense 
 implied by the educated Christian man's use 
 of the term? To this the answer must be, 
 No; and for the very good reason that the child 
 is not a man and is not educated. 
 
 In What Sense Religious 
 In what sense, then, can a child be religious ? 
 It cannot recognize itself as religious. This 
 would imply a knowledge of the meaning of 
 words and a power of abstraction, judgment, 
 and generalization far beyond the capacity of 
 
The Child as God's Child 
 
 many full-grown men. If the power to an- 
 alyze its own inner life and to distinguish and 
 classify its mental states and activities were 
 necessary to religion the child could not be 
 religious. But religious feelings and activ- 
 ities are no more dependent upon such power 
 of discrimination than intellectual activities or 
 the presence of the social feelings in childhood 
 are dependent upon a knowledge of psychol- 
 ogy. The child may love or be religious with- 
 out being able to say, "I love," or, "I am re- 
 ligious." Mental facts must exist before we 
 take cognizance of them, and they gener- 
 ally exist long before that power of introspec- 
 tion is developed which enables us intelligently 
 to apprehend them. 
 
 Equally impossible to a little child is religion 
 in the sense of a definite and elaborate set or 
 system of religious ideas. The ideas of omni- 
 presence, omnipotence, omniscience, eternity, 
 and of infinity in general must of necessity be 
 extremely vague to the child mind. So also 
 must it be with the idea of spirituality, which 
 could be understood by the child at best only 
 negatively. The child's idea of God, metaphys- 
 ically considered, cannot but be unsatisfactory 
 from the standpoint of the philosopher. The 
 same must be said of many other religious 
 
 JO 
 
The Possibility 
 
 ideas, such as sin, forgiveness, regeneration, 
 immortality, judgment, retribution. 
 
 Not only are these ideas vague and indefinite 
 in the minds of children ; they are often incor- 
 rectly conceived. At this point it is that the 
 deniers of the possibility of religion in children 
 find their chief support. They delight to dwell 
 upon instances of anthropomorphic misconcep- 
 tions of God and his relations to this world. 
 And if religion depended upon correct religious 
 conceptions children could not be religious. But 
 there is no such relation of dependence here 
 any more than there is between nutrition and 
 a correct knowledge of the chemistry of food, 
 which, by a good providence of God, most 
 people get on reasonably well without. 
 
 But so do the majority of adults get on 
 religiously without clear ideas of religious 
 theory. And it is this lack of correct concep- 
 tions in adults to which we must trace most 
 of the defective or erroneous religious notions 
 of childhood. Where did these children get 
 their ludicrously anthropomorphic ideas of God 
 but from their elders? That children acquire 
 such concepts does not prove that children 
 should not be taught, but that they should be 
 better taught. Were the reasoning that is 
 
 applied by some to this subject employed in 
 II 
 
The Child as God's Child 
 
 the sphere of general education we should have 
 to forbid all attempts to teach children. For 
 even in schools whose teachers are entirely well 
 qualified for their task the examinations of the 
 pupils reveal a most ludicrous state of igno- 
 rance and misapprehension in the common 
 branches. Incorrect conceptions are by no 
 means confined to religion.^ But it is not im- 
 possible to give to children relatively correct 
 though incomplete religious ideas. The exact 
 age at which correct religious ideas of various 
 kinds may be found in children cannot be def- 
 initely fixed. Some may be correctly conceived 
 earlier, some later; and the age will vary with 
 different children. But as soon as a child gets 
 the concept of visible being it can have that 
 of invisible being. The reality of the one it 
 will no more question than of the other. At 
 the dawn of the thought of causation may be 
 apprehended the idea of God as omnipotent 
 Creator. The invisibility and activity of God 
 are principal ingredients in the thought of his 
 spirituality. Upon the child's first conception of 
 
 ^ Rousseau and Kant held that religious instruction was appro- 
 priate to youth rather than to childhood— the former on the ground 
 that the child can see God only with the imagination, and that this 
 interferes with the later conception of him by the understanding; 
 the latter because religious ideas always presuppose some system of 
 theology which is beyond the powers of the child. 
 12 
 
The Possibility 
 
 self may easily be grafted the thought of God 
 as a person. When the child learns the theory 
 of space so far as to know the meaning of 
 "here" and "there" it is prepared to conceive the 
 idea of omnipresence ; and when it knows past, 
 present, and future it can be made to know 
 something of eternity. The practical acquaint- 
 ance of the child with knowledge and ignorance 
 furnishes the necessary preparation for the 
 thought of omniscience. 
 
 What is here meant is not that the child 
 can understand these portentous terms; much 
 less that it can relate the ideas they convey or 
 see in them what well-instructed adults see in 
 them. The wisdom of using such words in the 
 impartation of religious ideas to the very young 
 is decidedly open to question. But it is a fact 
 that a child can get a practically correct con- 
 ception of what is meant by certain untechnical 
 religious propositions, such as: "Some things 
 there are that you can see and feel and smell 
 and taste and hear ; but there is One whom you 
 cannot see, feel, smell, taste, or hear. This 
 One is everywhere, can do all things, knows 
 all things, always has been, and always will 
 be." And it is not difficult with these ideas in 
 the mind of the child to teach him how different 
 God is from every one of us, and yet how much 
 13 
 
The Child as God's Child 
 
 he is like us in the possession of purpose and 
 choice. In some instances the child might in- 
 deed misapprehend, but he will not misappre- 
 hend seriously if he is intelligently taught. The 
 failure will not result from the difficulty of 
 the ideas so much as from the ignorance or 
 incapacity of the teacher. 
 
 How much of this religious knowledge 
 should be imparted to a child is not here con- 
 sidered, but as far as any or all the ideas men- 
 tioned are necessary to childhood religion they 
 may be easily acquired. So that the opponents 
 of religion in children have no standing ground 
 left. That the ideas are vague and incomplete 
 is nothing to the purpose unless we were to 
 make it a principle of pedagogy that nothing 
 is to be taught until the mind can fully com- 
 prehend. 
 
 Perhaps few would be so venturesome as to 
 affirm that in the more intimate sense religion 
 is impossible to children. Gratitude, love, the 
 desire to please, obedience, right, wrong, de- 
 pendence are feelings and activities of the child 
 mind from very early infancy. Prayer, praise, 
 Bible reading, church attendance, and other 
 religious practices are not alien to the child's 
 conceptions of the proper and fitting; though 
 there may be times when other impulses, holy 
 14 
 
The Possibility 
 
 or unholy, will prompt him to prefer omitting 
 them. That in all respects in which it could be 
 expected of them multitudes of children have 
 been and are religious can admit of no dispute 
 with those who are conversant with the facts. 
 That it should be so argues no precocity or ab- 
 normality, but rather a healthy, normal state 
 of the child mind under proper training. 
 Among the many things that Jesus must have 
 meant by his pregnant saying about the neces- 
 sity of our becoming as little children must be 
 included this — that the piety suitable to a child 
 contains about all the elements necessary in 
 the religion of an adult, except, perhaps, its 
 expression. 
 
 Unreasonable Demands 
 One cannot but be surprised at the unrea- 
 sonable demands made upon children in the 
 matter of religion. In every other department 
 of life they are expected to display only so 
 much progress as comports with their physical 
 and intellectual capacities. In religion, on the 
 other hand, it is expected by many that they 
 will exhibit perfection from the start. This is, 
 no doubt, due in part to the erroneous idea 
 that religion is a sort of divine gift bestowed 
 upon us from without — a something which 
 15 
 
The Child as God's Child 
 
 must be bestowed entire or not at all — rather 
 than a divine influence operating differently 
 upon different hearts according as each has 
 capacity to receive it. That such gradations 
 exist, and that they are conditioned by tem- 
 perament and the like, must be evident to every- 
 one who studies the lives of adult Christians. 
 The imperfections of child Christians should 
 surely be as leniently dealt with as those of 
 adults, and we should no more expect all chil- 
 dren to manifest equal degrees of religious in- 
 terest and power than we expect them in adults. 
 If some are not as manifestly religious as 
 others we should not at once leap to the con- 
 clusion that the lack is an indication of ab- 
 solute irreligion. And while in the realm of 
 morals we may be more anxious about any 
 exhibition of vice in children than we would be 
 for the same vice in adults — because we know 
 the character of the latter and see that it is a 
 departure from the main trend, while in the 
 child we cannot tell but that it may indicate the 
 main trend — still we should not judge a child's 
 religion too severely because it is insufficient 
 to control the life with absolute sovereignty. 
 Religion and morals are not always intimate 
 companions in adults ; much less can we expect 
 
 that they should be in children. 
 i6 
 
CHAPTER II 
 
 The Propriety 
 
 Groundlessness of Objections 
 Much prejudice has been aroused against 
 religion in children because of the precocious, 
 morbid, or hothouse character of it in many of 
 its historical instances. That children or 
 younger young people should pray or speak 
 publicly with the freedom of adults is unnat- 
 ural and shocking to educated sensibilities. 
 The boy evangelist may be sincere, and even 
 effective, but he is a monstrosity. That such 
 manifestations, even on a smaller scale, should 
 be offensive and arouse prejudice against any 
 well-marked religious development in the very 
 young is not surprising, for it is a sure evidence 
 that the child's feelings have outrun his judg- 
 ment. But the religion of children need not be 
 of this type; nor should it be. Undue repres- 
 sion should, of course, be avoided; but so also 
 should undue and abnormal expression. En- 
 couragement should be given only to that kind 
 of religious life which manifests itself in rev- 
 erence, confidence, acquiescence in the provi- 
 (2) 17 
 
The Child as God's Child 
 
 dence of God, gratitude, love to God and man, 
 and the like. While there may be exceptions, 
 the rule here is, as elsewhere, that children 
 should be seen, not heard. Nevertheless, al- 
 though there is justification for the revulsion 
 of feeling which arises when we see public re- 
 ligious manifestations, whether in children or 
 adults, which we regard as not sufficiently 
 founded in thought or character, there is no 
 ground for objection to a religious life suitable 
 to each age and stage of development in human 
 life. 
 
 From still another widely different stand- 
 point the propriety of child religion has been 
 questioned. It is evident that if children are 
 to have any definite religious conceptions or 
 forms they must learn them from others. If one 
 could conceive a generation of children left 
 entirely to themselves they would not develop 
 religious ideas or ceremonies until they had 
 long passed the stage of childhood and youth. 
 It is claimed, therefore, that religion, so far as 
 it is superimposed upon children from without, 
 is a violation of their rights, that it hinders 
 their free development and makes them what 
 they would not naturally be. Thus they grow 
 up to be not wholly themselves, but, at least in 
 
 part, bear the character of others. 
 i8 
 
The Propriety 
 
 The right claimed, then, for the child is the 
 right to be itself and to develop according to 
 its own inner nature. But how singular that 
 this claim is confined to the matter of religion ! 
 The very same people who are loudest in their 
 demand that the child shall not be filled with 
 religious prejudices are also among the most 
 determined that the child shall not be left to 
 itself in any other line of individual develop- 
 ment. Nor can these objectors hide behind the 
 fact that there are differences of opinion in 
 matters of religion, while the elements of sci- 
 entific knowledge are common to all ; for these 
 people entertain, and inculcate in the minds of 
 their children, very definite ideas as to society, 
 government, and manners, notwithstanding 
 many all about them maintain views quite 
 diverse from their own. 
 
 Still others emphasize the thought that when 
 the child grows up he may regret that he was 
 taught and trained in the doctrines and prac- 
 tices of religion, and that religion will thus be 
 made odious to those who might have chosen 
 it freely for themselves if it had not been forced 
 on them. But do we not incur the same risk 
 in the secular education of our children? It 
 is by no means uncommon for men and women 
 to wish that a different course had been pur- 
 19 
 
The Child as God's Child 
 
 sued in their school life than that chosen for 
 them — that more or that less time had been 
 given to language, ancient or modern ; that this 
 rather than the other language had been taught 
 them; that their teaching had included more 
 or less of certain sciences, of history, and the 
 like; or even that they had been allowed more 
 time or less time for their school life. There 
 are numberless young men who feel that their 
 college days are wasted days so far as real ben- 
 efit is concerned, and are kept in college only 
 by a sort of parental compulsion. Who can 
 tell beforehand what the individual will prefer 
 when he attains the years of manhood? And 
 the fact that no one can foretell does not justify 
 waiting for the training of a youth until he is 
 old enough to express and follow his own ma- 
 ture and final choice. The child's training 
 must go forward. If when he grows to matur- 
 ity he does not approve that training he can 
 take measures to change the direction in which 
 he was started. But there are few indeed who 
 would wish that they had had no training 
 at all. 
 
 There are other aspects of the question which 
 the opposers of child religion on the grounds 
 now considered appear to forget. One of these 
 is the duty of the parents and of the community 
 
 20 
 
The Propriety 
 
 to the child. If the child has its rights the 
 child's elders have their obligations. And 
 these elders alone can determine what those 
 obligations are. That they should be governed 
 in this respect by the thought that the child 
 grown to be an adult might not approve the 
 action taken does not excuse them for inaction. 
 Especially is this true of the parents, to whom 
 by nature and by law is committed the care of 
 the child. They must take the responsibility. 
 If they decide to give religious training the 
 child may later not approve; if they decide to 
 omit it the child may not approve. The dis- 
 approval, in a world constituted as ours is, 
 would be more certain in the latter case than 
 in the former. But some decision parents must 
 reach on this momentous question. What more 
 natural than for them to decide in favor of 
 what they have found to be the most important 
 single factor in their own welfare and happi- 
 ness? 
 
 Obligations of Parents 
 
 But suppose that the parents should omit 
 religion from the child's training. This would 
 involve the abandonment on their own part of 
 all religious exercises either public or private 
 and the avoidance of all mention of religious 
 subjects. It would involve the restraining of 
 
 21 
 
The Child as God's Child 
 
 the child from all associations which might 
 give it the idea of religion. Others might hear 
 of God and of the religions of the world, but 
 not their child. He would be deprived not 
 only of the associations in which most children 
 find much of their pleasure and social delights 
 — the society of those who attend the Sun- 
 day school, the young people's meetings, and 
 the services of the church in general — ^but also 
 of the reading of most of the books which 
 would arouse his interest and awaken his en- 
 thusiasm for humanity. If religion is to be left 
 out such a course would have to be pursued, 
 and it might be necessary to renounce all so- 
 ciety whatever by going into hermitage. Does 
 all this seem absurd? Then why say that re- 
 ligion should not be taught to children? In 
 fact, if children were not to become acquainted 
 with religion, religion would have to be ban- 
 ished from history, literature, and daily life 
 or else the child would have to be banished. 
 
 But perhaps the objector wishes only that the 
 parent should not in any way bias the child's 
 mind in favor of any specific form of religious 
 faith or practice. How, now, would that work ? 
 There can be but one answer. The result would 
 be a picked-up, haphazard form of religion, 
 or perhaps of irreligion. In short, the opposer 
 
 22 
 
The Propriety 
 
 asks the parent to vacate his duty in the interest 
 of the child's Hberty, and in so doing is wilHng 
 to risk the child to whatever chance influence 
 may affect it. That a parent who so conceived 
 his duty would conceive of duty as neglect is 
 apparent. Such a course could be followed 
 only by one who felt that whether the child 
 became religious or not made no difference, 
 or who felt that any form of religion was as 
 good as any other. So can no one feel who has 
 given sufficient thought to the subject to entitle 
 him to speak concerning it. The parent has his 
 duty as well as the child its rights. 
 
 Rights of the Community 
 Then, too, the community has its rights as 
 well as the child. This is recognized in our 
 truant and compulsory school laws. Too great 
 repression of individuality is, of course, to be 
 avoided ; but, on the other hand, so is too great 
 development of individuality. Associated life 
 is possible only between those who by similar 
 training are brought into reasonable harmony 
 of taste and habit. This involves the elim- 
 ination of all the more prominent idiosyn- 
 crasies — in short a rigid process of leveling 
 among the youth of any land. If the indi- 
 vidual does not by this system come to his 
 23 
 
The Child as God's Child 
 
 full development he at least becomes of use 
 to his fellow-men. One of the most impor- 
 tant differences between animals and men is 
 that the adults of the former are of very little, 
 while those of the latter are of great, use to 
 each other. In this connection the length of 
 human infancy as compared with that of ani- 
 mals becomes very significant. With his great- 
 er capacity of individualization a brief infancy 
 would render the human individual incapable 
 of associated life. In other words, the infancy 
 of human beings is greatly extended, appar- 
 ently in order to secure the adjustment of each 
 individual's special capabilities to the general 
 condition so that he can be of the greatest use 
 to the society in which he is to live. The com- 
 munity has a right to demand that its younger 
 members shall be so brought up as to be useful 
 to society at large and not as freaks. Only 
 the rankest egoism can deny this. And as the 
 general consensus of opinion is that religion 
 adds greatly to the common benefit the com- 
 munity rightly condemns those few individuals 
 who oppose the religious training of children. 
 
 Rights of the Parents 
 The parents, too, have some rights as com- 
 pared with the child. But especially as the 
 24 
 
The Propriety 
 
 custodians of the youthful life must they em- 
 ploy the most effective methods for developing 
 its highest character. Apart from religion 
 there are no thoroughly effective ethical mo- 
 tives. This is very generally acknowledged 
 by ethicists, and it is the tendency to a rela- 
 tive over-emphasis of religion as compared 
 with the morality that ought to accompany it, 
 not a denial of the value of religion, which 
 has led to the organization of ethical culture 
 societies. So, also, it is not disregard of re- 
 ligion as an ethical motive that has led to the 
 almost universal abandonment of religious in- 
 struction in the public schools, but a recogni- 
 tion of the fact that the formal instruction in 
 religion possible in the school fails of both the 
 religious and the moral results desired while, 
 of necessity, it runs counter to the religious 
 convictions of some of the patrons and sup- 
 porters. But while there may be some justifi- 
 cation for the course pursued by the school 
 authorities in this particular, it is plain enough 
 to anyone who studies the matter that moral 
 instruction and moral training must be carried 
 on in such schools at a great disadvantage. 
 The most efficient motives Felix Adler recog- 
 nizes, in his Moral Instruction of Children, 
 are the appeal to the aesthetic, the intellectual, 
 25 
 
The Child as God's Child 
 
 and the emotional faculty. That this appeal 
 has a certain value is frankly admitted, and 
 the moral instructor may need to avail him- 
 self of these motives. But however useful they 
 may be, they are not comparable to the re- 
 ligious sanction when rightly apprehended. 
 That abuses of the religious motive are pos- 
 sible does not argue against its proper use. 
 
 Utility of Child Religion 
 The propriety of child religion is further seen 
 in its utiHty. Many of the noblest specimens 
 of Christian manhood and womanhood are 
 found among those who were trained in the 
 habits and dispositions of religion from in- 
 fancy. Such was the case with the Rev. Dr. 
 Theodore L. Cuyler, who, in his Recollections 
 of a Long Life, tells us that he cannot name 
 any day or place of his conversion; but that 
 his mother's steady and constant influence from 
 his infancy led him gradually along, and that 
 it was under her patient training and by the 
 power of the Holy Spirit working through her 
 agency that he grew into a religious life. It 
 is difficult for those accustomed to the influence 
 of revival methods to appreciate the value of 
 religious training. But wherever it has been 
 
 faithfully tried this method has proved suc- 
 26 
 
The Propriety 
 
 cessful. Nor is there here any purpose to be- 
 Httle or decry the properly conducted revival. 
 It has its place in the work of the Church. It 
 is needful for those who are Church members, 
 but not Christians; for those who are Chris- 
 tians, but not members; and for those who 
 are both Christians and members, as well as 
 for those who are neither Christians nor mem- 
 bers. But it is especially needed and designed 
 for the last-named class, and therefore should 
 not be permitted to usurp the place of Chris- 
 tian training or to occasion its neglect. 
 Christian nurture should be the rule in all 
 Christian homes. For gathering into the fold 
 those who have not enjoyed the privilege of 
 Christian nurture the revival is very effective. 
 
 The utility of training for religion from 
 early childhood is seen not alone in its numer- 
 ous examples ; it lies in the very nature of the 
 conception of such training. For while the 
 chief stress appears to be laid upon human in- 
 fluences, the real purpose is the bringing of 
 the child and youth into vital relationship with 
 the divine. The product of such training is not 
 bare of the supernatural. Rightly conducted, 
 it opens the heart to the influence of the Spirit 
 of God as truly as, and more effectively than, 
 
 the revival method. Whatever religion can do 
 27 
 
The Child as God's Child 
 
 to support one in the moral crises of life is 
 secured by Christian training, since religion so 
 appropriated is not something foreign and un- 
 assimilated, but becomes part of the very being. 
 It is not the religion of the "once-born" or of 
 "healthy-mindedness," merely, which even 
 Professor James affirms to be inadequate for 
 the vicissitudes of life. It is the religion of 
 the union of human and divine forces working 
 together harmoniously toward the worthiest 
 end. The strength is great because the com- 
 bination is strong. The life thus engendered 
 is the life of personal effort, of consecration to 
 duty, of love for God and man, and of prayer. 
 The nature of such religion is a pledge of its 
 utility, meeting, as it does, the needs of the 
 
 individual soul at every moment of its life. 
 28 
 
CHAPTER III 
 
 The Presuppositions 
 
 Possibility of Child Conversion 
 Admitting the possibility, propriety, and 
 utility of childhood religion, the question still 
 remains as to its beginnings. Not a few are 
 ready to champion the cause of the child on 
 the ground that children can be converted 
 at a very early age, even as early as six years, 
 and some would say at the age of four. 
 Numerous instances are on record of very 
 young children who experienced the pangs of 
 remorse for sin, the blessedness of saving faith, 
 and the ethical transformation familiar to in- 
 stances of sudden conversion. There need be 
 no doubt as to the genuineness either of the 
 remorse, the faith, or the transformation. Nor 
 is there any room for question as to the per- 
 manent results often attained in such conver- 
 sions. The only question is whether such 
 high-pressure methods are as wise or as re- 
 ligiously desirable as methods more suitable to 
 the child's development. 
 
 There is a degree of truth in the plea that, 
 29 
 
The Child as God's Child 
 
 while children are relatively innocent when 
 compared with those who have lived long in 
 sin, they may, just because less hardened, feel 
 as keen remorse for whatever sins they have 
 committed as they would be likely to feel in 
 later life. The point here disputed is not the 
 possibility, but the desirability, from the re- 
 ligious standpoint, of inducing such remorse 
 in the young. Remorse exhibits a fatal tend- 
 ency to grow weaker with recurrence, and 
 should therefore be experienced very infre- 
 quently if its full benefits are to be reaped. 
 Besides, while keen remorse can be induced in 
 the young, it is questionable whether it is not 
 a too painful feeling for the child, considering 
 his general immaturity and moral irresponsi- 
 bility. The feeling of remorse has its place 
 in the moral and spiritual development of 
 juveniles ; but it ought to be graduated accord- 
 ing to age and the turpitude of the moral 
 delinquencies, which are seldom great in early 
 life. 
 
 A crisis in the religious Hfe of a child may 
 be brought on attended by all the violent emo- 
 tions known to adult converts, but it is unnatu- 
 ral. Furthermore, it is dangerous, and in most 
 cases it is, and in all cases it should be, un- 
 necessary. There is nothing in the moral 
 30 
 
The Presuppositions 
 
 condition of the average child to warrant such 
 a crisis. This too is admitted by many who 
 beheve in the necessity of a distinct crisis in 
 which the child shall commit himself definitely 
 to a religious life — in which he shall distinctly 
 break with his past and begin the new life. 
 There is certainly far more justification for 
 child conversions of this type than of the other. 
 The predominant element in them is that of 
 devotion or consecration. If adapted to the 
 child's capacity, if not forced or unnatural, if 
 patterned after the true type of child reli- 
 gion, such child self-consecration is legitimate 
 enough, although there is a still better way, at 
 least, for children of Christian parents. 
 
