■ 
 
Class _BALt___ 
 
 Book 
 
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 Copyright N°, 
 
 COPYRIGHT DEPOSIT. 
 
THE SOUL OF A CHILD 
 
The Soul of a Child 
 
 By y 
 RAYMOND rf. HUSE 
 
 ' pSijttt ,3«r«I tana « tifilb, 
 
 Cincinnati: Jennings and Graham 
 New York: Eaton and Mains 
 
elites 
 
 Copyright, 1914, by 
 Jennings and Graham 
 
 MAR 30 1914 
 
 ©CI.A371173 
 
TO 
 
 Abbie Plumer Huse 
 
 ' Sometimes in the hush of the evening hour 
 When the shadows creep from the west. 
 
 I think of the twilight songs you sang. 
 And the boy you lulled to rest. 
 
 The wee little boy with the tousled head- 
 That long, long ago was thine — 
 
 I wonder if sometimes you long for that boy, 
 little mother of minel " 
 
CONTENTS 
 
 PAGE 
 
 Introductory Chapter, 9 
 
 The Child's World, 16 
 
 The Child's Philosophy, 22 
 
 The Child's Theology, 27 
 
 What Is a Child? 35 
 
 The Sense of Sin, 40 
 
 The Child's Christian Experience, 44 
 
 Child Varieties, 52 
 
 Christ and the Child, 57 
 
 The Holy Spirit and the Child, - 63 
 
 The Child and His Bible, 68 
 
 The Prayers of a Child, .... 76 
 
 The Call to Service, 83 
 
 The Call to Sainthood, 89 
 
 The Child's Dress, 96 
 
 The Child's Food, 104 
 
 More Food, - - Ill 
 
 The Child's Sabbath, 121 
 
 The Other Child, 126 
 
 The Child and His Dreams, .... 133 
 
 Growing Pains 139 
 
 The Child and the Church, - 147 
 
 The Child in the Church, 154 
 
 The Church and the Child, .... 161 
 
 Postlude, 166 
 
 7 
 
THE SOUL OF A CHILD 
 
 CHAPTER I 
 
 Introductory Chapter 
 
 The introduction to a book is like the front porch 
 to a house. It is usually built last, and yet it is the 
 design of the architect for you to enter it first. Fre- 
 quently, however, you do not, but climb up some 
 other way. However, we dare to express the hope 
 that the reader of this book will first peruse this 
 chapter, for we beg to assure him it will help to 
 make the rest of it comprehensible and, like the 
 strange and wonderful rhymes with which Bunyan 
 was wont to prefix his immortal allegory, will ex- 
 plain "Why it was writ." 
 
 Professor Borden P. Bowne, one of the greatest 
 philosophers of the century, said, "The foundation 
 of all psychology is experience." We have endeav- 
 ored, by turning back the pages of memory and by 
 opening our hearts and minds to the voices and 
 
 9 
 
THE SOUL OF A CHILD 
 
 spirits of little ones who have clustered about us 
 during our ministry, to reproduce here freely and 
 frankly the experience of a child : and having told 
 you that, we have really given you the purpose of 
 our book. 
 
 This is not a manual of pedagogy nor a volume 
 of methods of work among children. Wiser spe- 
 cialists than we have written many books on these 
 important subjects. We have tried, as far as pos- 
 sible, to avoid even the terminology that would 
 characterize such studies, and only occasionally, 
 when the temptation was too great, have we climbed 
 into the chair of the pedagogue. We have felt that 
 if preachers, teachers, and Christian workers gener- 
 ally could come to see the child's soul as it is, its 
 needs and its hunger, its possibilities and its glory, 
 that their own eager minds and hearts would find 
 a way to minister unto the least of these. Like our 
 Master, we simply would take a young child and 
 place him in the midst. 
 
 The generation that neglected children has 
 
 passed away. The theology that damned them is 
 
 dead. The pendulum has swung far to the other 
 
 extreme and our danger to-day is that we shall be 
 
 10 
 
INTRODUCTORY CHAPTER 
 
 superficial in our work among them and, while say- 
 ing glib words about their innocence, shut out of 
 their lives, by denying its necessity, the gracious 
 experience of saving grace that is their birthright. 
 We need to remember to-day that to be brought 
 up in the Church and trained in all the ordinances 
 thereof is not enough, even though there shall be 
 a scrupulous attention to the externals of moral be- 
 havior. History has comparatively recent evidence 
 to show that even that external morality can not 
 long continue if the soul has been untouched by the 
 Spirit divine. 
 
 The old-fashioned error was to expect all re- 
 ligious experience and life to be cast into the same 
 iron mold. Some of us have sweat under that 
 dogma and to-day rejoice in the liberty wherewith 
 Christ has set us free. But we can not afford to go 
 bounding over to the other extreme, and while no 
 longer insisting upon the mold, also cease to insist 
 upon the experience and life. And because we have 
 been disturbed by a tendency in this direction 
 among some who labor in Zion, we have "taken 
 our pen in hand to write a few lines." With the 
 optimism of an author we believe that we have 
 ii 
 
THE SOUL OF A CHILD 
 
 helped to offset this tendency by placing the child 
 in the midst. 
 
 It is hardly necessary to explain that by the soul 
 of the child we mean the child. There was an an- 
 cient psychology that picked the child to pieces and 
 found body, mind, and soul, and some other things. 
 And what they called the soul was hardly worth 
 temporary existence, to say nothing of immortality. 
 We are glad the tendency of the modern psychology 
 is not to pick the child to pieces, but to put him 
 together, to emphasize the fact that in all our study 
 of consciousness and phenomena we are really talk- 
 ing about the same individual. That the soul ex- 
 presses itself through the body we all admit. 
 
 Herein we sojourn 
 
 Till in some far sky 
 
 We lease a fairer dwelling, built to last 
 
 Till all the carpentry of time is past. 
 
 Only the grossest materialist would confuse the 
 body with the real self. There has not been the 
 same clearness always, however, about the emo- 
 tional and mental machinery. We therefore wish 
 to state that when we speak of the will we mean 
 the soul choosing, that when we speak of the mind 
 12 
 
INTRODUCTORY CHAPTER 
 
 we mean the soul thinking, that when we speak of 
 the heart we mean the soul loving, and when we 
 speak of the child's soul we mean the child, the 
 individual, the ego, the invisible spirit self, made in 
 the image of the Eternal God and Father of us all. 
 Hence, when we talk of books and comrades, for 
 instance, we are talking of things that touch the 
 child's soul as really as do cloister and place of 
 prayer. 
 
 It has been impossible to avoid becoming auto- 
 biographical occasionally. The very nature of the 
 case seems to demand it as it did when Paul faced 
 Agrippa. Unlike the great apostle, however, we 
 have inserted our experience when it seemed to us to 
 be like that of the commonality of folks rather than 
 where it differed. To do this, we have felt some- 
 what the embarrassment of literary style. After 
 considering the case we have determined to follow 
 apostolic example, and in our general treatise to use 
 the always appropriate editorial "we," and when 
 illustrating with some personal experience to drop 
 into the third person singular, as did Paul when 
 he talked about the man he "knew in Christ Jesus 
 that was caught up into the third heaven." 
 
THE SOUL OF A CHILD 
 
 We do not apologize for our frequent and 
 copious quotations from the poets. We believe that 
 they are, in many fine things of the spirit, safer 
 guides than the theologians, and that our little book 
 is richer because of these extracts. Indeed, we dare 
 to think that if some do not care for the beads of 
 our own that we have strung together, they may 
 give our message consideration because of these 
 pearls that are on the same string and preserve this 
 volume as a worthy compilation of poetical quota- 
 tions. Since it is customary in a preface to express 
 indebtedness, we hereby record our gratitude to 
 William Wordsworth, Alfred Tennyson, Elizabeth 
 Barrett Browning, John Greenleaf Whittier, Henry 
 Wadsworth Longfellow, James Russell Lowell, Ed- 
 gar Allen Poe, Robert Louis Stevenson, Frederick 
 Lawrence Knowles, James Whitcomb Riley, Rich- 
 ard Watson Gilder, Eugene Field, and others, all 
 of whom have assisted us greatly. 
 
 Finally, we send out our book with the prayer 
 of Burnbrae in the "Bonnie Brier Bush" on our lips 
 and in our hearts: "Almichty Father, we are a' 
 Thy puir and sinfu' bairns wha' wearied o' hame 
 and gaed awa' intae the far country. Forgive us 
 14 
 
INTRODUCTORY CHAPTER 
 
 for we didna' ken what we were leavin' or the sair 
 heart we gied oor Father. It was weary wark tae 
 to live wi' oor sins, but we wud never hev come 
 back had it no been for oor Elder Brither. He 
 cam' a long road tae find us and a sore travail He 
 had afore He set us free. He 's been a gude Brither 
 tae us, and we 've been a heavy charge to Him. 
 May He keep a firm hand o' us and guide us in 
 the richt road and bring us back gin we wander 
 and tell us a' we need tae know till the gloamin' 
 come. Gather us in then, we pray Thee, and a' we 
 luve, no* a bairn missing, and may we sit down for- 
 ever in oor ain Father's house. Amen." 
 
 15 
 
CHAPTER II 
 The Child's World 
 
 We are speaking of the normal child. There are 
 those who, on account of the avarice of the rich and 
 the poverty of the poor, are robbed of the priceless 
 gift of a normal childhood. In their behalf Eliza- 
 beth Barrett Browning wrote: 
 
 They look up with their pale and sunken face9, 
 
 And their look is dread to see, 
 For they 'mind you of their angels in high places 
 
 With their eyes turned on Deity. 
 "How long," they say, "how long, O cruel nation, 
 
 Will you stand to move the world on a child's heart, 
 Stifle down with nailed heel its palpitation, 
 
 And tread onward to your throne amid the mart? 
 Our blood splashes upward, O gold heaper, 
 
 And your purple shows your path; 
 But the child's sob in the silence curses deeper 
 
 Than the strong man in his wrath." 
 
 It is a sign of social and moral progress that 
 great political leaders and statesmen to-day are hear- 
 ing and heeding "The child's sob in the silence," 
 16 
 
THE CHILD'S WORLD 
 
 and the day is sure to come when Old Glory will 
 guarantee to every child his childhood. 
 
 The child's world is wonderland. William 
 Wordsworth was one time accused of not being able 
 to appreciate nature. He replied with some earnest- 
 ness, "I do appreciate nature, human nature." His 
 keen appreciation of human nature and his splendid 
 memory of child nature are clearly seen in his "Ode 
 on Intimations of Immortality," even when he at- 
 tempts to use that ode to bolster up a philosophy 
 that in spite of his poetical crutches persists in limp- 
 ing awkwardly and painfully. He says : 
 
 There was a time when meadow, grove, and stream, 
 
 The earth and every common sight 
 To me did seem 
 
 Appareled in celestial light, 
 The glory and freshness of a dream. 
 
 It is not now as it has been of yore ; 
 Turn wheresoe'er I may, 
 By night or day, 
 
 The things which I have seen I now can see no more. 
 
 The child's world is wonderland. When we 
 
 revisit the old home of our childhood we are rested 
 
 and refreshed as we climb the rolling hills, stand by 
 
 the quiet river, or look off at the purple mountains 
 
 17 
 
THE SOUL OF A CHILD 
 
 in the distance. We still believe it to be the most 
 heavenly spot on earth, but even with the utmost 
 effort of will to re-create old moods and memories, 
 we can not make it look to our world-weary eyes 
 as it used to appear to the wondering gaze of child- 
 hood. When we sit under the old tree, remember 
 the barefoot boy who used to play there and think 
 wistfully of the world in which he lived, we are 
 not guilty of the foolishness of wishing to exchange 
 places with that shadow boy. Our rainbow is be- 
 fore us. The horizon that fascinates us is westerly, 
 and not the fading glory of the deserted east. And 
 yet — and yet, we would like to camp out just a 
 little while in the wonder-world of childhood. 
 
 The philosophers tell us that color is not in the 
 object we are looking at, but is the effect of the 
 combination of rays of light upon the eyes of him 
 who looks at the object. This must account, then, 
 for the green of the fields, the blue of the sky, and 
 the red of the wild strawberries by the wayside in 
 the world of childhood. A critic said to an artist, 
 "That is a fine picture you have painted, but I never 
 saw such colors in the sunset as you have there on 
 that canvas." The artist replied wistfully, "Do n't 
 
THE CHILD'S WORLD 
 
 you wish you could?" It took the artist's soul to 
 see the beauty of the sunset. The child's world is 
 only seen by the child's soul. Mrs. Browning, in- 
 deed, claims that the poet also sees this world : 
 
 The poet hath the child's 6ight in his breast 
 
 And sees all new. What oftenest he has viewed 
 He views with the first glory. 
 
 But a careful study of the lives and productions of 
 the poets of the ages leaves one with the impression 
 that, save for rare moments of vision, they also were 
 world-weary, and the child's soul still has the 
 monopoly of wonderland. 
 
 The child dwells in the world of phenomena. 
 Thus the history of the race is reproduced in the 
 life of each individual. Like our first parents, he 
 dwells in his garden of Eden and views everything 
 from that advantage. He has no use for Copernicus. 
 The greater light is for his little day and the lesser 
 light for his little night. The sky arches over his 
 little world. Everything is neighborly. God Him- 
 self is just above the tree-tops and comes down into 
 his garden in the cool of the day. 
 
 It is always a tragic thing when a man moves 
 19 
 
THE SOUL OF A CHILD 
 
 out of this world and his faith does not keep pace 
 with his discoveries. The writer of this book re- 
 members an old man in the village postoffice, who 
 said: "I used to think when I looked up at the sky 
 I was looking at heaven. Now I know it is only 
 space." "What!" said a neighbor, who had come 
 in to get his mail. "Space," he replied, with a smile 
 that was sadder than tears. He might aptly have 
 quoted the words of Thomas Hood: 
 
 I remember, I remember, 
 
 The fir trees dark and high, 
 And how I used to think their lender tops 
 
 Were close against the sky. 
 'Twas childish ignorance, 
 
 But now 't is little joy 
 To know that I am farther away from heaven 
 
 Than when I was a boy. 
 
 It is better to dwell in a neighborly world with 
 God bending over the tree-tops than in a boundless 
 universe of empty space. The supreme task of the 
 Christian home and Church is to lead the child 
 while still in his garden of Eden to such a personal 
 fellowship with his Father God that when he moves 
 out into the bigger world of maturity he goes not 
 without a Guide. 
 
THE CHILD'S WORLD 
 
 The world of the child is a world where faith 
 is reasonable and normal. Daily wonders provoke 
 expectancy. Miracles are not strange to the little 
 pilgrim whose world is still sparkling with the morn- 
 ing dew and is itself a miracle. 
 
 Childhood is, therefore, the divinely appointed 
 time for the beginning of an experience that is de- 
 pendent upon faith for its inception and fruition. 
 
 *i 
 
CHAPTER III 
 
 The Child's Philosophy 
 
 A man's philosophy determines his theology and has 
 a profound effect upon his religion. This is equally 
 true of the child, who is "father of the man." 
 
 The average child belongs to the idealist school 
 of philosophy. He not only has a wonderful world 
 about him, but his soul is at home in a more won- 
 derful other-world. 
 
 Across the way from our study window there 
 lived a sturdy little lad of five summers and his 
 sunny-faced little sister of three. One bright morn- 
 ing this boy came to the front gate displaying a piece 
 of tin tied to a soiled string. His face was aglow 
 with pardonable pride as he said, "This is my watch 
 and chain." His sister had also a look of pride, 
 mingled with a little of the wistful maternal 
 anxiety, which dawns early in feminine minds, as if 
 she feared he would not be understood and appre- 
 ciated, as she affirmed, "Yes, it is his watch and 
 
 22 
 
THE CHILD'S PHILOSOPHY 
 
 chain." The little matter-of-fact neighbor girl 
 across the yard looked scornful and sneered: 
 " 'T is n't. It is only a piece of tin and an old 
 string." But with a flash in his eye the lad insisted : 
 "It is. It is my watch and chain," and with a 
 stamp of her baby foot, his loyal sister echoed, "It 
 is! It is his watch and chain!" And the preacher, 
 watching and musing, thought the little philosopher 
 was right. He had something in his soul like the 
 magic in the fingers of old Midas that turned to 
 gold all it touched. A piece of tin and string, plus 
 the little boy's soul, made a watch and chain of 
 glittering splendor. James Russell Lowell wrote 
 words dripping with life when he said: 
 
 When I was a barefoot boy 
 
 And dwelt in a cellar damp, 
 I had n't a friend nor a toy, 
 
 But I had Aladdin's lamp. 
 When I could not sleep for the cold, 
 
 I had fire enough in my brain, 
 And builded with roofs of gold 
 
 My wonderful castles in Spain. 
 
 This other world is one of the joys of early 
 childhood, and one of its terrors, sometimes. Fairies 
 and ghosts, angels and goblins dance in fantastic 
 23 
 
THE SOUL OF A CHILD 
 
 confusion across the horizon. Santa Claus drives 
 triumphantly through the air with his fleet reindeer. 
 
 The imaginative faculty of the child's soul offers 
 splendid opportunity for "reproof, correction, and 
 instruction in righteousness." Crude and lazy 
 parents abuse it, and in many a home there is the 
 type of teaching that finds expression in the lines, 
 "The goblins will get you if you do n't watch out." 
 Even fathers and mothers of high ideals of parent- 
 hood hardly know what to do with it. Their minds 
 balance about equally between the happy memory 
 of the rare joy of their childhood belief in St. 
 Nicholas and the pathetic face of some little child 
 who said tearfully in the hour of his disillusionment, 
 "The next thing they will be telling us there is n't 
 any Jesus." 
 
 Whether or not the imagination of childhood is 
 fed with fables and wonder tales, it will persist in 
 making a world for itself of rose-tinted hues or 
 black, terrible colors, according to childish mood. 
 And as the days go by, 
 
 The youth who daily from the east 
 Must travel, still is nature's priest, 
 And by the vision splendid 
 Is on hia way attended. 
 34 
 
THE CHILD'S PHILOSOPHY 
 
 Even after he learns the unreality of much of the 
 world of imagination he still finds supreme joy in 
 "pretending" and "making believe." A very proper 
 maiden-lady, who had a summer home in the coun- 
 try, pitied the poor minister's little children in the 
 bare little parsonage across the way because they 
 had so few toys, — just a few sticks and stones and 
 buttons. She knew so little of childhood. Those 
 sticks blossomed in childish hands like Aaron's rod 
 of old. Those stones were living stones. Those 
 buttons were diamonds. 
 
 Finely constructed mechanical toys are chiefly 
 enjoyed by adults, who are usually disappointed to 
 see how little enthusiasm they inspire in the little 
 folks and how soon they are broken. The little 
 maiden will admire respectfully the elegant wax doll 
 that will open and shut her glassy eyes, and then 
 will take the "old rag baby" to bed with her and 
 smother it with her kisses. The little boy will 
 watch his uncle wind up the stiff-leg horse that will 
 walk, and then he will go galloping off on the 
 broom-stick. 
 
 The imaginative faculty of the child makes him 
 an idealist in philosophy. He is not a slave to the 
 25 
 
THE SOUL OF A CHILD 
 
 visible. He can picture things and conceive things 
 and believe in things that "eye hath not seen, nor 
 ear heard." Thus things hidden from the wise and 
 prudent are revealed unto babes. 
 
 Just as the eye presupposes light and the ear 
 sound, so the childish belief in the ideal and the 
 invisible feels around restlessly until it discovers the 
 spirit world, the heavenly home, and the Divine 
 Christ. And the time to find these invisible things 
 that are eternal is before the child's belief in the 
 ideal has been rooted up by the everlasting tyranny 
 of the external creation groaning in pain. For he 
 who receives the Kingdom of Heaven must always 
 receive it as a little child. 
 
 26 
 
CHAPTER IV 
 The Child's Theology 
 
 When Helen Keller was first told about her 
 Heavenly Father by Phillips Brooks, she replied: 
 "I know Him, although I never knew His name 
 before. I have felt His presence. It is like the 
 warmth." The Holy Spirit had found His way 
 to that little, lonesome soul, imprisoned in the dark. 
 The child does not get all his theology "from men 
 or by men." The God who talked to Samuel still 
 speaks directly to the child soul. 
 
 However, for the interpretation of the message 
 of the "inner light" the child, like the adult, is de- 
 pendent upon human teachers. There is here the 
 same intertwining of the human and divine that we 
 find everywhere in life, even in our Bible. 
 