 New Testament Conception of 
 Conversion 
 Conversion is an event which ought not to 
 be necessary in the conscious life of any hu- 
 man being. It must be said in truth that the 
 New Testament conception of conversion is 
 that it ought not to have been necessary. It 
 is urged upon adults who have lived for many 
 years in a state of moral obliquity and aliena- 
 tion from God. All the presuppositions of con- 
 version — the new birth, adoption, justification, 
 or whatever other terms are employed to ex- 
 31 
 
The Child as God's Child 
 
 press the new life and the new relationships 
 assumed by the convert — are connected with 
 the thought of a life of sin previous to the 
 change. In the present-day idea of conversion 
 these same presuppositions prevail, whether 
 the conversion be that of an adult or of a 
 child. Conversion, in other words, presup- 
 poses a previous life of sin. Unless such a Hfe 
 is unavoidable conversion must be regarded as 
 a means adapted to do away with the abnormal 
 and to introduce normal conditions. How 
 vastly better it would be to prevent the abnor- 
 mal conditions — the long continued life of sin 
 that makes conversion necessary! This is just 
 what a correct conception of child religion 
 effectively realized would accomplish. A re- 
 ligious life beginning with the life of the 
 child and never lost would make conversion 
 unnecessary, because the occasion for it would 
 be obviated. 
 
 Is there any good reason for believing that 
 such a religious life is possible? The answer 
 to that question must be found in the facts now 
 to be considered. 
 
 The Adult Convert and the Child 
 The very best authorities on the subject of 
 
 child character affirm that there are in the in- 
 
 32 
 
The Presuppositions 
 
 fant evil impulses which are not the result of 
 imitation, but spring from heredity, or which 
 are at least congenital. Thus far even the most 
 scientific observers confirm the doctrine of orig- 
 inal sin, not in the sense of its guilt or demerit, 
 but of the corruption of human nature in its 
 very beginnings. These evil inclinations vary 
 in different children, but they are found in all, 
 and they are sure to find expression when the 
 circumstances adapted to call them forth are 
 present. But these same observers are equally 
 sure that in the character of the child there 
 are good impulses which are quite as certain 
 to find their expression under suitable condi- 
 tions. This does not at all disprove the doc- 
 trine of original sin, though it does destroy the 
 doctrine of total depravity. The infant, in- 
 capable of choosing either good or bad, is, in 
 original character, both good and bad. It is, 
 with the infant, wholly a question of original, as 
 distinguished from acquired, character, and of 
 character as distinguished from conduct. The 
 expression of his infantile impulses, whether 
 good or bad, is neither praiseworthy nor blame- 
 worthy. The tendency of his impulses is, how- 
 ever, plain. After a time he may choose either 
 to follow or to deny his impulses. 
 
 Considered from the standpoint of charac- 
 (3) 33 
 
The Child as God's Child 
 
 ter, how does the newborn child differ, then, 
 from the adult new convert? Is there not in 
 both a mixture of good and evil impulses? 
 Does not the adult convert soon discover that 
 he is not wholly free from inclinations to evil 
 which he is obliged to repress by force of will 
 and the assistance of divine grace? Such has 
 been the practically universal observation. The 
 adult recognizes the evil impulses in their true 
 nature, and attempts, perhaps successfully, to 
 avoid being led by them; while the child does 
 not know the nature of his impulses, and so 
 gives them free and unhindered expression. It 
 is possible that the adult may be freer from 
 blemishes in conduct than the infant, but this is 
 because he knows more, has within him a moral 
 sense commensurate with his greater age, and 
 has learned to hide his feelings as the child 
 has not. But the mixture of good and bad im- 
 pulses is present in the characters of both. 
 Neither the adult nor the infant is w^holly 
 sanctified, purified, in his inmost being. In fact, 
 these evil impulses of the adult are just the im- 
 pulses he carried with him from infancy, more 
 or less strengthened or weakened, as the case 
 may be, by indulgence or repression. In inner 
 character of impulse he is practically the infant 
 grown to maturity. In other respects enor- 
 34 
 
The Presuppositions 
 
 mous changes have taken place during his de- 
 velopment, but in this respect the changes have 
 been very slight. 
 
 If the infant and the newly converted adult 
 both have within them this mixture of good 
 and evil impulses how can the infant that 
 grows up with these impulses need conversion ? 
 The only ground would be that as the child 
 grew toward maturity he became guilty of 
 voluntary indulgence of these impulses. In 
 other words, his conversion would affect his 
 will. In infancy he indulged his impulses in- 
 voluntarily ; in later life voluntarily ; after con- 
 version he controls or aims to control them. 
 If the child could be so trained as to avoid 
 the voluntary indulgence of his evil impulses 
 he would not need conversion. If, as he grew 
 toward maturity, he could be led to control 
 his impulses he would be exactly in the moral 
 state of the converted all the time without 
 having passed through the crisis of the adult. 
 
 The point here insisted upon is not that the 
 child can be so led, but that if he could be so 
 led there would be no need of conversion. 
 But, the question of volition aside, the child 
 is in the same state as the converted adult. 
 And he must be, in the involuntary indulgence 
 of his impulses, as free from condemnation as 
 35 
 
The Child as God's Child 
 
 the adult is who controls his impulses. There 
 are also certain relationships with God of 
 which the adult is conscious which the child 
 knows nothing about. But all these are differ- 
 ences in degrees either of volition or of knowl- 
 edge, not of native character or impulse. 
 
 Why the Mixture of Good and Evil 
 How, now, does it come that in the infant 
 character there is this mixture of evil and 
 good? We are accustomed to say that it is 
 the result of heredity, that our ancestors for un- 
 told generations were of this mixed character, 
 and that they have bequeathed to us this in- 
 heritance. Heredity is probably a law of God's 
 operation. It is designed to be, and for the most 
 part it is, beneficent. If it leaves us with some 
 inherited evil tendencies it also bestows upon 
 us many benefits. If heredity is to remain we 
 shall have to bear some of the evils it carries 
 with it. The evils are, however, not any nec- 
 essary part of human life; they are incidental. 
 One can conceive of humanity without them. 
 It is our business to eliminate them from char- 
 acter and life. What puzzles one most is that 
 there has been so long this mixture of the 
 good with the bad in native character. All 
 
 good it could not be on any known theory of 
 36 
 
The Presuppositions 
 
 man's origin and moral history; all bad it 
 might have been. Why was it not all bad? 
 The believer in God will answer that it was 
 because God, while he did not see fit to destroy 
 heredity, did determine that entire ruin should 
 not come upon the race. In other words, his 
 grace intervened in man's behalf and held him 
 back from utter moral degradation. 
 
 There seems to be no other explanation of 
 the fact that original sin does not result in 
 total depravity. Left to work out its history 
 for itself, humanity would soon become morally 
 bankrupt. But God does not leave us to our- 
 selves. With unforgetting regularity he im- 
 parts to each newly conceived human being 
 those qualities which by nature it could not 
 have. And he does this as truly for the chil- 
 dren of the non-Christian population as for 
 those of Christian parentage. Every child 
 comes into the world with a native character 
 at least as pure as the character of the con- 
 verted adult. It is the tremendous, but glori- 
 ous, responsibility of parents and others to see 
 that that character does not degenerate. It 
 may be improper, from the standpoint of tech- 
 nical theology, to speak of the child as regen- 
 erated; but it is not improper to say that it 
 is the subject of divine, gracious activity. If 
 Z7 
 
The Child as God's Child 
 
 it is not born again it is born from above, and 
 this value of being born again consists just in 
 the fact that being born again is being born 
 from above. The child has the essence of that 
 which Christ referred to in his conversation 
 with Nicodemus. 
 
 The Infant Fit for Heaven 
 There is another line of argument which is 
 still more convincing. There is practically com- 
 plete unanimity to-day in the belief that chil- 
 dren dying before the age of responsibility are 
 as certain to reach heaven as the adult Chris- 
 tian can be. The grounds for this belief need 
 not be given here, but the implications of it 
 are valuable. It certainly implies that the child 
 is as free from faults of character that would 
 exclude a soul from heaven as the adult Chris- 
 tian is. But unless we deny the doctrine of 
 the natural corruption of man's heart, and the 
 necessity of divine action in the heart of man 
 in order to the correction of that corruption, 
 we must admit that God has done for the soul 
 of each child dying in infancy at least as much 
 as he does for the adult in his conversion. It 
 is, indeed, conceivable that God might do that 
 work in the soul of the child just before death 
 
 in order to fit its character for the holiness 
 38 
 
The Presuppositions 
 
 of the new surroundings into which it is about 
 to enter. But while this is conceivable, it is 
 not believable that he would do for a child 
 about to die what he would not do for one 
 whose destiny was to live. The child certainly 
 needs the impress of the divine upon it, coun- 
 teracting the influence of the merely human, in 
 order to live out its life properly. It is in- 
 credible, therefore, that God would allow a 
 child to go into the moral dangers of this 
 world with no hallowing influence of his Spirit 
 upon it. There is a blessed truth in the words 
 of Jesus that the angels of the children do 
 always behold the face of the Father in heaven, 
 the general meaning of which is that God con- 
 stantly ministers to the highest needs of all 
 infant children. And, besides, if it is true that 
 God's Spirit is always striving with men to 
 keep them safe in the midst of life's moral 
 perils, is it credible that he leaves children 
 without that care? True it is that the Spirit 
 can work upon adults in such a way as to in- 
 fluence their choices while the very young child 
 can make no choices. But is it not a fact that 
 just because it is the passive object of external 
 influences whose force it can neither measure, 
 understand, nor counteract, the child needs 
 special guidance by the Spirit ? And while the 
 39 
 
The Child as God's Child 
 
 child has parental care that the adult does not 
 need, this can, in the best case, be no substitute 
 for what God can do; while there are all too 
 many instances in which the parental care tends 
 toward moral ruin. 
 
 Jesus and the Child 
 We are forced, then, to believe that every 
 child is born into this world with at least as 
 much of the mark of God's hand upon its moral 
 character as the converted adult has. But the 
 crowning reason for maintaining this view is 
 found in the large place children hold in the 
 words and deeds of Jesus, especially his defense 
 of them in the words, "Of such is the kingdom 
 of heaven." 
 
 Some quibbling there has been as to the exact 
 meaning of Jesus in using this language; but 
 it at least means that children, no doubt very 
 young children, are members of his kingdom. 
 If they are they must be so by some act of 
 God's sovereign authority, not at all with the 
 consent of the child. Such a sovereign act God 
 would not perform for an adult; but as God, 
 by a sovereign act, must either include or ex- 
 clude children from his kingdom it is certainly 
 no more a disregard of the child's possible 
 
 future choice to include than to exclude^ while 
 40 
 
The Presuppositions 
 
 it is far more in accord with God's mercy ancj 
 love. 
 
 Figurative Representations 
 
 But what of moral quality is implied in being 
 in the kingdom of God? The phrase, "king- 
 dom of God/' or ''heaven," is figurative, and 
 expresses the relationships of king and subject, 
 ruler and ruled. In an adult we regard a 
 change of will or, as we ordinarily say, of 
 heart as the necessary introduction into the 
 kingdom. It is not implied that all the adult's 
 impulses are thereafter good, but that he pro- 
 poses thenceforth to control all his impulses, 
 good or bad, so as to serve the interests of the 
 kingdom. The adult is for all practical pur- 
 poses, in essentially the same moral condition 
 as the infant, with the exception of the differ- 
 ence in will, which, of course, the child cannot 
 intelligently exert. Both are related to God as 
 his subjects, one without, the other with, 
 choice. 
 
 Another phrase, "children of God," is prac- 
 tically equivalent to the "kingdom," though it 
 represents the relationship somewhat differ- 
 ently. So also is it with the phrase, "the house- 
 hold [or family] of God." Whether the figure 
 be that of the new birth or that of adoption 
 the relationship in the household is that of chil- 
 
 41 
 
The Child as God's Child 
 
 dren. If the figure is drawn from the con- 
 ception of God's right to rule over us we are 
 said to be members of his kingdom ; if from the 
 conception of God's loving care, children in 
 his family. In both cases we are under his pro- 
 tection and subject to his authority — the pro- 
 tection and authority of a loving King or of 
 a mighty Father. 
 
 Neither of these figurative representations 
 of the Christian's relation to God gives us any 
 hint as to the conditions for entering into this 
 relation. Other Scripture passages supply this 
 lack. We are born again — that is, have a 
 heavenly life principle imparted to us. We are 
 created anew; old things have passed away. 
 These, too, are figures of speech, expressive 
 of the change that must be wrought in the 
 adult who has lived the life of an alien from 
 God before he can come into the new relation- 
 ship. But in no case is it meant that the inner 
 impulses of the changed adult's heart are more 
 free from evil than those of the child. Or, to 
 put it in reverse form, if the child and the adult 
 are both members of the kingdom, or family, 
 of God both must be in the moral condition 
 requisite to that relationship. God has pro- 
 vided that the child shall enter into this world 
 
 with as fair a chance against the inherited evil 
 42 
 
The Presuppositions 
 
 as the adult convert has — at least so far as 
 the proportion of good to bad impulses is con- 
 cerned. If anyone should insist that it is in- 
 correct to speak of the child as regenerate it 
 must at least be said that the child's impulses 
 are such as the moral condition of the regen- 
 erate displays. God has done as much for the 
 
 child as he does for the adult. 
 43 
 
CHAPTER IV 
 The Training; 
 
 If the newborn infant is in the religious re- 
 lationship to God and in the moral condition 
 described in the preceding chapter a momentous 
 task is thereby set for those into whose hands 
 the young life has come. That task is none 
 other than the protection and development, 
 from infancy to maturity, of the moral and 
 religious state in which the babe enters the 
 world. It is the function of Christian train- 
 ing to accomplish this desirable end. 
 
 From the standpoint of Christianity the 
 problem is one far larger than that of moral 
 training, though that is so important as to de- 
 mand primary attention. The task is neces- 
 sarily twofold: The evil impulses must be 
 repressed and in every wise way discouraged, 
 while the good impulses must be encouraged 
 and developed. 
 
 Moral Training: Repression 
 The usual practice is to confine attention 
 exclusively to the work of repression. This is, 
 44 
 
The Training 
 
 in one sense, much easier than the other work. 
 It is only needful that one be able to recognize 
 the wild shoot when it appears and to apply 
 the pruning knife instantly. The theory is 
 that if the adventitious growths are cut away 
 the sap will flow in the fruit-bearing branches. 
 But the analogy between plant life and human 
 character is not as close as the figure just em- 
 ployed would suggest. Infant psychology is 
 exceedingly complicated, and not every evil 
 manifestation results from an evil impulse. 
 The child's anger, falsehoods, selfishness, 
 jealousies, cruelties, tyrannies, and other out- 
 ward faults are not always to be charged solely 
 to evil impulses. They are partly due to igno- 
 rance, partly to uncontrolled energy. Will- 
 fulness is a very unpleasant and dangerous 
 trait in child life, but it has become a truism in 
 modern education that the child's will must not 
 be broken. With a wider understanding of life's 
 relations much of the selfishness, jealousy, and 
 the like will disappear. What remains after 
 such information is gained and comprehended 
 must, of course, be attributed to native evil 
 impulse. 
 
 But it would not do to wait for the begin- 
 ning of repressive measures until the source 
 from which they spring can be determined. 
 
 45 
 
The Child as God's Child 
 
 Evil manifestations must be promptly checked. 
 A part of the child's training consists in learn- 
 ing to connect the disapproval of parents, 
 teachers, and all older companions with certain 
 manifestations of self. Otherwise bad habits 
 will soon be formed and the difficulty of the 
 situation largely increased. By such external 
 repression also the child learns to discriminate 
 between its activities, and the faint beginnings 
 of moral distinctions are evolved. Another 
 advantage of external repression is that it 
 teaches the child to attempt self-restraint, and 
 thus develops the activity of the will in the 
 realm of morals. 
 
 The task of repression is one that must 
 be performed with the utmost wisdom and 
 delicacy, lest the child should come to look 
 upon morality in a too exclusively negative 
 light. This has been one of the chief defects 
 of most Christian nurture. As a result we 
 have a generation largely imbued with the idea 
 that righteousness and holiness consist princi- 
 pally in abstinence from certain classes of acts. 
 Repression is attended with danger also in an- 
 other direction. So far as the evil manifesta- 
 tions spring from the inner necessity for action 
 they are inevitable. No amount of repressive 
 
 effort on the part of parents or others will 
 46 
 
The Training 
 
 avail to restrain the child's activities. Just 
 here is where the break may come between the 
 parents and the child, and the latter learn to 
 practice in secret its forbidden ways. Espe- 
 cially will this risk be incurred if repression is 
 unduly severe or too frequently takes the form 
 of punishment. Unquestionably many of the 
 child's deceptions are practiced because he feels 
 unable to control himself and is, notwithstand- 
 ing, unwilling to bear the censure or other 
 penalty sure to follow violations of command. 
 But, perplexing though the situation may be, 
 parents and teachers must find a way to restrain 
 the child without damaging him. 
 
 Perhaps if all who have to do with the train- 
 ing of children were to study the good traits 
 in them as assiduously as they do the evil, and 
 while not neglecting the repression of these 
 strove as diligently to develop those, the prob- 
 lem might at least approach its solution. Un- 
 doubtedly there is here a suggestion of a better, 
 though it must be confessed a more difficult, 
 way. Notice is taken of the evil tendencies of 
 the child because they are held to be danger 
 signals. Love acts as a stimulus to the watch- 
 ful eye of the parent, who fears the conse- 
 quences of the evil more than he rejoices in the 
 expectation of the good. The parent's life is 
 
 47 
 
The Child as God's Child 
 
 usually one long anxiety for the moral welfare 
 of the child from its birth until it is matured 
 in habits of good. This condition of things 
 is due to almost numberless sorrowful examples 
 of miscarriage or shipwreck in the morals of 
 the young. How natural, therefore, is repres- 
 sion, and, on the other hand, how easy to 
 overlook the hopeful aspects in the child's 
 character! Besides, the evil manifestations 
 annoy and Irritate, and patience is difficult to 
 exercise. It is easy for the parent or teacher 
 to give way and to punish in a fit of impatience 
 or anger. Little do those in authority over the 
 child consider that if they cannot control them- 
 selves when their wishes are crossed they 
 should not expect the child to control himself 
 under like circumstances. 
 
 The Development of the Good 
 
 But, though it may be more difficult, the 
 
 way of the cultivation of the good in the child 
 
 character should not be passed by. If it is 
 
 more difficult it is also less thorny, and it avoids 
 
 all the dangers attendant upon the method of 
 
 repression and secures all the results that are 
 
 sought by the anxious parent. Along, then, 
 
 with some repression of the evil there must go 
 
 some cultivation of the good. The difficulty is 
 48 
 
The Training 
 
 once more apparent as soon as the question of 
 method is raised. It might be legitimate in 
 one whose purpose is the discussion of princi- 
 ples to decline the treatment of the pedagogical 
 aspect of application. But a few hints may at 
 least be given. And, first of all, careful dis- 
 crimination should be made as to the sources 
 or springs of the child's action. Not every 
 falsehood is a sign of a deceitful disposition. 
 When the misrepresentation is the result of im- 
 perfect perception the child can be led to per- 
 ceive more accurately. When it arises from 
 a vivid imagination it would, in most cases, 
 be better to pay no attention to it. When there 
 is in it any element of conscious or purposed 
 deception as much can be gained by pointing 
 out the value of truthfulness as by censure or 
 punishment in any form. Even a repressive 
 influence can be exercised by showing up the 
 dangers to itself from self-deception or the 
 deception of others. 
 
 This suggestion of an appeal to self-interest 
 raises the question of how to deal with cases of 
 egoism. Here again it is requisite to distinguish 
 between a legitimate and an inordinate regard 
 for self. The one should be let alone; the other 
 may be counteracted by changing the form. A 
 child that looks out too exclusively for its own 
 (4) 49 
 
The Child as God's Child 
 
 interests may be gradually led to know the pleas- 
 ure of giving others pleasure. One form of 
 egoism substituted for another, it is true; but 
 still it is a. less objectionable form, and it is 
 so akin to altruism that in time the latter will 
 come to prevail. Even in very young children 
 the sense of self-respect and the desire for the 
 esteem of others may be so developed as to 
 cause them to restrain themselves in the exhibi- 
 tion of traits which they have been taught to 
 regard as evil. In this connection a proper 
 use of the existence and attributes of God may 
 be made eminently useful. Love, also, which 
 very early manifests itself, may become a pow- 
 erful aid in holding in check evil propensities; 
 and just because there is so much mystery in 
 it love to God is unusually effective with 
 children. 
 
 But though the appeal to self-respect and 
 the esteem of others rather than to shame, and 
 to love for parents and for God rather than to 
 fear, are useful, they are so incidentally and 
 in exigencies chiefly. These things are, of 
 course, factors in the upbuilding of permanent 
 and abiding character ; but to obtain this result 
 in its highest form opportunity must be af- 
 forded the child for the exercise of all his 
 
 virtues. It is not here meant that artificial 
 so 
 
The Training 
 
 occasions for the exercise of virtue should be 
 provided. There is an element of caprice in 
 such procedures that must sooner or later de- 
 feat their very purpose. Besides, occasions for 
 the practice of the virtues will arise naturally 
 in sufficient numbers. Self-denial, patience in 
 disappointment, self-control in irritating or 
 exciting situations, generosity, affection, and 
 all the virtues will find numberless inevitable 
 and unavoidable opportunities for exercise in 
 the home, the nursery, the school, and at play. 
 At the moment when the child's will wavers 
 between these virtues and the opposite vices 
 a word of encouragement will decide the con- 
 flict. If this process of training is kept up from 
 day to day and from year to year good habits, 
 which are as easy to form as bad ones, and 
 which have nearly as much force, will be 
 produced and strengthened. 
 
 Too Great Strenuousness Possible 
 Of course, wisdom dictates that the life of 
 the child must not be looked at exclusively 
 from the standpoint of morals and of char- 
 acter. It has been the bane of much of the 
 training of children that life was made to ap- 
 pear too earnest. This will react, as history 
 shows, even in adults ; much more will it react 
 SI 
 
The Child as God's Child 
 
 with children and youth. The joyousness of 
 the child nature must be encouraged. The 
 demand for bodily exercise must be provided 
 for. The undue repression, or the under-cul- 
 tivation of these, will certainly result in morose- 
 ness of disposition if nothing worse, and in 
 such inertia as will render the child weak in 
 temptation. Besides, it is one of the most 
 important of all the elements in proper child 
 training that he be kept employed, and mostly 
 employed about things that he enjoys. And 
 what a powerful appeal can be made to the 
 child that is permitted all reasonable oppor- 
 tunity for the gratification of innocent impulses 
 to abstain from those which will hurt! The 
 child that has confidence in the desire of the 
 parent to secure its highest pleasure and happi- 
 ness will listen to the loving voice of restraint. 
 
 From still another point of view is it unwise 
 to be too strenuous with the moral life of chil- 
 dren. Account for it as we may, it is a pe- 
 culiarity of human beings that they do not 
 like to appear in the light of patterns of virtue. 
 Reprehensible this may be, though probably it 
 is not altogether so. As a fact of human na- 
 ture it must, nevertheless, be reckoned with. 
 This trait appears in quite young children, espe- 
 cially in boys, whose rudenesses are not infre- 
 
 52 
 
The Training 
 
 quently the result of a reluctancy to be classed 
 with the well-behaved. The hero of the child 
 is often one whose qualities the cultivated 
 and upright man cannot admire. Observant 
 writers have noticed that even among men 
 there is a disposition to look not too severely 
 upon the foibles, and perhaps the sins, particu- 
 larly of the genius who is otherwise pleasing. 
 However much we may condemn such a fact 
 in adults, leniency in judgment is necessary in 
 dealing with children. The child feels within 
 him instincts which to his immature judgment 
 are as legitimate as possible. He cannot but 
 feel a sense of unnaturalness when these in- 
 stincts are not all exhibited. They are in vio- 
 lation of no sense of taste or propriety with 
 which he is acquainted. His point of view is 
 not at all that of the adult, yet he feels some 
 degree of confidence in his own rights. He 
 could not put it into words, but he wants to live 
 out his whole self. It is evident that under 
 such circumstances too great violence must not 
 be done the child nature. He cannot bear the 
 strenuous conceptions of his elders, and any 
 attempt to impose them suddenly or too con- 
 sistently upon him will render the whole moral 
 life odious and artificial, and leave a memory 
 of an unpleasant moral crisis in his history. 
 53 
 
The Child as God's Child 
 
 The task may sometimes seem to baffle the pa- 
 rent's or teacher's skill; but some way must 
 be found to lead, not force, the child to see 
 that only one side of his moral nature has rights 
 which he should respect. 
 
 Training for Religion 
 When we turn from the moral to the re- 
 ligious training of children new problems enter 
 upon the field of mental vision. Moral train- 
 ing is approved by all, but there are not a few 
 who find slight justification for religious train- 
 ing. Perhaps if the objectors were to analyze 
 their feelings they would discover that the dif- 
 ference in their attitude toward moral and 
 religious training respectively is based on a 
 difference between morals and religion. Mo- 
 rality as well answers all its purposes for soci- 
 ety if it is the expression of habit as though 
 it were a matter of choice. Society, therefore, 
 is satisfied with the habit of morality. But 
 society as such cares little for religion, which 
 is felt to be so largely an individual matter. 
 It is recognized, however, that although it is 
 individual, it is at its lowest when it is a 
 habit. All Protestants, at least, who under- 
 stand themselves demand that every act of 
 religion shall be not formal but vital; not 
 54 
 
The Training 
 
 habitual, but the expression of a conscious per- 
 sonal feeling. This is based on the insight that 
 religion is genuine and valuable only in pro- 
 portion as it is founded on continually fresh 
 volitions. 
 
 While this, in some measure, explains, it does 
 not justify, the opposition to religion developed 
 by training as distinguished from religion in- 
 augurated by conversion. The religion of 
 training would neither ignore nor coerce the 
 child's will, makes as much room for free and 
 intelligent choice as the religion of conversion, 
 and also affords as large a place for the su- 
 pernatural element and the cooperation of the 
 divine and human. In the sudden conversions 
 of later life, whether in youth or maturity, the 
 will of the individual is somewhat more in 
 evidence because it is the will of a relatively 
 developed being, and because there is some- 
 thing convulsive, cataclysmic, and therefore 
 spectacular about it. These words are not used 
 in an offensive sense, but simply to point out 
 the contrast between such a conversion and the 
 religion of training. But although the child 
 is led to exercise his will in the interest of re- 
 ligion, it is none the less his will. And al- 
 though at first his choices are not characterized 
 by their intelligence so much as by their pas- 
 55 
 
The Child as God's Child 
 
 sivity, still as time goes on and, under training 
 and instruction, he comes to an intelligent 
 appreciation of religion his choices become his 
 own in every sense in which the choices of 
 the subject of sudden conversion are his own. 
 It is not even true that the one is led by outside 
 influence while the other makes his choice freely 
 and without constraint; for in every case of 
 sudden conversion the subject of it was led by 
 external, though perhaps imperceptible, influ- 
 ences to make his decision. 
 
 Nor is the divine element left out of the re- 
 ligion of training. It is distinctly presupposed 
 that the babe is the subject of redemption, and 
 that its good impulses are the result of a divine 
 provision. If it may not be called regenerate 
 it is at least in the moral state of the regenerate, 
 and that by God's own act. His Spirit is ever 
 watching over the child. The parent does not 
 interfere or attempt to do the work intended 
 to be done by the Holy Spirit. Rather does the 
 parent cooperate with the Spirit of God until 
 the child is capable of assuming control of him- 
 self. The resultant morality is as truly the prod- 
 uct of human and divine cooperation as it is in 
 the case of the adult who is suddenly converted. 
 As soon and as completely as possible the 
 
 child's own will is enlisted in the work. The 
 56 
 
The Training 
 
 only time when the child's will is ignored is 
 when the child has no will. And the child's 
 will would be ignored in precisely the same 
 sense if God had left it without gracious help 
 and its parents without training. The objector 
 proceeds upon the assumption that the child's 
 will is evil and that only, and that it would 
 inevitably choose an evil course, at least for 
 a time, if left to itself. Even if this assumption 
 were true it would really be nothing to the 
 point. Since the child has no reasonable will 
 the question is, What shall the parent do? 
 Shall he allo\y it to forfeit by lack of training 
 most of the benefits of God's grace, or shall 
 he so bring it up as to reap these benefits? 
 Which will the child approve when he becomes 
 a man ? 
 
 Emotional Aspect of Religion of 
 Training 
 
 A further difficulty may be felt in the ques- 
 tion of the emotional aspect of the religion of 
 training. Sudden conversions are almost al- 
 ways preceded by some degree of a conscious- 
 ness of sin and followed by some degree of 
 relief and positive joy. Will not all of this be 
 forfeited in the religion of training? And 
 will this not result in a cold and lifeless re- 
 57 
 
The Child as God's Child 
 
 ligion? Suppose it were so. Is not the joy 
 of the new convert too costly when purchased 
 at the price of a previous life spent in the 
 neglect of God, if not in positive wickedness? 
 Dare we incur the risk that the child will never 
 be converted in order to secure a certain kind 
 of joy if he should be converted? But it is 
 an error to suppose that the religion of training 
 is joyless or lifeless. There is not so much 
 emotion, painful and pleasurable, crowded into 
 a short space of time; but whatever emotions 
 are legitimately connected with the religious 
 life are present in all who are truly religious. 
 One need not have lived in sin to know the 
 joy of purity, nor in the neglect of duty to 
 know the happiness of performance. Much is 
 made of the joy of forgiven sin, but the joy 
 of having followed always the voice of con- 
 science is better. Love, gratitude, reverence, 
 confidence toward God are felt by all really 
 religious souls. The sense of divine sonship, 
 the communion of saints, the fellowship with 
 God in prayer, are as certainly realized by the 
 religion of training as by that attained in sud- 
 den conversion. The only emotion not known 
 to one that is known to the other is the sense 
 of pardon. But is it worth while to have lived 
 
 in sin to secure that? Besides, even this will 
 58 
 
The Training 
 
 be likely to be known in some measure to one 
 trained in religion from infancy; for as the 
 suddenly converted sometimes falls into sin 
 which needs to be forgiven afresh, so may, and 
 so mostly has it been, with those trained from 
 birth. The necessity for living long under an 
 accumulated load of sin in order to know the 
 relief of pardon is not apparent. And even if 
 it be supposed that there is some peculiarly 
 blessed relation between the forgiven soul and 
 God, still, unless the one trained from infancy 
 should never sin, he too may know that rela- 
 tionship. But surely no one would plead for 
 sin that we might know the joys of pardon. 
 
 Imitation and Curiosity 
 It must not be overlooked that the training 
 under consideration is not secured solely by the 
 use of words of direction or advice. These 
 are necessary, but the most effectual religious 
 training is that which arises out of the daily 
 life of the adult members of the household. 
 What that life is will largely determine what 
 the religious life of the younger members of 
 the family shall be. Of the two great char- 
 acteristics of childhood which make education 
 possible imitation is the earlier in appearance 
 and for a long time the more significant in its 
 59 
 
The Child as God's Child 
 
 results. The other quaHty, curiosity, is more 
 rational, and cannot therefore show itself quite 
 so early. Imitation being at first unconscious, 
 and for a considerable after period not fully 
 conscious, leaves the child passive in the hands 
 of its companions. It v^ill imitate good and 
 bad, meaningful and meaningless acts alike — 
 words, tones, gestures, attitudes. As imita- 
 tion becomes conscious the child instinctively 
 imitates or, more properly, produces within it- 
 self the feelings which certain words, tones, 
 gestures, and attitudes express in the adult. 
 When imitation becomes fully conscious the 
 child chooses individuals as ideals which it 
 strives to be like. In all but this last stage 
 the wordless language of acts and acted emo- 
 tions impresses itself powerfully upon the child 
 mind and character. And as the child within 
 certain limits tends to reproduce, during its 
 earlier years, the life of the parents — their 
 ways, their points of view, their desires and 
 aspirations, their emotions — so the type of 
 parental piety will be almost certain to re- 
 appear in the child according to its capacity. 
 Prayer, Bible reading, and natural, unaffected 
 religious conversation in the home will induce 
 the desire for them in the mind of the child. 
 
 Reverence for sacred things and genuine de- 
 60 
 
The Training 
 
 votion to the interests of God's kingdom on 
 
 earth on the part of the parents will generate 
 
 like states of mind and action in the children, 
 
 who will grow up to respect and expect in 
 
 them'selves what they saw and respected in 
 
 their parents. In short, the religion of the 
 
 parents will be the religion of the children. 
 6i 
 
CHAPTER V 
 The Teachingf 
 
 The view of the religious condition and life 
 of children here maintained does not propose 
 to make children Christians by teaching, but to 
 train children who already hold a firmly estab- 
 lished place in the kingdom of God as such 
 children ought to be trained. Nevertheless, a 
 certain amount and kind of teaching is neces- 
 sary to the best results. 
 
 Training implies absolute or relative passiv- 
 ity, and may be begun long before teaching 
 is possible. Teaching appeals to intelligence 
 and reason, though it may also be an aid in 
 right training. Nevertheless religious and moral 
 teaching should not be postponed until rea- 
 son develops the power of intelligent choice. 
 Facts have their practical bearings, and even 
 a very young mind is sufficiently logical to 
 draw correct practical inferences from the 
 facts, though the power to frame the infer- 
 ences into propositions may be altogether lack- 
 ing. It is for this reason that Bible stories 
 and biographies are so helpful to the reli- 
 gious life of children and youth. The moral 
 
 and religious lessons latent in them are felt 
 62 
 
The Teaching 
 
 as a power in the life long before an analy- 
 sis of the causes thereof is possible to the 
 child. 
 
 The ultimate purpose of all true teaching 
 and education, whether of children or adults, 
 should be, as it was among the Stoics, the pro- 
 duction and development of character. It may 
 be proved by statistics that the diffusion of 
 intelligence alone does not result in a reduction 
 of the quantity of vice in any community. 
 Nevertheless, all knowledge and intellectual 
 culture tend toward the elevation of a charac- 
 ter already virtuous, while it prevents men 
 from falling into many hurtful delusions. 
 Most of the fanaticism of the world arises 
 from ignorance, though in some instances it 
 is ignorance parading as the loftiest wisdom. 
 An intelligent Christianity is, all other things 
 being equal, better than an ignorant Chris- 
 tianity. And while knowledge is not the 
 main element in religion, the great Christian 
 facts must be known in order to secure Chris- 
 tian results. Scripture knowledge exerts a 
 powerful tendency toward the promotion of 
 morality. 
 
 63 
 
The Child as God's Child 
 
 Subject-Matter of Religious 
 Instruction 
 
 The first question that confronts those who 
 have to do with the reHgious instruction of 
 children pertains to the subject-matter. What 
 shall be taught? This is a question the cus- 
 tomary answer to which sadly needs revision. 
 It used to be assumed that the Catechism 
 should be taught consecutively until all the 
 questions and answers, from the doctrine of 
 God to the doctrine of the last things, were 
 committed to memory. This view was based 
 upon the importance of the form of instruction. 
 Sound doctrine might easily be jeopardized by 
 uncarefully guarded forms of expression. And 
 as sound doctrine is of great importance one 
 should have correct formulas for its expression 
 ever in the memory. 
 
 One might admit the desirability and even 
 the necessity of sound doctrine, adequately ex- 
 pressed, as a mental possession, without con- 
 ceding the conclusion that the Catechism should 
 be consecutively taught or learned. No doubt 
 certain beneficial results have accrued from the 
 learning of the Catechism in childhood. But 
 no benefit has been derived from the employ- 
 ment of that method that would not have fol- 
 64 
 
The Teaching 
 
 lowed a better method. Men learned language 
 in the days when it was believed that the first 
 task was to master the grammar from begin- 
 ning to end ; but as grammar is now taught in 
 connection with practice in reading and com- 
 position, and as an aid to these, so it is ques- 
 tionable whether more of the theory of religion 
 should be taught than is needed for practice. 
 
 This is no plea for a haphazard method of 
 religious instruction, although it is a protest 
 against the attempt to impart to the child a 
 complete system of theology. Catechisms, as 
 doctrinal standards of a secondary order, may 
 be well enough ; but they are not the offspring 
 of a study of the child's needs so much as of 
 the demand for system in the minds of mature 
 men. It may, indeed, be that before the req- 
 uisite religious instruction is finished the sub- 
 stance of the entire Catechism will have been 
 imparted; and it may be that after a certain 
 age has been reached a careful and systematic 
 study of the Catechism should crown the re- 
 ligious instruction already imparted. But 
 everywhere where the method of systematic 
 religious instruction of children has been in 
 vogue there is a growing feeling that it fails 
 to accomplish the desired results, and in not 
 a few cases prevents them. In Germany and 
 (5) 65 
 
The Child as God's Child 
 
 in France there is a powerful reaction against 
 prevailing methods on the ground that they are 
 worse than useless. It is felt that if the re- 
 ligious results so much desired are to be at- 
 tained there must no longer be so complete a 
 divorce between the instruction and the life. 
 Instead of the stress being laid upon the subject- 
 matter it must be laid upon the ends to be 
 gained by its impartation. Somehow a vital 
 connection must be made between theory and 
 practice. This is impossible as long as the 
 amount of material to be taught and learned 
 absorbs so completely the energies both of 
 teacher and taught. 
 
 But the most important modification in the 
 religious instruction of the young must come 
 in the better understanding of the purpose of 
 instruction. If the instruction is designed to 
 make theologians the present method is not so 
 far out of the way. But if the instruction is 
 designed to point out the way of life and to 
 shed light upon it the modern conceptions of 
 pedagogy must be adopted. It is unfortunate 
 that there has been no adequate study of the 
 development of the child's religious life with a 
 view to the preparation of a course of instruc- 
 tion adapted to it. This lack is, however, less 
 
 felt simply because the end and aim of instruc- 
 66 
 
The Teaching 
 
 tion is practical, not theoretical, knowledge. 
 Such handbooks as those suggested are neces- 
 sary only for the parent and teacher, not at 
 all for the child. Any wise instructor can 
 judge for himself what religious teaching a 
 child needs, or rather in what department such 
 teaching falls, by the questions it asks and the 
 acts and feelings the instructor wishes to se- 
 cure. But it would be advantageous to the in- 
 structor, whether parent or teacher, if he could 
 have access to carefully prepared manuals, in 
 which the results of exact research into child- 
 hood religious development were set forth. 
 
 The Profession of Parenthood 
 This is all the more necessary since not 
 alone the proper training of the child demands 
 instruction suitable to its peculiar exigencies, 
 biit also because the child is likely at any mo- 
 ment to ask questions demanding the most accu- 
 rate and extended information and the greatest 
 pedagogical wisdom on the part of the parent 
 or teacher. Dr. Oppenheim, in his book on 
 The Development of the Child, has a chap- 
 ter entitled "The Profession of Maternity.'' 
 He might have enlarged the scope by entitling 
 it "The Profession of Parenthood." Very cer- 
 tain is it that to be a good parent requires an 
 67 
 
The Child as God's Child 
 
 amount and a variety of knowledge, a practical 
 wisdom and skill in the management and cul- 
 ture of a human being, which surpasses the 
 demands of some other professions. But in 
 the present order of things the training of the 
 children falls mostly to the mother. If she 
 could understand the dignity as well as the im- 
 portance of her vocation it would seem that 
 she would prepare carefully for her office. Re- 
 ligiously considered, this would demand no 
 inconsiderable acquaintance with the theory of 
 morals and religion, as well as of Scripture and 
 ecclesiastical history. It would also demand a 
 thorough knowledge of the laws of human de- 
 velopment and a quick and ready command of 
 all her theological information. Thus she 
 would be prevented from committing the dan- 
 gerous error of teaching what must afterward 
 be unlearned and from having to resort to the 
 subterfuge of postponing to a future date an 
 answer to the questions of her child. 
 
 Demand for Accuracy 
 While religious instruction must of necessity 
 be more or less piecemeal in character, it should 
 in all cases be accurate. It is better to confess 
 ignorance than to teach error. Almost any an- 
 swer to its question will satisfy the child's 
 68 
 
The Teaching 
 
 mind at the time. Its curiosity is greater than 
 its power of reason. But there comes a time 
 when the reason will assert itself, and then 
 answers will be weighed. The child's bal- 
 ances may not be very exact. It may see dif- 
 ficulties which would not be apparent in its 
 later life. At the time, however, the difficulty 
 is very real. Then the instructor must be pre- 
 pared to say authoritatively that the difficulty 
 will solve itself in due time. But what if it 
 is a difficulty as strongly felt by adults as by 
 children? What if it be a doctrine that ought 
 to be given up? Fatal consequences may easily 
 result from clinging to a doctrine that cannot 
 but be rejected when the child grows to matur- 
 ity. Many a youth's faith has suffered serious 
 damage, not to say shipwreck, by his having 
 been taught in childhood doctrines that cannot 
 be sustained in the light of later acquisitions of 
 knowledge. The introduction of the doctrine 
 of the evolutionary theory of creation wrought 
 havoc with the religious faith of unnumbered 
 multitudes partly because it seemed to contra- 
 dict the teachings of the Bible, which were de- 
 clared to be infallible even in matters of science. 
 The remainder of the damage done was due 
 to a false doctrine of the relation of God to the 
 world. The doctrine of the Bible as the record 
 69 
 
The Child as God's Child 
 
 of God's progressive revelation of himself to 
 man, and of God as immanent in the world, 
 would have prevented all the disaster. Fortu- 
 nately, the essentials of Christian doctrine, so 
 far as they are necessary to the support of 
 Christian practice, are untouched by modern 
 thought. If there are any doctrines which have 
 only speculative significance they are not so 
 important as to cause grief should they have to 
 be forfeited. In any event they do not call 
 for consideration here, since the plea now made 
 is that only those doctrines shall be taught 
 which have practical significance. The all- 
 controlling principles of the teaching of doc- 
 trine are, first, that nothing should be imparted 
 which is not either demanded by the exigencies 
 of the child's development or elicited in re- 
 sponse to the child's curiosity ; and second, that 
 whatever instruction is imparted shall be cor- 
 rect as far as it goes, capable of bearing the 
 light of investigation in later years. 
 
 Place of the Bible 
 
 While the doctrinal teaching should be oc-- 
 
 casional rather than systematic, there should 
 
 be a systematic presentation of the contents of 
 
 the Old and New Testaments. The system 
 
 should, on the whole, follow the actual course 
 70 
 
The Teaching 
 
 of the historical development, whether or not 
 this corresponds to the order of the books of 
 the Bible. Nevertheless, the teaching of the 
 contents of the New Testament must not be 
 postponed until the Old Testament is com- 
 pleted. Rather should the New Testament be 
 the starting point, especially the life of Christ. 
 There are numerous books excellently adapted 
 to this purpose, giving the substance of the 
 Bible in simple yet vivid language. A good 
 reader will at once entertain, instruct, and re- 
 ligiously impress any company of children for 
 any reasonable length of time by reading from 
 these books. This will furnish the opportunity 
 of pointing many a moral and of familiarizing 
 the children with religious ideas. It will also 
 have the effect of stimulating inquiry in the 
 child and furnish the occasion for imparting 
 many most helpful religious principles. Such 
 readings will prove popular with young chil- 
 dren, and there will be a demand for the re- 
 reading, especially of some portions. This will 
 afford an opportunity for deepening and clari- 
 fying the impressions at first made. 
 
 Right View of Child Necessary 
 The religiously earnest parent or teacher will 
 need no one to urge him to action in these par- 
 
 n 
 
The Child as God's Child 
 
 ticulars, and if intelligence accompanies ear- 
 nestness an effective method of presenting 
 religious truth will be discovered. But it can- 
 not too strongly be insisted upon that in all 
 references to the child's nature and relations 
 to God and his kingdom, or family, the right 
 view should be taken if the best results are to 
 be obtained. Children will believe in this re- 
 spect what they are told. If they believe they 
 are out of the fold of Christ they will act in 
 one way; if they believe they are in the fold 
 of Christ they will act in a different way. 
 
 The usual religious instruction is to the 
 effect that the child is not in the family of 
 God, but that it is to become a member of his 
 family after a while. Meantime its childish 
 wrongdoings are used to show it that it needs 
 a new heart, that without this change it cannot 
 live aright. In the family prayers the father 
 calls upon God to lead the little children to 
 himself and to take them into his family. This 
 is not without its influence for good. The child 
 is impressed with the importance of having a 
 heart right in God's sight, and with the desir- 
 ability of religion in everyday life. Parents 
 who thus teach and pray cannot be accused of 
 neglecting the religious interests of their chil- 
 dren, and many are they who have had the 
 72 
 
The Teaching 
 
 joy of seeing their children devote themselves 
 to the service of God in early or in later life. 
 But how certain such teaching is to make the 
 child feel that he is not God's child! And 
 how uncertain it is whether he will choose to 
 become such if he enjoys the gratification of his 
 evil impulses! There is danger, too, that nei- 
 ther the parent nor the child will really expect 
 anything but a life of waywardness from one 
 whose heart is wicked. The child certainly 
 cannot be surprised at any evil manifestation 
 in itself. It reckons itself alive unto sin, and 
 sinful deeds are the natural fruitage of such an 
 inner life. 
 
 Turn now to the other view, according to 
 which the child is in a state of grace — a child 
 of God, a member of God's kingdom, with a 
 heart which is the pattern after which all con- 
 verted adults must seek to model themselves. 
 In such a case the child's wrongdoings are used 
 to point out how necessary it is to avoid them 
 as unbecoming one in God's family. The 
 prayers express gratitude for the gracious work 
 of God in the child's heart and petitions for 
 the preservation of its original purity. In this 
 case, as under the other form of teaching, the 
 child is impressed with the value of a right 
 heart and of religion in daily life. The differ- 
 73 
 
The Child as God's Child 
 
 ence is seen in the child's natural expectations 
 of itself. Reckoning itself alive unto God, it 
 must be pained at its manifestations of evil. It 
 must, of necessity, expect good things of itself 
 and strive to attain them. It loses no motive 
 of self-interest realized imder the other teach- 
 ing, while it has the additional motive of 
 preserving intact a precious treasure. This 
 expectation it will often be disappointed of, 
 but it is very much to have a child expect great 
 things of itself. In time it will bear fruit an 
 hundredfold. It is not, w4th a child so trained 
 and taught, a question of being converted after 
 a while, which it may or may not choose, but 
 of maintaining a conversion wrought in it by 
 an act of God. If it makes any change it must 
 be the change from a child of God to a rejec- 
 tion of God. Many might, with but little 
 compunction, choose to remain in the state of 
 sin in which they are taught God brought them 
 into this world. Few young people would have 
 the temerity to deliberately reject the religious 
 relationship with God. 
 
 This form of teaching certainly has great 
 advantages over the other. If the training 
 is in accordance therewith, if the child is 
 led step by step to choose and practice the 
 good and to abhor the evil, nothing but good 
 
 74 
 
The Teaching 
 
 can flow from the entire process of divine 
 and human cooperation. If, in addition to the 
 suggestions already made, the child be taught 
 suitable hymns >and poems, the Ten Command- 
 ments, certain psalms and selected portions 
 from the New Testament, suitable forms of 
 prayer, including the Lord's Prayer, and per- 
 haps also the Apostles' Creed, all will be ac- 
 complished that need be. But in all teaching it 
 must be remembered that the end is not knowl- 
 edge, but piety. If the formal religious in- 
 struction is evidently obnoxious to the child 
 it should be omitted, and curiosity should 
 be aroused concerning religious truth so that 
 it can be imparted informally and occasionally. 
 A distaste for religion may easily connect itself 
 in the child mind with a distaste for religious 
 instruction. If the taste for religion can be 
 preserved the principal point will be gained. 
 All else will follow in due time. This is a 
 wise principle of pedagogy in other lines which 
 can least of all be safely neglected in the realm 
 of religion. Teaching is designed to aid train- 
 ing. It should in no case be allowed to hinder 
 it. But the wise parent or teacher will find 
 ways of interesting the child in all necessary 
 religious truth. 
 