 What pastor has not wondered, as he has seen 
 the eager, serious eyes of childhood turned inquir- 
 ingly toward him from the pew, how many of the 
 fine things he is trying to say find their way to the 
 child's soul. The wise pastor does not forget the 
 27 
 
THE SOUL OF A CHILD 
 
 child. And the wise parent does not deprive his 
 child of the divine message and mood of the Sab- 
 bath Church service with its hush of reverence, its 
 sense of the presence of the Unseen. Richard Wat- 
 son Gilder starts the trains of memory moving in 
 the minds of many when he says: 
 
 How oft have I, a little child, 
 
 Hearkened my father preaching the Word! 
 Again I see those circling, eager faces, 
 
 I hear once more those solemn, urging words 
 That tell the things of God in simple phrase ; 
 
 Again the deep-voiced, reverent prayer ascends 
 Bringing to the still summer afternoon 
 
 The sense of the Eternal. 
 
 When we recall the pastors of the Church of 
 our childhood, of all they meant to us, we feel led 
 to breathe a fervent prayer that we may never offend 
 one of these little ones who are looking to us as 
 we looked to those men, as prophets of the living 
 God. We have met these same clergymen in later 
 life at Conference and elsewhere. We have talked 
 with them of salaries, grade, and other common- 
 places, and found them to be very human, like our- 
 selves. And yet, we can never forget the time when 
 their faces seemed to shine with anointing oil and 
 28 
 
THE CHILD'S THEOLOGY 
 
 they appeared to belong to the same world as the 
 pictures of the high priests in the family Bible. 
 
 From the Church service, from the study of the 
 Bible in the Sunday school and home and the Chris- 
 tian teaching that comes with it, the child gets the 
 information by which he interprets the inner light, 
 the material from which he constructs his theology, 
 his thought of God. Of course, he does not use 
 all that the preacher tells him (alas for the mature 
 man who does that!), nor all that he learns from 
 the lips of pious teachers and parents. He selects 
 that which appeals to his childish mind and heart. 
 
 The child's conception of God is anthropomor- 
 phic. Thus again we see the history of the race 
 reproduced in the life of an individual. He finds 
 no difficulties in Genesis. The God who comes to 
 take dinner with Abraham is the sort of God in 
 which he believes. And in spite of much learned 
 talk to the contrary, it has yet to be proved that 
 the anthropomorphic conception of God is not an 
 approach toward the truth. It is infinitely to be 
 preferred to the modern pantheistic notion, which 
 makes the Deity a sort of diluted divine influence 
 scattered thinly through universal space. Man was 
 29 
 
THE SOUL OF A CHILD 
 
 made "in the image of God and after His likeness," 
 and the divine human Christ said, "He that hath 
 seen Me hath seen the Father." 
 
 The child thinks in the terms of his own sur- 
 roundings. He usually starts with his own home. 
 God is like his father, only stronger and wiser and 
 more sure to be right. There is one word which 
 describes a child's conception of God, the same word 
 that the poet-seer in Isaiah applies to the Christ: 
 "Wonderful." Like the early earth dwellers, he is 
 impressed first of all by the divine power and 
 glory. Later he thinks of God's goodness and love. 
 It is the things in which God is different from 
 father and mother that impress the child in the 
 early years. Father is not omnipotent, not quite. 
 God is. Mother is not omniscient, not quite. God 
 is. Then, as the child years go by, and the little 
 pilgrim proceeds westward on the rugged life jour- 
 ney, he learns to think of those qualities which 
 father and mother possess to a limited degree and 
 which come to their fullness in the great soul of 
 the Infinite God, righteousness and love. 
 
 The first of these is revealed, partially, at least, 
 by that spark of celestial fire called conscience in the 
 30 
 
THE CHILD'S THEOLOGY 
 
 child's breast, supplemented, of course, and inter- 
 preted by human teachers. 
 
 To understand and appreciate the love of God 
 the child needs not only an explanation, but an in- 
 carnation. In spite of the presence "like the 
 warmth," Helen Keller's soul was like a storm- 
 tossed sea until her wonderful Teacher came. The 
 world was lost and lonesome until the Christ came. 
 Herein lies the great motive for Christian missions. 
 Here is the necessity of the gospel. It is pathetic 
 for a child to go through the beautiful valley of 
 childhood without being told the good news by rev- 
 erent lips and impressed with its reality by Christ- 
 like lives. 
 
 John Greenleaf Whittier, in his own inimitable 
 way, tells how the child soul hungers for just this 
 combination : 
 
 In the minister's morning sermon 
 He had told of the primal fall. 
 
 And how thenceforth the wrath of God 
 Rested on each and all. 
 
 And how of His will and pleasure 
 
 All souls save a chosen few 
 Were doomed to the quenchless burning, 
 
 And held in the way thereto. 
 
 31 
 
THE SOUL OF A CHILD 
 
 Yet never by faith's unreason 
 
 A saintlier soul was tried, 
 And never the harsh old lesson 
 
 A tenderer heart belied. 
 
 And after the painful service, 
 On that pleasant Sabbath day, 
 
 He walked with his little daughter 
 Through the apple bloom of May. 
 
 Sweet in the fresh, green meadows 
 Sparrow and blackbird sung; 
 
 Above him their tiny petals 
 The blossoming orchards hung. 
 
 Around on the wonderful glory 
 The minister looked and smiled, 
 
 "How good is the Lord who gives us 
 These gifts from His hand, my child! 
 
 "Behold in the bloom of the apples 
 And the violets in the sward 
 
 A hint of the old lost beauty 
 Of the garden of the Lord." 
 
 Then up spake the little maiden, 
 Treading on snow and pink: 
 
 "O father, these pretty blossoms 
 Are very wicked, I think ! 
 
 "Had there been no Garden of Eden, 
 There never had been a fall, 
 
 And if never a tree had blossomed, 
 God would have loved us all." 
 
 32 
 
THE CHILD'S THEOLOGY 
 
 "Hush, child," the father answered; 
 
 "By His decree men fell: 
 His ways are in clouds and darkness, 
 
 But He doeth all things well. 
 
 "And whether by His ordaining 
 
 To us cometh good or ill, 
 Joy or pain, or light or shadow, 
 
 We must fear and love Him still." 
 
 "O, I fear Him," said his daughter, 
 "And I try to love Him, too, 
 
 But I wish He was good and gentle, 
 Kind and loving as you." 
 
 The minister groaned in spirit 
 As the tremulous lips of pain 
 
 And the wide, wet eyes uplifted 
 Questioned his own in vain. 
 
 Bowing his head, he pondered 
 The words of the little one: 
 
 Had he erred in his life-long teaching? 
 Had he wrong his Master done? 
 
 To what grim and dreadful idol 
 Had he lent the holiest name? 
 
 Did his own heart, loving and human. 
 The God of his worship shame? 
 
 And lo ! from the bloom and greenness 
 From the tender skies above, 
 
 And the face of his little daughter, 
 He read a lesson of love. 
 
 33 
 
THE SOUL OF A CHILD 
 
 No more as the cloudy terror 
 
 Of Sinai's mount of law, 
 But as Christ in the Syrian lilies 
 
 The vision of God he saw. 
 
 And when the hungry heart of childhood has 
 received the gospel of the love of God, the satisfied 
 possessor thereof sets an example of confiding tnist 
 to those who have lived long to see the goodness of 
 God in the land of the living. 
 
 34 
 
CHAPTER V 
 What Is a Child? 
 
 In the grim old Calvinistic days the ready answer 
 would be, "A little sinner!' and most parents and 
 teachers have times when they feel like accepting 
 the Calvinistic theory. 
 
 Isaac Watts was wont to sing : 
 
 Soon as we draw our infant breath 
 The seed of sin springs up to death. 
 
 And for many weary generations, in New Eng- 
 land especially, sensitive childhood was obliged to 
 drag around the millstone of the belief in inherited 
 sin. The practical result of this unethical notion 
 was that children were always counted as outside 
 the fold of Christ, there to await renewing grace, 
 miraculously given, that should bring them in. 
 And the practical result of this theological fiction 
 has lingered long after the theory itself has been 
 discarded by thoughtful minds. 
 
 A sinne- at least in popular speech, is a person 
 35 
 
THE SOUL OF A CHILD 
 
 who has sinned or is sinning; usually both. The 
 new-born babe sleeping in his mothers' arms or the 
 irresponsible child playing in the sunlight can not 
 be counted in this class. Needless to say, the child 
 can prove an alibi as far as the performance in 
 Eden is concerned and all the sad sequence of events 
 from that day to this. 
 
 We can not affirm, however, as do some child- 
 lovers, that the child is born a Christian. Such a 
 conception robs that historic word of all the ethical 
 significance it has had from the days of Antioch. 
 Regeneration on the one hand is not a passive state 
 of innocency, but is the result of the inflow of the 
 Spirit Divine in response to intense and character- 
 making moral choice. On the other hand, this ex- 
 perience, so gracious and heavenly, the source of our 
 certainty and our song, is not given to repenting 
 transgressors only, and we rob the wistful child of 
 his heritage in grace when we deprive him of its 
 blessings by acting as if it did not apply to his case. 
 It is not necessary for him to know the stain and 
 sting of sin in order to know what it means to be 
 born of the Spirit, but it is necessary for him to 
 personally choose to open his heart to the eager 
 36 
 
WHAT IS A CHILD? 
 
 Christ. To quote from Prof. Olin A. Curtis: 
 "Our teaching as to the guiltlessness of infants, true 
 as that teaching certainly is, should never be al- 
 lowed to change our point of stress. With much 
 care to avoid artificial hothouse forcing we should 
 insist that every child under our influence needs 
 (to the full extent of understanding and ability) 
 to give his heart in actual submission to his Savior." 
 
 Therefore, the child at life's beginning, in spite 
 of what the theologians and the pedagogues may 
 say, is just what he seems to be to his mother — 
 not a sinner yet — thank God ! — and not a Christian 
 yet — but a child with a soul like an unblown rose- 
 bud, and the key to his character and destiny in his 
 tiny baby hand. 
 
 What of depravity? There is no doubt he has 
 some of it. Part of it he received as his racial 
 heritage from "That man whose guilty fall cor- 
 rupts the race and taints us all." Even more of 
 it as his family heritage he has received from his 
 father's ancestors and his mother's family. The 
 iron-bound law of heredity is one of the mysteries 
 of God's wonderful universe. It serves as our peda- 
 gogue to lead us to Christ, for it is this intense 
 37 
 
THE SOUL OF A CHILD 
 
 consciousness of moral wrongness and need of divine 
 help which brings us to the cross and the upper 
 room- 
 While with human nature as it is, depravity 
 can never be left out of our books on childhood, 
 it is also true that with divine nature as it is there 
 is one other old-fashioned term that belongs here 
 also, prevenient grace. The Spirit of God is given 
 in gracious abundance to every child. As in Bun- 
 yan's parable, the man with the oil is constantly 
 replenishing the divine fire in child souls. Pre- 
 venient grace, supplemented by Christian teaching, 
 so offsets the effects of inherited depravity that the 
 child soul turns as naturally to Christ as the flower 
 to the sunlight. While Christian character is not 
 attained without ethical struggle, the beginnings of 
 the life divine are as natural as the sunrise of a 
 new morning, and "heaven lies all around us in our 
 infancy." 
 
 Regarding those little children who, in the bud- 
 ding beauty of childhood, go out from us to the 
 great Unknown, whatever the creeds of the cen- 
 turies may have said, our hearts feel instinctively 
 the truth of the Master's words that, "In heaven 
 38 
 
WHAT IS A CHILD? 
 
 their angels do always behold the face of My 
 Father." 
 
 "My Lord hath need of these flowerets gay," 
 
 The Reaper said, and smiled; 
 "Dear tokens of the earth are they, 
 
 Where He was once a Child. 
 
 "They shall all bloom in fields of light, 
 
 Transplanted by my care, 
 And saints upon their garments white 
 
 These sacred blossoms wear." 
 
 And the mother gave in tears and pain 
 
 The flowers she most did love. 
 She knew she should find them all again 
 
 In the fields of light above. 
 
 O, not in cruelty, not in wrath, 
 
 The Reaper came that day: 
 'Twas an angel visited the green earth 
 
 And took the flowers away. 
 
CHAPTER VI 
 The Sense of Sin 
 
 Eugene Field, the poet of childhood, says: 
 
 Supposing you have been bad some day 
 
 And up to bed are sent away, 
 
 From mother and the rest; 
 
 And supposing you ask who has been bad, 
 
 You will hear what's true, 
 For the wind will moan in its ruefulest tone, 
 
 "Yoo-oo, Yoo-oo, Yoo-oo." 
 
 Do you not, gentle reader, remember that night? 
 You had been bad, and no one knew it but your- 
 self. Mother knew nothing about it. At least, 
 you thought that was the case. And you went up- 
 stairs and tried to go to sleep. You tried to say, 
 "Now I lay me down to sleep," and could n't. It 
 stuck in your throat. You tried to go to sleep with- 
 out saying it, and you could n't do that. Your 
 pillow was so hot you turned it over, and it was 
 just as hot on the other side. There was a little 
 clock on the mantel that seemed to be sharply tick- 
 ing, "You did it, You did it, You did it." A patch 
 40 
 
THE SENSE OF SIN 
 
 of white moonlight was on the floor. In through 
 the open window, with exaggerated loudness, came 
 the hundred sounds of the summer night. In your 
 turbulent soul was mankind's age-long storm; in 
 your childhood's cup humanity's age-long bitterness. 
 
 Finally, you could not stand it any longer and 
 you got up and pattered into mother's room and 
 half sobbed, "Mamma, are you awake?" And she 
 was awake. She was always awake when you 
 needed her. Then you burst out, "O mamma, I 
 did it, and I 'm sorry." She put her arms around 
 you and cried a little; she felt the beginnings of 
 your life tragedy. You cried, too, and felt better 
 for it. With her kiss of forgiveness moist on your 
 brow you went back to bed, said your prayer, and 
 were asleep almost as soon as your head had touched 
 the pillow. 
 
 Let no one who remembers experiences like that 
 deny to the child the possibility of knowing what 
 it means to have godly sorrow for his sins. Indeed, 
 it may be questioned if ever in after life does one 
 know repentance so genuine and full of ethical sig- 
 nificance as we find in the tender heart of the un- 
 hardened child. 
 
 4i 
 
THE SOUL OF A CHILD 
 
 Moreover, the sense of sinfulness, the sense of 
 racial wrongness is strong in the child, as he who 
 remembers will know. We hardly need to repeat 
 again the statement that the child is not born a 
 sinner. No shadow of guilt is on his white soul. 
 But he is born into a race that is out of harmony 
 with God. How it became thus it is not the pur- 
 pose of this volume to say. It is evident, as A. J. 
 Hough, the poet-preacher of Vermont, says, that 
 "somewhere man had a fall. For there are several 
 of him living down upon our street who, with lov- 
 ing hands to help them, have n't yet got on their 
 feet." And the sense of this wrongness is strong 
 in the child. 
 
 Topsy, in "Uncle Tom's Cabin," was, of course, 
 a creature of bad environment and training. More- 
 over, the dark tragedy of a downtrodden race shone 
 from her dark eyes. But what child has not felt 
 like repeating her characteristic remark, "I'se so 
 wicked." The writer of these lines well remembers 
 the tragic times of his boyhood, when it seemed as 
 if there came up from some hidden geyser hot, 
 naughty thoughts and feelings, for which he felt 
 responsible and guilty, and yet before which he was 
 42 
 
THE SENSE OF SIN 
 
 almost helpless. He had not then read the words 
 of the great apostle, but he knew well the ex- 
 perience he was describing when he wrote: "When 
 I would do good, evil is present with me. I find 
 another law in my members bringing me into cap- 
 tivity to the law of sin and death." It was Har- 
 riet Beecher Stowe who exclaimed, "Nature is a 
 first-class Calvinist." And although we have long 
 since rejected the theories of Calvin and Edwards, 
 we have to recognize that we find in human nature 
 to-day the same qualities which led them to their 
 drastic conclusions. The difference is that now-a- 
 days we use them as the stuff our psychology is 
 made of rather than the foundations of our the- 
 ology. 
 
 The important thing, as far as this chapter is 
 concerned, is to remember that the tender heart of 
 the thoughtful child of the Christian home feels 
 his moral need of forgiveness and the sanctifying 
 grace of God. Unless he has help from outside 
 himself his days can not be "bound each to each 
 by natural piety." 
 
 43 
 
CHAPTER VII 
 
 The Child's Christian Experience 
 
 In that charming story of old New England life, 
 "Oldtown Folks," Harriet Beecher Stowe tells of 
 a faithful pastor who said to a noble young man, 
 "My son, is it not about time you gave your heart 
 to God?" "I have given my heart to God," was 
 the quiet, earnest reply. "I am very glad," said 
 the preacher. "When did you do it?" "I have al- 
 ways done it/' said the young man. This is the 
 ideal toward which all Christian parents and teach- 
 ers should strive. A single year wasted in selfish- 
 ness and sin is a tragedy. 
 
 The Christian experience of a child is not so 
 much a matter of dates and times and seasons as 
 that of the adult. We wish here to enter our pro- 
 test against embarrassing the child Christian by 
 asking him when he was converted. When a man 
 has spent years outside the fold, has lived the 
 Christless life, and comes to the definite conclusion 
 to turn to the Lord and seek salvation, of course 
 44 
 
CHILD'S CHRISTIAN EXPERIENCE 
 
 he will have a red mark on the calendar, possibly 
 also on the clock. His habits are formed, his life 
 course is fixed. He gathers himself together, as 
 it were, in one grand crisis, and chooses to follow 
 the Christ, while the angels sing above him and 
 his soul sings within him; but a child who is con- 
 structing his life instead of reconstructing it, has 
 a new crisis every morning. He will go forward 
 for prayers every opportunity, go sincerely and 
 eagerly, and feel his little heart warmed by the 
 Spirit divine. The mathematical evangelist will 
 write his name down in his book and send in the 
 number to the Church paper. The anxious pastor 
 will sigh and say: "I am afraid he doesn't realize 
 what he is doing. He came last week, also." Both 
 are mistaken, the evangelist who claims him as his 
 convert and the pastor who sighs. Last week the 
 child gave himself to God for last week. This 
 week he is in a new world, and he has grown some, 
 so he is a new child, and he does it again. And 
 our good Father, God, smiles on him every time 
 and loves him freely. 
 
 "When, then, is he converted?" some one asks. 
 We reply in the words of the apostle: "Ye ob- 
 45 
 
THE SOUL OF A CHILD 
 
 serve times and seasons. I am afraid of you." 
 The child's conversion is the habit of his life to 
 turn from his sin and his sinfulness to our Christ. 
 Happy the child who begins that habit in those 
 blessed early years, concerning which we have few 
 recollections in later life, although those wt have 
 are golden, and continues it through the unfolding 
 years. It is worth more than a crisis after years 
 of selfishness and sin. 
 
 The regenerating grace of God, according to 
 the unfolding faith and loyalty of the child, finds its 
 way to the child heart, grows with his growth, 
 buds and blossoms and fruits with the ripening 
 years. The daily manifestation of this grace is well 
 expressed by Mary Willard in that fascinating bi- 
 ography, "Nineteen Beautiful Years." "God com- 
 mands me to love Him with all my heart, and I 
 think I can do it, if I am helped." Daily help in 
 loving God is a good evidence of regeneration. And 
 the inner consciousness of divine sonship, the "wit- 
 ness of the Spirit," comes like the dawning sun- 
 rise, or bursts on the child's soul in vision after 
 vision; for the child Christian, instead of being de- 
 prived of the revelations of grace and glory, given 
 46 
 
CHILD'S CHRISTIAN EXPERIENCE 
 
 to the deep-dyed sinners seeking pardon, has more 
 of them, because his vision is clearer and his soul 
 less sodden, and more sensitive to spiritual impres- 
 sions. 
 
 After an old-time camp-meeting exhortation in 
 which the various steps to salvation were logically 
 outlined and chronologically described, an old Eng- 
 lish local preacher arose and said, in substance, "I 
 think these are all in the cup; repentance, faith, 
 pardon, regeneration, etc., and we have to drink it 
 all, but I did n't take them in just that order. I 
 think I repented more after I was forgiven." The 
 chronology of Christian experience is, after all, not 
 so important as we sometimes think. The im- 
 portant thing is that on the human side there be a 
 heart-deep turning to God, and on the divine side 
 grace to pardon and to cleanse and bring moral 
 victory. 
 
 The writer of this little book speaks from a full 
 heart. A flash of memory shows him a little boy 
 sitting in a high-chair by the kitchen table watching 
 his mother cook, and they talked together of the 
 things of God. Perhaps that mother thought the 
 most important thing she was doing that day was 
 47 
 
THE SOUL OF A CHILD 
 
 to make the pies. The boy surely thought so. But 
 in reality, while that mother was molding the dough 
 she was also molding the plastic stuff of a child's 
 soul, and responding to the tender touch, he was 
 getting the Christian attitude and the Christian 
 vision. He recalls, also, a children's meeting in 
 a church vestry, led by the pastor and his wife, 
 in which there was a quiet row of kneeling chil- 
 dren and he was one of them, and heard his own 
 voice in public prayer asking God to make him a 
 good boy. And he remembers he was never the 
 same boy afterwards. The sins of childhood had 
 no charm for him. He remembers also a day under 
 an old butternut tree, with a Bible open on the 
 grass, and the blue sky overhead, and the sunbeams 
 stealing through the leafy tree to the pages of the 
 open book, while also the sunbeams of the love of 
 God came pouring into his child's soul, warming 
 him to the center, and he felt rich. 
 
 These are just some pearls that are strung on 
 his memory. There are others, some experiences 
 dark and pathetic, when he faced childhood's sins 
 and wrongness, and tearfully sought help from 
 heaven. By these experiences he came to know 
 48 
 
CHILD'S CHRISTIAN EXPERIENCE 
 
 the saving grace of God, in which he rejoices to- 
 day. Unable to put a mark in the almanac or 
 on the clock, like the old English local preacher 
 more sincerely repentant for the sins of his youth 
 to-day than when he first prayed for their forgive- 
 ness, as he looks back over the years he can see as 
 clearly as the most recent convert in Water Street 
 Mission, where human struggle ended and divine 
 help came, and exclaims with the apostle, "By the 
 grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, I am what I am!" 
 
 You ask me how I gave my heart to Christ? 
 
 I do not know. 
 There came a yearning for Him in my soul 
 
 So long ago. 
 
 I found earth's flowers would fade and die: 
 I wept for something that would satisfy, 
 And then, and then somehow I seemed to dare 
 To lift my broken heart to Him in prayer. 
 I do not know, I can not tell you how; 
 I only know He is my Savior now. 
 
 You ask me when I gave my heart to Christ? 
 
 I can not tell. 
 The day or just the hour I do not now 
 
 Remember well. 
 (It must have been when I was all alone) 
 The light of His forgiving Spirit shone 
 
 49 
 
THE SOUL OF A CHILD 
 
 Into my heart, so clouded o'er with tin. 
 I think, I think 'twas then I let Him in. 
 I do not know, 
 
 I can not tell you when; 
 I only know 
 
 He is so dear since then. 
 
 You ask me where I gave my heart to Christ? 
 
 I can not say. 
 That sacred place has faded from my sight, 
 
 As yesterday. 
 Perhaps He thought it better I should not 
 Remember where. How I should love that spot ! 
 I think I could not tear myself away, 
 For I should want forever there to stay. 
 I do not know, 
 
 I can not tell you where, 
 I only know 
 
 He came and blessed me there. 
 
 You ask me why I gave my heart to Christ? 
 
 I can reply: 
 It is a wondrous story; listen while 
 
 I tell you why 
 My heart was drawn at length to seek His face. 
 I was alone, I had no resting place; 
 I heard of how He loved me with a love 
 Of depth so great, of height so far above 
 
 A human ken; 
 I longed such love to share, 
 
 And sought it then 
 Upon my knees in prayer. 
 
 50 
 
CHILD'S CHRISTIAN EXPERIENCE 
 
 You ask me why I thought this loving Chriit 
 
 Would heed my prayer? 
 I knew He died upon the cross for me, 
 
 I nailed Him there. 
 I heard His dying cry, "Father, forgive!" 
 I saw Him drink death's cup that I might live ; 
 My head was bowed upon my breast in shame. 
 He called me, and in penitence I came. 
 He heard my prayer — 
 
 I can not tell you how. 
 Nor when, nor where. 
 
 Why, I have told you now I 
 
CHAPTER VIII 
 Child Varieties 
 
 In the olden days of metes and bounds the ques- 
 tion was sometimes asked, "When does a child 
 reach the age of accountability?" If the answer 
 were, for instance, "five years," one can see readily 
 the absurdity of the situation. A child four years, 
 eleven months and twenty-nine days old would not 
 be "accountable," but some time in the night before 
 his fifth birthday he would sail serenely across the 
 invisible equator. 
 
 There can, of course, be but one answer to this 
 old question, "That depends upon the child." Na- 
 ture, that never produces duplicates, shows in noth- 
 ing greater variety than in children. We shall, 
 therefore, expect to find in child souls what Pro- 
 fessor James calls "varieties of religious experi- 
 ence." As we have already stated, the child comes 
 into the world with a racial heritage. Just as we 
 see in a single dewdrop the whole landscape — blue 
 52 
 
CHILD VARIETIES 
 
 sky, green field, and busy city — so in the solitary 
 child soul we see human history. The age of 
 savagery, the age of stone, the age of dawning 
 civilization, the fall of Adam, the hot resentment of 
 Cain, as well as countless things bright and beauti- 
 ful all through the tragic past appear in the biog- 
 raphy of child. It is a fearful thing to be born. 
 Yet all but the misanthrope are glad for the thrill- 
 ing venture of life. And since Christ came there 
 is hope and healing "far as the curse is found." 
 
 Moreover, every child receives also a family 
 heritage. That study in heredity, "The Jukes and 
 the Edwardses," shows us two families on American 
 soil, side by side, like two rivers flowing through 
 the land, the one producing in generation after 
 generation criminals and dependents, the other 
 preachers and teachers and statesmen! 
 
 One of the most fascinating studies in Amer- 
 ican biography is the story of the Beechers. Brave 
 old Lyman Beecher blazed his way into the in- 
 visible and led all his children in after him. The 
 result gave rise to the saying, "There are three 
 kinds of nature: divine nature, human nature, and 
 the Beecher family." 
 
 53 
 
THE SOUL OF A CHILD 
 
 And besides all this there is the greater mys- 
 tery of a Jacob and an Esau 'neath the same family 
 roof, nestling in the same mother's arms. Specu- 
 lations as to what determines this difference are 
 extremely popular to-day, but only Almighty God 
 knows the secret. 
 
 The sense of sin mentioned in a previous chap- 
 ter comes much earlier to some than to others, 
 comes with more overwhelming force to some than 
 to others. A Puritan ancestry helps. A home in 
 which the day of judgment is wholesomely near 
 has its influence. A Church and community in 
 which right is king helps to grow a conscience in 
 the little citizens thereof. Children are very sensi- 
 tive to atmosphere. The Christian experience of a 
 child is much determined by his environment. The 
 Epworth rectory gave us John Wesley. We see, 
 therefore, we can have no cast-iron molds for the 
 religious experience of a child. While we have 
 tried to confine our discussion to what we consider 
 the normal experience of a child of the Christian 
 Church and home, we realize that it is still true 
 that each child soul must be handled separately. 
 54 
 
CHILD VARIETIES 
 
 At this point lies the danger in evangelistic meet- 
 ings for children, decision days in the Sunday 
 school, and other movements where people move 
 en masse. Two children may stand side by side, 
 kneel at the same altar, or sign the same card, and 
 yet not see the same vision, nor in the deep places 
 of the soul mean at all the same thing. We would 
 not discourage such movements or meetings, but we 
 believe they should be preceded and followed by the 
 most careful personal work. In the meantime, it 
 might be well for both evangelists and pastors to 
 be fairly modest in their bookkeeping. 
 
 And while we say "personal work," we recog- 
 nize the fact that there is also a sense in which no 
 third party can adjust the relations of a child's soul 
 to its God. Because child nature is so plastic it 
 is not well to presume upon it. Horace Bushnell 
 said that it was a characteristic of his early home 
 that its atmosphere was full of Christliness, but 
 each child was left free to make his own personal 
 choice to follow the Master and profess the faith. 
 The human will is such a delicate thing it can not 
 be roughly turned by some outside party like the 
 55 
 
THE SOUL OF A CHILD 
 
 cranic of an automobile. This "let alone" policy, 
 however, would be dangerous if applied to every 
 case. Here again it depends on the child. We 
 conclude with the statement of an old New Eng- 
 land deacon who was wont to remark, "We all have 
 our peculiar-rarities." 
 
 S6 
 
CHAPTER IX 
 
 Christ and the Child 
 
 A thoughtful boy one time startled his Sunday 
 school teacher with this question, "Are God and 
 Jesus two different men?" Generally speaking, 
 this is a problem that does not puzzle childish 
 brains, the child feeling intuitively the mystery and 
 the wonder of God in Christ, reconciling the world 
 unto Himself. 
 
 Which Person of the Godhead appears to the 
 child nearest and most real, is doubtless determined 
 by the atmosphere in which he lives. In the old 
 New England days, when thought and teaching 
 were saturated with Old Testament conceptions 
 and ideals, and fathers prayed at morning worship 
 to the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, the 
 First Person of the Trinity would naturally be the 
 center of thought and of worship. Small wonder 
 that the children of those homes became pious Uni- 
 tarians. The theological reaction really set in when 
 Lyman Beecher brought to his manse to be the 
 57 
 
THE SOUL OF A CHILD 
 
 mother of his children that charming woman whom 
 Harriet Beecher Stowe characterizes as a devout 
 Christ-worshiper. If Divine Providence were plan- 
 ning to transform the theological climate of a con- 
 tinent, He could not do better than to drop a 
 woman like her down into a parsonage full of 
 Beechers. Both the children whom she came to 
 mother and those who later were born of this wed- 
 lock imbibed her thought and her spirit. Many 
 years afterward Lyman Beecher's gifted son, the 
 immortal Henry Ward, exclaimed, "Who is my 
 God? Christ Jesus is His name. All that there 
 is of God to me is bound up in that name. A 
 dim and shadowy effulgence rises from Christ, and 
 that I am taught to call the Father." This ex- 
 treme statement of the impulsive prophet of Plym- 
 outh Church would hardly be accepted as com- 
 plete and satisfactory by Christian thinkers to-day. 
 We believe that through Christ we have access 
 to the Father and come to know Him so that we 
 say with the beloved John, "Our fellowship is with 
 the Father and with His Son, Jesus Christ." Yet 
 there has never been a time since the Christ first 
 came when the thought of His Church was so cen- 
 58 
 
CHRIST AND THE CHILD 
 
 tered on Him as to-day. We are not so eager to 
 analyze Him as were the theologians of old. We 
 can never explain Him, but we can know Him and 
 love Him. 
 
 This is a very happy environment for the child. 
 The child is very much like the people Samuel 
 Hadley, of Water Street Mission, used to tell 
 about. He would exclaim: "What do we tell 
 these poor fellows who come into our mission seek- 
 ing help? We just tell them about Jesus. Don't 
 we tell them about God? Not much at first. 
 Don't we tell them about the Holy Ghost? Not 
 at first. A man has to be quite a way along in 
 Christian things before he can understand a ghost, 
 but Jesus was a Man. He could understand Him." 
 And Jesus was a Child. He knows all the wonders 
 and the tragedies of the child soul, not by the cool 
 searchlight of omniscience, but by the warm mem- 
 ory of experience. He always was the Friend of 
 children. What other religious teacher of the ages 
 could the artist paint with the children clustering 
 around him? Mohammed with his dark scar and 
 bloody sword would not fit into that picture. 
 Buddha and Confucius would think it contemptible, 
 59 
 
THE SOUL OF A CHILD 
 
 but Jesus thinks it is glorious, and when the dis- 
 ciples protest He utters those immortal words, 
 "Surfer the little children to come unto Me, and 
 forbid them not, for of such is the Kingdom of 
 Heaven." Under the blessed spell of the Christo- 
 centric teaching of Bible, school, Church, and home, 
 and under the gracious leadership of the Holy 
 Spirit, the child finds the attitude of the Christ 
 of history to be the eternal attitude of the ever- 
 living Christ. Therefore he finds it easy to draw 
 nigh to Him. 
 
 We knew a boy who, by reading the gospel in 
 the mellow shining of the inner light God kindled 
 in his soul, was early led to see the glory of God 
 in the face of Jesus Christ. With the child's 
 tendency to picture things, drawing partly doubt- 
 less from his memory of portraits in Sunday school 
 papers and illustrative Bibles, and partly from his 
 own imagination which was apt to run at riot, but 
 which in this case was softened and chastened by 
 reverence, not with pen or with crayon, but for 
 the eye of the mind, he pictured for himself the 
 face of the Christ. It was in the golden summer 
 time, and as he spread hay, helped make the load, 
 60 
 
CHRIST AND THE CHILD 
 
 and did the commonplace errands of a boy, oft 
 and again he would look up at the cloud-swept 
 blue of the July sky and he would seem to see that 
 Face looking down upon him with a heavenly smile 
 of approval, and lo! life lost its commonplaceness 
 at once and the ordinary path of duty seemed a way 
 of glory! When impatience and anger surged hot 
 within him he would find himself cooled and 
 steadied by the thought of that Face. He was but 
 a boy, and like the children of Israel he needed 
 pictures and symbols to make him remember; so 
 he made this one out of the thoughts of his mind 
 and the reverent affection of his heart. As the 
 days went by the Face faded from the sky, he for- 
 got his symbols, but the strength and beauty of 
 the constant presence of the Christ stayed with his 
 child soul. Sometimes, indeed, he was forgetful 
 and careless, and lost his vision, but he had learned 
 to sing: 
 
 Though I forget Him and wander away, 
 Kindly He follows wherever I stray. 
 Back to His dear, loving arms would I flee, 
 When I remember that Jesus loves me. 
 
 6l 
 
THE SOUL OF A CHILD 
 
 And the glimpses he had through the unfolding 
 years of the glory of the ever-present Christ enabled 
 him to keep contentedly to the path of virtue. With 
 the sins of the flesh and sense he had no great battle. 
 The more subtle contest with the sins of the spirit 
 was not the blind, discouraging struggle of one who 
 was led by Duty, "stern daughter of the voice of 
 God," for although the symbol had faded, he caught 
 ever again the vision of the glorified Face. What 
 could a boy not do for Jesus' sake ? 
 
 As he thinks of these things he is filled with 
 wonder, first that with such a vision splendid he 
 has so often failed in faith and hope and charity. 
 And second, how so many of his friends and com- 
 panions, who know not the Christ and the wonder 
 of His presence and love, have been able to keep 
 their integrity and their kindness. How cold and 
 lonely must be the effort of child or man to be good 
 without the vision of the Christ and the sense of 
 His nearness! 
 
CHAPTER X 
 
 The Holy Spirit and the Child 
 
 There is a pertinent story told of the childhood 
 of Gladstone. Like most stories of this sort, it is 
 also told of several other great men. It is good 
 enough to be true of all of them. When he was 
 a lad of three years old, says the story, he went 
 out into the field with a "stick" in his hand and 
 saw a tortoise crawling leisurely along. With the 
 savage instinct of the genus homo he raised the 
 stick and was about to strike the tortoise in cruel 
 sport when something within him said, "Do n't do 
 that." In surprise he let his hand fall to his side 
 and, rushing eagerly home, asked his mother what 
 it was that said to him, "Do n't do that." His 
 mother took him in her arms and with tears in her 
 eyes replied, "My boy, some call it conscience, 
 but I prefer to call it the voice of God in the 
 soul." 
 
 It is by such experiences as this that the child 
 is introduced to the Holy Spirit. He does not 
 63 
 
THE SOUL OF A CHILD 
 
 know much about Him. Neither does the adult. 
 The Spirit did not come to speak of Himself. 
 After centuries of His gracious ministry He is still 
 little more than what Whittier characterized as the 
 "Holy Call" to the majority of Christian people. 
 And this He is to the child. 
 
 In our chapter on "The Sense of Sin and the 
 Christian Experience of a Child" we have already 
 seen the signs of the working of the Holy Spirit. 
 Indeed, in all our consideration of the child life 
 we are as near Him as Moses was to the burning 
 bush. 
 
 The "Holy Call" to the child of the Christian 
 home is the call to personal allegiance and loyalty 
 to Jesus Christ. 
 
 The same boy, mentioned in the previous chap- 
 ter, who saw the face of the Christ in the sky, sat 
 one summer Sunday afternoon in a little country 
 schoolhouse. It was the same schoolhouse that he 
 attended each school day of the busy week, but 
 it looked like a strange building that day. By 
 the teacher's desk sat the minister; his black hair 
 and careworn face are silhouetted on that boy's 
 memory to-day. In front of one of the black- 
 64 
 
HOLY SPIRIT AND THE CHILD 
 
 boards, with his chair tipped back a little, sat the 
 class-leader and sweet singer of Israel with silver 
 beard and glowing face. All around in the wooden 
 seats behind the long desks sat the neighbors who 
 had come to worship and to listen. The boy looked 
 around at his schoolmates, who had come with their 
 parents and neighbors, and bashfully returned his 
 bashful greeting. After the minister had finished 
 his earnest exhortation he "threw the meeting 
 open." One after another gave expression to Chris- 
 tian faith and purpose. Then the boy felt his 
 heart begin to beat wildly, and the hot blood rush 
 to his cheeks. Something was telling him he ought 
 to "take his stand" on the side of those who loved 
 the Lord. He had never heard of a boy's speaking 
 in meeting. All around his schoolmates sat ap- 
 parently indifferent — it did not seem to concern 
 them. There was a pause in the meeting. Now 
 was the time and opportunity, but a trembling 
 seized his limbs and he waited. Then they sang 
 another hymn ; perhaps they would close the meeting 
 now and he would not have to do it. But no, — 
 another pause and the minister urged a little the 
 more timid people to take part. Then the boy 
 5 65 
 
THE SOUL OF A CHILD 
 
 arose and stammered a few broken syllables of 
 loyalty to Jesus Christ. They were so low one 
 could hardly hear them; the old class-leader looked 
 at him in a surprised way, as if he did not just 
 know what happened ; he preferred to see hardened 
 sinners weep their way to peace, or old soldiers 
 tell how they first enlisted ; the minister's smile was 
 almost indulgent, as if he were watching a child 
 at play; the boy's brother said to him afterwards: 
 "What did you say? I couldn't tell what you 
 were saying?" The boy, perplexed a little, told 
 it over to his mother, who comforted him by re- 
 plying, with the intuition of spiritual motherhood, 
 "You showed which side you were on." That was 
 just the comfort he needed, for that was just the 
 "Holy Call" to take sides with Jesus Christ; and 
 all through his child-years that was what the Holy 
 Spirit told him to do. 
 
 It is the saintly Daniel Steele who calls the 
 Holy Spirit the Executive of the Godhead. As 
 such, He it is who "pours abroad the love of God" 
 in our hearts, — as such He strengthens us with 
 "all might in the inner man according to His 
 glorious power, that Christ may dwell in our hearts 
 66 
 
HOLY SPIRIT AND THE CHILD 
 
 by faith." In this capacity also the child knows 
 Him. 
 
 Do not the memories of the years stir up your 
 pure minds on this subject? Do you not remember 
 in the heat of a temptation how you paused and 
 prayed — and there came a wave of peace and power 
 as real as the "wind that bloweth where it listeth" 
 into your child soul and gave you the victory? 
 Do you remember a time when, realizing your 
 weakness and your need, you gave yourself to 
 Jesus Christ wholly expecting Him to make you 
 what you ought to be? And there came to your 
 soul, and you were but a child, a blessing that 
 lingers with you yet. 
 
 Who more than the child-Christian has a right 
 to sing that matchless hymn of Dr. Warren's: 
 
 I worship Thee, O Holy Ghost, 
 
 I love to worship Thee; 
 My risen Lord for aye were lost 
 
 But for Thy company. 
 
 I worship Thee, O Holy Ghost, 
 
 I love to worship Thee; 
 With Thee each day is Pentecost, 
 
 Each night nativity. 
 
 67 
 
CHAPTER XI 
 The Child and His Bible 
 
 Bishop Vincent was wont to say of the Bible 
 that it is like a river from which a bird may drink 
 and in which an elephant may swim. The child 
 is the bird that drinks from its brimming waters 
 and finds them refreshing and sweet. 
 
 The Bible is a child's Book. It is also the 
 scholar's Book — indeed, it has taught more scholars 
 how to think, more philosophers how to reason, and 
 more "men of letters" how to spell than any other 
 book known to men or angels. 
 