 A final consideration is that the teaching 
 75 
 
The Child as God's Child 
 
 must not result in mere opinion. If the out- 
 come is not profound convictions the teaching 
 will be fruitless. But the production of convic- 
 tions is the work of years, and the instructor 
 himself must have them before he can impart 
 them to the child. And he must hold to his 
 convictions, not alone on the basis of prejudice, 
 but on rational grounds which will make them 
 eminently respectable in the estimate of the 
 inquiring mind of the growing child and youth. 
 If the instructor, parent or teacher, can produce 
 settled convictions in his pupil he will establish 
 a character worth all his expenditure of care 
 and prayer. 
 
 1(^ 
 
CHAPTER VI 
 
 The Baptism 
 
 Protestant Episcopal View 
 Believers in infant baptism divide as to the 
 reasons for the practice. Large branches of 
 the Christian Church hold that baptism is God's 
 appointed means for the regeneration of the 
 heart. The Protestant Episcopal Church in 
 the United States may fairly be taken as a 
 representative of this view. In its office for the 
 Ministration of Public Baptism of Infants found 
 in the Book of Common Prayer all the presup- 
 positions are in favor of the doctrine of bap- 
 tismal regeneration. In the first address to 
 the godfathers and godmothers, parents and 
 sponsors, the minister exhorts them to call upon 
 God that of his bounteous mercy he will grant 
 to the child that which by nature he cannot 
 have. In the first prayer the minister calls 
 upon God to deliver the child from God's 
 wrath; and in the alternative prayer petition 
 is made that the infant coming to baptism may 
 receive remission of sin by spiritual regenera- 
 tion. In the exhortation upon the words of the 
 
The Child as God's Child 
 
 Gospel the minister encourages the sponsors 
 to believe that as Christ once declared his good 
 will toward children so he will ''favorably re- 
 ceive this present infant; that he will embrace 
 hiixi with the arms of his mercy; that he will 
 give unto him the blessing of eternal life, 
 and make him partaker of his everlasting king- 
 dom." And in the prayer which follows the 
 minister calls upon God to give his Holy Spirit 
 to the infant that he may be born again and 
 be made an heir of everlasting salvation. The 
 sponsors are then reminded that in offering the 
 child for baptism, they have prayed that Christ 
 would vouchsafe to receive him and to release 
 him from sin. In the next prayer petition is 
 made that the old Adam in the child may be so 
 buried that the new man may be raised up in 
 him, and that the water may be sanctified to 
 the mystical washing away of sin. The ad- 
 dress which follows assumes that, having been 
 baptized, the child is regenerate and exhorts 
 that prayers be offered that he may lead the 
 rest of his life according to this beginning. 
 
 It is evident that in this office the assumption 
 is that prior to baptism the child is in a state 
 of nature, not of grace; that he is under God's 
 wrath; that he is in need of remission of sin 
 
 and of regeneration; that he has not been, but 
 78 
 
The Baptism 
 
 in baptism will be, received by Christ; that he 
 is not in possession of the blessing of eternal 
 life, not a partaker of Christ's everlasting king- 
 dom, not an heir of everlasting salvation ; that 
 in baptism the new life is begun. 
 
 Methodist Episcopal View 
 Not in the interest of sectarian controversy, 
 but in order to illustrate the contrary view, men- 
 tion is here made of the similar office used in 
 the Methodist Episcopal Church, as found in 
 the Book of Discipline. The Protestant Epis- 
 copal office is an almost verbatim reproduction 
 of the office in the Book of Common Prayer 
 of the Church of England. The Methodist 
 Episcopal office is taken from the same source 
 as the Protestant Episcopal, but shows impor- 
 tant modifications. It eliminates about every- 
 thing that could suggest that prior to baptism 
 the child is not in a state of grace or the fact or 
 need of regeneration in baptism, and it implies 
 throughout that the child is in a religious re- 
 lation to God of which baptism is merely the 
 recognition. It recognizes that God by his 
 bounteous mercy has redeemed the child by the 
 blood of his Son, and has included children 
 as partakers of the gracious benefits of his cov- 
 enant relations with men, declaring that of such 
 79 
 
The Child as God's Child 
 
 is his kingdom; that baptism represents that 
 inward purity which disposes us to follow the 
 example of Christ. There is no prayer for the 
 beginning of a new life, but there are several 
 that ask for such guidance as will lead the child 
 through the dangers, temptations, and igno- 
 rance of his youth ; that he may never run into 
 folly or into the evils of an unbridled appetite; 
 that his course may be so ordered that, by good 
 education, by holy examples, and by God's re- 
 straining and renewing grace, he may be led 
 to serve God faithfully all his days. 
 
 Outward Sign of Inward Grace 
 
 Which of these two views of the child's na- 
 ture is governed by dogmatic considerations 
 and which by the utterances of Christ must 
 appear plainly to every thoughtful reader. But 
 if the child is a child of God in the Christian 
 sense, then there is no call for baptismal re- 
 generation, but for baptism as an outward sign 
 of an inward grace previously bestowed. It 
 is customary for opponents of child baptism to 
 affirm that the practice is significant only for 
 those who believe in baptismal regeneration. 
 Baptists also not infrequently claim that they 
 alone have a converted membership, since they 
 
 deny the right of baptism to all except adult 
 80 
 
The Baptism 
 
 converts. But Methodists, at least, baptize 
 only as a sign of a regenerate state, so that they 
 too might with equal justice claim to have a 
 converted membership. If baptism is a recog- 
 nition of an inward state of grace, why seem 
 to deny that state in the child by refusing it 
 baptism? Good practical logic certainly for- 
 bids such a refusal. Those who deny at once 
 baptismal regeneration and the regenerate con- 
 dition of the infant may be justified in neglect- 
 ing the baptism of the infant; but those who, 
 while denying baptismal regeneration, affirm 
 the regenerate condition of the newborn infant, 
 must, in all good logic, have the child baptized. 
 
 Not Necessary to Salvation 
 
 Closely affiliated with the doctrine of bap- 
 tismal regeneration is the doctrine that the 
 baptism of infants is necessary to their salva- 
 tion. This doctrine is a serious reflection upon 
 the goodness of God by making the salvation 
 of millions of souls that have no personal re- 
 sponsibility dependent upon the Christian 
 character and consistency of their parents. 
 Those who are so fortunate as to have parents 
 who believe in and practice infant baptism will 
 be saved, all others not. Such a doctrine, of 
 
 however long standing, must be rejected and 
 (6) 8i 
 
The Child as God's Child 
 
 is being rapidly rejected by all Christians. 
 Some Christian denominations never held the 
 doctrine. It is in the interest of such that it 
 is here said that the ground of infant baptism 
 is not its necessity for infant salvation. In- 
 fants who die will be saved, and they will be 
 saved whether they are baptized or not. The 
 ground of their salvation is that God's grace 
 acted upon them for their regeneration, or, if 
 it be preferable, for their protection from the 
 purely human consequences of heredity, thereby 
 placing them in the condition of converted 
 adults. Baptism is not necessary for infants 
 who die so much as for infants who live. 
 
 Baptism as Dedication 
 But it may be asked, If baptism confers no 
 grace, but merely recognizes it, why is it nec- 
 essary for infants who live? Why not post- 
 pone baptism until intelligence and responsi- 
 bility are at least measurably developed ? This 
 raises the whole question of the benefits con- 
 ferred in infant baptism. 
 
 It must be confessed that there is compara- 
 tively little benefit if it cannot be maintained 
 that the child is for all practical purposes in a 
 converted state. In any case baptismal regen- 
 eration must be regarded as a fiction, and bap- 
 82 
 
The Baptism 
 
 tism is not in any sense necessary for the 
 salvation of infants who die. If it cannot be 
 rightly administered as an outward sign of an 
 inward grace, what is left? It may be, and it 
 often is, said that it is a solemn dedication of 
 the child to God. But surely such a dedication 
 could be made, and as publicly made, without 
 the baptismal sign. It must not be supposed 
 that those who disbelieve in infant baptism 
 fail to dedicate their children to God and to 
 pray that they may be led into the way of 
 eternal life. The whole Baptist denomination 
 is a standing confutation of such an opinion. 
 Nevertheless, given a rational basis for Infant 
 baptism, it is a solemn dedication of the child 
 to God and of the parents to its religious train- 
 ing. Those who practice infant baptism have 
 at least as much in their favor in this respect 
 as others, and more, since the call to have their 
 children baptized is a constant reminder to the 
 parents of the duty of such dedication. 
 
 Considered merely as dedication, therefore, 
 infant baptism has its benefits. The parents 
 take certain solemn obligations which must be 
 more impressive to them than a mere private 
 resolution. The children grow up with the 
 understanding that they have been dedicated, 
 by parents who love them, to God, who loves 
 83 
 
The Child as God's Child 
 
 them. The consistent carrying out by the pa- 
 rents of all the implications of such a dedica- 
 tion must result in the greatest blessings to the 
 children. Particularly is this true when the 
 parents are made by the pastor to feel that the 
 act is one not of form or custom or display, but 
 of deep religious import, and that it should 
 only be performed with the most prayerful and 
 thoughtful preparation. Most of the failures 
 to reach the good results which ought to accrue 
 from infant baptism are caused by the lacking 
 sense of the significance of the rite. No parent 
 who understands that his child is God's child, 
 that its baptism is a recognition of that fact, 
 that it means that this child is left in his hands 
 by God to be trained for God, can fail to be 
 profoundly impressed with the deep importance 
 of baptism and parental obligation in connec- 
 tion therewith. Besides, if the pastor does his 
 duty he will follow up the impression first made 
 and strive to hold the parents to the obligations 
 they have taken. He is at once the representa- 
 tive of God and of the Church, with both of 
 whom the parents have made a solemn con- 
 tract. The Church thus acquires the right to 
 urge the parents to perform their whole duty, 
 whether they be members of the Church or not. 
 
 Particularly if the parents are known to be 
 84 
 
The Baptism 
 
 themselves not as religiously alive as they 
 ought to be should the pastor by all wise yet 
 efficient means hold them to their obligations 
 so solemnly assumed. If this can be done the 
 results will be sure. 
 
 Children of the Unchurched 
 The justification for the baptism of the chil- 
 dren of those who, whether members of the 
 Church or not, are not actively engaged in 
 Christian work is found in the right of the 
 children to baptism, and in the claim this bap- 
 tism gives the Church upon the child and the 
 parents. The claim of the Church upon a 
 child whom it has baptized at the request of 
 the parents is certainly greater than that upon 
 one whom it has not baptized. This should be 
 carefully explained to all parents who present 
 their children for baptism, and the* claim of the 
 Church should neither be relinquished nor 
 neglected. By baptizing the child the Church 
 itself assumes certain duties which it neglects 
 at peril to its own religious life and that of the 
 child. By a mutual agreement cooperation be- 
 tween parents and Church is made possible 
 and obligatory in the interest of the child. 
 The Church not only has the right to expect 
 the parents to do their duty, but it is bound to 
 85 
 
The Child as God's Child 
 
 do all it can to secure the performance of that 
 duty on the part of the parents. The child is 
 thereby benefited. But, besides all this, if the 
 Church has duly impressed upon the parents 
 the nature of the act they are about to perform 
 it may safely assume that they are not wholly 
 indifferent to religion and religious obliga- 
 tions. If the Church follows this up as it 
 should there is every reason to believe that the 
 parents will erelong take upon themselves the 
 duties of religion in a still wider sphere, ally- 
 ing themselves openly and actively with the 
 Church in all its Christian activities. With 
 the prospect of securing such benefits to both 
 parents and children it seems as though the 
 baptism of the children of unconverted pa- 
 rents should not be refused. But if neither the 
 parents nor the Church intend to do their duty 
 infant baptism is a solemn farce. 
 
 Recognition of God^s Work 
 Infant baptism will fail of its full results if 
 it is not understood as something more than 
 a dedication of the child to God. It must be 
 understood as a recognition of God's work al- 
 ready wrought in the child's soul. It then 
 becomes the first act in a long and self-con- 
 sistent process of religious training and in- 
 
The Baptism 
 
 struction for the child. The assumption must 
 be that as God wrought in the child's soul 
 without its cooperation all possible blessing", 
 so the parent must do for the child without 
 its cooperation all that is humanly possible. It 
 is much for a parent to say to the child that 
 it belongs to God by God's own act, and It is 
 much to be able to say to the child that be- 
 cause of God's act the parent gave it the cor- 
 responding sign of baptism. To postpone that 
 sign in order to secure the consent of the child 
 Is to offer God a rebuke for not waiting for a 
 similar consent. To assume that the child may 
 repudiate God's act Is to open the way for 
 such a repudiation. There should never be 
 the slightest suggestion, in any act or omis- 
 sion to act, either on the part of the parents 
 or the Church, that It can be thought of that 
 the child will reject God. It belongs to God ; 
 It is baptized and dedicated to God, the pa- 
 rents giving It over to him and accepting It 
 back as a sacred trust; It Is to be trained and 
 taught for God; It does not In any sense hold 
 any religious or Irreligious relation to any but 
 to God. Thus understood and acted upon, 
 infant baptism becomes one of the most im- 
 portant events In a child's life. It confers 
 nothing at the time, but it opens the way for 
 87 
 
The Church Membership 
 
 future benefits of the most blessed character. 
 With this conception of baptism the question 
 should not be, *'What is the benefit of infant 
 baptism?" but, "By what right do you with- 
 hold from the child the outward sign of the 
 inward grace wrought by God's own act?" 
 "How dare we treat one of God's children, be- 
 cause he is too young tO' demand his rights, 
 as though he were an alien from God?" 
 
 Futile Arguments Against Infant 
 
 Baptism 
 An objection to infant baptism is some- 
 times based upon the fact that persons baptized 
 in infancy may not, as adults, be satisfied either 
 with the mode or with the fact that they had 
 no voluntary part in it. This difficulty will 
 continue with us as long as there are those 
 whose bondage to forms blinds them to the 
 truth that it is the spirit that maketh alive. 
 Nevertheless, there should be no hesitation in 
 rebaptizing anyone whose conscience demands 
 it. This takes away the objection at once, and 
 makes it possible for us to give children the 
 benefit of baptism as a consistent human rec- 
 ognition of what God has done for them. 
 However, if all those who have to do with the 
 
 instruction of the child are themselves correctly 
 88 
 
The Baptism 
 
 instructed there will be little danger that when 
 he grows up he will be discontented with the 
 form of his baptism. All such will know that 
 there is no way of determining whether or not 
 there was uniformity as to the mode of 
 baptism in New Testament times. They will 
 know that if the exact mode of baptism is of 
 any account sticklers for that supposed mode 
 do not themselves follow it consistently. They 
 will know that if Christ and the apostles or- 
 dained any particular mode of baptism it is 
 not known what it was, and that it was the 
 only ceremony which they did fix for succeed- 
 ing generations. They will know that in the 
 absence of any information to the effect that 
 a particular mode was authoritatively estab- 
 lished we are authorized by the spirit of Chris- 
 tian liberty to determine the mode for our- 
 selves. They will know that in Christianity 
 the spirit is everything, the form nothing. 
 
 As to the lack of voluntary participation in 
 the baptism, it must be said that if the subject 
 of it understands that it is an outward sign of 
 an inward grace, it should make no difference 
 whether he was voluntarily baptized or not, un- 
 less he were baptized in spite of his protest that 
 he was not in sympathy with the act of God. 
 This is, of course, impossible to a child. Be- 
 89 
 
The Child as God's Child 
 
 sides, infant baptism does not forbid, but really 
 presupposes, an act on the part of the child 
 when he comes to years, when he ratifies God's 
 act and assumes publicly the obligations God's 
 act imposes upon him. Here is all the room 
 anyone needs for his voluntary participation. 
 Still, if, owing to pernicious teaching, anyone 
 desires to be baptized on his own account, let 
 him be ungrudgingly gratified. It is, at most, 
 but a repetition of the sign. 
 
 Another objection to infant baptism is 
 founded upon the silence of the New Testa- 
 ment on the subject. But there is no reason 
 why one should expect that infant baptism 
 should be treated there. The New Testament 
 is a book dealing almost entirely with adults. 
 The conditions precedent to baptism are those 
 suitable to adults. But even here the idea that 
 baptism is a recognition of belief cannot be 
 maintained. No doubt the situation could be 
 summed up in the formula, * 'Believe and be 
 baptized." But the belief was in order to sal- 
 vation; and the baptism recognized the salva- 
 tion, not the means of it. Therefore if we 
 believe that children are in a saved state by 
 God's sovereign act without their cooperation 
 through faith, baptism must be given them 
 
 though not a word is said about it in the New 
 90 
 
The Baptism 
 
 Testament. If baptism is a recognition of be- 
 lief, the means or condition of adult conversion 
 or salvation, then it should not be bestowed 
 upon children; but if it is a recognition of the 
 work of God, then they should be baptized. 
 Besides, there is so little in the New Testament 
 on the subject of baptism that it is unreason- 
 able to suppose nothing is left to the judgment 
 of the developing Church. 
 
 It is not so certain, however, that there is 
 no hint of infant baptism in the New Testa- 
 ment. Those Christian households that were 
 baptized, of which there must have been many, 
 would certainly differ widely from most mod- 
 ern households if they had had no children in 
 them. Irenaeus in the second century referred 
 probably, Tertullian about the close of the sec- 
 ond century referred certainly, to infant bap- 
 tism as a custom in no sense new. Tertullian 
 argued against it, not as an innovation subse- 
 quent to the times of the apostles, but on the 
 ground that children were not capable of re- 
 ceiving the preliminary instruction. He was 
 thinking of heathen conditions. In a Christian 
 home in a Christian country the argument 
 would not apply. Besides, his argument was 
 openly and violently and consciously in conflict 
 with the teaching of Jesus. From this we must 
 91 
 
The Child as God's Child 
 
 rather infer that he knew it to be an apostolic 
 custom, which, in his headstrong determination 
 to have his own way, he was willing to set 
 aside. 
 
 Infant baptism was probably practiced by 
 the apostolic Church. But, above all, it is 
 man's glad recognition that God has not left 
 the infant soul untouched by his grace. Re- 
 fusal to bestow it argues an unwillingness to 
 do in our measure what God has done in his. 
 It is a setting up of our judgment against the 
 judgment of God. It is an implication that 
 one who could be transferred directly from 
 earth to heaven is not a fit subject for the sign 
 of God's operation in the soul, though an adult 
 in the same condition may be. The baptism of 
 young children should be continued in the 
 
 Church. 
 
 92 
 
CHAPTER VII 
 
 The Church Membership 
 
 Baptism is not only the outward sign of 
 the inward grace, but also the initiatory rite 
 into the visible Church. This is theoretically 
 as true for infants as for adults, as an exam- 
 ination of the forms for infant and adult bap- 
 tism used in Protestant Churches, such as the 
 Methodist Episcopal and Protestant Episcopal, 
 will show. 
 
 Objections to Infant Church 
 Membership 
 Is there not something incongruous in intro- 
 ducing into membership in the visible Church 
 children who cannot possibly assume any of the 
 responsibilities of that relation? It might be 
 admitted that baptism should be administered 
 to children in token of their religious relation- 
 ship to God, and at the same time denied that 
 they should be counted members of the visible 
 Church on the mere ground of their baptism. 
 
 Perhaps much of the difficulty felt by op- 
 posers of infant Church membership is due 
 93 
 
The Child as God's Child 
 
 to the fact that we are accustomed to the idea 
 of adult conversion and consequent voluntary 
 union with the Church. It is difficult to adjust 
 ourselves to the idea that the beginning of 
 Church membership is not practically the be- 
 ginning of a new life, voluntarily and deliber- 
 ately undertaken. This involuntary Church 
 membership strikes us strangely. But, after 
 all, what does Church membership mean? It 
 does not mean the beginning of a new life, for 
 that is supposed to have been begun before 
 the formal connection with the Church. The 
 new life of the soul is not dependent for its 
 beginning upon joining the Church, but join- 
 ing the Church is the public confession of the 
 existence of that new life. Or perhaps it 
 would be truer to say that because the new life 
 has been begun the adult feels disposed to 
 unite with others in whom the same life has 
 been begun. 
 
 When an adult unites with the visible 
 Church we rejoice for two reasons: In the 
 first place, we rejoice because we feel that if 
 he understands what he is doing, he will join 
 energetically in the practical Christian work 
 for which the Church exists; but we also re- 
 joice, especially if the adult is comparatively 
 young or has been wayward hitherto, because 
 94 
 
The Church Membership 
 
 we feel that we now have a hold upon him 
 through which we may do him personally much 
 moral and spiritual good. The obligations in 
 which we rejoice the child cannot, indeed, 
 assume; but he can become the object of our 
 care. Very true it is that he could become the 
 object of our care if he were not counted a 
 member, especially if he belongs in a Christian 
 family. But the same may be said of an adult, 
 and in justification of infant Church member- 
 ship it must be noted that it immediately ac- 
 complishes one of the great ends of union with 
 the Church. Much more than this has it in 
 its favor, however ; for the child can very early 
 be led to perform some of the duties of Church 
 membership. Gradually the number of these 
 duties becomes larger and more varied, and 
 also the performance of them takes on a more 
 voluntary character. Who shall say that this 
 is not more in accord with a true ideal than 
 to fix an arbitrary time at which we will permit 
 the child to assume these obligations? Are 
 we never to get our minds accustomed to the 
 thought of childhood religion with all its log- 
 ical consequences? Is the type of religion 
 which shall receive our approval always to be 
 one which has a sudden beginning after a pre- 
 ceding life of neglect or of sin? Unless one 
 95 
 
The Child as God's Child 
 
 took the position that Church membership 
 should not be assumed until full maturity is 
 reached it must be admitted that there is al- 
 ways danger that it will be assumed without 
 due ripeness of judgment and thought. There 
 seems, therefore, to be no reason for keeping 
 an infant out of the visible Church which does 
 not hold in some degree for all immature peo- 
 ple. From the very first he needs the care of 
 the Church, and gradually he can take up the 
 duties and obligations of the Church. 
 
 Children Members of the Invisible 
 Church 
 
 Though this might void the arguments 
 
 against the admission of children into the 
 
 Church in their infancy, it does not afford all 
 
 necessary positive proof of the importance of 
 
 their admission. The considerations in favor 
 
 of such admission are very weighty. The first 
 
 of these considerations is that by God's act they 
 
 are members of the invisible Church. It is 
 
 the design of the visible Church to gather into 
 
 its fold all who are vitally related to Christ. 
 
 It can only be the Church of Christ in so far 
 
 as it purposes to gather into its communion all 
 
 who are united to Christ, the Head of the 
 
 Church. By rejecting from visible Church 
 96 
 
The Church Membership 
 
 membership so large a number of those who 
 belong to the household of Christ any denomi- 
 nation must put itself before God in the light 
 of rejecting those who belong to him. This 
 does not, of course, imply that they are mem- 
 bers of the visible Church by any birthright. 
 It is jttst the characteristic of the visible Church 
 that it must have some outward sign of mem- 
 bership. Baptism is this outward initiatory sign. 
 For this reason also in later life it is necessary 
 that the child openly and voluntarily take upon 
 himself the responsibilities and place himself 
 under the spiritual care of the Church. This is 
 what is done in the Methodist Episcopal Church 
 in what is called reception into full membership 
 and in the Protestant Episcopal in what is 
 called confirmation. The outward sign and 
 the outward act, when age renders it possible, 
 are necessary for the assumption of all the 
 rights and duties of visible Church membership. 
 What is here pleaded for is the recognition of 
 the obligation of the Church to baptiz^,and thus 
 initiate into the Church, all children whom it 
 has reasonable hope their parents or guardians 
 will train or allow the Church to train for the 
 Christian life. Opposition to this is based 
 upon erroneous presuppositions relative to the 
 
 place of the child in the kingdom of God or 
 (7) 97 
 
The Child as God's Child 
 
 else on false reasoning with regard to the 
 significance of Church membership. 
 