 But it is also the child's Book, and the child 
 is as much at home amid its fragrance as a hum- 
 ming-bird in a garden of roses. 
 
 The fact that the old Bible stories deal with 
 phenomena rather than processes irritates the un- 
 imaginative, iron-headed scientist ; it does n't bother 
 the child. He likes to see stars leap into light 
 from chaotic night, to hear how the Red Sea piled 
 up its mighty waters, and Jericho's massive walls 
 68 
 
THE CHILD AND HIS BIBLE 
 
 crumbled at the sound of the blast of the ram's 
 horn. 
 
 The way the Bible writers ignore secondary 
 causes and the naive way in which they go back 
 to the beginning of things appeals to the child's 
 way of thinking. God makes it rain in his world. 
 He likes to think of it in that way, and cares very 
 little about the machinery He uses. The Bible 
 talks in that way. He and the Bible agree. 
 
 The wonder of the Bible stories is obnoxious 
 to people who are grown up and dried up. They 
 try to pare them down and encumber them with 
 explanatory footnotes that make them stir your 
 blood no more than an account of a tea party in 
 a weekly newspaper. Not so the child. He enjoys 
 the thrill. It seems to him just the thing for the 
 water to turn into blushing wine in the presence of 
 Jesus, for the loaves to multiply like popcorn, and 
 Lazarus to walk leisurely out of his tomb. And 
 we may yet learn that in this respect the child is 
 wiser than the man. 
 
 The tragic element in the Old Testament tales 
 does not shock the child. He does not turn pale 
 at the sight of blood. He has not yet learned from 
 69 
 
THE SOUL OF A CHILD 
 
 life's battlefield what a terrible thing it is to bleed 
 and to die. Later in life we all learn this lesson 
 and we shudder at Judges and Kings, but even 
 that shudder is an unconscious testimony to the fact 
 that these tales are throbbing with life. The Bible 
 is full of tragedy, but so is life, — hence the shudder. 
 
 Do you remember the fascination of the Bible 
 stories in childhood's days? You had your Mother 
 Goose and your iEsop's Fables and your fairy 
 stories, but you knew they were "make believe." 
 You felt it, even before they told you so. But 
 these matchless accounts of Bible characters and 
 life, they were true and they were glorious. You 
 felt your mind glow and your soul flame when 
 you read them. And even now you feel that the 
 critics should hesitate long before assigning to the 
 realm of "folk-lore," stories that inspired your child 
 soul like that. 
 
 The gospel of the Bible is clear and beautiful 
 to the child soul. The child would agree with the 
 old lady who said to the agent who was trying to 
 sell her a "Harmony of the Gospels," "Such a time 
 trying to get four men to agree who never had any 
 falling out!" He doesn't know very much about 
 70 
 
THE CHILD AND HIS BIBLE 
 
 names and dates, but in all four matchless biog- 
 raphies he sees the Christ of the Syrian lilies and 
 the Bethany home walk before him. 
 
 The writer can never forget a chilly November 
 Sabbath in his childhood, when for some reason 
 he did not go to Church and sat by the dining- 
 room stove and let Dr. Luke tell him about Jesus. 
 That chamber in his memory smells of roses even to 
 this day. Matthew's report of the Sermon on the 
 Mount he associates with summer time, a blue sky, 
 and a green yard, — an old-fashioned chair under 
 the trees — a strange hush of soul as if listening to 
 beautiful music. Mark makes him think of the 
 district school and morning reading of the Testa- 
 ment, when all read in turn. Alas for the day 
 that banished that good old custom ! Nature studies 
 and daily quotations from Shakespeare and Emer- 
 son can never take its place. It was the reading 
 like that which gave us Shakespeare and Emerson. 
 If we continue to timidly surrender "the wells our 
 fathers digged," we will never produce any more 
 of that race, and the people will perish because 
 there is no vision. 
 
 The Gospel of John and the wonderful dream 
 7i 
 
THE SOUL OF A CHILD 
 
 of the Revelation and the beautiful glimpses through 
 the lattice-work of the face of the Beloved given 
 in the Acts and the Epistles, all these surround the 
 child soul with an atmosphere and a fragrance that 
 is better felt than told. Thank God for the re- 
 membrance of childhood spent in a land concerning 
 which James Russell Lowell says, "New England 
 was full of meeting-houses when I was growing 
 up," a land where the Bible is free as the water of 
 the untamed brooks and the air sweeping over the 
 matchless mountains! 
 
 Have you, gentle reader, somewhere in your 
 possession the well-worn Bible of your childhood 
 that your mother gave you? It has no notes or 
 comments, and its print is rather fine for your 
 spectacled eyes to-day, but it was clear enough 
 once. And in the last page have you written in 
 childish hand, "Finished reading — " and then the 
 date? That was a milestone on life's journey. 
 You had read the Bible through. There are those 
 who tell us now that it is not the way for a child 
 to read the Bible. Some there are who say there 
 are parts of the Bible unfit for childish eyes to see 
 and childish brains to think; but you came through 
 72 
 
THE CHILD AND HIS BIBLE 
 
 the experience with innocence unsoiled and with 
 iron in your soul for moral combat with evil. If 
 from perusing the unvarnished tales you learned 
 some of the mysteries of life concerning which you 
 had wondered and which your old-fashioned parents 
 had not told you, if some of the dark shadows of 
 life were first realized by you then — who shall say 
 that is not a good place to find out about them? 
 Is it not better to have God's prophets tell you 
 some things than the newspaper reporters — some- 
 times it may even be better than some of the writers 
 on sexual hygiene. Modern teachers say that the 
 specialist in pedagogy and psychology should cull 
 out and arrange the wonderful riches of the Bible 
 according to the requirements of the unfolding child 
 mind and soul. They forget that the child will 
 arrange them that way himself. When a child is 
 turned out into God's out-of-doors world he will 
 find the blossoms, see the sights adapted to the child. 
 We feel in a similar way about letting the child 
 out into the green pastures of Holy Writ. 
 
 It may be in writing these lines we are just 
 a little in the mood of the child who said : "I do n't 
 want to eat what is nourishing for me. I want to 
 73 
 
THE SOUL OF A CHILD 
 
 eat what I 'd rather." We certainly are impatient 
 with those who think the great things of the Bible 
 must all be predigested before given to the child. 
 We share something of the feeling of the woman 
 who said, when she was told a certain food was 
 predigested, "Dear me, who by?" 
 
 We believe in the graded lessons of Bible school 
 study. To gain a clear and satisfactory knowledge 
 of the Bible and its application to modern life they 
 are unsurpassed, but with these we still feel the 
 child soul should have the happy privilege of roam- 
 ing throughout the whole blessed Book. It is a 
 child's Book. He won't need a dictionary nor a 
 commentary to enable him to pick up pearls along 
 the shores, even if he can't fathom the depths of 
 the sea. 
 
 And when he comes to leave the happy valley 
 of childhood and goes out into the world, some who 
 are reading these pages know from blessed experi- 
 ence what happens then. After you had said 
 "good-bye" to the old home scenes and faces and 
 went sturdily away, your bravery oozed out and 
 you found yourself that first night in a strange 
 room sitting by a window looking wistfully out on 
 74 
 
THE CHILD AND HIS BIBLE 
 
 the moonlit street, lonesome and homesick. You 
 wanted to say "good-night" to your mother and 
 could n't, for she was miles away. The very sight 
 of the familiar things in your trunk made a lump 
 come to your throat. You dreaded to unpack — it 
 brought back with a rush the scenes around when 
 you packed. Then you reached down into your 
 trunk and drew out your well-worn Bible. You 
 opened it to familiar chapters, 1 — indeed, it would 
 almost open itself there. The words were so well 
 known by you that you only needed to read one here 
 and there and the rest came trooping from mem- 
 ory's chambers, — and the moonlight lost its cold- 
 ness and the night wind lost its chill, and you crept 
 into the strange bed, warm at the heart as "one 
 whom his mother comforted." 
 
 75 
 
CHAPTER XII 
 The Prayers of a Child 
 
 On a young people's meeting held at a Methodist 
 camp-meeting a spirit of tenderness and fellowship 
 dropped down one day like "showers on the mown 
 grass," and the younger folk present were talking 
 soberly and eagerly of their spiritual life and vic- 
 tory. A boy of twelve or thirteen summers said: 
 "I would like to tell you how God answered my 
 prayer one day. I was taking an examination in 
 Civil Government at school. One of the questions 
 called for the answer, 'Supreme Court.' I could 
 think of the word 'court,' but not of the word 
 'supreme.' So I bowed my head on my desk and 
 prayed — and then it came to me, 'Supreme/ and I 
 wrote down the correct answer." Of course, it 
 would be easy for these people who account for 
 everything by their favorite word, "psychology," to 
 explain this lad's experience on natural grounds, 
 nor would it of necessity be any less divine. Natu- 
 ral things are just as divine as supernatural. 
 76 
 
THE PRAYERS OF A CHILD 
 
 It might even be possible to become humorous 
 over the lad's faith and theory, and say if God told 
 him that word in answer to his prayer it was not 
 honest to write it down, — it was cheating. This, 
 and more, you might say, my philosophical friend, 
 if you had not been at that meeting. If you had 
 been there and felt the spell of it, and seen the 
 honest-hearted lad's face glow with solemn joy, you 
 would not have been very critical. That boy evi- 
 dently believed that just as God helped him in 
 answer to prayer in his conscientious preparation for 
 that examination, so in answer to prayer also He 
 helped him when the time came; and the beautiful 
 thing about his theory was that it worked. 
 
 Prayer is a human instinct. It is as natural to 
 pray as to cry. A workman on a staging was one 
 time airing his atheistic views to his fellow-work- 
 men when, becoming careless, he slipped from the 
 staging and would have plunged to sudden death 
 had it not been for the help speedily given him 
 by the others. As he was falling and realized in 
 one swift moment his condition, almost involun- 
 tarily he exclaimed, "O God, help me I" When 
 questioned afterwards as to the sudden cure of his 
 77 
 
THE SOUL OF A CHILD 
 
 infidelity, he said, "Well, if there is n't a God to 
 help a fellow when he can't help himself, there 
 ought to be." Underneath all his prayerless, faith- 
 less years there was still something in him that 
 wanted to pray — and at the crisis it showed. It is 
 always so. There were no infidels on board when 
 the Titanic went down. Therefore, when we con- 
 sider the prayer-life of a child we are speaking of 
 something as inherent and as normal a part of the 
 unfolding mental and spiritual life as the tendency 
 to think or love. We begin praying early. Who 
 can remember his first prayer? We talked to God 
 about as soon as we talked at all — perhaps before. 
 Of course, we were taught to pray just as we were 
 taught to walk, but there was something about 
 us that made us want to do both. Our early pray- 
 ing was doubtless selfish and almost pagan. We 
 know a clergyman who says he remembers dis- 
 tinctly as a small boy telling a lie and then pray- 
 ing that his mother might not find it out, for, as 
 he told the Lord, he "did n't mean to do it." 
 Evidently he asked "amiss," for he remembers dis- 
 tinctly that she did find it out, and that right 
 speedily — but he did n't stop praying any more than 
 78 
 
THE PRAYERS OF A CHILD 
 
 he stopped walking or crying or singing, and as he 
 continued to pray to the Holy Christ he learned 
 more the meaning of it, and in answer to prayer 
 found "forgiveness of sins and an inheritance 
 among those that are sanctified." It takes a whole 
 lifetime to learn how to pray well, just as it takes 
 a whole season to ripen fruit; but you can have 
 sweet and beautiful blossoms in springtime, and we 
 believe there is a fragrance around the throne of 
 God rising from the blossom-prayers of child souls. 
 
 Certain characteristics of effective prayer espe- 
 cially emphasized in the Scriptures are also char- 
 acteristics of child life. One of these is faith. Who 
 can "believe all things" like the child? 
 
 Another is definiteness. The child prays with 
 a definite goal. It is only after he becomes a learned 
 clergyman that he opens his prayer with a eulogy 
 addressed to the Deity and follows with a list of 
 generalities, theological and slightly religious. 
 
 Another characteristic of the child is purity of 
 purpose and desire. We mean, of course, after 
 he has been purged of his paganism, mentioned a 
 moment ago, and really understands what it means 
 to pray to the Holy Christ. In a little prayer- 
 79 
 
THE SOUL OF A CHILD 
 
 meeting one evening a golden-haired girl of seven 
 happy years reverently bowed her head and in tones 
 that start the tears in the eyes of at least one who 
 heard her, as they ring through his memory after 
 many years, she said, "Dear Jesus, make me like 
 one of Your little lambs." The Good Shepherd 
 heard her prayer and one day, not long after that, 
 He took her in His arms and carried her to His 
 heavenly fold. A big bad boy heard her pray that 
 night and he said, "I thought if that little girl 
 could pray like that, I could too," and he tried, but 
 he could n't. He was n't a lamb ; he was a goat ; 
 and save for a few passing moments when he 
 thought of her prayer, he wanted to be a goat and 
 chose to be. So he never learned to pray, and is 
 out in the world to-day a miserable sinner. 
 
 With faith and definiteness and purity, small 
 wonder that the fragrance of the children's prayers 
 finds its way to the very throne of God! 
 
 We knew a band of children once who united 
 to pray. They had a pledge concerning the simple 
 duties of clean and wholesome living that they 
 signed, and they used to meet after school to pray 
 about it. We remember distinctly when one of 
 80 
 
THE PRAYERS OF A CHILD 
 
 the number was overtaken in temptation and broke 
 the pledge, how the others all stayed and prayed 
 with her, a little girl of twelve. She confessed 
 with weeping and sought and found forgiveness. 
 
 It was just a company of children, and some of 
 the neighbors said, "They are too young to know 
 what they are doing," but still the children prayed, 
 and in a very few years the schoolhouse where they 
 met was crowded with worshiping people and many 
 sought and found Christ there. For some time 
 now no school has been held in the little school- 
 house. It is a country neighborhood and has felt 
 the changes of the years, but still each Sabbath 
 afternoon a little company meet there to pray, and 
 there is a certain heavenliness to the very at- 
 mosphere that is noted by all who come. Like the 
 clay that absorbed the fragrance of the rose by 
 which it lay, somehow the very building seems 
 to be different from ordinary schoolhouses, just as 
 the tabernacle was different from ordinary tents. 
 
 And although fewer and fewer assemble at the 
 meeting each year, because there are fewer in the 
 neighborhood to come, yet it continues to be a way- 
 side well of blessing to many souls. Is it because 
 « 81 
 
THE SOUL OF A CHILD 
 
 the influence of those child-prayers lingers there 
 like the Shekinah over Israel's tented camp? Who 
 can tell? But it might be well for the discouraged 
 pastor eager for a revival, who finds the bankers 
 and brokers on his Official Board so rusty and stiff- 
 kneed they squeak and creak when he tries to get 
 them to pray, to turn his attention to the children. 
 If the stones won't cry out, perhaps the hosannahs 
 of the children may bring a triumphal entry to his 
 Jerusalem. 
 
 82 
 
CHAPTER XIII 
 The Call to Service 
 
 One of the facts that the fiftieth anniversary of 
 Gettysburg's terrible battle has revealed is the com- 
 parative youth of the majority of the soldiers of 
 the Civil War. The Union was preserved by an 
 army of boys in their teens. Many of them lied 
 about their age to get an opportunity to enlist. 
 Some of us confess to have had a temptation to 
 do likewise to get an opportunity to enlist for 
 Christian service. The natural expression of the 
 religion of Jesus Christ is service. The first im- 
 pulse of the freshly converted man is a missionary 
 impulse. He must find his brother Simon and 
 bring him to Jesus. He must ally himself eagerly 
 and promptly with those organized agencies that 
 exist for the spread of the gospel. He must be 
 in them and of them. He must give his testimony 
 for Jesus. All this is equally true of the child 
 Christian. No more than the adult is he con- 
 83 
 
THE SOUL OF A CHILD 
 
 tented merely to be good. He must be good for 
 something. He must express his spiritual life in 
 Christlike service. This impulse, spontaneous and 
 genuine, frequently needs direction. 
 
 A lad of ten, fired by the same spirit that 
 moved Neal Dow and John B. Gough, with lead- 
 pencil and paper worked laboriously preparing 
 some temperance tracts. He planned to tack them 
 up on bridges and fences. His mother, knowing 
 the futility of the special plan of aggressive reform 
 outlined by the young prophet, and the unpleasant 
 reaction on his own life, endeavored to turn his 
 impulse to serve humanity in another direction. 
 He responded, largely because he had been trained 
 to obey, and remembers well how he felt when 
 he assigned the bag of tracts to the fire. His 
 mother did not tell him to do that, but, like the 
 poetess Mary Wilkins tells about who burned her 
 poems and saved the ashes in a sugar bowl, he was 
 inclined to be melodramatic. The direction which 
 his mother sought to turn his flaming desire for 
 service was characteristic of mothers. She sug- 
 gested faithfulness in his lessons and chores and 
 his efforts to conquer his own fiery temper. In 
 84 
 
THE CALL TO SERVICE 
 
 this she was wise; for children who are born ideal- 
 ists are prone to separate their religious service 
 from the practical drudgery of daily living unless 
 reminded by Christian teachers of the apostolic 
 advice to do all things heartily unto the Lord. 
 What a pity it is that some adult reformers have n't 
 mothers to teach them this same lesson! We re- 
 call a grocer who conducted a mission in a little 
 village and forgot to pay his creditors, a temper- 
 ance orator who was cruel to his "bound boy," 
 and many personal workers "for souls" who have 
 been notoriously neglectful of the plain duties of 
 life. So the lad is thankful to-day for the timely 
 direction given to his missionary zeal. The present 
 duty must be attended to first, then larger fields 
 of service would open. And they have. 
 
 But while the child needs to learn the lesson 
 of "plain devotedness to duty" and the glory of 
 doing common things for Jesus' sake, it is also just 
 and right that his Spirit-inspired desire to serve 
 should be utilized in the Church of God. The 
 disciple who testifies these things recalls vividly an 
 experience he had when endeavoring to go to class 
 meeting at a city Church one night. In the church 
 85 
 
THE SOUL OF A CHILD 
 
 building two class meetings were to be held— one 
 a young people's class and the other an older peo- 
 ple's class, a division of the family of the Church 
 which we believe to be exceedingly unfortunate and 
 undesirable. With his brother of fourteen, two 
 years older than himself, the boy was trying to 
 find a place to go to meeting. The young people 
 were slow in coming, and the two boys wistfully 
 waiting seemed to worry the melancholy old sex- 
 ton. Hence he said, and the look and tone are 
 preserved on memory's records: "You boys might 
 just as well come in here; you won't have anything 
 to say anyway." Now, we had come on purpose 
 to say something. In the schoolhouse, where we 
 worshiped at home, we always had something to 
 say. There the stones would have cried out if the 
 children had kept still. 
 
 The attitude of that sexton should never be 
 the attitude of the Christian Church. A child 
 Christian is not different from other Christians. 
 He is not to be put in the corner and told to be 
 good, to be seen and not heard. He has a testi- 
 mony in his soul, a desire to serve Jesus in his 
 heart. The Church is his household also, and he 
 86 
 
THE CALL TO SERVICE 
 
 has the right to express his loyalty and his love 
 for our common Lord. 
 
 It is no part of this book to treat of methods 
 of work among the children. Of the making of 
 many books on that subject there is no end. We 
 have no word to say against Junior Leagues, and 
 children's classes are very desirable in their place, 
 just as sometimes a men's meeting or a women's 
 meeting is desirable; but against the continual sep- 
 aration of the child from the adult in religious 
 worship and service we would protest. 
 
 The child needs the adult. He will learn more 
 from the prayers and exhortations of the saints 
 and prospective saints of the years than from a 
 prepared catechism taught him by some nice young 
 lady. The joy and the victory, the struggle and 
 the tragedy of the Christian life will get into his 
 soul better that way than if administered in homoeo- 
 pathic doses by specially trained doctors. He should 
 feel that he belongs with the others and has a part 
 in it and of it. 
 