 Children Should Be Counted In 
 As in the case of baptism, so in reference to 
 Church membership, a weighty consideration 
 impelling to the admission of infants is found 
 in its practical consequences. If it be admitted 
 that all children are the children of God it is 
 the solemn duty of the Church to foster in their 
 minds the recognition of that fact. But as the 
 Church cannot foster that thought by refusing 
 them baptism until they come to years of re- 
 sponsibility, so it cannot foster it by refusing 
 them Church membership until those years ar- 
 rive. Unconsciously, or subconsciously, the 
 child will inevitably draw the inference from 
 its exclusion from the Church that, after all, 
 its elders do not regard it as capable of sustain- 
 ing a true religious life. It makes little differ- 
 ence whether the explanation given be that 
 the child needs a new heart before he can be- 
 come a member or whether it be that he is too 
 young to understand what he is doing. In 
 either case it is evident that he is not counted 
 as a religious being; he is outside the fold 
 whether because of his depravity or because 
 
 of his immaturity. Children are good prac- 
 98 
 
The Church Membership 
 
 tical logicians, and they will, under the circum- 
 stances named, be sure to draw the conclusion 
 mentioned or else the other one that there is 
 some pronounced disparity between the visible 
 and the invisible Church. 
 
 Particularly must this impression grow upon 
 the child if he is refused the Lord's Supper. 
 It is often argued that he cannot understand 
 the significance of that ceremony. Very true, 
 and probably he will not get all the benefits of 
 it on that account. But shall he be refused all 
 the benefits because he can secure only a part 
 of them? Neither does the child understand 
 prayer, yet no one would advocate neglecting 
 to teach the child to pray. In many cases the 
 very highest benefits of religious ceremonies 
 are reaped, even with adults, not by under- 
 standing, but by mere participation in them. 
 The elements of feeling and action are at least 
 two thirds of religion. Nor is there any rea- 
 son to think that children, in larger numbers 
 than adults, go to the Lord's table out of mere 
 habit rather than as a distinctly religious act. 
 If there is danger of this it can easily be rem- 
 edied by the parent. So also children do not 
 more frequently than adults lose the sense of 
 the religious value of an act by its repetition. 
 But even if no particular benefit come to the 
 99 
 
 L.ofC. 
 
The Child as God's Child 
 
 child at the time from these outward religious 
 acts in the Church and in the home, still should 
 he be taught and led to perform them, not by 
 force, but by gentle persuasion, because of the 
 meaning of such a course in his whole training. 
 As God's child he must as rapidly as possible 
 be led to do all that a child of God should do. 
 The religious emotions should not be subjected 
 to unnatural stimulations, but neither should 
 the occasions for their growth be neglected. In 
 this respect Methodist Episcopal theory is in 
 advance of Protestant Episcopal. From the 
 days of John Wesley to the present it has held 
 to the gracious state of all children, even before 
 baptism ; has given them baptism as a sign and 
 an initiation; and has not, on the ground that 
 they were not confirmed or received into full 
 membership, refused them the Lord's Supper. 
 The only difficulty with Methodism in this 
 particular is that so many of its members and 
 even of its ministers do not consistently con- 
 form to their theory. The same must be said, 
 however, of Protestant Episcopalians. By liv- 
 ing and acting on the high level of their the- 
 ories these two Churches could do a great 
 work. More and more are Presbyterians and 
 Congregationalists coming to hold the same 
 theory. And if these four Churches were to 
 
 lOO 
 
The Church Membership 
 
 unite in this matter public sentiment would 
 soon turn predominantly toward their views. 
 It is the inconsistencies between the theory and 
 the practice among the Methodist and Protes- 
 tant Episcopalians which make them weak in 
 efforts to convert the world to their ideas. They 
 should take their theories more seriously and 
 administer them more consistently. 
 
 The inveterate prejudice in favor of adult 
 conversions suggests that the reception into 
 full membership or confirmation of a company 
 of young people trained as here recommended 
 cannot mean as much to them nor be followed 
 by as beneficial results as would accrue to a 
 similar company of young people converted 
 according to custom and afterward joining the 
 Church. Very certain is it that it would not 
 mean the same thing to them, but it is not 
 certain that it would not mean something just 
 as religiously valuable and effective. It must 
 not be supposed that the kind of religious train- 
 ing here advocated omits the appeal to the con- 
 science. Rather does it rouse that faculty to 
 steady and powerful activity. And when the 
 time comes for the public avowal of Christian 
 standing there must of necessity be a regirding 
 of the loins and a summoning of all the moral 
 powers for action. Serious meditations on 
 
 lOI 
 
The Child as God's Child 
 
 past failures and manifest evil tendencies will 
 be inevitable at such a period, and all the sense 
 of sorrow for sin needful will surely be felt. 
 So also all the noble and elevating sentiments 
 naturally accompanying any high resolve, and 
 all the joy in the consciousness of duty done, 
 will inevitably rise to the requisite prominence. 
 Though not the passing from darkness to 
 light, from nature to grace, it is in an impor- 
 tant sense a new beginning, an epoch in the 
 life. This is, in fact, the experience of those 
 who have been properly trained when they 
 come to their public avowal. It is an experi- 
 ence in no sense inferior to that of the 
 adult convert, though it is of necessity vastly 
 different. 
 
 But does it not seem ridiculous to reckon 
 as members of the visible Church puling in- 
 fants who, if they are brought to the services 
 of the sanctuary where the members are ac- 
 customed to meet for worship and instruction, 
 can at best do nothing but disturb the gravity 
 of the assembly? There is, of course, a vast 
 contrast between the intellectual development 
 of the infant and the adult. And no plea is 
 made for taking a child to the public servdces 
 of the Church at too early an age. But the 
 puling infant will soon cease to be a puling 
 
 102 
 
The Church Membership 
 
 infant. In a very short while he will be able 
 to feel the difference between being counted 
 in and being counted out of the fold. In his 
 thoughtlessness and restlessness he may cause 
 some annoyance and inconvenience, but if he is 
 not made to feel at home in the Church in very 
 early years it may be exceedingly difficult in 
 later years to naturalize him. It seemed ridic- 
 ulous enough, no doubt, to the disciples of 
 Jesus that mothers should presume to interrupt 
 the high intercourse Jesus was holding with the 
 adult population of Galilee by bringing their 
 children to him. But the Master's standards 
 of judgment and ours are quite different. No 
 sentimentality is needed to make a thoughtful 
 man feel the exceeding importance of the child. 
 It is a mere accident of earlier birth, and in no 
 way to our particular credit, that we have at- 
 tained to the development of greater age. God, 
 who sees the end from the beginning, does not 
 despise one of these little ones. Perhaps in his 
 sight we are not as much wiser than these chil- 
 dren as we think we are. In any case he prizes 
 them, and therefore we must prize them. 
 
 Instead of this how many regard their pres- 
 ence in the church as a sort of mark of in- 
 feriority ! If they are numerous in any service 
 
 we sneeringly call that service a Sunday school, 
 103 
 
The Child as God's Child 
 
 as though that branded it as something quite 
 
 contemptible in the estimate of a full-grown 
 
 man. Without any purpose to determine the 
 
 wisdom or unwisdom of having children and 
 
 adults present in the same 'service, it must be 
 
 insisted upon that the feeling of contempt for 
 
 children as Church members is un-Christlike 
 
 and highly censurable. The Church as a 
 
 Church must count the children in, not out. 
 
 It must solve the problem of keeping them in, 
 
 not of getting them in. It must make them 
 
 feel that they are welcome in God's family 
 
 gatherings. It must make those gatherings 
 
 so attractive to them at first and so helpful 
 
 later that they will never prefer absence to 
 
 presence. They should be treated with as 
 
 much consideration in God's family as they 
 
 receive in the earthly family. The pastor in 
 
 his visitations from house to house must not 
 
 ignore the children, nor must he deal with them 
 
 condescendingly. In a few years he will crave 
 
 their affection and confidence. Why should 
 
 he first alienate them and then mourn because 
 
 they do not revere him ? It may give him some 
 
 trouble to do his duty by them; but God has 
 
 set him his task, and God will hold him to 
 
 account. If the Church and the pastor allow 
 
 the little ones to grow up without the warmest 
 104 
 
The Church Membership 
 
 affection for the Church the blood of these chil- 
 dren will be on their heads. The pitiful fact 
 comes out in Starbuck's statistics that Church 
 and pastor occupy a relatively small place 
 among the external influences leading children 
 and youth into the religious life. The remedy 
 for this is in the hands of Churches and pastors 
 themselves. 
 
 A Grave Defect 
 
 There is some grave defect in that system 
 which permits so many young people to slip 
 away from the Church at the age of fifteen or 
 thereabouts. This is the age which any experi- 
 enced observer will recognize as the most re- 
 ligiously impressible age. It is the age when 
 the largest numbers of young people are con- 
 verted, but strangely enough also the age when 
 the largest number of young people forsake the 
 Church forever. How shall we explain this 
 anomaly that just when we ought to expect 
 the best results we grieve to find our hopes 
 blighted? The answer is not far to seek. 
 Three facts account for the situation : 
 
 The first is that so many of these young 
 people have been allowed to grow up in sin on 
 the ground that nothing but a sudden and radi- 
 cal change of heart can avail. For the coming 
 
 of this change parents and pastors have prayed, 
 105 
 
The Child as God's Child 
 
 while evil habits have been rooting themselves 
 and the love of pleasure instead of the love 
 of God has been growing upon them. The 
 children have been taught that with their evil 
 nature nothing else is to be expected, and they 
 have acted upon the truth of the teaching. A 
 better device for hardening children in sin and 
 alienating them from God Satan never in- 
 vented. The impressible age religiously is also 
 the impressible age in many other directions. 
 The struggle comes on, and all thoughtful peo- 
 ple tremble for the outcome. And well may 
 they tremble. 
 
 The second determining factor in the dire 
 result is that the child has been brought up 
 to think of himself as outside the number of 
 God's own. Now, when he is pleaded with to 
 give himself to God it can only be on the pre- 
 supposition that God stands off and says, "Do 
 it or not, as you will; but remember that the 
 damage is all to yourself if you do not." Why 
 else did God wait till now to make this young 
 soul his own? We may talk of God's love all 
 we will to the youth, and he will feel, though 
 he may not express, the thought that if God 
 really wanted him for his own he would have 
 made him his own long ago. 
 
 The third element in this destructive process 
 io6 
 
The Church Membership 
 
 is the attitude of the Church. As the youth 
 comes to think of it he finds that according 
 to the teaching he has received and as best he 
 can judge from the action of the Church God 
 has counted him out and the Church has 
 counted him out. He is a sinner, and he is 
 out. He inventories himself. He cannot see 
 that he is actually worse than many others. 
 He loves his sins, that he has been taught he 
 could not resist without a new heart and which 
 have grown with his years. God does not love 
 him as he loves his converted children, and 
 therefore the youth does not love God as he 
 ought. The Church has always treated him 
 with comparative indifference if not with con- 
 tempt, and he does not love the Church. It 
 is a powerful combination to overcome. The 
 outside world offers its allurements. Here is 
 something tangible whose delights he knows. 
 He hesitates, and finally he refuses to turn 
 away from them to the problematical pleasures 
 of the Christian life. 
 
 What unutterable falsehoods and folly have 
 gone into the process which ended in this ruin ! 
 If this same youth had been taught that his 
 heart was the battleground of good and evil 
 impulses, and that he must lend his aid to the 
 
 good; that he was the child of God and that 
 107 
 
The Child as God's Child 
 
 God expected him and would assist him to 
 overcome the evil, if the Church, from the pas- 
 tor to the humblest member, had been so kind 
 and so considerate of him that he would feel 
 like a runaway from home to forsake it, if the 
 decision had been made to center not around 
 coming to Christ, but publicly acknowledging 
 him, who can believe that the result would have 
 been so disastrous? 
 
 If the Church will regard the child as with- 
 in, not without, and perform its part faithfully 
 the child will not disappoint it. And if when 
 the child grows to the years when he is ex- 
 pected to make his public avowal and does 
 make it, the Church faithfully performs the 
 duties which belong to its part of the con- 
 tract, the youth will not disappoint it. "Like 
 Church, like children ; like Church, like youth," 
 may be taken as a certainty in ecclesiastical 
 
 affairs. 
 
 io8 
 
CHAPTER VIII 
 
 The Parents 
 
 Responsibility Chiefly on Parents 
 The importance of the proper religious 
 training of the children is such as to warrant 
 the expectation that all possible agencies shall 
 be utilized in its accomplishment. The educa- 
 tion of a human being demands the application 
 of all the resources of human society. This 
 religious education is difficult in proportion as 
 the task is delicate. The means and agencies 
 employed must be varied and effective. But 
 upon the parents must the burden chiefly fall. 
 Statistics gathered by Starbuck indicate that 
 to the father and mother we must look chiefly 
 for the all-controlling external religious influ- 
 ences of childhood and youth. 
 
 Parents sometimes affirm that they have not 
 time for the proper training of their children. 
 Then why assume the responsibilities of pa- 
 rentage? Race suicide may be an evil to be 
 deprecated, but it is better than the moral ex- 
 posure of children. If the number of the off- 
 spring must be reduced in order to improve 
 
 the stock let it be so. To bring into the world 
 109 
 
The Child as God's Child 
 
 children who for lack of proper training will 
 prove a curse to society or who even fail to 
 fulfill life's high purposes, does not compensate 
 for all it costs of pain and care and money, 
 and is a sin against both God and man. Some- 
 how parents must be made to feel their respon- 
 sibilities. The craze for club life among both 
 women and men must be made to give way to 
 the demands of the child. The desire for rec- 
 reation must be forbidden to usurp the place 
 in the hearts of men and women that their 
 children ought to occupy. Parents must be 
 impressed with the fact that they cannot dele- 
 gate their responsibilities to- nurses, governesses, 
 tutors, teachers, or pastors, though they should 
 diligently utilize the cooperation of all these. 
 Money cannot buy what the parent can give. 
 The parable of Christ may well apply here: A 
 hireling careth not for the children, though 
 God knows the hirelings often seem tO' care 
 more than the parents. But anyone who 
 studies the matter will discover that most of 
 the superstitious terrors, not to say immoral 
 traits, of the children of well-to-do families 
 are the result of the teaching of incompetent, 
 ignorant, or conscienceless nurses. And any- 
 one who has watched the effect of what even 
 
 a very little child learns on the streets of pro- 
 no 
 
The Parents 
 
 fanity and obscenity must feel that children 
 cannot be too carefully guarded; for habits 
 of speech, thought, and feeling acquired in 
 childhood leave their trace for evil or for good 
 on the grown man or woman long after the 
 age when these habits are renounced by the 
 will. The amount of care that parents bestow 
 upon the physical and intellectual development 
 and nurture of their children should certainly 
 not exceed that which they give to their moral 
 and religious training. 
 
 It is the first duty of parents, therefore, to 
 protect their children from the moral perils 
 of early childhood as well as of youth. Says 
 Froebel {Education of Man) : *Tt is highly 
 important for man's present and later life 
 that at this stage he absorbs nothing mor- 
 bid, low, or mean For, alas! often the 
 
 whole life of man is not sufficient to efface 
 what he has absorbed in childhood, the impres- 
 sions of early youth, simply because his whole 
 being, like a large eye, was open to them and 
 wholly given up to them." In order thus to pro- 
 tect them there must be such an agreeableness 
 of companionship between parent and child as 
 can be secured only by the most persistent and 
 painstaking effort on the part of the parents. 
 
 Children are fond of the new and the exciting, 
 III 
 
The Child as God's Child 
 
 and may sometimes grow tired of the monot- 
 ony of their parents' society. This childish 
 impulse should neither grieve nor surprise the 
 parent nor be too much restrained. A rea- 
 sonable indulgence under proper restrictions 
 should be allowed. It will only serve to bind 
 the child the more firmly to his parents and 
 to secure that relation of filial confidence so 
 necessary to the parents' most efficient influ- 
 ence. But parents should, in their own per- 
 sons and provisions, afford such attractions as 
 will ever make the children feel that no others 
 furnish them such strong delights. If the due 
 limits of indulgence and restraint of the child's 
 impulses in all directions are observed the bond 
 of union between parent and child will never 
 be broken. Children naturally and gladly take 
 their standards from their parents unless the 
 latter place some unnecessary obstacle in the 
 way. Parents have need of self-restraint lest 
 in their fondness for their children or their 
 fear for them they lean too much toward indul- 
 gence or severity. And they have need equally 
 of an ideal which, while it does not ignore all 
 real earthly good, still rather tends toward 
 the gradual exaltation of the child heart to 
 fix its strongest affections upon spiritual bene- 
 fits. That anything morbid should enter into 
 
 112 
 
The Parents 
 
 such an ideal is wholly unnecessary. A healthy 
 and sane conception of religion in the parent 
 and of the limits of religious possibility in 
 the child will secure the natural unfolding of 
 the child's religious nature and habits. 
 
 The parents are the natural guardians and 
 guides of the child's life. The first human 
 influences affecting its physical and moral 
 character, though prenatal, are still from the 
 parents, especially the mother. When the child 
 is born into this world it but enters another 
 matrix, that of the parental affection and 
 studied care. When, later, the matrix for the 
 molding of the child life includes ever larger 
 and larger circles the parents' influence should 
 still be the most predominant as it should be 
 the most constant. To the parents, therefore, 
 is committed also the positive religious train- 
 ing of the children. And here there should be 
 no special difliculty in the case of those parents 
 who are openly followers of Christ. 
 
 The Atmosphere of Irreligion 
 Unfortunately, however, there are difficul- 
 ties of various kinds. First of all, there are 
 difficulties arising from the fact that many 
 parents do not entertain correct beliefs as to the 
 
 possibilities of religious training. They either 
 (8) 113 
 
The Child as God's Child 
 
 cannot get away from the doctrine that the 
 human entail of sinful tendencies is stronger 
 than the divine purpose to give the child a fair 
 start in life, or if their views are correct in this 
 they do not believe in all that logically and 
 consistently flows from the premise. Still 
 others who are unconscious of any theoretical 
 difficulties are not impressed with the impor- 
 tance of the training. Busy with many cares, 
 they let the spiritual nurture of their children 
 drift with the tides of circumstance, content if 
 no very vicious propensities exhibit themselves, 
 hoping that after a while the child will natu- 
 rally or because of some outside influence turn 
 to religion. By far the most common difficulty 
 springs from the relative indifference of the 
 parents to religion. They may be members of 
 the Church and attend upon its services, they 
 may be respectable citizens and members of so- 
 ciety, but the atmosphere in which they per- 
 sonally live and which they impart to the home 
 is not that of piety. They are not hypocrites, 
 but they are not in earnest. They do not in- 
 dulge in sinful tempers or acts, but they do not 
 feel that religion is the one all-pervading qual- 
 ity of their lives. They may even have family 
 prayers regularly, but there is no vital connec- 
 tion between themselves and God. 
 114 
 
The Parents 
 
 Such an atmosphere is one of irreHgion, 
 though it may be that of a nominally Christian 
 home. It will tend at best to give the children 
 an impression that religion is something ex- 
 traneous, something to be respectful toward 
 rather than something to be vitally interested 
 in, a theory rather than a life. On the other 
 hand, there is the type of family religion which 
 borders on the fanatical, which the children will 
 discard as soon as they become acquainted with 
 the derision in which it is justly held by the 
 general public. Woe to those parents whose 
 piety does not command the respect of their 
 children either because of its inconsistency or 
 of its extravagance ! If parents can, by exam- 
 ple and training, keep their children in the 
 right way, what a motive they have for exactly 
 the right type of Christian living! There is 
 a psychology of nations and of races as well as 
 of individuals. There ought to be a psychol- 
 ogy of the family, a genius peculiar to it, and 
 in the Christian family the predominant element 
 ought to be religion — religion, strong, sane, 
 attractive. 
 
 Parents Who Neglect God 
 But what shall be said of those parents who 
 neither give their children any religious train- 
 115 
 
The Child as God's Child 
 
 ing nor themselves pay any attention to the 
 duties of rehgion; who are neglecters of God 
 and of all the peculiarly Christian interests of 
 mankind? If there is anything that can add 
 strength to the argument for the belief in a 
 divinely imparted impulse toward godliness 
 in the very constitution of mankind it is the 
 fact that out of such willfully godless surround- 
 ings come so many of our most godly men and 
 women. Still, while we must rejoice that so 
 many escape the religiously depressing influ- 
 ences of such homes, it is pitiful to remember 
 that the vast majority of the children of such 
 homes grow up as neglectful of religion as 
 their parents are. Of course, as between a 
 so-called Christian home in which the proper 
 Christian nurture of the children is neglected 
 and a home without any pretense of religion 
 in which such training is neglected there is 
 little choice; results will be about the same. 
 But the vast majority of those who are con- 
 spicuous for their zeal in propagating the 
 Gospel of Christ, whether as clerical or lay 
 workers, have sprung from homes in which the 
 atmosphere of piety pervaded the daily life, 
 and in which the religious training of the chil- 
 dren was assiduously and affectionately carried 
 
 forward. 
 
 ii6 
 
The Parents 
 
 One cannot so greatly censure parents, who, 
 sincerely renouncing religion as a delusion 
 or superstition, do not give their children 
 a religious training. We may wonder at their 
 lack of insight, but they are at least con- 
 sistent. But there are thousands of families in 
 which the parents theoretically accept the 
 Christian faith, but in which there is no action 
 consistent with such abelief. These parents hold 
 aloof from any participation in Christian work 
 whether in public or in private. They would 
 not want their children brought up in a com- 
 munity in which there is no church, but they 
 do nothing by word, deed, gift, or church at- 
 tendance to maintain the church. If all were 
 like them the community would be churchless. 
 They want their children to be in the Sunday 
 school and to have the benefit of the Christian 
 training there given, but if they are asked to 
 do any of the Christian work involved therein 
 they excuse themselves on the ground that they 
 do not profess to be Christians. The selfish- 
 ness of all this is apparent. But how repre- 
 hensible in the sight of God must it be for men 
 and women who believe in the value and valid- 
 ity of religion to neglect religion for themselves 
 and to bring up their children to a practical 
 
 atheism! And even if they do teach the little 
 117 
 
The Child as God's Child 
 
 ones to pray and to do some of the other acts 
 of devotion, and even if they do instill into 
 their minds and hearts reverential thoughts 
 and feelings, how weak and inefficacious is all 
 this without the example of the parent ac- 
 companying the instruction. And especially 
 must all this training be counteracted by the 
 lack of example when the neglect of religion 
 springs, as it generally does, from some petty 
 spite against a professor of religion or from the 
 overweening love of pleasure, perhaps of sin, 
 or other similar motives — all of which, in the 
 light of eternity, must appear and will appear 
 infinitely insignificant. What enormous risks 
 such parents incur in order to gratify their 
 unreasonable whims ! 
 
 It is not enough for parents to say that they 
 place no obstacles in the way of the religious life 
 of their children. If they are not themselves re- 
 ligious they do thereby place the greatest obsta- 
 cle in their children's way. As well might the 
 horticulturist declare that he places no obstacle 
 in the way of the growth and development of his 
 plants and flowers when he does not furnish 
 them protection from extreme cold or provide 
 them opportunity for receiving adequate light, 
 heat, and moisture. The neglected plant may 
 
 flourish; some such cases occur. The reli- 
 ii8 
 
The Parents 
 
 giously neglected child may become religious; 
 some such cases occur. But the lack of proper 
 nurture will destroy or weaken the life of the 
 plant, and the lack of proper nurture will de- 
 stroy or weaken the religious instincts of the 
 child. Simply allowing outsiders to do what 
 chance affords them opportunity for doing is 
 no adequate discharge of parental duty. Re- 
 ligion must be the atmosphere of the home, 
 or the religious life of the children will not 
 be sufficiently nourished. If for no other mo- 
 tive than the good of their children parents 
 should maintain a genuine religious life in 
 their own hearts and at the family fireside. 
 The lack of example and of the steady pressure 
 of the parents are just the greatest obstacles 
 to the child's religious development. The pres- 
 ence of this example and pressure is just the 
 greatest earthly help to such development. If 
 children grow up for ruin in homes where the 
 neglect of religion has been conspicuous the 
 parents have no one but themselves to blame, 
 and they will be held responsible before God. 
 Parents who attempt to train their children 
 religiously may fail of the desired results for 
 lack of judgment. There may be too much 
 indulgence or too much severity ; there may be 
 
 a defective or inconsistent ideal, and this may 
 119 
 
The Child as God's Child 
 
 result in disaster. But if disaster follows an 
 honest attempt the parent cannot profoundly 
 blame himself; while no one can censure him- 
 self sufficiently if, after bringing children into 
 the world, he neglects to exert himself so as 
 to train them up in the nurture and admonition 
 of the Lord. 
 
 Attractiveness of Family Religion 
 
 Sometimes the weak excuse is made that the 
 religious training received at home may tend 
 to make religion odious to children. No doubt 
 such has sometimes been the result of parental 
 effort. Where wisdom has been lacking and 
 force has been used family prayers have be- 
 come irksome to the younger members of the 
 family. Long-drawn-out, formal, lifeless de- 
 votions, during which the children are com- 
 pelled to sit like dumb statues at peril of a 
 flogging afterward, are not likely to impress 
 a restless child with the beauty of religion. 
 But if, with real affection for the children and 
 deep love and gratitude and confidence toward 
 God, the father, like the priest that he ought to 
 be, reads reverently a portion of the Bible and 
 prays as reverently and feelingly for each child 
 by name, the children kneeling about their 
 mother, who affectionately throws her arms 
 
 I20 
 
The Parents 
 
 about them while they all pray, there will sel- 
 dom be any disorder, the children will be eager 
 for the hour of devotion, and if for any reason 
 it is passed by the children will beg for it. 
 Wisdom and tact are needed, but so are they 
 in all other departments of child training. 
 Properly conducted, religious training will 
 make the early memories of the home more 
 blessed than any other feature of the life. The 
 Sunday afternoons or twilight hours, when 
 father and mother entertained the children with 
 the voice of sacred song, will ever remain in 
 the recollections of childhood as the most pre- 
 cious moments in which family affection and 
 family religion were combined. 
 
 The cheerfu' supper done, wi' serious face, 
 
 They, round the ingle, form a circle wide; 
 The sire turns o'er, wi' patriarchal grace, 
 
 The big ha' Bible, ance his father's pride; 
 
 His bonnet rev'rently is laid aside. 
 His lyart haff ets wearing thin an' bare : 
 
 Those strains that once did sweet in Zion glide, 
 He wales a portion with judicious care; 
 And " Let us worship God! " he says, with solemn 
 
 They chant their artless notes in simple guise; 
 
 They time their hearts, by far the noblest aim: 
 Perhaps " Dundee's " wild-warbling measures rise, 
 
 Or plaintive " Martyrs," worthy of the name; 
 
 Or noble " Elgin" beets the heavenward flame, 
 
 121 
 
The Child as God's Child 
 
 The sweetest far of Scotia's holy lays: 
 
 Compared with these, Italian trills are tame; 
 The tickled ear no heartfelt raptures raise ; 
 Nae unison ha'e they with otir Creator's praise. 
 
 The priest-like father reads the sacred page, — 
 
 How Abram was the friend of God on high; 
 Or Moses bade eternal warfare wage 
 
 With Amalek's ungracious progeny; 
 
 Or how the royal bard did groaning lie 
 Beneath the stroke of Heaven's avenging ire; 
 
 Or Job's pathetic plaint, and wailing cry; 
 Or rapt Isaiah's wild, seraphic fire; 
 Or holy seers that tune the sacred lyre. 
 
 Perhaps the Christian volume is the theme, — 
 How guiltless blood for guilty man was shed; 
 
 How He who bore in heaven the second name 
 Had not on earth whereon to lay his head: 
 How his first followers and servants sped; 
 
 The precepts sage they wrote to many a land; 
 How he, who lone in Patmos banished, 
 
 Saw in the sun a mighty angel stand, 
 
 And heard great Bab'lon's doom pronounced by 
 Heaven's command. 
 
 Then, kneeling down, to heaven's eternal King, 
 
 The saint, the father, and the husband prays: 
 Hope " springs exulting on triumphant wing," 
 
 That thus they all shall meet in future days; 
 
 There ever bask in uncreated rays. 
 No more to sigh, or shed the bitter tear, 
 
 Together hymning their Creator's praise, 
 In such society, yet still more dear. 
 While circling time moves round in an eternal 
 sphere. 
 
 122 
 
CHAPTER IX 
 The Sunday School 
 
 Although no agency for the religious in- 
 struction and training of children is at all com- 
 parable to the home in point of efficiency, the 
 church in general and the Sunday school in par- 
 ticular afford valuable if not absolutely neces- 
 sary assistance. The Sunday school may be 
 viewed for present purposes in three different 
 but mutually supplementary aspects : 
 
 I. As an opportunity for religious instruc- 
 tion. This must not be taken in too narrow 
 a sense. It does not exclude any knowledge 
 which avails to throw light upon the lesson for 
 the day. Geography, history, science, philos- 
 ophy may all be needful in turn for the eluci- 
 dation of different passages of Scripture. Nor 
 does it exclude any religious ideas elaborated 
 or exemplified in any nation or age or by any 
 method, whether in literature or in art; for 
 while the Bible is fundamental in the Sunday 
 school, it is often useful to illustrate or enforce 
 the truth from other sources. 
 
 Much may be said in favor of a carefully 
 123 
 
The Child as God's Child 
 
 graded course of lessons from the Bible. Un- 
 questionably better pedagogical methods are 
 demanded. This matter cannot be here dis- 
 cussed. But there are two things that should 
 be aimed at by all teachers whether the lessons 
 chosen are graded or not. First, the truths 
 drawn from the lessons should be adapted to 
 the stage of mental, moral, and religious de- 
 velopment reached by the children to whom 
 the instruction is to be given. The teachers 
 need feel no obligation to make an exhaustive 
 analysis of the contents of the passage to be 
 studied and to give it entire to the class. The 
 verse-by-verse method of treating the lesson 
 is not the most helpful. Few passages there 
 are which do not afford ideas suitable both to 
 adults and children of every age. What is 
 needed is skill in discerning these truths and 
 in simplifying and illustrating them. What- 
 ever other ideas the passage may contain 
 should be passed by, unless notice is taken of 
 them by some member of the class. Second, 
 the impression should be left upon the mind 
 of the child or youth that the Bible is a rich 
 storehouse of moral and religious truth. It 
 may be well enough in secular schools to treat 
 the Bible as literature; but that should not be 
 
 the chief, or even a prominent, point of view 
 124 
 
The Sunday School 
 
 in the Sunday school. When the child becomes 
 an adult he should have learned to think of 
 the Bible, not as history, not as a treatise on 
 science, but as a record of the religious vicis- 
 situdes of the race, especially of the Israelites, 
 under the leading of God's Spirit. If in order 
 to do this it is necessary to point out the rela- 
 tive imperfection of the science of the Old 
 Testament, or even of the New; and if it is 
 necessary to inculcate the idea of a gradual, 
 progressive revelation, adapted to the capac- 
 ities of each age, until the perfect revelation 
 came in Christ, well and good. There is noth- 
 ing in any of this to shake the faith of any child ; 
 but as he comes to see how wonderful the 
 knowledge of religion was at each stage as 
 compared with the imperfection of the knowl- 
 edge in other realms, he will be fully persuaded 
 that a revelation must have been given in re- 
 ligion, though men were left to work out the 
 truth for themselves in other departments of 
 life. The Bible must come to be thought of 
 as a book of morals and religion, and these must 
 be thought of as imperfect in the conception of 
 every age and religious teacher prior to Christ. 
 The moral and religious defects of the indi- 
 viduals and nations mentioned in the Bible may 
 
 be as useful examples by contrast as the per- 
 125 
 
The Child as God's Child 
 
 fections there manifested in other cases. We 
 are instructed reHgiously by negatives as truly 
 as by positives. The whole Bible may be made 
 and should be made religiously helpful. 
 
 Qualifications of the Ideal Teacher 
 It will be seen from this that the ideal 
 teacher needs, among many qualifications, a 
 liberal education and a thorough course in the- 
 ology. This ideal can, of course, seldom be 
 realized. But it does not follow that the teach- 
 er should fail altogether because the ideal can- 
 not be attained. Almost all learning, including 
 theological, is so popularized in these days that 
 a teacher can become self-educated for the 
 work demanded. The mastery of two or three 
 well-chosen books on various phases of the 
 Bible and its contents each year would soon 
 equip the teacher for the accomplishment of 
 the best results. Especially would this be the 
 case if the teacher also carefully prepared for 
 each lesson. There is no method of acquiring 
 full and accurate knowledge of a subject com- 
 parable to the mastery of that knowledge with 
 a view to its impartation to others. 
 
 But if it is desirable that the teacher should 
 know the Bible in all its aspects it is also de- 
 sirable that he should know human nature in 
 126 
 
The Sunday School 
 
 its various phases of development from infancy 
 to age. The intellectual, moral, and religious 
 capacities of the pupil, of whatever age, should 
 be neither overrated nor underrated. Where 
 previous opportunities have not been afforded 
 or sufficiently employed to furnish the teacher 
 with first-hand knowledge of child life in all 
 its phases and aspects the Sunday school teach- 
 er needs to begin the fascinating work of ob- 
 serving children and of reflecting upon their 
 exhibitions of intellectuality and character. 
 This first-hand knowledge of the child is essen- 
 tial to vitality. But the earnest student of 
 these things will rarely have adequate oppor- 
 tunity to do for himself all that is needed; so 
 that one or more of the excellent books on the 
 development of the child now available should 
 be carefully studied, thus both supplementing 
 and guiding the individual's own work. 
 
 Besides these intellectual qualifications, the 
 teacher must be personally acquainted with the 
 value of the religious truths imparted. The 
 mere student may be interested in truth for 
 its own sake. The Sunday school teacher dare 
 not view truth thus apart from its uses. And 
 all other things being equal, the teacher will 
 impart most effectively those truths which he 
 
 has found most significant in his own life. 
 127 
 
The Child as God's Child 
 
 There is in this an important pedagogical 
 principle. It is that no truth should be im- 
 parted in the Sunday school class which expe- 
 rience has not found helpful to the religious 
 life. There are only two cautions necessary 
 in this connection : The first is that the teacher 
 must not too absolutely limit his conception 
 of needful truth to what he has found useful 
 in his own life. No one has universal needs; 
 and it might well be that one individual would 
 find in his own life no use for a doctrine or 
 fact that might appeal powerfully to another. 
 The exchange of views on matters of this kind 
 may prove very helpful, especially to young 
 teachers. Nor must the idea of the religiously 
 useful be too narrow. Things may be useful 
 in different degrees and in different ways; 
 and while it should be the aim to employ the 
 most effective means, still it will often be found 
 desirable to add to the most effective some 
 particularly interesting truth, even though it 
 is less important. The second caution is that 
 the whole lesson hour should not be taken up 
 in application. Truth must be reasonably clear 
 to the mind before it can be made available 
 for practice. The truth must therefore be 
 vividly and impressively set forth before any 
 
 application is attempted, and this will often 
 128 
 
The Sunday School 
 
 obviate the necessity of any elaborate applica- 
 tion. The hortatory element must be limited 
 also, because it is possible to make so many 
 applications that none of them produces its 
 desired effect. Not only may one applied 
 truth obliterate the impression made by an- 
 other, but if the hortatory element is too prom- 
 inent the strain upon the child's will becomes 
 so great that he cannot endure it, and he re- 
 leases himself by listlessness and inattention. 
 The secret of effective application of truth lies 
 in limiting the amount and intensifying the 
 impression by the excitement of interest and 
 by judicious repetition in various form at 
 comparatively short intervals. 
 
 2. As a means of religions development. 
 The religious instruction imparted in the Sun- 
 day school does not have its end in itself. If 
 that were all that the Sunday school is designed 
 to accomplish its work could be better done 
 in the day schools, and no one would object 
 seriously to its being done there. It is just 
 because religious truth is expected to affect 
 life that the expenditure of time, effort, and 
 money in Sunday school work is warranted. 
 It is necessary, therefore, that all connected 
 with the work of the Sunday school have a cor- 
 rect conception of the task to be accomplished. 
 (9) 129 
 
The Child as God's Child 
 
 The Theory of the Child's Nature 
 And here it becomes apparent that the defi- 
 nite purpose of the Sunday school can be de- 
 termined only in the light of a true theory of 
 the child's nature. If the infant is expected 
 to grow up for future conversion the work 
 will be of one kind. If he is expected to grow 
 up as one in whom the grace of God has been, 
 for all practical purposes, convertingly opera- 
 tive from the first, the work will be of another 
 kind. In the first instance the teacher will 
 endeavor to deepen the sense of inward sinful- 
 ness. He will emphasize the evil propensities 
 and point out how ruinous they are, and he will 
 strive to lead him to resist their power as much 
 as possible until the age when he can be in- 
 telligently converted. Who shall say that in so 
 doing he is not accomplishing a great work? 
 On the other theory he will endeavor to deepen 
 the sense of the value of the purity God be- 
 stowed upon the child, and as a means thereto 
 urge the importance of gratifying no evil im- 
 pulse. So far as dealing with the sinful pro- 
 pensities are concerned the content of the in- 
 struction is essentially the same in both cases. 
 But with a similar content there is a different 
 
 method of approach as there are different pre- 
 130 
 
The Sunday School 
 
 suppositions. One undertakes to prepare the 
 child for what he ought to be; the other, to 
 preserve his gracious state intact. When it 
 comes to the exercise of the child's will the one 
 tries to prepare it for one tremendous effort 
 to come after a while; the other calls upon him 
 to summon it afresh for every temptation. 
 
 It is needless to reiterate here the arguments 
 showing the advantages of the latter method. 
 If the term ''conversion" is to be insisted upon 
 it must be said that the view now maintained 
 proposes a gradual rather than a sudden con- 
 version. The converting grace of God is pro- 
 gressively and steadily bestowed, not reserved 
 for one great cataclysmic act. The action of 
 the will, or the human cooperation, is secured 
 as progressively and steadily as the grace, not 
 allowing the sense and the power of sin to 
 accumulate for removal by one mighty up- 
 heaval. The grace of God and the effort of 
 man combine; but from beginning to end, not 
 in spasmodic fashion. 
 
 Wherever parents and Church combine to 
 make this kind of Sunday school work possible 
 it is the ideal to be sought for. Unfortunately 
 so many parents and Churches hold the other 
 view that the teacher can seldom assume that 
 this can be his work. Under such conditions 
 131 
 
The Child as God's Child 
 
 he must do the best he can. That best is, it 
 must be sadly confessed, all too often further 
 hindered by the positive opposition, or at least 
 the refusal of cooperation, on the part of the 
 parents. The wholly pernicious idea that reli- 
 gion is a thing possible only to a relatively 
 mature intelligence causes many parents to for- 
 bid any serious attempt to lead the child as 
 he should be led. But for this the teacher 
 might undertake to secure the child's conver- 
 sion at a very early age in such a way as to 
 undo much of the damage of a still earlier 
 home influence. As it is, the teacher can only 
 look on with sad heart at the ruinous folly of 
 the parent and strive by whatever means he 
 can devise to save as much from the wreck as 
 possible, and often much can be done. 
 
 What Can Be Accomplished 
 Three things in particular almost any teach- 
 er can accomplish in the face of all obstacles: 
 The first is the guidance of the moral judg- 
 ment and the consequent gradual delimitation 
 of the lines of future activity. If the teacher 
 can so win and hold the confidence of the child 
 as to become and remain his ideal of moral and 
 religious excellence he can, by precept and ex- 
 ample, determine the child's moral and religious 
 132 
 
The Sunday School 
 
 career in spite of parental indifference or op- 
 position. And he can do this without causing 
 any breach between parent and child. Not in- 
 frequently children choose some one entirely 
 outside their own family as an example to pat- 
 tern after, and testimonies are often given to 
 the effect that it was a faithful Sunday school 
 teacher who determined the careers of the 
 members of his class. The second thing the 
 teacher may accomplish is the production of 
 convictions in the minds and consciences of his 
 pupils. A conviction is far deeper than an 
 opinion. It takes hold not alone upon the 
 judgment, but upon the moral nature. An 
 opinion may have very little influence upon the 
 life; a conviction is a controlling force. An 
 opinion may leave its holder inert ; a conviction 
 imparts vigor. But if the teacher himself has 
 convictions he will be likely to generate them 
 in his pupil. This, of course, presupposes that 
 the convictions are such as to mold the teacher's 
 life into beauty of inward character and out- 
 ward expression. If the teacher's convictions 
 render him censorious or fanatical they will 
 either fail to affect the pupil for good or they 
 will mar him as they have marred the teacher. 
 The third result is an inward commitment of 
 
 the pupil to Christ. In cases where there is 
 ^33 
 
The Child as God's Child 
 
 no home opposition an outward commitment 
 can usually be secured also. Where there is 
 opposition to the outward expression there is, 
 generally at least, none to the inner life. Then 
 it is that the teacher can aid the pupil by point- 
 ing out how important is conduct at home and 
 elsewhere such as to convince everybody of 
 the genuineness and persistence of his pur- 
 pose. Much parental opposition springs from 
 the fear that religious acts on the part of their 
 children will be taken under the influence of 
 spasmodic impulse rather than on principle. 
 When the child is known to the teacher to be 
 moved in his desire to give himself up to the 
 Christian life by feelings and motives proper 
 to him a glorious opportunity is offered for 
 deepening, strengthening, guiding, and per- 
 petuating all these holy impulses. The teacher 
 must avert the danger the parents fear. 
 
 One of the most serious problems that con- 
 fronts the teacher relates to the amount of pres- 
 sure that he should bring to bear upon his 
 pupils. Very young children are so easily in- 
 fluenced that they must be handled with the 
 utmost care. The teacher should, it would 
 seem, give most attention just to the child's 
 inner life. Much outward expression of reli- 
 gious feeling is unnatural to children and is 
 134 
 
The Sunday School 
 
 likely to deaden the emotions or to produce a 
 revulsion, from either of which results the child 
 will be slow to recover. The wise teacher 
 will not undertake to make the child's outer 
 religious manifestations conform to the type 
 of the adult. He will carefully consider how 
 to encourage every suitable manifestation of 
 the child's religious life, and at the same time 
 how to prevent every illegitimate manifesta- 
 tion. He will have to remember ever that his 
 pupil, being a child, should be expected to think 
 and speak as a child and not as a man. A 
 very simple outward act in a child will mean 
 as much as a far more elaborate one in a man. 
 It may be assumed with perfect security that 
 any approach on the part of children to the 
 methods of adults in the expression of their 
 religious feelings is imitative and conventional, 
 and therefore abnormal and dangerous. The 
 thoughtful teacher will not expect to reverse 
 the order: first the blade, then the ear, then 
 the full corn in the ear. In his anxiety lest 
 the seed he is sowing from Sunday to Sunday 
 may not spring up he should not fall into the 
 error of forgetting that dealing with a child 
 calls for the patience of hope. He may rest 
 secure in the belief that, though after many 
 
 days, he will see the ripe fruitage of his sow- 
 135 
 
The Child as God's Child 
 
 ing and nurture. To have his class grow up 
 to maturity of Christian life under his affec- 
 tionate care, not to see them mature Christians 
 while they are yet children in all their other 
 capacities, should be his desire. And there is 
 no more joyful expectation nor any more abun- 
 dant reward than in bringing about this result. 
 A class so trained will grow up to call such a 
 teacher blessed. 
 
 3. As a connecting link between the home 
 and the Church, The figure of a chain is not 
 altogether felicitous, and there are implications 
 of contrast between home, Sunday school, and 
 Church which are not really meant. But if 
 the figure and the implications are not insisted 
 on the expression may be allowed to stand. 
 In any case it is as good as any other. 
 What is meant is that the Sunday school takes 
 the child and cares for his moral and religious 
 life, at least until he is an adult; that it takes 
 him when he is passively Christian and trans- 
 forms him until he is actively Christian; that 
 when it receives him he is not by his own con- 
 sent a full member of the visible Church and 
 when it has wrought its office upon him he is 
 a full member by his own act. If home, Sun- 
 day school, and Church cooperate these desir- 
 able results can be accomplished. 
 136 
 
The Sunday School 
 
 The Function of the Sunday School 
 The function of the Sunday school, then, is 
 to educe, develop, and sustain, from infancy 
 to full age, the religious life of its members 
 and to introduce them gradually into inter- 
 ested and enthusiastic participation in all the 
 duties, responsibilities, and enjoyments of 
 Church life. While the Church in the larger 
 sense must seek to attract to itself from the 
 ranks of the Sunday school workers for those 
 departments which lie outside the range of the 
 school, the school must also strive to awaken 
 an interest in features of Church life outside 
 of itself. One of the most serious dangers of 
 the Sunday school is that it will train its mem- 
 bers to be passive recipients of good rather 
 than active bestowers of good ; that it will fail 
 even to interest its members in active relations 
 to the school sufficiently to secure its working 
 force from its own ranks ; that it will at best 
 only interest its members in itself and fail to 
 connect them vitally with other departments of 
 Church life. This is a danger, too, which ex- 
 ists as a menace. The school ought in some 
 way to secure such a hold on its younger 
 members that they will never leave it. And it 
 should secure such an influence over them as 
 ^Z7 
 
The Child as God's Child 
 
 will lead them to love the entire range of 
 Christian activity and legitimate Church life. 
 
 Correlation of Sunday School and 
 Church 
 
 There are those who would regard the Sun- 
 day school as the children's Church. This is 
 erroneous in several ways: First of all, the 
 Sunday school ought not to be made up ex- 
 clusively of children and their adult teachers. 
 Besides, this idea perpetuates that fatal an- 
 tithesis between the Sunday school and the 
 Church. Somehow the vital and functional 
 union between Sunday school and Church must 
 be kept ever in mind; perhaps the relation 
 should be that of a part or rather a department 
 to a whole. But while there are some errors 
 in the putting, there is much truth in the idea. 
 The Sunday school should be so constituted 
 and conducted as inevitably to pass its members 
 into the more comprehensive organization 
 known as the Church; to transfer them almost 
 imperceptibly, so as to avoid the sense of 
 strangeness; and so to train them that they 
 shall be interested in and capable of undertak- 
 ing all the work for which the Church stands. 
 In order to this the sense of contrariety be- 
 tween the terms "Sunday school" and "Church" 
 138 
 
The Sunday School 
 
 must be lessened. Sunday school and Church 
 will have to be more accurately correlated in 
 our minds, and that correlation more consist- 
 ently worked out in practice. Is it not anom- 
 alous that the Church should meet for worship 
 morning and evening, while not the Church, 
 but the Sunday school, meets for the detailed 
 study of the Bible? Should not every meeting 
 be a meeting of the Church, the difference being 
 solely the difference of purpose. If there may 
 be any legitimate exception to this it must be 
 along the line of meetings for different classes 
 of people, as, for example, meetings for young 
 people. Perhaps the very fact that the Sunday 
 school has its separate organization puts it into 
 a relation of essential distinctness from that 
 other organization known as the Church, if 
 not indeed of a competitor. 
 