 Moreover, the adult needs the child. A young 
 girl in Wales, with eager face and trembling voice, 
 arose in a meeting and said, "I do love the Lord 
 87 
 
THE SOUL OF A CHILD 
 
 Jesus with all my heart," and the Welsh revival 
 wafted the voice of singing over land and ocean. 
 The Church of Christ as never before in its 
 history is hearing the call to social service. We 
 are realizing that the Church exists not merely to 
 build up its own borders and battlements, but to 
 save the community. Jesus taught this lesson "rest- 
 less centuries ago," but we have sometimes been 
 slow to learn it. The child soul also hears this 
 call. A little boy looking at the famous picture 
 we have all seen of the little girl crossing the 
 bridge with the broken rail and the guardian angel 
 attending her, said wonderingly, "Why do n't the 
 angel mend the rail?" The work of mending the 
 rail appeals to children. The movements for 
 cleaner cities, for mercy and kindness and the 
 prevention of evil everywhere will find eager help- 
 ers in the children. All they need is, like the man 
 from Missouri, "to be shown." 
 
CHAPTER XIV 
 The Call to Sainthood 
 
 The child believes in being perfect. It is grown-up 
 people who learn the fine art of lowering their 
 ideals to correspond to their attainments. 
 
 The lowering of an ideal is always pathetic — • 
 the loss of an ideal is tragic. When Edgar Allan 
 Poe was twenty he wrote: 
 
 I stand amid the roar 
 Of a surf-tormented shore, 
 And I hold within my hand 
 Grains of the golden sand 
 How few ! Yet how they creep 
 Through my fingers to the deep. 
 While I weep, while I weep! 
 O God, can I not save 
 One from the pitiless wave? 
 Is all that we see or seem 
 But a dream within a dream? 
 
 These lines might have been his epitaph, for they 
 were his biography. He lost all his golden ideals 
 and died moaning in half-consciousness, "Lord, help 
 my poor soul!" When a man loses his ideals — 
 89 
 
THE SOUL OF A CHILD 
 
 lets them all slip through his fingers, no matter 
 whether his picture hangs in the hall of fame or not, 
 "the shadow on his pathway shall be lifted never- 
 more." 
 
 Our ideals are born with us, or at least come 
 early. They are the first-fruits of prevenient grace. 
 That is why there is truth in Wordsworth's state- 
 ment that "trailing clouds of glory do we come 
 from God, who is our Home." We have already 
 considered the idealist philosophy of childhood. 
 This same divinely-inspired mental tendency makes 
 the child an idealist in Christian experience. The 
 notion clings to him that it must be possible to be 
 perfectly good. His mother has expected it of 
 him ever since he can remember — it must be God 
 expects it, too, and what God expects He must 
 furnish grace to accomplish. He never mistrusted 
 until the theologians told him that a Christian 
 must continue to live in sin. His idea of a Chris- 
 tian is that given by the little girl to her Sunday 
 school teacher, "To be a Christian means to keep 
 away from sin." 
 
 This is the only chapter in which we touch 
 the subject of religious pedagogy. We confess to 
 90 
 
THE CALL TO SAINTHOOD 
 
 practically no specific experience therein: but from 
 our own experience as a child we venture a few 
 suggestions. It is of the first importance that the 
 child hold this ideal. It is better to die half way 
 up the Alps carrying the banner "Excelsior" than 
 to live in contentment in the lowlands. Long- 
 fellow said, regarding the youth who died that 
 way: 
 
 There in the twilight cold and gray 
 Lifeless but beautiful he lay, 
 And from the sky serene and far 
 A voice fell like a falling star, 
 "Excelsior !" 
 
 There is something splendidly heroic about 
 Tennyson's Merlin, who spent his lifetime follow- 
 ing the gleam and who died pointing it to others: 
 
 And can no longer but die rejoicing, 
 For through the magic of Him the Mighty, 
 Who taught me in childhood, 
 There on the border of boundless Ocean 
 And all but in heaven, hovers the gleam. 
 O young mariner, down to the haven 
 Call your companions, launch your vessel 
 And crowd your canvas, And ere it vanishes 
 Over the margin, After it, Follow it, Follow 
 the gleam. 
 
 91 
 
THE SOUL OF A CHILD 
 
 If a child is to become an artist, we wish him 
 to strive for the perfect picture; if he is to become 
 a musician, to work for the perfect song. We heard 
 of a mother who, in reply to her boy's statement 
 that he was to become a garbage man, wisely talked 
 to him of how to do the work of a garbage man 
 perfectly, so that he might be a blessing to the com- 
 munity. Some one, in a poem called "The Artist," 
 has put this same ideal into words, beautiful and 
 inspiring : 
 
 His was a lowly task: 
 
 Only toiled at digging ditches 
 All the livelong day; 
 
 Yet he worked with joy, 
 And at the end of labor he could say, 
 
 "There is a ditch, that is a ditch 
 Honest as I am, and straight and true — 
 
 No man can dig it better; 
 I 'd be glad to have Almighty God 
 
 Look it through." 
 
 Hence it is the normal and natural, as well as the 
 Scriptural expectation that the child should hold 
 his ideal of a perfect Christian life and say with 
 Charles Wesley : 
 
 92 
 
THE CALL TO SAINTHOOD 
 
 What! never speak an impure word, 
 
 Or harsh or evil or unkind? 
 How shall I, most gracious Lord, 
 
 This mark of true perfection find? 
 
 We have sometimes thought that half the grace 
 and winsomeness of the late Benjamin M. Adams, 
 whose faithful and fruitful ministry inspired the 
 hymn, "One more day's work for Jesus," was that 
 he never lowered his ideal. He never talked much 
 about "having attained;" he called himself "just a 
 seeker," confessed to many sins and failures, but 
 kept his faith in the possibility of a life of perfect 
 victory and, in the eyes of every one but himself, 
 practiced it. Therefore, let the child keep his ideal. 
 Hang a millstone around the theological stiff neck 
 of the man who would steal it from one of those 
 little ones and cast him into the sea of oblivion. 
 
 In the second place, and we are still speaking 
 pedagogically, let us magnify the possibilities of 
 the grace of God in the soul of a child. If it is 
 effective anywhere, it certainly has its best chance 
 to be there. There are ripened fruits of grace 
 which are the product of the years. There are 
 lessons in Christlike living that time and experi- 
 93 
 
THE SOUL OF A CHILD 
 
 ence and pain alone can teach. It takes a whole 
 lifetime to grow a Christlike character. But per- 
 fect blossoms are a good preparation for sound 
 fruit, and it is certainly both philosophical and 
 Scriptural to expect the child to be able to secure 
 enough of the grace of God to obtain complete 
 victory over the sins of childhood. We do not need 
 to be dogmatic or controversial as to theory or 
 method, but simply repeat again the words of Mary 
 Willard, "God commands me to love Him with all 
 my heart, and I think I can do it, if I am helped." 
 It was the beloved John who said, "My little chil- 
 dren, these things write I unto you that ye sin not." 
 These words are written not that Elder Sancti- 
 monious and Sister Rigid may expect every child 
 who "names the name of Jesus" to be faultless as 
 well as blameless. These critical individuals had 
 better change their residence from their present 
 glass house before they throw many stones. We 
 write these words that none may place a hindrance 
 or barrier in the way of the child as he seeks by 
 the grace of God to follow his own ideal, engraven 
 on his mind by the Word of God and on his heart 
 by the Spirit Divine. 
 
 94 
 
THE CALL TO SAINTHOOD 
 
 There have been many foolish things written 
 on the subject of Christian perfection. As soon as 
 some men get any sort of a blessing from heaven 
 they take to running camp-meetings and writing 
 books. We do not purpose to add anything to 
 what has already been written, but simply say this, 
 that whatever heights and depths and fullness of 
 the saving grace of God there are — and there we 
 are prone to underestimate rather than overesti- 
 mate — they are all for the child soul. Moreover, 
 the accident insurance that goes with all our strug- 
 gle for perfection is his also. "If any child sin we 
 have an Advocate with the Father, even Jesus 
 Christ the Righteous, and He is the Propitiation for 
 our sins, and not for ours only but for the sins of 
 the whole world." 
 
 95 
 
CHAPTER XV 
 
 The Child's Dress 
 
 So real was the sense of things spiritual in the 
 early home of Frances E. Willard that when she 
 was afflicted with one of the physical ills common 
 to childhood she was accustomed to say, "My dress 
 aches." The physical dress of the soul of a child 
 has a very pronounced influence on that child's life. 
 We can not understand completely his soul until 
 we know some things about his body. The child 
 is aware of his body before he is aware of his soul. 
 His first experiences are physical. This is no argu- 
 ment against the reality of his spiritual life; for at 
 the very beginning of his career he is equally ig- 
 norant of the existence of his body. That he be- 
 comes aware of his body is an argument for the 
 existence of his soul, for he who becomes thus aware 
 is the soul we are talking about. 
 
 The relation of the soul to the body is an inter- 
 esting study. That the soul has a pronounced effect 
 on the body is illustrated by such simple things 
 as the blush of shame, the blanched face of fear, 
 96 
 
THE CHILD'S DRESS 
 
 the flashing eyes of anger, and the quick heart-beat 
 of mighty emotion. To attempt, however, to pro- 
 vide for physical ills and wants wholly by spiritual 
 cures and supplies, whatever it may be in theory, 
 in practical life is as absurd as the story of the 
 shipwrecked sailor who claimed that he existed for 
 weeks by thinking of the folks at home until a 
 lump came in his throat and then swallowing the 
 lump. 
 
 The consideration of effect of the body on the 
 soul bears more directly on the subject of this 
 chapter and book. It is doubtless a good thing for 
 the soul to have a body, otherwise we would not 
 have been thus clothed. There are probably lessons 
 in life's eternal school that we can best learn in 
 this material world by dwelling in a material body. 
 It may be because the 
 
 Mark of rank in nature is 
 
 Capacity for pain, 
 And the sadness of the singer 
 
 Lends the sweetness to the strain. 
 
 Byron Palmer, sitting in his invalid's chair, turn- 
 ing to stone, holding the pen with stiffening fingers 
 that wrote "God's White Throne," doubtless grew 
 97 
 
THE SOUL OF A CHILD 
 
 a bigger soul because of the terrible physical ex- 
 perience that was his. 
 
 Who has not been thrilled as he has read of 
 Robert Louis Stevenson's heroic battle with disease 
 and pain, through black, weary nights still keeping 
 the laughter in his soul and the stars in his sky, and 
 when at last he was baffled, writing these sublime 
 words : 
 
 Under the wide and starry sky 
 Dig the grave and let me die; 
 Gladly did I live and gladly die, 
 And I laid me down with a will 
 This be the verse you grave for me: 
 "Here he lies where he longed to be, 
 Hence is the sailor home from the sea 
 And the hunter home from the hill"? 
 
 The soul that penned those words was doubt- 
 less more royal from its association with a body 
 racked with pain. 
 
 Nor is this all; there are doubtless experiences 
 of joy and peace that come to the soul because it 
 is clothed upon with this mortal clay. If the taste 
 of wild strawberries and the whiff from wild roses 
 are physical experiences, our souls are richer because 
 of them. There is a physical joy which makes 
 "young lambs bound as to tabor's sound while the 
 98 
 
THE CHILD'S DRESS 
 
 birds then sing a joyous song" which must affect 
 our souls. 
 
 On the other hand, the burden of this physical 
 body which, as the apostle says, "perishes daily," 
 has brought discords to many a hymn of praise, 
 interfered with the success of many a splendidly 
 conceived plan for Christian service, and brought 
 the lines of care and distress to many an otherwise 
 radiant and transfigured face. 
 
 The conclusion is, therefore, that we are better 
 souls because of our physical experiences, but we 
 do not seem to be so good. Our life of sainthood 
 and service is not as satisfactory to ourselves or 
 others because in this body "we groan, being 
 burdened." This may be questioned when one 
 thinks of the splendid examples of heroic suffer- 
 ing we have mentioned, but we think if the question 
 had been submitted to them and their most intimate 
 associates they would have expressed the same con- 
 viction. 
 
 All this applies in a very special way to child- 
 hood, because, as already stated, the child is in- 
 tensely physical. A pastor calling upon a mother 
 whose little girl had recently given her life to the 
 99 
 
THE SOUL OF A CHILD 
 
 Christ, asked how Mary was getting along. She 
 replied: "I do not think Mary understood what 
 she was doing. She wanted to go sliding this morn- 
 ing just as usual." It does not apply especially to 
 the point we are endeavoring to illustrate, but it 
 might be interesting to know that the pastor con- 
 fessed to the writer, "There was a fine crust that 
 morning, and I had been sliding myself ;" but think 
 of Mary with childhood's blood running swift and 
 warm and childhood's body quiveringly eager to go 
 bouncing down the frosty hill! 
 
 An old lady, who was thrice widowed and crip- 
 pled with rheumatism, arose in meeting and said in 
 effect that she knew she was converted because the 
 Lord had taken all the love of the dance out of 
 her heart. That He had done so is doubtless true, 
 but the method He used may have been by advanc- 
 ing years and her rheumatism. Her unfortunate 
 matrimonial experiences may have also had its ef- 
 fect. We can not be surprised if a child, young and 
 strong of limb and blithe of heart, does not spon- 
 taneously take her view of the situation, even if his 
 soul is just as eager for whatsoever things are 
 lovely and true. 
 
 ioo 
 
THE CHILD'S DRESS 
 
 Wc have felt that when official members and 
 deacons in the stress of modern life, with strained 
 nerves and weary heads, are not as patient and 
 calm at some late Church meeting as their profes- 
 sion and position would seem to warrant, due al- 
 lowance should be made for their physical condi- 
 tion. If this be true — and who can doubt it? — it 
 is also true that if a troop of merry children, who 
 love the Lord and love His cause, do not seem to 
 have the "sacred awe that is not fear" on all occa- 
 sions when it is the proper attitude of mind, we 
 should not hastily conclude that they are aliens from 
 the commonwealth of Israel. 
 
 The body of a child: how little after all we 
 know about it! It has taken a long line of genera- 
 tions to make it just what it is. The failures of 
 ancestors long dead are recorded in it. The iniqui- 
 ties of the fathers are visited upon it. The poten- 
 tialities of fatherhood and motherhood exist within 
 it and in some mysterious way will grow with the 
 expanding years. Its influence on the soul of the 
 child is so subtle as to be hardly realized. So many 
 of the experiences of childhood and youth that seem 
 to be spiritual or infernal are really caused by blood 
 IOI 
 
THE SOUL OF A CHILD 
 
 corpuscles or nerve tissue. With this body, or, as 
 we are wont to say, in this body, the soul of the 
 child must live for threescore years and ten, more 
 or less. Happy the child who learns early two 
 things. The first of these is to keep his body pure. 
 As the temple of his spirit and, as the apostle puts 
 it, as the temple of the Holy Ghost, it should be 
 kept in good repair. The second is to keep his body 
 under. The apostle implies that he sometimes had 
 to fight to do it. It is worth fighting for. The 
 supremacy of the soul is worth a struggle. This 
 supremacy can best be won not by books of hygiene, 
 but by things that feed the soul. 
 
 These are days when there is much talk about 
 telling the child the vital facts of physical exist- 
 ence. There can be no objection to this — indeed, 
 it is very desirable — provided by vital facts we mean 
 the facts that pure men and women must know. 
 It can not be necessary to take a child through the 
 slime so he will know enough to keep out of it. 
 The old pilot showed sense when one asked him 
 if he knew where all the rocks in the harbor were. 
 He replied, "No, but I know where they ain't." 
 The writer thanks God there are some things he 
 1 02 
 
THE CHILD'S DRESS 
 
 does not know. The bloom of innocence is still 
 worth keeping. A knowledge of the vital facts 
 of life will not necessarily give the child soul- 
 supremacy. This must be done by growing a vig- 
 orous soul. To be thinking of things spiritual and 
 eternal during the child years so that the habit is 
 formed and continued during the years of youth, 
 when many experiment in things physical and car- 
 nal, is a splendid guarantee of pure manhood and 
 womanhood. 
 
 The atmosphere of the Willard home, that the 
 soul is the important thing, the body but a dress, 
 is a priceless heritage, and probably had much to 
 do in giving us America's uncrowned queen, whose 
 marble statue worthily represents her State in our 
 National Capitol and whose gracious influence has 
 blessed many homes. 
 
 The advice of an old-fashioned book is unsur- 
 passed for child and youth and man: "Whatso- 
 ever things are pure, whatsoever things are true, 
 whatsoever things are lovely and of good report, — 
 if there be any virtue and if there be any praise, 
 think on these things." 
 
 103 
 
CHAPTER XVI 
 The Child's Food 
 
 Sir Francis Bacon said, "Some books are to be 
 tasted, others to be swallowed, some few to be 
 chewed and digested." This quotation will per- 
 haps indicate the meaning of the title of this chap- 
 ter. 
 
 One of the first books the child reads is the book 
 of nature — and a wonderful book it is. It was the 
 privilege of the writer to revisit not long since the 
 little wayside cottage where he first remembers to 
 have pored over this book. The kindly face of his 
 grandmother that used to greet him was absent; he 
 visited her grave that afternoon. A stranger met 
 him at the door; but the old Williams apple tree 
 still spread its kindly shade by the kitchen windows ; 
 the sturdy oak by the end of the house looked just 
 the same, although the happy-hearted boy who used 
 to play beneath its majestic branches was gone. 
 Half whimsically he wondered if it knew the home- 
 104 
 
THE CHILD'S FOOD 
 
 sick pilgrim gazing at it through his tears was that 
 same boy. 
 
 In the hazel bushes across the road the locusts 
 plajied their mandolins and flutes just as they did 
 a quarter of a century ago. A red squirrel slipped 
 slyly and shyly across the road. The wayside blos- 
 soms were as sweet, the afternoon sunlight was as 
 kind. He recalled gratefully the words of Whit- 
 tier: 
 
 The years no charm from nature take: 
 
 As clear her voices call, 
 As fresh her mornings break, 
 
 As calm her evenings fall. 
 
 What wonderful lessons he used to learn from 
 nature's book! All her pages were illustrated — il- 
 lustrated with pictures of dewy mornings when the 
 little creatures that dwell between the blades of 
 grass had spread their fairy umbrellas, when the 
 sun was so bright that, as the boy looked at it with 
 the unblinking carelessness of childhood, great disks 
 of purple and red and yellow and green seem to 
 roll from it down over the sky and tumble into the 
 tree-tops. (He would not dare to look at it now 
 without smoked glasses. It was probably a bad 
 105 
 
THE SOUL OF A CHILD 
 
 thing for his eyes then, but he is glad he did n't 
 know it until afterwards.) 
 
 The pages of this book were illustrated also 
 with crimson sunsets that touched with glory the 
 ragged clouds peering up over the horizon, and the 
 boy, wondering, said to himself, "Do they come up 
 every night, and do they make the dark?" 
 
 Then, there were pages of rain upon the roof — 
 pattering, pattering, pattering — so near his little bed 
 that if it were not for the shingled roof between 
 he could reach out and get a whole handful of 
 crystal drops! 
 
 This is a good world for a child to be born 
 in. Nature is a good book for him to learn his 
 first lessons in. He does n't realize how much those 
 sights and sounds of God's out-of-doors have en- 
 tered into his child soul until in later years he finds 
 when he recalls them they are all tangled up with 
 the life of his spirit — they have entered into the 
 very tissue of his soul. The brook singing out back 
 of the house did n't merely please his ear — it 
 splashed into his heart. 
 
 Because the child reads so eagerly the book of 
 nature he can not be an atheist. He may be a 
 1 06 
 
THE CHILD'S FOOD 
 
 pagan, but not an infidel — for nature is a religious 
 book. It is people who have moved in-doors and 
 shut down the windows and pulled down the cur- 
 tains who are atheists. The child is out-of-doors 
 with God and he believes, for the lovely words 
 T. E. Brown applies to his own are equally true 
 of nature's garden : 
 
 A garden is a lovesome thing 
 God wot: 
 Rose plot, 
 
 Fringed pool, 
 Ferned grot; 
 
 The veriest school 
 
 Of peace, and yet the fool 
 Contends that God is not. 
 Not God? In gardens? 
 
 When the eve is cool? 
 Nay, but I have a sign 
 'T is very sure God walks in mine. 
 
 The second book the child reads might almost 
 be called by the title Harriet Beecher Stowe gives 
 to one of her charming novels, "We and Our 
 Neighbors." The pages are covered with photo- 
 graphs. The first page has one face — and happy 
 is the child who gets the first glimpse of heaven 
 in his mother's eyes! Other faces there are — and 
 107 
 
THE SOUL OF A CHILD 
 
 as you think of them even now at night they are 
 more interesting than the most fascinating arti- 
 ficial moving pictures. 
 
 When the eccentric Father Taylor was dying, 
 one whispered to him, "You are going to see the 
 angels soon." Quick as a flash the old man replied, 
 "Folks are better than angels." 
 
 Do you remember the folks of your childhood? 
 
 It may be you had an elder sister that bossed 
 you and told you to "go away and not bother her," 
 but one night when your parents were away and 
 she was left to be mater familias and you tried to 
 say your prayers, all of you children were so full 
 of frolic and laughter you could n't say them — you 
 got half way through "Our Father who art in 
 heaven," and then dissolved into giggles over noth- 
 ing. Your sister was in it, too, but after she had 
 tried several times, she said, "Wait a minute," and 
 then, very reverently, in a little hushed voice, she 
 asked God to help you all say your prayers — and 
 somehow the frolic died away and a great sense 
 of quietness came stealing in with the evening 
 breeze, and you could pray with steady, thoughtful 
 voice after that: and your childhood's soul drank 
 it all in. 108 
 
THE CHILD'S FOOD 
 
 There was a rough man who "tended the boiler" 
 in the neighboring machine shop. At least you 
 thought he was rough, for he chased away the 
 mischievous boys who gathered around^— and one 
 day you were running away with them and he 
 called you back and gave you a whistle and talked 
 to you and told you to come again — and you used 
 to go to see him and you and he were chums after 
 that — and the lesson your soul learned was some- 
 thing like that expressed in these lines by James 
 Whitcomb Riley: 
 
 There 's a spot for good to bloom in 
 Every heart of man or woman, 
 And however wild or human, 
 
 Or however burned with gall, 
 The darkest heart to doubt it 
 Has something good about it 
 
 After all. 
 
 The little girl next door died one day. And 
 you sat by your front door and heard the minister's 
 rich, sympathetic voice reading the solemn words. 
 For the first time in your life you saw a home 
 with its most bitter sorrow — and a chord of sym- 
 pathy you did n't know existed began to vibrate in 
 109 
 
THE SOUL OF A CHILD 
 
 your soul. It has vibrated so often since that it 
 has worn a place all around it that aches all the 
 time, but it came first that day. 
 
 For, after all, this is the lesson the child learns 
 from the book of human nature — the picture book, 
 "We and Our Neighbors." He learns to be a 
 humanitarian. From the book of nature he learns 
 that a "side of his nature is open toward the 
 Infinite." From this book of folks he learns that 
 nothing that is human is foreign to him. Those 
 are big lessons. It takes a whole lifetime to learn 
 them well. Therefore, it is well that we start in 
 childhood. 
 
 We have said that the child in God's out-of- 
 doors can not be an atheist. It is also true that 
 the child in God's world of folks can not be a 
 recluse. A man will have to forget his childhood 
 lessons if he ever becomes a sordid hermit or a pillar 
 saint. It is the natural and normal thing for the 
 child learning the lessons God has given a child to 
 learn, with the soul God has given to learn them, 
 "to dwell in a house by the side of the road and 
 be a friend to man." 
 
 no 
 
CHAPTER XVII 
 
 More Food 
 
 Oliver Twist became immortal by asking "for 
 more." However, he did not do an unusual thing. 
 It is the child that does not ask for more who is 
 unique. And for that matter, in this particular 
 adults are but children a few years older. 
 
 The child's glimpses of nature — flat on his back 
 perhaps, looking up through the leafy boughs of a 
 tree at the wonder of the cloud-swept blue — make 
 him long for more. 
 
 The child's glimpses of humanity — sitting in 
 the boiler-room listening timidly to the tales of the 
 smutty-faced engineer — make him long for more. 
 
 Hence the early appeal of literature to childish 
 mind and soul. And in this chapter we talk of 
 books — not fanciful books, but literal flesh and 
 blood, paper and ink, leather and gold books. 
 
 We do not propose, however, to say what the 
 child ought to read, neither do we attempt to de- 
 scribe the books he ought not to read. We re- 
 member a clever merchant who covered his show- 
 
THE SOUL OF A CHILD 
 
 windows all over save two little peek-holes and put 
 over them the sign, "Do not look in here." And 
 we remember that it accomplished just what the 
 merchant had foreseen. 
 
 Our purpose is to speak of some books that feed 
 the child soul. In a previous chapter we have 
 spoken of the Bible. When Sir Walter Scott was 
 dying he exclaimed, "Bring me the Book." "What 
 book?" they asked, for he had a large library and 
 was himself the creator of books. "Bring me the 
 Book," he replied, "there is only one Book." And 
 that is as true for the living child as the dying 
 sage. There is no book compares with the Bible 
 in its capacity to feed the soul. That must always 
 be first. 
 
 A puritanical minister one time said he would 
 not read anything unless it was perfectly true. 
 We have wondered what he could read. The well- 
 worn and always loved "Pilgrim's Progress" would 
 have to go. "Robinson Crusoe" could never de- 
 scribe to us his desert island and good man Friday. 
 The average school history would have to be badly 
 mutilated, for the higher critics have been as merci- 
 less with the good old stories of Peter Parley as 
 
 112 
 
MORE FOOD 
 
 they have been with Jonah and Job. How he 
 would have to cut up his Bible! The priceless 
 parables of Jesus and the matchless visions of the 
 Revelation were hardly true in the cold, gray sense 
 this preacher meant. And finally, a daily news- 
 paper could never darken his doors. About all he 
 could read would be the multiplication table! 
 
 As a matter of fact, what we call fiction is often 
 more nearly true than what we call history; what 
 we call poetry is more real than what we call fact. 
 For fiction, real fiction, dripping with life, gives 
 us the soul of history — the bare and often imper- 
 fect narrative of events gives us the dried-up body. 
 You can learn more of Hebrew history from the 
 Psalms than from the Chronicles! "The Battle- 
 Hymn of the Republic" gives you a better vision 
 of American history than the Congressional Record. 
 
 It may seem heresy to say it, but a child had 
 better be ignorant of the multiplication table than 
 to be without an imagination. However, there is 
 no occasion for anxiety, for Almighty God has 
 equipped the average child with a fairly vigorous 
 imagination and left parents and schoolma'ams to 
 pound in the multiplicaiton table! 
 8 113 
 
THE SOUL OF A CHILD 
 
 We do believe that the average child is not as 
 silly as his average instructor. We think even a 
 small child would just as soon hear his mother sing 
 "Holy angels guard thy bed" as some popular ditty 
 ground out by the recent phonograph. We have a 
 very vivid remembrance of how our soul was nause- 
 ated by the crude fairy stories some childless rela- 
 tives presented to us, and how it was fired by some 
 of the splendid things in literature that came our 
 way early. The author of this book will never 
 cease to thank God that his tired father used to 
 read the poems of John Greenleaf Whittier to him 
 on Sunday afternoons. He does n't remember very 
 much about them, but the spirit and the music 
 sunk into his soul. There was another poem of a 
 terrible battle and a dying man calling for water 
 that lingers in memory to this day. The author 
 and lines are long since forgotten — but the poem 
 was full of soul-thrilling tragedy and life. 
 
 Every Methodist Sunday school worker should 
 be grateful for the new Sunday School Hymnal 
 because of the fine type of poetry it has introduced 
 to our Sunday schools. We have attended Christ- 
 mas celebrations where little children sang things 
 114 
 
MORE FOOD 
 
 about "St. Nick" that were crude in literary style 
 and irreverent in spirit. How refreshing now to 
 hear: 
 
 There's a song in the air, 
 
 There 's a star in the sky, 
 There 's a mother's deep prayer 
 
 And a baby's low cry; 
 And the star rains the fire 
 
 While the beautiful sing, 
 For the manger of Bethlehem 
 
 Cradles a King! 
 
 We would not dare say anything against 
 Mother Goose. She seems to be as necessary to 
 some homes as paregoric. But we would respect- 
 fully call attention to such books of childish verse 
 as those of Robert Louis Stevenson and Eugene 
 Field. They both had child souls and a literary 
 taste that is exquisite. But before we become peda- 
 gogical, we hasten to say that our contention is 
 simply that the child soul be given good poetry to 
 feed on. It will be richer and sweeter forever be- 
 cause of it. 
 
 It is customary to poke fun at the old-time 
 Sunday school library. Indeed, the modern Car- 
 negie affairs have about driven it out of business — 
 i'5 
 
THE SOUL OF A CHILD 
 
 but whatever may have been its defects, it had one 
 thing that more than offset them all. Have you 
 ever seen a flower garden full of awkward, homely 
 flowers — with one little pansy blossom so sweet you 
 forgot all the rest? Whatever the literary critics 
 may say, the fresh, pure, and beautiful stories of 
 Mrs. Alden have been a literal message of light and 
 power to many a child soul. She knows how to 
 translate the message of the Christ into the terms 
 of a boy's and girl's life so that it will appeal to 
 their chivalry and their enthusiasm. Her saints 
 are full of warm-red blood. Her ideals are sane. 
 Her own beautiful spirit sheds its fragrance 
 through all her books, — they are worth while. 
 
 "Pilgrim's Progress" is immortal. Unimagina- 
 tive people have tried to rule it out of late. Social 
 service experts say Christian ought not to have 
 started on his pilgrimage and left his family in 
 the city of Destruction. They strongly hint that 
 he ought to have stayed at home, got elected on a 
 sanitary commission and tried to improve the con- 
 ditions of his native burg. Thus they miss en- 
 tirely the point of the tale. The city of Destruc- 
 tion, of course, signifies a life of sin, from which 
 116 
 
MORE FOOD 
 
 every man should get out, whether his wife goes 
 with him or not. The child sees this. He has 
 no fads to blind him. He knows what the city of 
 Destruction of his life is, and applies the imaginary 
 pilgrimage to his own career. He knows what 
 Apollyon he ought to kill, and Bunyan's dream puts 
 iron in his soul for the conflict. Perhaps we should 
 hardly call it a food — it is more like a tonic for 
 the soul. And yet it is not bitter to take. "Chil- 
 dren cry for it." 
 
 An early acquaintance with the best of Amer- 
 ican literature is a blessing to be desired— good for 
 the mind and soul. And very fortunately the 
 heroes of our golden age were nearly all lovers 
 of children and remembered them with voice and 
 pen. Hawthorne's tales, chaste and beautiful, are 
 so simple, a child can not only understand their 
 meaning, but also appreciate their beauty. Long- 
 fellow's verses, exquisite as a garden of blush roses, 
 have no thorns to prick childish fingers. Even 
 Bryant is a children's poet at times and his "little 
 people of the snow" and Sella are charming fairy 
 stories. Whittier was a bachelor, but never forgot 
 his own childhood, and his winsome simplicity and 
 117 
 
THE SOUL OF A CHILD 
 
 directness make him a favorite with the little folks. 
 
 The writer counts it one of the blessings of his 
 life that during his later child years, perhaps when 
 he was thirteen or fourteen, he came under the 
 spell of the genius of Harriet Beecher Stowe. That 
 meant the opening of a new world before him and 
 a new heaven above him. He re-reads "Oldtown 
 Folks" each year just as he visits again his old home, 
 and he always closes its covers with quickened mind, 
 clearer vision, and tender feelings in his breast. 
 Mr. Lincoln called Mrs. Stowe "the little woman 
 who caused this big war;" but that was perhaps 
 the least of the things she did with her magic pen. 
 We know a learned preacher, full of science and 
 philosophy, who surprised us by saying that during 
 the days of his college skepticism the thing that 
 brought him to a life of faith and victory was 
 reading Mrs. Stowe's "My Wife and I." Many 
 others owe her a similar debt. And the child soul 
 will be richer if it knows her early. 
 
 The healthy child relishes history and biography. 
 Indeed, he astonishes many an adult who has intel- 
 lectual dyspepsia and partakes daintily of highly 
 flavored fiction by the hearty eagerness with which 
 118 
 
MORE FOOD 
 
 he can chew and digest the solid life-stories of men 
 and women who have lived and dared. God made 
 him that way so he would grow. 
 
 One of the finest touches in Whittier's "Snow- 
 bound" is the account of the arrival of the weekly 
 newspaper. After a week shut in from the world 
 by the storm : 
 
 At last the floundering carrier bore 
 The village paper to our door; 
 Lo! broadening outward as we read 
 To warmer zones the horizon spread; 
 In panoramic length unrolled 
 We saw the marvels that it told; 
 We felt the stir of hall and street, 
 The pulse of life that round us beat; 
 The chill embargo of the snow 
 Was melted in the genial glow. 
 Wide swung again our ice-locked door, 
 And all the world was ours once more. 
 
 In these days when a new edition of some flaring 
 daily is cried on the streets every few hours, the 
 simple charm of scenes like that has passed away 
 with the good old days. But happy the child one 
 day of whose week is a red-letter day because his 
 mind and soul are fed by some periodical that is 
 fresh and wholesome. You can't feed your mind 
 119 
 
THE SOUL OF A CHILD 
 
 and soul on daily papers. They are good for men 
 who want to find out about the stock market and 
 the weather, or women who are interested in bar- 
 gains; but a child's growing mind will starve on 
 such intellectual sawdust. A home with only secu- 
 lar dailies is as bare of soul food as old Mother 
 Hubbard's cupboard. But, thank God ! the Youth's 
 Companion and its stalwart Methodist brother, The 
 Classmate, are still with us; and, although it is hard 
 to convince some people of the fact, the average 
 Church paper is as full of wholesome food as a 
 New England Thanksgiving dinner. It is still 
 true that the clearest brains and most kingly souls 
 are in the Church of God. What they say with 
 voice and pen is good for man and child. 
 
 We have not attempted, in this chapter, a cata- 
 logue of books to be read by various ages and types 
 of children. We have simply tried to hint that the 
 child soul should be fed with sincere milk of the 
 Word, "honey from the rock," and the "finest of 
 the wheat." 
 
 120 
 
CHAPTER XVIII 
 
 The Child's Sabbath 
 
 Isaac Watts thought of heaven as a land "where 
 congregations ne'er break up and Sabbaths never 
 end." Many have seen a grim humor in this de- 
 scription and have sympathized with the little girl 
 who told her mother she wanted to go to the other 
 place, where there was "more going on." 
 
 The old-time Sabbath was not adapted to the 
 active limbs and ready laugh and eager mind of 
 untamed childhood. We do not wonder that its 
 hours seemed to go with leaden feet and that, after 
 two long services and the grave, silent hours at 
 home, the child could hardly feel like David, that 
 "a day in Thy courts is better than a thousand." 
 
 But as we have seen the modern Sabbath with 
 the crowded trains and trolleys — in which little 
 children are dragged around in a crowd of pleasure- 
 seekers all day and come home at night with hot, 
 sticky faces down which tears of weariness trickle 
 unrestrained, we have wondered if after all it is 
 not the child of to-day that needs our pity. With 
 
 121 
 
THE SOUL OF A CHILD 
 
 all its defects, the old-time Sabbath did two things — 
 it gave the child soul time to think "long, long 
 thoughts," and it put the child's body in such con- 
 dition that he came to Monday rested and "fresh 
 as a daisy." This the modern Sabbath does not 
 do. Watch the dusty crowd returning from the 
 excursion train and you will not see much of Sab- 
 bath peace or satisfaction. A Sabbath spent next 
 to the heart of nature has much in its favor, but 
 a Sabbath spent in a crowd of people going rest- 
 lessly from ice-cream tables to moving picture 
 shows and band concerts all day is hardly close to 
 the heart of nature, even if there is an unnoticed 
 ocean in the distance. 
 
 The child's soul needs a Sabbath, probably not 
 the rigid Sabbath of the Puritans, but it needs a 
 Sabbath ! The Sabbath was made for man because 
 he needed it. The child needs it, too. He needs 
 the rest. It 's hard work playing all the week. 
 If you do n't believe it, try it yourself awhile, you 
 grown-up reader. That little boy of yours can tire 
 you out in a couple of hours so that you exclaim 
 in self -protection, "Run to your mother awhile 
 now." The child needs a time when his week- 
 
THE CHILD'S SABBATH 
 
 day toys — most of them^— are put away and he can 
 rest. As the school years draw on he needs to put 
 his school-books away, too. Every once in a while 
 in grammar or high school the question is debated, 
 "Is it right to study on Sunday?" That is not 
 the best way to put it. It is as if one were to 
 debate the question, "Is it right to put your hand 
 on a hot stove" or "Is it right to ignore the law 
 of gravitation?" There is a moral side, of course, 
 to both of these questions, but that is hardly the most 
 prominent one. When God made a child's brain, 
 He made it to do business in a world where one 
 day in seven was a day of rest in worship. There- 
 fore, it is not guaranteed to run successfully in any 
 other kind of a world. 
 
 But, most of all, for his spiritual welfare does 
 the child need the Sabbath. There is a psycho- 
 logical atmosphere about Sunday — when the mill 
 whistle is silent, and the stores are closed, their cur- 
 tains down; when work on the farm ceases; when 
 the church bell peals out, and so many people 
 everywhere are thinking of God and eternity — that 
 the sensitive soul of the child is as responsive to 
 as the wilting field of corn to a summer shower. 
 123 
 
THE SOUL OF A CHILD 
 
 We shall never forget the Sabbaths in the coun- 
 try home of our childhood. We never dreaded 
 them; they had an interest all their own. A rest- 
 ful quiet seemed to mantle all nature. The very 
 cattle grazing in the pasture seemed to know it was 
 Sunday and take a quiet satisfaction in it. The 
 huge oxen knew it because that day they were 
 turned out with the other stock. No loads to haul 
 to-day. Almighty God had them in mind and men- 
 tioned them by name when He told Moses to write 
 down the fourth commandment. Then, through 
 the hush sounded musical in the distance the church 
 bell. The quiet ride to church, the service, and 
 the ride home again; then a peaceful afternoon, 
 either in the house or under the shade of the an- 
 cient maple tree in the pasture, or under the "apple 
 bloom of May" in the orchard, with a bundle of 
 good reading matter, the Church paper, and one's 
 own Bible (the writer was trying to beat his brother 
 in reading it through and went galloping through 
 Leviticus and Numbers). Then "sunset and even- 
 ing star," and early to bed — rested in body, mind, 
 and soul. 
 
 That our childhood experience was not the ex- 
 124 
 
THE CHILD'S SABBATH 
 
 ception we have found from our study of biog- 
 raphy — wherever the child soul has been given a 
 true Sabbath, the fragrance of it has been wafted 
 down the devest years. Frances E. Willard wrote: 
 "O, sacred Sabbaths of our childhood! O early 
 mornings in the spring, when we ran together 
 through the dewy grass, or laid our ears to the 
 bosom of the earth to hear her vibrant breathing 
 and to thrill at her pulsing heart! O birds that 
 sang for me, and flowers that bloomed for me! O 
 father-love and mother-love that held me!" She 
 thus associates her childhood Sabbaths with the most 
 beautiful things of her beautiful past! Many there 
 are who read those lines who would like to "speak 
 in meeting" on this same subject. We are not plead- 
 ing for blue laws or a Sabbath day of idle gloom ; 
 but when we see the pathetic quest for pleasure, 
 the indignant protest against any restriction upon 
 the multiplying schemes of amusement on the Sab- 
 bath, we feel, like lifting up our voice in behalf of 
 the child and saying, Give child soul a Sabbath! 
 
 125 
 
CHAPTER XIX 
 The Other Child 
 
 There has to be the other child, for two reasons. 
 One is to account for all the naughty things in your 
 child, dear parents. He learns them from the bad 
 little boy across the way. 
 
 The more vital reason is that old-fashioned truth 
 that "It is not good for man to be alone." We 
 need each other. There are, of course, exceptions, 
 but generally speaking a hermit can not become a 
 saint. Occasionally there are unavoidable circum- 
 stances which compel one to move from the house 
 beside the road; sometimes an Emily Dickenson 
 seems especially called to the quiet places of life, 
 but usually the example of the ministering Christ 
 is the only safe one to follow. 
 
 The child is naturally a social being. There 
 is a warm feeling in his heart for his fellows. God 
 made him so. It is just as much a part of his 
 equipment for life as his eyes with which to see and 
 his ears with which to hear. 
 
 126 
 
THE OTHER CHILD 
 
 Students in child psychology are wont to classify 
 and catalogue in order the various manifestations 
 of this social instinct of childhood, but as we have 
 already seen, it is difficult to catalogue a child. 
 Generally speaking, however, he starts his social 
 career with a playmate. He can't count much 
 beyond two, and a third party seems an intrusion. 
 We have watched the children — the little children 
 — beneath our window. A little boy and girl are 
 playing together. Another little girl comes eagerly 
 along to join them. She perhaps has "paired off" 
 with each of them yesterday, so she feels confident 
 of welcome. She is met with such inhospitable 
 remarks as, "We do n't want you," and "You can't 
 play with us." She goes sadly and sulkily away. 
 Our first impulse is to compel the little snobs to 
 welcome her, but our experience with compulsory 
 welcomes should teach us better. They do not in- 
 tend to be mean, but their heaven this morning 
 depends on "me and my playmate." They can't 
 count beyond two. As the preachers frequently tell 
 us, sometimes men and women in mature life can't 
 count much beyond four. 
 