 Whatever it may be that causes the young 
 person to feel at home in the Sunday school 
 and a stranger in the Church, very certain is 
 it that multitudes do so feel, and no more 
 weighty responsibility rests upon all of us than 
 to discover and remove the cause of the diffi- 
 culty; for a frightfully costly difficulty it is. 
 Probably eighty per cent of those who unite 
 with the Churches are trained in the Sunday 
 school; but it is not far from the truth to say 
 139 
 
The Child as God's Child 
 
 that sixty per cent of the boys and girls in 
 the Sunday school never unite with the Church. 
 One suggestion may prove valuable here: The 
 work and methods of the Sunday school and 
 the Church as a whole ought to be brought 
 into better alignment. Most Sunday schools 
 have some connection with the missionary 
 cause. For the rest of the benevolent work of 
 the Church no provision whatever is made in 
 the Sunday school. Whether this can be rem- 
 edied or not is hard to tell. But it is sure 
 that the contrast between the services of the 
 Sunday school and those of the public con- 
 gregation, whether in its more formal worship 
 or in its devotional meetings, is exceedingly 
 marked. Those who attend only the Sunday 
 school know nothing of how it would seem to 
 be present at a meeting for prayer or Christian 
 testimony. The hymns and tunes used are 
 not only other, but they are widely different in 
 quality. One who forms a taste for the aver- 
 age Sunday school hymn and tune will scarcely 
 like the richer hymns and tunes used in the 
 public worship, as one who feeds his taste on 
 the popular airs finds the higher types of in- 
 strumental or vocal music distasteful. Could 
 not the Sunday school frequently have a prayer 
 
 and testimony meeting for a few minutes to 
 140 
 
The Sunday School 
 
 good advantage? Could not more of the 
 hymns and tunes be common to the pubHc wor- 
 ship and the Sunday school? Could not the 
 methods of the Sunday school be so planned 
 and executed as to work more completely into 
 the hands of the wider organization? The 
 noise and confusion of the ordinary Sunday 
 school may be unavoidable during the lesson 
 time, but surely the spirit of reverence and 
 worship during other parts of the service could 
 be approximated to the devotional ideals of the 
 public worship. 
 
 The Sunday school is the one meeting of the 
 Church in which considerable numbers of 
 adults and children meet together. If properly 
 managed the Sunday school ought, therefore, 
 to be the one place in which adults and children 
 should become acquainted with and interested 
 in each other. One obstacle in the way of this 
 desirable unity of feeling is the twofold an- 
 tithesis : adults — children ; members — not mem- 
 bers. The first of these is taken as a matter of 
 course; the second has no reason grounded 
 in the nature of things. It is arbitrary and 
 offensive as well as dangerous, creating a 
 division which reaches even to the separation be- 
 tween parents and children. The outs are out by 
 
 no choice of their own, though they are pleaded 
 141 
 
The Child as God's Child 
 
 with to come in. Why erect such a barrier, 
 condemned both by revelation and reason, and 
 then place upon the children the burden of re- 
 moving it? But for that barrier children and 
 adults might meet and work upon a level ex- 
 cept as to age. All would be counted, as they 
 really are, of the family of God. There would 
 be no aliens; all would be the children of a 
 common Father — brothers and sisters, some 
 younger, some older. If this idea were carried 
 out in spirit and truth, with all that it involves 
 of the stronger bearing the burdens of the 
 weak, there would be fewer losses to the 
 Church by far than now. But while some are 
 counted out and some in, the leakage will con- 
 tinue with all its fearful havoc to the Church 
 and to individual character. In the Sunday 
 school is the place to weld young and old into 
 a compact mass w^hich cannot be torn asunder. 
 Here, at least, the divisive principle of deny- 
 ing the rights of the children should be ex- 
 cluded and the bond of religious union should 
 be emphasized. 
 
 There is one more suggestion: Reckoning 
 all, old and young, members of the Church, the 
 pastor treating all as such, the teachers, wheth- 
 er nominally or not, should actually stand in 
 
 the relation of subpastors to their classes. This 
 142 
 
The Sunday School 
 
 seems to be about the only practical way in 
 which to secure proper supervision and pas- 
 toral care. If each teacher regarded himself 
 responsible for the spiritual welfare of his 
 class in the same sense and degree in which 
 a faithful pastor regards himself responsible 
 for all a sudden change would sweep over the 
 face of our Church life. How little this has 
 been appreciated hitherto may be inferred from 
 the fact that of all the cases studied by Star- 
 buck only a very small percentage refer their 
 religious life to the influence of teachers, and 
 of these it must be presumed that not all were 
 Sunday school teachers. 
 
 And here it seems necessary to point out 
 that the only one who can bring to bear upon 
 the problem all the elements of success hith- 
 erto mentioned and cause them to work in har- 
 mony toward the desired end is the pastor. 
 Busy he may be. Enough is on his shoulders 
 now. But if he could bring about the use of 
 all the means and agencies advocated here he 
 would thereby lighten his labors and increase 
 his success. He alone can disseminate widely 
 right doctrine with reference to the child's 
 place in the kingdom and family of God and 
 in the visible Church. He alone can inspire 
 
 the parents and Sunday school teachers with a 
 143 
 
The Child as God's Child 
 
 due sense of their functions and obligations. 
 
 He alone can induce the adult members of the 
 
 Church to regard the children as their younger 
 
 brothers and sisters. And though not all at 
 
 once, he can do these things. His very example 
 
 will go a great way toward accomplishing his 
 
 purpose. His word of advice and entreaty 
 
 along with his example will, in due season, 
 
 work the needed transformation. In all the 
 
 work of the Church the pastor is, humanly 
 
 speaking, the inspiring, guiding spirit. 
 144 
 
CHAPTER X 
 
 The Qitical Period 
 
 After parents, Church, Sunday school, and 
 pastor have done all, and as wisely as possible, 
 there still remains an element of danger aris- 
 ing from the instability of youth. For a time 
 the child can be guided safely, and principles 
 can be fixed in the mind and heart which will 
 have a certain regulative influence throughout 
 life. But there comes a period in the life of 
 every youth — it may lie anywhere between the 
 ages of eight or ten and twenty-five — when the 
 influences so powerful and effective in child- 
 hood lose some measure of their force and may 
 be thrown off entirely. It is the period when 
 the sense of self begins to assert itself. This 
 new consciousness is inevitable, and it is usu- 
 ally strong in proportion as the character is 
 forcible. External restraints become extremely 
 obnoxious, and the greatest wisdom is needed 
 by those who would project their controlling 
 influence from childhood into and through 
 youth. Compulsion must be gentle, if exer- 
 cised at all, and must gradually give way to 
 (lo) 145 
 
The Child as God's Child 
 
 guidance by advice and counsel. At this point 
 it is that the confidence and affection inspired 
 in children by parents, teachers, pastors, be- 
 come available in the highest degree. If these 
 feelings have not been produced, or if they are 
 not warranted in the light of the youthful in- 
 telligence, the result can but be less of influence 
 just when it might be most helpful. 
 
 This critical period has been denominated 
 the period of adolescence, because during ado- 
 lescence the moral and spiritual dangers of 
 humanity are at their maximum. There are 
 some reasons why the term "adolescent" is 
 not so good as the term "critical ;" but which- 
 ever word is employed, the critical, dangerous 
 aspect of the period is that which must chiefly 
 absorb attention. 
 
 The Sense of Personal Responsibility 
 The first great source of danger arises, then, 
 from the new sense of personal responsibility 
 which awakens at this time. The young life 
 feels the necessity of taking charge of his own 
 destiny before his judgment is sufficiently 
 mature to perform this duty safely. It is this 
 mixture of self-confidence with immature judg- 
 ment which makes the ordinary youth appear 
 
 so ridiculous at times. He feels his self-im- 
 146 
 
The Critical Period 
 
 portance just because he does not suspect — 
 cannot suspect — his own insignificance, and 
 because he has had too little experience to sug- 
 gest the question of the validity of his own 
 judgments. But judge he must — it is his na- 
 ture — and judge he will. This immature judg- 
 ment applies itself to the problems of belief 
 and to the problems of conduct. It is not sur- 
 prising if doubt and waywardness appear. 
 
 Doubt concerning traditional religious be- 
 liefs cannot exist in any important sense until 
 the youth attains a degree of confidence in 
 his own judgment. The child may ask 
 "Why?" and "How can it be?" but this is 
 curiosity rather than doubt. But there comes 
 a time when the beliefs the child has received 
 on authority are subjected by him to the 
 scrutiny of reason. He has been often told 
 that he cannot understand the reasons for the 
 beliefs inculcated. Now his overweening self- 
 confidence refuses any longer to submit to 
 external authority. He stands ready to pass 
 judgment on everything. He is unaware that 
 he does not possess the facts requisite to form 
 the basis of a sound judgment, and that he 
 could not appreciate their bearing upon the 
 conclusion if he did possess them. Reasons 
 
 for beliefs are given him, it may be with the 
 147 
 
The Child as God's Child 
 
 utmost skill ; but because of his lack of knowl- 
 edge and his incapacity for weighing facts 
 these reasons are without force. He has 
 passed from the excessive credulity of child- 
 hood into the excessive incredulity of youth. 
 A few years later the same arguments will 
 appeal to him with power. Now they are 
 useless. 
 
 Intellectual Development 
 
 This incredulity is not, however, wholly 
 spontaneous. It is partly a result of reflection 
 upon his new sense of his own importance. 
 As he looks back upon his past he wonders 
 that he could so easily have taken things for 
 granted. In his desire to prove that he is to 
 be no longer duped he goes to the other ex- 
 treme and takes nothing for granted. This 
 impulse finds nourishment in what he hears. 
 Few preachers, even, fail to suggest to their 
 hearers doubts that would have been otherwise 
 undreamed of by the youth. The preacher, 
 the lecturer, the book, the magazine article 
 wrestles with doubt. The youthful philosopher 
 and theologian wrestles with it in his own 
 fashion because others have set him the exam- 
 ple. Then as his circle of information, acquired 
 in school, college, and society, widens he finds 
 
 himself unable to harmonize his new knowl- 
 148 
 
The Critical Period 
 
 edge with his old beliefs. His power of ac- 
 quisition is greater than his power of assimila- 
 tion. Sadly he feels constrained to give up 
 beliefs once held sacred. The notorious and 
 paradoxical melancholy of youth is such that 
 he feels a genuine pleasure in the self-sacrifice. 
 
 Doubt concerning the beliefs he has been 
 taught in childhood springs, then, from the 
 youth's own intellectual and personal develop- 
 ment and from his contact with the outer world 
 of thought in reading and study. It is an al- 
 most necessary incident in life. It is one of 
 the surest marks of the change from intel- 
 lectual youth to intellectual manhood. It is 
 not a sign of inward depravity. It is not de- 
 liberate and in the interest of a sinful life. 
 Rather does the feeling that in matters of re- 
 ligion one must be thoroughly conscientious 
 tend to deepen the doubt by forbidding him to 
 accept as true that of whose truth he is not 
 convinced. There is, indeed, in such a line of 
 argument a serious fallacy, but the youth does 
 not know it. Some mature men, even, have 
 been led astray by it. Is it surprising, then, 
 that a youth should be deceived thereby? 
 
 Such an intellectual condition should not 
 
 only not create surprise ; it should not occasion 
 
 serious anxiety. Usually it is a passing stage 
 149 
 
The Child as God's Child 
 
 in the life of the youth. Time and reflection 
 generally bring with them the necessary cure. 
 True, the recovery may not leave the youth 
 in possession of all the beliefs of his childhood. 
 If he was taught untenable doctrines he is 
 likely to leave them behind, especially in our 
 age, when the search for reality is so marked. 
 But the period of negations is the period of 
 immaturity, of which the delight in negations 
 is a sign. Maturity is never quite reached 
 with a growing personality, but relatively the 
 period of negations passes with the assumption 
 of active duties. Life demands affirmations, 
 and the worth of negations appears less with 
 each added year. Such is, at least, the rule. 
 Exceptions there may be with controversial 
 natures or with those who have been driven 
 into strife. But just because the rule is as 
 stated parents, teachers, and pastors may spare 
 themselves undue anxiety. 
 
 When a youth is found in this state of doubt 
 the worst thing that can be done is to treat him 
 harshly or contemptuously. He is a victim, 
 not a sinner. What he most needs and what 
 will be surest to correct his wanderings is sym- 
 pathetic treatment. The one who can most 
 thoroughly enter into the youth's state of mind 
 
 and manifest the greatest patience with his 
 150 
 
The Critical Period 
 
 difficulties is the one who will help him most 
 effectually. The youth's doubts may be super- 
 ficial, but to him they are very real. In dealing 
 either with superficial or with profound diffi- 
 culties of belief clear insight and the ability 
 to distinguish the essence from the accident 
 are necessary. Unfortunately not all possess 
 the knowledge and skill requisite tO' the ef- 
 fective treatment of doubt, and those concerned 
 cannot always command the services of others 
 qualified for the task. But in all cases com- 
 mon sense is valuable, and this will lead the 
 parent, teacher, or pastor to caution the youth 
 not to form definite conclusions hastily. The 
 assumption that one's elders are right and the 
 young in danger of going astray is safer than 
 the reverse one. Such considerations as these 
 will prevent the youth from committing him- 
 self definitely to unbelief. 
 
 Alienation 
 Closely allied to doubt is the youthful state 
 called alienation. The youth becomes alien- 
 ated, for example, from the creed or from the 
 form of worship in which he has been brought 
 up. This phenomenon generally springs from 
 the new spirit of independence sure to come 
 to each individual boy or girl. It finds a 
 151 
 
The Child as God's Child 
 
 celebrated instance in Susannah Wesley, who, 
 at the age of thirteen, forsook the dissenters and 
 became an adherent of the Established Church. 
 Another cause is the pugnacity so frequently 
 seen in young people. Independence and pug- 
 nacity will explain the origin of most cases 
 of theological and ecclesiastical alienation. 
 Sometimes, indeed, this state may arise from 
 the inability to find in the creed or the form 
 Off worship the needed intellectual, aesthetic, 
 moral, or religious satisfaction. If this be 
 found in any other creed or form alienation 
 from the old follows, generally accompanied 
 by the adoption of the new. This whole move- 
 ment is facilitated by association with young 
 people of other forms of faith and worship. As 
 alienation may be thus only inconvenient, not 
 morally or spiritually dangerous, it need cause 
 little alarm. The division of households by 
 sectarian differences Is undesirable, but when 
 there Is mutual forbearance It may even be a 
 blessing. If the new faith preferred by the 
 youth is not too far from that of his parents 
 it had better be let alone. 
 
 In other cases alienation approaches nearer 
 to the verge of danger because It affects life's 
 established conventions or even its established 
 
 views of morals. But this, like doubt, is usu- 
 
 152 
 
The Critical Period 
 
 ally a transient manifestation, and one that 
 will rectify itself in due time. What is most 
 needed is to guard the young from falling into 
 moral disaster on account of this disregard or 
 defiance of custom. The dark feature of this 
 stage of development is that it is so clearly, 
 though no doubt unconsciously, the result of 
 impulses which cannot always be justified by 
 good morals. One of the most common in- 
 stances, as one of the most difficult to handle, 
 is seen in the relation of the sexes with each 
 other. Even the most careful early training 
 does not in every case avail to restrain the 
 youthful impulses. Still, if proper caution is 
 exercised by parents young people can gener- 
 ally be tided over this danger until their own 
 better selves can "find assertion. Nowhere is 
 the appeal to religious motives more needed 
 than here; and nowhere is the \alue of a vital 
 religious training, one that affects the life in 
 all its aspects, emotional and practical, more 
 evident. Rarely do religiously trained young 
 people carry their improprieties to the point 
 of moral lapse. The conscience has been too 
 well developed, the sense of God's disapproval 
 of sin is too deep seated, the worth of the 
 moral nature is too profoundly felt, to permit 
 
 of gross breaches of propriety. 
 153 
 
The Child as God's Child 
 
 This whole subject of the sexual instinct or 
 ipassion, though so delicate, needs the most 
 careful study. There is room for difference 
 of opinion as to the wisdom of teaching very 
 young adolescents the nature and significance 
 of the new feelings. Particularly does it seem 
 unnecessary to acquaint girls in their early 
 teens with matters so sacredly private unless 
 something in their conduct suggests that igno- 
 rance might endanger their physical or moral 
 future. After they have reached young wom- 
 anhood the case is different. With regard to 
 boys the matter is not so clear. A passion 
 that comes on so suddenly and with such force 
 may, by its very novelty, lead to danger. If 
 either boy or girl is likely to be led astray by 
 this passion its whole significance should be 
 laid bare. Unfortunately so many parents 
 themselves entertain wrong notions as to the 
 moral quality of the passion. It cannot be too 
 fully understood that it is intrinsically inno- 
 cent, and even holy. No youth need suffer from 
 remorse on account of the stirrings of it. On 
 the other hand, it cannot be too fully recog- 
 nized that it is to be restrained, and its legiti- 
 mate uses should be carefully distinguished 
 from its illegitimate uses. If the boy could 
 be made to know that this passion, if kept 
 154 
 
The Critical Period 
 
 under control, is the basis of manly strength 
 and nobility, and that it will prove his ruin, 
 mental, moral, social, and religious, if indulged, 
 the result would be wholly beneficent. Any 
 information on this subject given to the youth 
 should include the fact that the greatest and 
 strongest men have felt this passion in its 
 greatest force, but that they have fought with 
 themselves until they conquered and controlled 
 it. The principles of religion, if they have 
 been properly inculcated and duly practiced in 
 childhood, will come to the rescue of the youth 
 in this time of danger. For religion leads the 
 mind away from physical to spiritual pleasures, 
 and teaches and trains the individual to self- 
 control instead of self-indulgence. Besides, 
 religion teaches us to devote ourselves with 
 assiduity to the duties of everyday life, and so 
 to conduct ourselves as to make our lives useful 
 to mankind. All these motives afford the 
 young man powerful aid in his struggle for the 
 supremacy of the spirit in his life. 
 
 Waywardness 
 One of the dark phenomena of youth is way- 
 wardness, the unchecked gratification of natu- 
 ral or acquired impulses, recklessness of moral 
 restraints. Two principal causes of this phe- 
 155 
 
The Child as God's Child 
 
 nomenon must be taken into account. The 
 first is some defect of early training. For this 
 parents are not always to blame. With the 
 best intentions and utmost caution the judg- 
 ment may be faulty, resulting in the growth 
 of tendencies that ought to be checked in child- 
 hood. Once grown to considerable strength 
 they may result in a dangerous waywardness 
 for which the parents cannot account. Or 
 some outside evil influence may come into the 
 life of the child of which the parent is un- 
 aware. Here parents come nearer to being 
 blameworthy, for they ought to have the con- 
 fidence of their children to such a degree as 
 to make it morally impossible for a child to 
 secrete such influences from them. 
 
 The second principal cause is that of evil 
 associations. These may be accidental at first ; 
 but the bad effects flow, after all, from the 
 presence within of impulses to evil which con- 
 science has not learned sufficiently to condemn 
 or the will to control. Sometimes these wrong 
 impulses lead the youth to seek evil compan- 
 ionships all regardless of the fact that thereby 
 his sinful propensities will be nourished into 
 giant strength. The desire for companionship 
 is a trait of the youthful nature well recognized 
 
 by careful observers. Legitimate enough in 
 156 
 
The Critical Period 
 
 itself, it is fraught with such tremendous pos- 
 sibilities as to call for the most careful regu- 
 lation. Here it is often sufficient merel}^ to 
 play off the sense of shame and the desire for 
 the esteem of the community against the fond- 
 ness for associates who are under the social 
 ban. Sometimes the appeal can be effectively 
 made to parental affection. Very powerful is 
 that world-old consideration that, however 
 sweet may be the gratification of passion, and 
 however easy it may be to yield to the lower 
 appetites and tastes at first, in the end the way 
 of the transgressor is hard. In no case where 
 conscience has been properly developed in 
 childhood will the appeal to it in youth be 
 wholly valueless. In fact, given the right kind 
 of early training, the higher motives will al- 
 ways prove the most effectual. In cases of in- 
 cipient waywardness will the strength or weak- 
 ness of the hold of the Church and Sunday 
 school upon the youth be revealed. That 
 Church and that Sunday school which have 
 not done their utmost to provide agreeable and 
 powerful attractions able to counteract those 
 inimical to the moral welfare of the youth are 
 greatly to blame. If the Church binds its chil- 
 dren to itself as it should and can it will, under 
 all ordinary conditions, be able to hold them 
 157 
 
The Child as God's Child 
 
 firmly by ties too strong to be broken when 
 they come to the years of youth. The Church 
 must learn that prevention is both easier and 
 better than cure. Whatever boys' clubs or 
 girls' clubs can do to satisfy the social in- 
 stinct of youth must be done. These measures 
 are less costly alike in money, effort, and anxi- 
 ety than their neglect. No revival can imdo 
 the damage of neglect, and if it could it would 
 cost more than the care which would make the 
 revival unnecessary. 
 
 It is of the greatest importance in cases of 
 waywardness that the hold of the parent, the 
 teacher, the Church, and the pastor on the 
 youth should not be forfeited by any rash or 
 harsh act. Wrong the youth may be in his own 
 eyes, but an unjustifiable act or word on the 
 part of those he looks to for standards of 
 Christlike conduct only serves to make him 
 feel that if he is wrong the patterns of conduct 
 are wrong also. In the desire to gratify his 
 own impulses he will be sure to feel that as no 
 one is perfect he need not strive too hard to 
 be perfect. The harshness of those who ought 
 to be patient may alienate him from the Church 
 and her holy influences forever. Such cases 
 are not rare. Our Lord sometimes bitterly 
 
 condemned wrongdoers to their face; but it 
 158 
 
The Critical Period 
 
 was always the self-righteous wrongdoer who 
 had grown old in his sin, never the young or 
 the penitent or the weak. 
 
 Another fact must be ever kept in mind. 
 However these wayward ones may professedly 
 justify their evil conduct, they recognize in 
 their deepest hearts that they are wrong. 
 There is in their minds an ideal which they still 
 cherish. Passion may at times blind them to 
 its presence, but it lives on, and sometimes it 
 allures them. They sin because they are in- 
 wardly weak or lack the requisite external sup- 
 ports of virtue as well as because they love 
 the immediate fruits of evil ways. If the ideal 
 were lost they would be lost. As a consequence 
 it is important to appeal to that ideal, to keep 
 it alive, to make it effective. In the end, there- 
 fore, the motives of religion, of that religion 
 which does not consist in the mere escape from 
 hell, but in the attaining of the end for which 
 God created us, are the most effective motives. 
 159 
 
CHAPTER .XI 
 
 The Ideal 
 
 The Two Standards 
 The standard for every Christian, old or 
 young, is often declared to be the example of 
 Christ. What did he do, or what would he 
 do, under circumstances like those in which 
 each individual finds himself at successive mo- 
 ments in his life? To apply this standard to 
 our own conduct is a matter of no small diffi- 
 culty. It involves a knowledge of the mind 
 of Christ which few possess, and it demands 
 a correctness in judgment even more rare. 
 No one can be quite certain what Jesus would 
 do under given conditions. Besides, his mis- 
 sion, nature, and character were unique, and 
 permitted and even required of him some 
 things not required of us. All these consid- 
 erations show that Christ, whether in his re- 
 corded deeds or words, or in those which he 
 might be supposed to perform or speak, can- 
 not be taken, in all respects, as our pattern. If 
 such a standard is difficult for an adult how 
 almost wholly impracticable it would be for a 
 
 child or youth! 
 