 The child learns from his playmate. His vision 
 127 
 
THE SOUL OF A CHILD 
 
 is corrected by hers. That is a lifelong lesson. It 
 runs way up into the question of Bible interpre- 
 tation. What else does that text mean, "No 
 prophecy is of private interpretation?" It means 
 that one man does n't know it all — that one man 
 can't see it all. The child had never noticed how 
 much the daisies looked like little suns until she 
 showed him. He will tell his mother all about it 
 to-night. Perhaps she has n't noticed it, either. 
 And his playmate did n't know you could make a 
 chain out of dandelion stems. His big sister told 
 him and showed him how; and he knows all about 
 it, although somehow they won't stick together for 
 him. Thus they learn things from each other out 
 there in the green yard beneath the blue sky. But 
 in exchanging information about things they are 
 doing more than that — that unconscious, subtle in- 
 terplay of spirit, of influence of soul upon soul is 
 enriching the life of each like the pollen the bees 
 lug around from flower to flower. 
 
 But while we are thinking of these things we 
 
 hear a new kind of sound from the yard. We 
 
 look out; the child and his playmate are looking 
 
 at each other with blazing eyes, their childish voices 
 
 128 
 
THE OTHER CHILD 
 
 ring out angrily. And presently we see the play- 
 mate go sturdily and defiantly homeward and the 
 child is alone. He looks rather "sheepish" and feels 
 rather awkward, we can see. He plucks off some 
 daisy heads rather savagely, and then sits down 
 glumly and gloomily in the sun on the doorstep. 
 He is learning some more things from the other 
 child. She is n't as nice as he thought she was — 
 and he has to admit he is n't, either. There 's 
 something in him that is hot and naughty. It is 
 our social life and our social failures that reveal 
 to us our dire need of the grace of God, even more 
 than the meditation of the cloister. When the min- 
 ister talks next Sunday about needing the help of 
 the Christ to love our neighbors as ourselves, the 
 child will understand what he means. 
 
 But another sound beneath the window arouses 
 us from our reveries. It is a peal of merry laughter. 
 Something has happened while we were not look- 
 ing. The child and his playmate are together 
 again. They have "made up." Each side surren- 
 dered without much fuss because each wanted the 
 other. They probably did n't even say "Forgive 
 me?" or "I apologize." He just called out over the 
 9 129 
 
THE SOUL OF A CHILD 
 
 fence, "Come over and see this hoppy toad" — and 
 felt better in his soul as soon as he said it. She said : 
 "All right. Mamma gave me a cooky, and I 'm 
 going to give you half of it," and came smiling 
 over. This, too, is a lifelong lesson. It touches the 
 child's soul. He is learning early that lesson of 
 the years, that there is nothing that sweetens the 
 life of his spirit like "forgiving and being forgiven." 
 God grant he may never forget it! 
 
 As the years unfold the child learns to count 
 beyond two. It is no longer just "my playmate." 
 It is "we boys," or, as he perhaps expresses it in 
 ungrammatical but expressive slang, "us kids." He 
 develops the "gang spirit." The spirit that makes 
 social organizations, the spirit that through the long 
 years has made nations and empires, the spirit that, 
 sanctified and baptized with blood, made the Church 
 of the living God, begins to wax hot in the child 
 soul. He wants to belong to something and wear a 
 badge. His little playmate is deserted, but she 
 does n't mind it, for she is one of "us girls" now. 
 The same spirit flames up in her heart. Loyalty 
 and chivalry bloom naturally now in the garden 
 of the child's heart. 
 
 130 
 
THE OTHER CHILD 
 
 The appeal of the Christian Church thus be- 
 comes increasingly strong and timely. The writer 
 remembers how he felt when as a lad of eleven he 
 became a member of the Christian Church. As 
 he turned away from the altar a silver-haired Chris- 
 tian man — now long years in glory— grasped him by 
 the hand and called him "Brother." The feeling 
 that welled up in his soul then was sort of a right- 
 eous pride. He was one of the "brethren." Meth- 
 odists had not fallen into the degenerate habit of 
 "Mistering" fellow Church members and "brother- 
 ing" fellow lodge members. It meant something 
 to be a "brother," and this lad knew it. He be- 
 longed. He was in it. It was his Church and his 
 minister. 
 
 As the years still blossom and fruit, the child 
 soul learns the possibility of retaining both the "my 
 playmate" spirit and the "gang spirit" — perhaps he 
 learns the rich possibility of friendship within the 
 gang — or that other blessed freak of child souls 
 which after all breaks up our exclusiveness and 
 priggishness of friendship outside of his particular 
 gang. What a long list of comedies and tragedies 
 all through history have been caused thereby! 
 131 
 
THE SOUL OF A CHILD 
 
 Happy the child soul who finds in the early 
 years at least one friend— who knows him well, 
 with his faults as well as his virtues, but loves him 
 still and continues to be his friend through the 
 stormy years— for next to the fellowship of the 
 great Divine Friend is the blessing of human friend- 
 ship. Our souls are richer and broader and clearer 
 visioned and sweeter toned because of it, and "there 
 are no friends like the old friends." 
 
 132 
 
CHAPTER XX 
 The Child and His Dreams 
 
 Up in the attic where I slept 
 
 When I was a boy, a little boy, 
 In through the lattice the moonlight crept, 
 Bringing a tide of dreams that swept 
 Over the low, red trundle bed, 
 Bathing the tangled, curly head, 
 While moonbeams played at hide and seek 
 With the dimples on the sun-browned cheek, 
 
 When I was a boy, a little boy. 
 
 And O the dreams — the dreams I dreamed 
 
 When I was a boy, a little boy, 
 For the grace that through the lattice streamed 
 Over my folded eyelids seemed 
 To have the gift of prophecy 
 And bring me glimpses of times to be, 
 When manhood's clarion seemed to call — 
 Ah! that was the sweetest dream of all, 
 
 When I was a boy, a little boy. 
 
 These words from the magic pen of Eugene Field 
 will find a responsive chord in many a heart. 
 Where do they come from, those dreams of child- 
 hood? Not so much the ones that come at night, 
 133 
 
THE SOUL OF A CHILD 
 
 but the one that came by day when a purple haze 
 hangs over the mountains and lazy summer time 
 mantles the golden earth! 
 
 There was that boy Joseph, in the olden times, 
 who persisted in having dreams of the wonderful 
 days to be. His good old father, forgetful of the 
 fact that he had done some dreaming himself in 
 his day, fell into the age-long habit of matter-of- 
 fact parents and said in effect, "Nonsense, child, 
 do n't be foolish." His jealous older brothers were 
 cruel in their opposition — but still he kept dream- 
 ing, and his after-life was almost a literal fulfillment 
 of his childhood dreams. 
 
 We suppose a storm of criticism would come 
 from very pious people if we should speak of the 
 boyhood dreams of the boy Samuel. "Why, God 
 spoke to Samuel!" they would exclaim. And yet 
 we suppose these very same people would say, if 
 Johnny or Mary told of things that came to them 
 as clearly as if a voice spoke in the night, "Non- 
 sense, child, you are dreaming." It took some time 
 to prove whether Samuel was dreaming or not. 
 Perhaps the years may prove whether some of the 
 voices that speak to little folks now, whether some 
 134 
 
THE CHILD AND HIS DREAMS 
 
 of the things that sail into their puzzled brains 
 from an unknown sea are harbingers of years to be. 
 
 We know a lad who, from the first time he 
 attended Church, when he was four years old, 
 never thought of himself in the glorious days of 
 manhood yet to be as anything but a Christian 
 minister. It was not the whim of the child who 
 wants to be a soldier one day and a storekeeper 
 the next. It was a deep feeling, a settled cer- 
 tainty that never left him. When he played with 
 the other children and, after the manner of child- 
 hood, posed as "butcher, baker, and Indian chief," 
 underneath it all was always the feeling, "I am 
 just playing this; I am really to be a minister." 
 
 One day as a schoolboy he visited some great, 
 empty ice-houses. He was alone. As he stepped 
 into the great, dark building with the afternoon 
 sunlight stealing in through the cracks in the boards, 
 a feeling of awe came over him — and then immedi- 
 ately the empty ice-house seemed to him like a 
 great church. He could almost hear the deep 
 tones of the organ pealing out, solemnly, the praise 
 of God. His mind quickly pictured a quiet, rever- 
 ent company, sitting silently before him, and he 
 135 
 
THE SOUL OF A CHILD 
 
 was the preacher. It was more than a play — it 
 was a dream like Joseph's. We almost dare to 
 say it was a voice like that which came to Samuel. 
 As he came out into the April day, there was a 
 choking at his throat and great waves of feeling 
 too deep for words swept over him. 
 
 One day he was in the granary and saw kernels 
 of corn scattered over the floor. In a flash he saw 
 the likeness to a picture in the history of Meth- 
 odism of the out-door throng listening to Jesse 
 Lee. In a moment again a great throb of eager- 
 ness came to his boyish soul. He, too, some day 
 would break the bread of life to a hungering mul- 
 titude. 
 
 And so it was ever. Sometimes indeed it settled 
 down on him so heavily that it seems to him now 
 his childhood was hardly normal — that he was so 
 eager to get on to this one thing he did n't see even 
 the flowers growing in the beautiful valley of child- 
 hood. To-day, humbly but conscientiously and 
 eagerly, he is a preacher of the gospel of Jesus 
 Christ. And he mentions this experience here, not 
 because it is unique, but because he has a feeling 
 it has many duplicates. 
 
 136 
 
THE CHILD AND HIS DREAMS 
 
 Do coming events cast their shadows over the 
 sensitive soul of childhood? Does God tell the 
 child sometimes something of His plan for his life? 
 
 But we can already hear the protest of the man 
 whose disappointed life has seemed to mock the 
 dreams of his youth. Many there are who, on 
 account of circumstances over which they have no 
 control, never come to their own in this life. Of 
 these Thomas Gray was thinking as he walked in 
 the village cemetery, among the graves of the vil- 
 lage dead, and wrote: 
 
 Perhaps in this neglected spot is laid 
 
 Some heart once pregnant with celestial fire, 
 Hands that the rod of empire might have swayed 
 
 Or waked to ecstasy the living lyre. 
 But Knowledge to their eyes her ample page 
 
 Rich with the spoils of time did ne'er unroll; 
 Chill penury repressed their noble rage, 
 
 And froze the genial current of the soul. 
 
 To the protest of the disappointed man we reply 
 that his life is not yet over. Earth's pilgrimage 
 is very short. Eternity is very long. Therefore, 
 despise not the beckoning hands and whispering 
 voices that stirred your child soul in the morning 
 years. You may yet find that the dream was a 
 vision. 137 
 
THE SOUL OF A CHILD 
 
 We are not building a theology on the dreams 
 of the child — not even a psychology — but we do 
 not feel like tramping heavily in, like the man Haw- 
 thorne describes, whose head was hard as an iron 
 boiler, and endeavoring to settle the question by 
 saying "Pooh!" which after all is not a very pro- 
 found argument or brilliant remark, for it may be 
 that these dreams are another manifestation of the 
 fact that the child soul is built as Bishop Fowler 
 said the early home of Abraham Lincoln was con- 
 structed, "side open toward the Infinite." Very 
 tenderly we say, as we see the thoughtful child with 
 the far-away look in his wistful eyes: "Let alone. 
 Let us see what will come of his dreams." 
 
 138 
 
CHAPTER XXI 
 
 Growing Pains 
 
 A small boy, whose active legs were aching one 
 night, said to his father, "What makes my legs 
 ache?" The father replied, with a twinkle in his 
 eye, "One leg has grown a little longer than the 
 other; you are having growing pains, my boy." 
 
 The child's soul has growing pains. He begins 
 to climb out of the happy valley of childhood. The 
 sky is farther off than he thought it was. Life 
 is less golden. He learns to doubt. He doubted 
 once before: It was a long time ago; his mother, 
 busy with home cares and a little anxious withal, 
 did not seem to pay much attention to him for 
 awhile. And little skeptic that he was, he said to 
 himself, "Mother does n't love me." His brother 
 heard him and told on him. He soon found out 
 his mistake. 
 
 Now his doubts are not so easily dispelled. He 
 doubts the Lord, not earnestly and heart-brokenly, 
 but just in sort of a cool, shaky way. There are 
 139 
 
THE SOUL OF A CHILD 
 
 so many strange things out there — he doesn't look 
 so eagerly and trustingly up above the tree-tops. 
 
 Then, his childhood's philosophy has had a 
 shock or two. Invisible things are not so real. 
 He cares more about externals. What the other 
 fellows say looms up. He is afraid of the gang. 
 Then, there is already stirring in his breast a world- 
 old feeling. The young lady across the way has 
 an influence over him quite disproportionate with 
 her character or her ability. 
 
 We are speaking in the masculine gender be- 
 cause the fashion of the English language requires 
 it when using the singular number; perhaps also 
 because the author of this book is a man; but we 
 are persuaded and assured that the same is true of 
 the opposite sex. 
 
 There are doubtless physiological reasons for 
 some of these changes. The body of the boy is 
 becoming that of a man ; the body of a girl is grow- 
 ing into that of a woman. Brain and soul feel 
 the transformation. There are also psychological 
 changes. The developing and unfolding mind is 
 having growing pains. 
 
 The train has left behind forever the little sta- 
 140 
 
GROWING PAINS 
 
 tion on life's railroad called "Childhood." It was 
 a beautiful station, and flowers grew all around it. 
 The next station is "Youth." Some call it "ado- 
 lescence," but what 's the use of talking in Latin 
 when Saxon will do as well? The young traveler 
 knows little about this station, but everybody he 
 has talked with from that town says it is wonder- 
 ful. So he is eager to go. The train does not go 
 fast enough to suit him. In later years he wonders 
 at his eagerness. He wishes he could take the 
 journey over again. He would not hurry so. He 
 would gather more flowers to take with him. What 
 if they do wither? there is fragrance in them. 
 
 The temptations of this period are increasingly 
 dangerous. Sin, instead of looking to be the dread- 
 ful thing it used to seem, has a sort of wild fas- 
 cination for him. The little world of childhood 
 looks commonplace. The wanderlust rages like a 
 fever within him. The supreme confidence in his 
 parents and teachers is shaken. They do n't know 
 it all. He does n't yet, but will soon. He is n't 
 so sure of the Bible as he was. There are so many 
 things that have been told him concerning which 
 he is now doubtful. He must find out himself. 
 141 
 
THE SOUL OF A CHILD 
 
 Some fallacies regarding this time we would 
 protest against. One is that the soul must sin — 
 that it is necessary for the youth to find out by 
 bitter experience the sort of husks prodigals feed 
 on — that he will be a better man because of it. 
 One is never better for doing wrong. Innocence 
 is like the down on the wings of the butterfly. It 
 is made to stay on and not to rub off. The child 
 need never lose it, nor cease for a single moment 
 to be a Christian. 
 
 But while it is not necessary nor desirable for 
 the youth to sin, nor even to backslide, it is also 
 not possible for him to go back to the unquestioning 
 piety that his soul drank in with the peaceful joys 
 of simple childhood. The railroad of life runs 
 trains in only one direction. 
 
 What, then, shall he do? We answer, the 
 period of his consecration has come. It is now for 
 him to decide whether he will choose to follow 
 the Christ of his childhood. The gospel call rings 
 in his ears. The Holy Spirit speaks to his soul. 
 The decisions of the child years have been made 
 almost unconsciously. He has come to his full con- 
 sciousness. He stands at the fork of the roads. 
 142 
 
GROWING PAINS 
 
 His manhood is before him. With the gracious 
 atmosphere of the Christian Church around him, 
 with the course of his habits already fixed by the 
 years of his Christian childhood, it is almost pre- 
 determined what his choice will be: and yet into 
 that choice he throws every faculty of his awakened 
 soul and dawning manhood. 
 
 If there is a revival service in the Church, or a 
 Decision Day in the Sunday school, that becomes 
 the motive power and the providential occasion of 
 his choice and consecration. He is getting out in 
 the world, and his soul calls for a public confession. 
 
 Sometimes his mother or his Sunday school 
 teacher flutters around and says: "Why! he has 
 been a Christian boy for years. What does this 
 mean?" Frequently, in the glow of feeling and 
 enthusiasm over his new choice, he makes the mis- 
 take of looking with doubt or disdain on those early 
 years and says: "I did n't know what I was doing 
 then. Now I understand. Now I am a Christian!" 
 Never mind, as the years go by he can get himself 
 classified and catalogued. The important thing now 
 is for him to be true to the light that shines from 
 heaven onto his pathway and to find out 
 143 
 
THE SOUL OF A CHILD 
 
 How near is grandeur to our dust, 
 
 How close is God to man, 
 When the voice of duty whispers, "Thou must," 
 
 The youth replies, "I can!" 
 
 The appeal of the higher Christian life is timely 
 at this milestone on the road. That furnishes a 
 logical connection between his early Christian life 
 and the more excellent way opening before him now. 
 But after all the important thing is not the label, 
 but the life! 
 
 B. Fay Mills tells of an old lady who was seen 
 going through the streets of a city carrying a pan 
 of fire and a pitcher of water. When asked what 
 she was going to do, she replied, "With this water 
 I mean to quench hell, and with this fare I mean 
 to burn heaven, that people may be good not for 
 selfish reasons, but for goodness' own sake." Of 
 course, that parable is based on a crude, unethical, 
 and unscriptural conception of heaven, but its clos- 
 ing ideal, "goodness for goodness' own sake," is the 
 call that appeals to the altruistic years of dawning 
 youth. In addition to this, the call to service meets 
 with warm and eager approval. His young soul 
 glows with chivalry and aches to be useful. That 
 144 
 
 
GROWING PAINS 
 
 summons ringing over the suffering centuries wins 
 many volunteers from the young men who are 
 strong. 
 
 The Son of God goes forth to war, 
 
 A kingly crown to gain; 
 His blood-red banner streams afar. 
 
 Who follows in his train? 
 Who best can drink his cup of woe, 
 
 Triumphant over pain, 
 
 He follows in His train. 
 
 When in response to his consecration and choice 
 the life more abundant pours into his soul, he finds 
 that with it comes a renewed love for the blessed 
 familiar things of the good old days. Before that 
 he felt he was growing away from his father and 
 mother — now he finds himself coming naturally into 
 more sympathetic fellowship with them. He was 
 getting to view his Bible with suspicion; now he 
 makes it his Guide-book. 
 
 His doubts are not gone forever. As long as 
 he thinks they will come; but his faith is bigger 
 than his doubts, and his love and his loyalty keep 
 him true. Thus does the child soul come through 
 its growing pains to the soul of a youth and the 
 soul of a man. 
 
 10 145 
 
THE SOUL OF A CHILD 
 
 The experience we have given is a typical one. 
 We do not say it is universal. Souls and flowers 
 grow up toward the sunlight each in his own way. 
 There is no hard and fast rule for either. Many 
 souls doubtless avoid the crisis we have described by 
 opening their hearts day by day to the grace of God 
 as the vision of manhood dawns clearer and nearer. 
 In either case the child's Christian experience has 
 the same relation to the Christian experience of the 
 youth as the buds of May to the full-bloom roses 
 of June. 
 
 146 
 
CHAPTER XXII 
 
 The Child and the Church 
 
 Every child should belong to the Church. This 
 is different from saying that every child should 
 be a member of the Church, although in popular 
 dialect the two statements are practically synony- 
 mous. 
 
 If we could answer easily and offhand the ques- 
 tion asked in Chapter V, "What is a child?" the 
 discussion of the relation of the child to the Church 
 would be much simpler. If a child is a sinner he 
 belongs outside the Church. If he is a Christian 
 he belongs inside the Church. If he is neither, 
 until he chooses to be, but a child-soul with his 
 back to the east and his face to the west and the 
 long pilgrimage all before him — where shall we 
 place him as to his relation to the organized 
 Church of our Lord Jesus Christ? 
 
 Our answer in Methodist phraseology is that 
 he is a probationer. We confess to a dislike to 
 this word, however, although it has had a long 
 147 
 
THE SOUL OF A CHILD 
 
 and honorable history among us. Its present use 
 in secular circles suggests a back entry rather than 
 a front porch. Students placed in probation in our 
 colleges are not on the way in, but on the way out. 
 We hope to see some sensible General Conference 
 substitute the phrase, "preparatory membership" for 
 this other venerated but backslidden term. 
 