 1 60, 
 
The Ideal 
 
 The same must be said for the standard of 
 love. What love permits and what love re- 
 quires it is not always easy to determine, and 
 under like circumstances different individuals 
 would judge differently. Nor does it at all times 
 seem possible to do what love prompts — at least 
 not unless love is regarded as transcending 
 the transient phases of human life and as look- 
 ing to the grand outcome of whole vast move- 
 ments. In any case a child cannot apply the 
 principle perfectly. 
 
 It is noticeable that these two standards are 
 respectively external and internal. And while 
 both are in some degree inappHcable, both are 
 still necessary. The great goal toward which 
 old and young ought to press is external and 
 internal likeness to the conduct and mind of 
 Christ, and at the same time the inner life of 
 the individual should be so transformed and 
 molded as to render reference to Christ's life 
 and character unnecessary. The example of 
 Christ and the spirit of love must ever be the 
 twin principles according to which life should 
 be directed. They supplement and correct 
 each other, and if we knew perfectly the exam- 
 ple of Christ, and if we loved perfectly, our 
 lives could be without fault. These two prin- 
 ciples cannot be too early, nor too impress- 
 (II) i6i 
 
The Child as God's Child 
 
 ively set before the mind, heart, and con- 
 science of the child; and they should be kept 
 before him steadily and with increasing 
 clearness of content until his character is 
 firmly established. 
 
 But just because neither adult nor child 
 can apply with absolute correctness these per- 
 fect standards it is necessary, particularly with 
 children and young people, to set up standards 
 more or less arbitrary and positive. Perfect 
 freedom in the exercise of the moral judgment 
 on the part of those whose judgment is so im- 
 mature would be dangerous in the extreme. 
 Difficulties in the training of children abound 
 here; because while it is necessary to set up 
 arbitrary or positive rules for specific cases it is 
 equally necessary to develop the sense of per- 
 sonal responsibility in the choice of one's own 
 courses of conduct. The final ideal must not 
 be one humanly imposed from without, but the 
 personal ideal formed from wdthin. The func- 
 tion of parent, teacher, pastor. Church is to 
 help the child and youth to points of view 
 which will enable him to escape the dangers 
 of his immaturity and to reach at last the 
 grandeur of a mature personality controlled 
 in all things by the behests of a correctly edu- 
 cated heart and conscience. 
 162 
 
The Ideal 
 
 The Inner Life 
 The ideal may be thought of with reference 
 to both the inner and the outer life. And as 
 to the inner life of thought, purpose, feeling, 
 desire, it can never be too exalted or strict. 
 The child should expect of himself absolute 
 perfection here. This may often lead him 
 into self-condemnation, but this is better than 
 laxity in his demands upon himself. There 
 are, however, some things ordinarily supposed 
 to belong to this perfect inner life which are 
 not to be required. Thoughts, feelings, and 
 desires often come into the consciousness un- 
 bidden, and they may be such as no pure- 
 minded person can relish. It is needful that 
 children be taught to distinguish between the 
 unwelcome and the welcome presence of these 
 thoughts and emotions. In some cases, too, 
 children condemn themselves because they can- 
 not detest these inner states. But it is not a 
 question of detestation, but rather of cherish- 
 ing them. If they are cherished the child needs 
 moral transformation; if they are not cher- 
 ished, even though not detested, and because 
 felt to be wrong fought against, all is done 
 that can be expected of anyone. The principle 
 that will turn away from the gratification of 
 163 
 
The Child as God's Child 
 
 a desire known to be evil is itself the principle 
 of holiness. 
 
 The inner life has been just now viewed in 
 its negative aspects. But there is the positive 
 aspect also. Of this the child can know but 
 little. To him it is much that he allows him- 
 self no wrong. And it is highly absurd to 
 demand that he shall be, in his inner life, a 
 paragon of virtue in the positive sense. Nega- 
 tive perfection is requisite to spiritual health. 
 Positive perfection is the result of forces and 
 conditions impossible certainly to the child, 
 even if possible to the adult. And yet the child 
 can be led to desire to be positively good and 
 holy. Especially is this possible if holiness is 
 conceived of as love. The spirit of unselfish- 
 ness, of kindliness, of helpfulness, of charity in 
 judgment, and the like can be and ought to 
 be inculcated and developed in the child heart. 
 And if the expectation be that these qualities 
 will be confined in their manifestation to such 
 acts as lie within the limits of child propriety, no 
 appearance of aflfectation or hypocrisy will ex- 
 hibit itself. The training for these qualities 
 needs to be conducted with especial care lest 
 the acts be performed without their real pres- 
 ence. The stress must be laid upon the quali- 
 ties, since, if they are present in healthy con- 
 164 
 
The Ideal 
 
 dition, the appropriate manifestations will 
 follow. 
 
 The Outer Life: Amusements 
 In the consideration of the outer life the 
 ordinary standards of honor, honesty, truth- 
 fulness, purity may be accepted as valid, 
 though some will think that on this point there 
 is room for difference of opinion. The prob- 
 lem of artificial sins, as they are sometimes 
 termed, is more complicated. From the mod- 
 ern standpoint many things which appeared 
 to former generations very real sins appear 
 wholly artificial. Few parents to-day bring up 
 their children to regard Sunday as so sacred 
 that even reasonable playfulness must be re- 
 pressed thereon. There, too, is the whole prob- 
 lem of amusements, which has been subjected 
 to a new scrutiny with a decided modification 
 of opinion concerning their permissibility. 
 What is the meaning of the greater favor 
 with which dancing, theater going, card play- 
 ing, and the like are regarded in many quarters 
 to-day ? Does this change of sentiment signify 
 merely that people have fewer artificial sins 
 now than formerly, or does it mean that 
 there is greater laxity now than in the past? 
 
 Thoughtful minds will hesitate, probably, be- 
 i6s 
 
The Child as God's Child 
 
 fore they decide in favor of either of these 
 alternatives. And the writer of these Hnes has 
 no thought of trying to settle the question for 
 others, nor even of expressing his own convic- 
 tions. But the problem is one of such conse- 
 quence that parents, teachers, and pastors must 
 have some definite word to say. It will not do 
 to temporize with it. 
 
 How shall the matter be treated in practice? 
 Some simply say, ''Better not!" Others un- 
 equivocally say, "These things are wrong." 
 What shall be said to the child? This one 
 thing the religious training of the child de- 
 mands — that is, that whether he be indulged or 
 not in- these amusements, it be understood that 
 the whole matter is not one merely of self- 
 gratification, but of doing the will of God. 
 There is a caution, however, that must be men- 
 tioned. While there is danger in later life of 
 a reaction from too great restraint in these 
 things, there is also danger that in their in- 
 dulgence the habit w^ill be formed of doing 
 whatever the impulse of the moment prompts. 
 Denial or indulgence in these things must be 
 viewed, at least in part, from the standpoint 
 of the effect upon the will. Asceticism cannot 
 be recommended if carried too far ; but, on the 
 
 other hand, too great self-indulgence can be 
 i66 
 
The Ideal 
 
 practiced. Asceticism kept within bounds has 
 the result of strengthening the power of resist- 
 ance to outer and hurtful, even though not sin- 
 ful, allurement. Self-indulgence weakens this 
 power. If the thoroughly innocent character 
 of the amusements in question were admitted 
 there would still be abundant reason for absti- 
 nence, if not total abstinence, from them. Par- 
 ticularly is this view to be emphasized in a time 
 when such large numbers of people, especially 
 women, appear to be wholly given up to pleas- 
 ure seeking. The woman who spent two after- 
 noons and three evenings each week at whist 
 and called whist a godsend proved thereby that 
 she was lost to all sense of a lofty mission 
 in the world. She does not know what to do 
 with her time unless she spends it in amuse- 
 ments. That young people should be brought 
 up in Christian communities with such utterly 
 frivolous views of life is appalling. The ques- 
 tion of amusements must be so treated on the 
 one side as not to repress too greatly the joy- 
 ousness of youth and on the other as to prevent 
 the deadening influence of self-indulgence on 
 the seriousness of every worthy life. 
 
 How to bring young people to adopt this 
 ideal of earnestness and the sense of a high 
 
 mission in the face of the attractions of worldly 
 167 
 
The Child as God's Child 
 
 pleasure is a difficult problem. That its solu- 
 tion is not always found every pastor of ex- 
 perience will confess. It may not be altogether, 
 nor even chiefly, his fault that it is so. In 
 those homes in which the parents give them- 
 selves up to pleasure rather than to Christian 
 work the young people are likely to follow the 
 example set them. Even the views sometimes 
 put into practice in secular education tend to 
 deprive children of a due development of se- 
 riousness. As long as children are beguiled 
 into learning by putting it into the form of 
 an amusement no solidity of character can be 
 developed. Pestalozzi's principle, which de- 
 mands exertion and the constant employment 
 of the thinking powers, is far better adapted to 
 the cultivation of both mind and heart. On 
 the other hand, too great austerity will bring 
 about a reaction sooner or later in the youth of 
 a household. If it does not do this it will in- 
 duce the feeling that the restraints placed by 
 Christianity upon the individual cause greater 
 loss than can be compensated by the blessings 
 of religion. It Is too much to expect that the 
 children and young people shall, in the use 
 of amusements, be able to appreciate the rea- 
 sons for caution which appeal with such force 
 
 to thoughtful and observant older people. But 
 i68 
 
The Ideal 
 
 if the parents are happy and cheerful without 
 questionable amusements ; if attractive but less 
 dangerous substitutes are provided; if parents 
 affectionately urge the children to accept their 
 judgment until they are older; if, when they 
 are older, they are not forbidden, but rather, 
 while left to their own consciences, advised not 
 to indulge; and if, above all, they are led to 
 see that amusements are not the chief end of 
 existence, there will usually be little difficulty 
 in so guiding the life of the child and the youth 
 as to give it all proper earthly joy and to pre- 
 serve it from the frivolous extremes into which 
 so many run, and which are the chief source 
 and occasion of the objection to popular amuse- 
 ments. 
 
 The Negative Method 
 Our generation is unquestionably suffering 
 from the effects of a too negative method of 
 treating all questions of practical conduct. 
 Prohibitions have been relatively too promi- 
 nent. The "Thou shalt not" of the Old Testa- 
 ment is good, but the *'Thou shalt" of Jesus 
 is better. The ideal to be kept before children 
 and youth is one of beneficent activity, not 
 merely of self-restraint ; of self-direction rather 
 than self-control. Self-denial, self-restraint, 
 
 self-control are needful only in those instances 
 J69 
 
The Child as God's Child 
 
 in which the useful activities are not suffi- 
 ciently absorbing to exclude the danger of evil 
 conduct. They ought to be passing, transient 
 words, in the description of one's personal en- 
 deavors, and they should become less promi- 
 nent with the years. On the other hand, the 
 negation of self should be displaced by the ex- 
 pression of self. This, of course, can safely 
 be only as self comes to be worthy of expres- 
 sion; and this, in turn, can be only after the 
 negative ideal has been supplanted by the pos- 
 itive, and the enriched personality has come to 
 some fair degree of perfection. If the young 
 people of the next generation could be aroused 
 to a proper pitch of enthusiasm to be inwardly 
 worthy and to engage outwardly in noble and 
 elevating employments and avocations only, 
 and then kept steadily, without undue strain, 
 to these conceptions of life, there would be vis- 
 ible a marked change for the better in a short 
 time. In some way it must be impressed upon 
 young and old that life is worth living only if 
 filled and fired with noble character and help- 
 ful deeds. 
 
 And yet it is easy to expect too much of the 
 young, in whom impulse is strong and judg- 
 ment neither correct nor sobered by the ex- 
 periences of time. Not infrequently better 
 170 
 
The Ideal 
 
 lives are demanded of them than of their 
 elders. Their thoughtless and frolicsome 
 moods are watched with impatience and anxi- 
 ety, and parents and teachers forget that they 
 themselves did just what their juniors are now 
 doing, and that notwithstanding they did not 
 go to the bad. Very true is it that those who 
 have the care of the young must watch nar- 
 rowly the manifestations of youthful vivacity, 
 and they must strive to direct these untamed 
 energies into right channels and apply them to 
 good ends. But much that passes among 
 grave and reverend elders for evidence of de- 
 pravity is thereby misjudged. The objection- 
 able conduct is no sign that the perpetrators 
 are outside the kingdom, but only that the se- 
 riousness of age has not found a home in the 
 heart of youth. And in any case the true 
 method of correction is not aloofness and 
 criticism. Far better is it for all to keep the 
 heart young and in sympathy with the joyous- 
 ness of youth, thus winning its confidence and 
 being able to direct its pleasures and all its 
 activities. In its mirth, jollity, lightness, and 
 even in its departures from propriety, youth 
 frequently sees no wrong and means no wrong. 
 Harshness may estrange the youthful feelings 
 
 from the religious life. Delicate handling is 
 171 
 
The Child as God*s Child 
 
 what the case demands until the tastes can be 
 improved and conscience educated and the 
 ideals heightened. 
 
 For, after all, the conceptions of what is for- 
 bidden and what is required are constantly 
 changing, especially in early life. All thought- 
 ful, and even most thoughtless, youths experi- 
 ence in the five years from thirteen or fifteen 
 to eighteen or twenty large modifications of 
 sentiment relative to right and duty. But not 
 this alone; in the same years there is intro- 
 duced into the mind a much more exacting 
 demand on self than was known in earlier life. 
 The youth not only has a better instructed 
 moral judgment; he has also a determination 
 to live up more perfectly to what he conceives 
 to be right. The extent and character of these 
 changes in the personal ideal will depend chiefly 
 upon the example set him by parents, teachers, 
 pastor, and Church. If any one of those whom 
 he trusts fails to be true to his highest con- 
 victions the ideal of duty will be lowered in 
 the youth's mind by so much. Whatever the 
 judgments of his elders may be relative to the 
 right or wrong of particular acts, he expects 
 them, and rightly, to live up to their ideals. 
 
 If they do not it is impossible that he will. 
 172 
 
The Ideal 
 
 Religious Emotions 
 
 What shall the child and youth expect of 
 himself emotionally in his religious life? The 
 question is one of very practical moment. Not 
 a few have set the standard either too high or 
 too low, and have suffered thereby. From one 
 point of view it is an error even so much as to 
 examine our emotional states or to expect any 
 religious emotion. Religion, conceived as 
 duty, does not regard feeling. On the other 
 hand, there can be no true religion without 
 genuine and deep feeling. 
 
 In order to a proper understanding of the 
 relation of the sensibilities to religion these 
 must be properly classified. The religious 
 emotions are of two varieties: those looking 
 outward and those looking inward. Outward- 
 looking feelings are a large constituent in re- 
 ligion. Some of these look Godward, such as 
 love, reverence, dependence, trust. Without 
 these and others that might be named there 
 can be no religion in the ordinary, or even in 
 the proper, sense of the word. A correct con- 
 ception of God is certain to evoke them. But 
 a sharp distinction must be made between their 
 presence on the one side and the consciousness, 
 
 the strength, and the constancy of them on the 
 173 
 
The Child as God's Child 
 
 other. In some natures the feelings do not rise 
 to a place of prominence in consciousness. Such 
 natures seldom notice whether they love, re- 
 vere, trust, until some unusual circumstance 
 directs special attention to the question. In 
 these respects all degrees of emotion must be 
 expected, according to temperament. It is 
 proper, however, to strengthen and deepen these 
 feelings, and a developing sense of God is likely 
 to produce that result. Of this same variety 
 other emotions look manward. Compassion, 
 mercy, love, and the like are of necessity 
 present wherever the Christian religion rules 
 in the life. These, too, may legitimately be 
 nourished. The laws of their growth are not 
 here discussed. On this point it will be suffi- 
 cient to say that one of the most effective 
 methods of cultivating them is to habituate 
 ourselves to the practice of the deeds those 
 feelings naturally require. 
 
 The self-regarding religious feelings stand 
 on a different plane. No impropriety attaches 
 to the sense of safety, of satisfaction, of joy, 
 and the like, so often experienced by Christians. 
 On the contrary, they are naturally connected, 
 in some measure and degree, with the Chris- 
 tian life. They necessarily spring from the 
 
 sense of love, trust, dependence, reverence, 
 174 
 
The Ideal 
 
 compassion, mercy, and from the conscious- 
 ness of being in right relations with, and from 
 the performance of duty toward, God and man. 
 Their presence gives zest and even enthusiasm 
 for all the burdens and pains of life. By them 
 we are lifted above the world, with its tempta- 
 tions, allurements, and trials. They should 
 not, therefore, be despised, but rather desired. 
 The point of danger is in making them too ex- 
 clusively the object of thought. Religion does 
 not consist in these emotions ; they are its efflo- 
 rescence. If they are present we should be 
 thankful, both for our own sake and for the 
 sake of their sustaining power; if they are 
 absent, or present only occasionally, we may 
 be religious still, in the sense of dutifulness 
 and faithfulness in the execution of God's 
 plans. 
 
 Of all these inward-looking emotions none, 
 perhaps, has been more emphasized than that 
 one commonly called assurance, or the witness 
 of the Spirit. Both terms are used, and with 
 some difference of signification. But the fact 
 signified in both cases is the feeling of confi- 
 dence that we are in right relations with God. 
 There is no reason to question that God be- 
 stows that confidence upon us. But experi- 
 enced pastors have discovered that the desire 
 175 
 
The Child as God's Child 
 
 for this confidence often proves a snare. The 
 degree of the confidence must of necessity be 
 conditioned somewhat by the temperament of 
 the individual. Therefore no one should grieve 
 if he experiences less of it than he could desire. 
 Then, too, the form of its coming into any 
 heart is conditioned by temperament. An 
 imaginative person or one with much mysti- 
 cism in his make-up is likely to feel the sense 
 of assurance, or the witness of the Spirit, the 
 consciousness of the filial relation to God, al- 
 most as a voice, certainly as a very striking 
 spiritual phenomenon. Others, because they 
 can obtain no such experience, fall into despair. 
 The great error is in seeking it directly. It 
 may be taken for granted that God is more 
 faithful than we are. If we do our best — and 
 no one ought to do less — in serving him we 
 may safely ignore the question of our relation- 
 ship to him. In the faithful, loving, humble 
 performance of duty as we see it, with what- 
 ever emotion naturally springs from or attends 
 it, we are most likely to enjoy the conscious- 
 ness that we are the children of God. What 
 we are and w'hat we do, not how we feel 
 before, during, or after, is the great thing. 
 These things are written not to discourage or 
 
 to disparage religious emotion, but to point 
 176 
 
The Ideal 
 
 out that emotion, especially such as looks in- 
 ward, is not essential. Our energies ought not 
 to be directed to securing these thrills, but 
 toward the work of God in the world that lieth 
 in wickedness. 
 
 It is very difficult to treat the religious life 
 without leaving a wrong impression of the 
 proportions and relations of its inner to its 
 outer aspects. Undoubtedly too much attention 
 has been given, relatively, to the inner experi- 
 ences. But there is danger from the other ex- 
 treme also. A great tree must have great roots 
 struck deep and broad into suitable soil. Coe 
 points out that the hymns of the Church have 
 been too one-sidedly descriptive of inner states. 
 He would, probably, be the last one to deny the 
 importance of just such hymns. Under their 
 inspiration about all the great works of moral, 
 spiritual, intellectual, and physical improve- 
 ment have been undertaken. Church history 
 shows that periods in which the devotional life 
 of the Church has been at once rich and healthy 
 have been those in which the Church has been 
 most vigorous in the execution of her outward 
 duties as she saw them. The great missionary 
 and reform movements of the world's history 
 have about all sprung from those individuals 
 
 or communities who were deeply influenced 
 (12) 177 
 
The Child as God's Child 
 
 by the consciousness of God or from communi- 
 ties who were so influenced. For every reason, 
 therefore, the devotional Hfe of the young 
 should be nourished. Genuineness should be 
 its chief mark, but if genuine it can scarcely 
 be too rich. Whether in private or in public, 
 devotional exercises are to be encouraged. 
 Devotional reading of the Bible, of biographies, 
 of the best thoughts of the profoundest minds, 
 whether in poetry or in prose, should be prac- 
 ticed. The young should be afforded oppor- 
 tunity for the still hour of meditation and 
 prayer; otherwise the religious life tends to 
 become shallow, unattractive, and ineffective. 
 
 Public Expression of Inner Life 
 The part that young people should take in 
 the public services of the Church must be de- 
 termined by principles applicable to each in- 
 dividual alone. One who has reached the age 
 to be employed as usher, teacher, or officer in 
 the Sunday school or young people's organiza- 
 tions can make it understood that he is on the 
 side of the Church without a spoken word. 
 His diligence will be the index of his devotion. 
 But if a youth of consistent life, actively en- 
 gaged in the work of the Church in one or 
 
 more of its departments, occasionally proclaims 
 
 178 
 
The Ideal 
 
 by word under suitable conditions, publicly 
 or privately, his inward reasons for his ear- 
 nestness in the work of Christ he thereby 
 greatly augments his usefulness. Many an- 
 other youth is just waiting for some such word 
 from him, and will need no other inducement 
 to join in the good cause. For lack of it he 
 stands aloof. The proper declaration of the 
 benefits of religion as experienced by a young 
 person has in it nothing to condemn, but every- 
 thing to commend. And if young people knew 
 how much pleasure they give their elders by 
 their testimonies it is probable they would be 
 heard more frequently. Under no circum- 
 stances should the young Christian allow him- 
 self to be ashamed of his profession. Christians 
 may be imperfect, but no one can justly say 
 a word against Christ. Christendom has often 
 displayed unchristian feelings, but Christianity 
 has never inculcated them. The young may 
 feel themselves unable to defend their faith 
 in the presence of unbelief and derision, but 
 most of the noblest men of the last nineteen 
 hundred years have been the product of Chris- 
 tian civilization. One need not seek to obtrude 
 his religion when he has reason to feel that it 
 would be unwelcome; but there is not the 
 
 slightest reason why one should hide it, and 
 179 
 
The Child as God's Child 
 
 there are many reasons why one should avow 
 himself. 
 
 Along with right emotion, devotion, and 
 profession or confession should go a spirit of 
 helpfulness in all directions. Every good cause 
 should have the young person's sympathy and 
 as far as possible his active cooperation. He 
 has a right to his emotional and devotional 
 states, but he has a duty in connection with the 
 work of the Church. He has no right to the 
 former unless they are made tributary to the 
 latter. Too much must not be expected of the 
 young, but gradually they should seek to be- 
 come effective workers. Nor must the work 
 of the Church be incorrectly apprehended. 
 Whatever may be thought of the place 
 of suppers, sociables, and entertainments in 
 Church life, they are not the specific object 
 of the Church's existence. One engaged in 
 their conduct can be said to be a worker in the 
 Church only as he sees in them a means for 
 the accomplishment of some good more inti- 
 mately connected with the spirit of Christ. 
 The works of mercy and help, such as the flower 
 mission, hospital work, and the like, are much 
 more nearly related to the mission of Jesus. 
 But the specific work of the Church is the 
 
 rescuing of men and women from sin and the 
 l8o 
 
The Ideal 
 
 impartation to them of the spirit and mind of 
 Christ. The young do not always strongly 
 feel the force and pressure of necessity here. 
 But if they are rightly trained and taught they 
 will gradually come into deeper sympathy with 
 this. As they study the Christ they will find 
 that he came to seek and to save the lost, and 
 as they wish to be like him they will enter into 
 the fellowship of this human service. More 
 and more the aim of their lives will be assim- 
 ilated to that of Christ. Their time, talents, 
 wealth will be placed at the disposal of their 
 Master for the completion of his mission. 
 
 So to train a human being from infancy to 
 maturity as that he will never fall into the evils 
 of an unbridled appetite; that he will live a 
 clean, pure, helpful life; that he will find in 
 the service of God and the service of his fellow- 
 man his chief joy; that he will gladly take his 
 place by the side of Christ in the saving of 
 
 other human beings — this is worth while. 
 i8i 
 
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