 To sail between Scylla and Charybdis is not 
 easy, but it is exhilarating and muscle-making. The 
 true word in ethics, theology, and religion is usu- 
 ally spoken by the man who steers his ship on that 
 course. 
 
 In the matter under discussion there are two 
 dangers to be avoided. The one is that rigid ideal- 
 ism which in its eagerness to preserve the spiritual 
 character of the Church, builds around it a wall 
 so high, so cold and forbidding that timid souls 
 and child souls are everlastingly walled out. Har- 
 riet Beecher Stowe makes one of her characters 
 say, and somehow we feel instinctively that he is 
 really speaking her own convictions: "I hold Jona- 
 than Edwards to have been the greatest man since 
 St. Augustine that Christianity has turned out. 
 But when a great man, instead of making himself 
 148 
 
THE CHILD AND THE CHURCH 
 
 a great ladder for feeble folks to climb on, strikes 
 away the ladder and bids them come to where he 
 stands at a step, his greatness and his goodness both 
 may prove unfortunate for those who come after." 
 
 This attitude has caused many ministers' sons 
 and deacons' daughters to stay outside the Church. 
 To quote again from the gifted author just men- 
 tioned: "Now it's a true proverb, 'Call a man a 
 thief and he '11 steal ; 'give a dog a bad name and 
 he '11 bite you,' tell a child he is 'a member of 
 Christ, a child of God and inheritor of the King- 
 dom of heaven,' and he feels to say the least civilly 
 disposed toward religion." 
 
 It is in accordance with the genius of Meth- 
 odism that although her ideals of Church mem- 
 bership have been high, like her Master she has 
 always been tender toward young children. Her 
 theological foundation has been the "unconditional 
 benefits of the atonement," and with this premise 
 to make them feel easy as to their orthodoxy, Meth- 
 odist ministers have wisely concluded that children 
 are "in the Kingdom." There is and always has 
 been a wide difference of opinion as to what that 
 phrase really means, but the practical result has 
 149 
 
THE SOUL OF A CHILD 
 
 been that save in a few rigid instances it has been 
 made easy for the children of the Christian home 
 to come into preparatory membership at least in 
 the Church of Christ. And while the author of 
 this book writes as a Methodist, he is aware that 
 this attitude is by no means peculiar to his denom- 
 ination, and before a single Wesleyan itinerant 
 threaded his way in the American wilderness the 
 Cambridge platform had declared that the child 
 of the faithful is "already a member in the Church 
 of Christ, in covenant with God, and so, if not re- 
 generate, is yet in a more hopeful way of attaining 
 regeneration and all spiritual blessings, both of the 
 covenant and real." 
 
 And the students of Church history tell us that 
 when the Puritans were making this platform they 
 were using old and well-seasoned timber, that from 
 the very beginning it has been a part of the Chris- 
 tian strategy of the Church to capture households 
 and families for the Christ and the Kingdom. 
 
 We borrow this term, "Christian strategy," from 
 
 the discussion of this subject by Dr. Olin A. Curtis 
 
 in his "Christian Faith," and we insert here as the 
 
 summary of what we have endeavored to say and 
 
 150 
 
THE CHILD AND THE CHURCH 
 
 as a clear statement of what we believe the fathers, 
 consciously or unconsciously, meant when they 
 spoke of children as "in the Kingdom" these words 
 from this same book: "These helpless and unde- 
 veloped and innocent children the Church has a 
 right to claim as her own wards to bring them 
 up on the inside of the rich life of the holy cath- 
 olic Church." 
 
 In thus bringing them up, however, we believe 
 that our point must be sacredly guarded. No man 
 can be a Christian by proxy. No man — no child — 
 can be a Christian unless he chooses to be. The 
 gracious Spirit of God will not break into a child 
 soul. He respects the awful fact that the child is 
 the keeper of his own castle. The Christ will not 
 intrude. He stands at the door and knocks. 
 
 That is why we have called the child a pro- 
 bationer rather than a member of the Christian 
 Church. And we are aware that in saying proba- 
 tioner we are using that historic word in a differ- 
 ent sense from that which is common among us, 
 a difference that the Methodist Discipline recog- 
 nizes and requires pastors to report baptized chil- 
 dren in a separate list from those enrolled because 
 151 
 
THE SOUL OF A CHILD 
 
 they have a desire to flee from the wrath to come 
 and to be saved from their sins. We are not par- 
 ticular as to names or labels ; what we mean is, that 
 the Church is to be in a peculiar sense the mother, 
 protector, and teacher of the little children who 
 flock its portals or wander shepherdless on the 
 neighboring hills, and that is all we do mean. That 
 is as far as the Church can go without robbing the 
 child soul of that most Godlike possession, his per- 
 sonal freedom. Dr. Henry C. Sheldon says: 
 "After generous room has been conceded to the 
 charitable assumption that the child trained in 
 Christian teachings will become in spirit and truth 
 a disciple of Christ, his own choice and line of con- 
 duct should be allowed to determine his standing 
 as being within or without the circle of Church- 
 fellowship proper." 
 
 We are very eager that Methodism shall not 
 let its passion for statistical size allow it to be 
 superficial at this point. Children love to join 
 things. They like to dress in white and go in 
 throngs. If we believed as do the sacerdotal 
 Churches in the inherent power of the sacraments 
 to transform and sanctify, we could consistently 
 152 
 
THE CHILD AND THE CHURCH 
 
 marshal them at our altars regardless of their pres- 
 ent spiritual experience, if we believed as do the 
 so-called liberal Churches, that a subjective religious 
 experience is unnecessary, we might do likewise; 
 but if the Master's requirement of the birth from 
 above is still our watchword and our passion, in 
 building the temple of our God we must, like the 
 saintly Theodore L. Cuyler, "handle each stone 
 separately" and insist that each child soul shall have 
 personally appropriated his heritage in grace before 
 becoming an enrolled member of the Church mili- 
 tant. 
 
 We are not kind to the child if by refusing to 
 insist upon their necessity we rob him of his vision 
 of those saving experiences in grace which must 
 ever be the foundation of the Christian certainty 
 of thoughtful souls. It is better to keep him wait- 
 ing at the portals of the Church until he "sees the 
 light." 
 
 *53 
 
CHAPTER XXIII 
 
 The Child in the Church 
 
 In our last chapter we left the child "waiting at 
 the Church." The Church of Christ has not done 
 its duty by the child or ministered unto him as 
 beautifully as it is its divine privilege to minister 
 if it is content merely to tell him the lofty truths 
 concerning which we have spoken, and then leave 
 him to decide the matter for himself, unhelped. 
 Such a course would be contrary to the whole 
 genius of Christianity, whose Christ came all the 
 way to Calvary not only to make possible our sal- 
 vation, but also to help us decide right the question 
 that makes our fate. 
 
 The writer confesses to have entered the Chris- 
 tian ministry with a prejudice against infant bap- 
 tism. The emphasis upon the ethical and volitional 
 that have always seemed to him so vitally and eter- 
 nally important, made him not feel so cordial 
 toward a rite in which the person most vitally con- 
 cerned could not voluntarily participate. However, 
 154 
 

 THE CHILD IN THE CHURCH 
 
 a saintly teacher, the late Samuel F. Upham, of 
 blessed memory, said frequently to his classes, and 
 the writer listened eagerly, as he did to all that 
 fell from the lips of that prophet: "I shall never 
 forget how, when I was a naughty boy, my mother 
 would take me in her arms and say to me: 'You 
 must not be bad. You are God's little boy. I gave 
 you to Him in holy baptism;' and it has followed 
 me all my life." Dr. Upham was well up toward 
 the threescore years and ten when he uttered those 
 words and his brow was crowned with snow, but 
 his voice choked and the tears ran down his cheeks 
 unrestrained — and a hush filled his class room! 
 Somehow, with the memory of that hush in his soul, 
 a budding young preacher would find it hard to be 
 an Anabaptist. 
 
 When he plunged into the work of eager evan- 
 gelism, this young preacher soon discovered that 
 those who responded first to the appeal and who 
 showed the finest staying qualities after their con- 
 version were those who were consecrated to God 
 in holy baptism in their infancy. Therefore, he 
 concludes that by this sacred rite of Christening — ■ 
 let the "i" in the word be pronounced long and 
 1 55 
 
THE SOUL OF A CHILD 
 
 you see something of its beautiful significance — the 
 Church of Jesus Christ can help the child soul to 
 decide right. 
 
 Just how this helps it may be impossible to ex- 
 plain. There is no mechanical or chemical change 
 brought about by the external rite. The water is 
 not holy save as it spills into somebody's soul — 
 but it usually does. Hardened indeed is the parent 
 whose attitude toward his child is not made dif- 
 ferent by the sacred spell of the hour. How much 
 the child himself knows about it or is affected by 
 it even the psychologist can not tell us. We can 
 not escape the fact that the years that make our 
 disposition, if not our character, are the years we 
 can remember nothing about in later life — they are 
 hidden in the golden mist of babyhood. If the day 
 and the hour and the rite place no mark on the 
 baby-soul— the influence it makes in the home in 
 those early years surrounds it with a fragrance like 
 that with which the lilac bush flooded the sunlit 
 parlor. 
 
 The Church of Jesus Christ should ever remem- 
 ber its responsibility to the baptized children. They 
 are adopted as it were by the bride of the Christ. 
 156 
 
THE CHILD IN THE CHURCH 
 
 They belong to her as Samuel belonged to the 
 tabernacle. For them she is peculiarly responsible 
 before earth and heaven. It is not enough that 
 they be taught in class and Sunday school. With 
 the same eagerness with which the wakeful mother 
 listens until the last child comes in, the whole 
 Church should eagerly seek and wistfully wait 
 until every one of them by personal choice be- 
 comes in life and heart a Christian. 
 
 A minister's wife was taking her two little girls 
 of seven and nine years to the communion table. 
 The other children in the small chapel stared and 
 smiled. The little maidens themselves smiled back 
 brightly, but partook of the sacred emblems. After- 
 wards one of them said to her mother, "Margaret 
 laughed at us because we took the Lord's Supper." 
 The mother smiled tenderly and said, "Did you 
 tell her mamma said it was all right for you to do 
 so?" Did that child understand fully the meaning 
 of the holy sacrament? She did not. Do you, my 
 esteemed and profound reader? She did under- 
 stand what it meant to desire to lead a new life. 
 She was in love and charity with her neighbors, 
 too — which, sad to say, was a little more than could 
 157 
 
THE SOUL OF A CHILD 
 
 be said of some of the gray-haired Church members 
 who walked unblushingly to the altar rail. Her 
 mother, whose own soul had learned the precious- 
 ness of it all, was right in thinking her little daugh- 
 ters were entitled to this help in making the right 
 choice and living the white life. 
 
 In our discussion of the child's Christian ex- 
 perience we said the child's conversion was the 
 childhood habit of turning from sin to Christ. We 
 do not say that the child should wait until this 
 habit is strong with the years before he takes upon 
 him the obligation of Church membership. Far 
 are we from declaring that he should know all 
 the visions and revelations of the Lord that are 
 coming to him on earth before doing so. Then 
 would it be simultaneous with his translation. As 
 soon as there is a choice, that in the opinion of 
 those who know children and know Christ — unless 
 one knows both he is not authority on this ques- 
 tion — represents a real, personal choice, which is 
 sure to bring from the Christ a personal reply in 
 the heart, the child is a proper candidate for 
 Church membership and service. 
 
 We have been speaking of some of the ways 
 158 
 

 THE CHILD IN THE CHURCH 
 
 the Church can help the child to make this per- 
 sonal choice. There are many more. And, most 
 of all, can the Church help by counting the child 
 in in all its plans and services. There is doubtless 
 a need in some places for a special children's 
 Church — but in reality every Church should be a 
 children's Church. There is no foundation in 
 Scripture or history for a Church that is merely for 
 adults, any more than for a Sunday school merely 
 for children. They both belong in both. We will 
 help the child most not by segregating him, but 
 by including him! The ordinary revival meeting 
 will do him more good than the average children's 
 meeting. Holy communion is better for his soul 
 than the Junior League. We are not speaking 
 against these institutions either. They are all good 
 in their place, but "these ye ought to have done 
 and not left the other undone." 
 
 Some ministers have a habit of giving a short 
 sermon to children before their usual Sunday morn- 
 ing discourse. This is proper and sometimes de- 
 sirable — although it would be just as proper and 
 perhaps just as desirable to give a special sermon 
 to young men or old ladies in the same way. Gen- 
 159 
 
THE SOUL OF A CHILD 
 
 erally speaking, every sermon should be a children's 
 sermon. The child won't understand all of it — 
 but neither will the trustees. The child may un- 
 derstand some parts of it the trustees do not. He 
 may keep awake better! A sermon that is over 
 the heads of the children is apt to be over the 
 heads of everybody else; in the opinion of every- 
 body except the preacher it may really be under 
 their heels, dealing with geology instead of life. 
 The Sermon on the Mount is as intelligible to the 
 primary department as to the adult Bible class. 
 
 If minister and Church, possessed of the spirit 
 of the Christ, to whose garments the little children 
 clung, will devote themselves to helping the children 
 each for himself to decide to open his heart to the 
 Christ-life and follow in His steps, we will not find 
 many of them lingering outside the portals of the 
 Christian Church. 
 
 1 60 
 
CHAPTER XXIV 
 
 The Church and the Child 
 
 A beautiful little girl, now in heaven, was show- 
 ing a stranger around her home town ; that stran- 
 ger will be well content if he finds this same 
 gracious and kindly ministering one waiting to show 
 him over the heavenly city. As they passed a 
 white wooden building with its upward-pointing 
 spire the child said, with an air of happy pro- 
 prietorship, "That is our church." 
 
 It is fine when a child feels that the church 
 belongs to her, just as her father belongs to her, or 
 her home. To really deserve that rare tribute from 
 childish lips the Church should do several things 
 for the child which we will here enumerate. ( I ) 
 // should teach the child reverence. It is hardly 
 natural for humanity to be reverent. Almighty 
 God had to keep a perpetual thunder shower going 
 on top of Mt. Sinai to get the children of Israel 
 in a proper frame of mind while He gave them 
 His law. This present generation with its roaring 
 " 161 
 
THE SOUL OF A CHILD 
 
 democracy is not prone to be reverent. Unless the 
 child soul learns it somewhere, he can not come to 
 his own spiritual heritage. Moreover, the land of 
 to-morrow will be lawless, homeless, flagless, and 
 godless. The Church or the representative of the 
 Christ should teach the child soul this lesson. 
 
 Art and architecture will help. Let modern 
 church builders read Exodus and Leviticus before 
 they go on building music halls and barns in which 
 to worship the Lord in the beauty of holiness. 
 
 As Frederic Knowles says: 
 
 Our lips shall have no sneer 
 
 For the spire, the mosque, the ark; 
 
 Broken symbols shall be dear 
 
 If they point us through the dark. 
 
 The attitude of the worshipers will have even 
 more to do in creating an atmosphere of reverence. 
 Some of us can remember the communion service 
 in an old Congregational meeting-house, bare of 
 furnishings and of ritual, yet as the white cloth 
 was uncovered and the deacon walked solemnly 
 around there was a silence only broken by our own 
 beating hearts. The sin of Protestantism to-day 
 is irreverence. It starts with the minister and or- 
 162 
 
THE CHURCH AND THE CHILD 
 
 ganist and choir and ends on the back seats. The 
 child soul is taking it all in. Let us all go forward 
 for prayers and do better! 
 
 (2) // should instruct the child in the truths 
 of the Bible. We are not thinking now of the 
 pulpit — although it might be well if American 
 preachers should not worry over the reporters so 
 much, get over being topic-mad, and like the mas- 
 terly expositors across the sea, be content to open 
 up the Scriptures. 
 
 "The Sunday school is the Church specializing 
 in the work of teaching." We heard this remark 
 at a convention and wrote it down in our memory. 
 We would add, "teaching the Bible." 
 
 We hear some things said about employing paid 
 teachers to do this. We have seen some of these, 
 and heard of more. That teacher who said to her 
 pastor with a glowing face, "The last of my pupils 
 has now come to Jesus," was a paid teacher. She 
 had opened up a heavenly bank account. 
 
 We believe, after all, this is the best kind of 
 
 paid teachers. We do not need specialists as much 
 
 as we need folks who are showing how the gospel 
 
 truths work in everyday life. An intelligent knowl- 
 
 163 
 
THE SOUL OF A CHILD 
 
 edge of the conclusions of higher criticism may be 
 a good thing for the teacher to possess, but a saving 
 knowledge of how the promises of God work is 
 better. The real weakness of the preacher's appeal 
 is that he is paid for making it. It is necessary in 
 his case, but the least professionalism we can get 
 along with tends to fruitfulness and peace. There- 
 fore, let those who live in Berea continue to count 
 it a priceless privilege to teach a little child the 
 Holy Scriptures. 
 
 (3) It should furnish the child a wholesome 
 social environment. It should supply him with his 
 books and his chums. It is as natural for him to be 
 sociable as religious. He will look for social life 
 somewhere. The devil has an abundant supply of 
 emissaries ready to entertain him. This is where 
 the Junior League should come in — and all the other 
 clean, bright, wholesome, sociable things invented 
 by consecrated brains. 
 
 Is a word of caution necessary? Perhaps not, 
 but we can not forbear saying that the child does 
 not need silly things to interest him. It is grown-up 
 men and women who like to try to pretend that 
 they are young who revel in "donkey parties." The 
 164 
 
THE CHURCH AND THE CHILD 
 
 child finds that which gives him a finer outlook 
 on this wonderful world more fascinating, and need- 
 less to say it is more appropriate for the Church 
 to deal in that sort of articles. A good friend, an 
 awakening book, a finer sense of refinement, a 
 stronger purpose to be good for something — these 
 are the pearls that should be passed around to chil- 
 dren at Church sociables. 
 
 (4) 77 should minister to his spiritual nature. 
 This, of course, most of all. It should not rest — 
 meaning its members — should not rest until the 
 children of its constituency and the shepherdless 
 children beyond are brought into saving fellowship 
 with Jesus Christ. This is old-fashioned, but it 
 is infinitely important. The very plastic character 
 of the child's mind and heart is pathetic in its 
 appeal. Let us prayerfully engrave this on our 
 hearts. 
 
 (5) It should offer an opportunity for the ex- 
 pression of the child's religious life. We have 
 already entered our plea for the child's rights in 
 the Church services. They are his. Let him feel 
 it and know it. Let the children sing "Hosannah." 
 
 165 
 
CHAPTER XXV 
 
 Postlude 
 
 Who can consider the child soul, the child world, 
 and the child dreams without being homesick? We 
 exclaim with the poet: 
 
 Backward, turn backward, ye hours, in your flight; 
 Make me a child again just for to-night. 
 
 The world seems rough and desert. Even its 
 applause is empty, its honors tinsel, and we long 
 to pillow our hot heads in mother's lap and feel 
 her cool hand on our brow. 
 
 We want a drink of water from the well at 
 Bethlehem. We want to go "back to Griggsby's 
 Station, where we used to be so happy and so poor." 
 We want the old-fashioned flowers, the old- 
 fashioned joys, and the old-fashioned friends of 
 auld lang syne. But*^ 
 
 All are scattered now and fled, 
 Some are married, some are dead, 
 And when I ask with throbs of pain 
 Ah ! when shall they all meet again 
 
 1 66 
 
POSTLUDE 
 
 As in the days long since gone by? 
 The ancient timepiece makes reply, 
 
 "Forever — never, 
 
 Never — forever." 
 
 This is a lonesome spot to close a book. There- 
 fore, bashfully, like an amateur singer at a concert, 
 but with the consciousness of having a song we 
 fain would sing, we pen here the words which well 
 up from our own mind and heart and give us peace : 
 
 When in other lands we wander, 
 And in distant paths we roam, 
 
 How our hearts grow warm and tender 
 When at night we think of home ! 
 
 And the hills we loved in childhood 
 
 Seem to charm us from afar, 
 As they did when o'er their summits 
 
 We beheld the evening star. 
 
 Our lives are but a journey 
 
 Round the circle, through the glen, 
 
 And when shadows fall at even 
 We shall all come home again. 
 
 In the dear home paths we '11 wander, 
 And the years that took their flight 
 
 In our joy will be forgotten 
 When we all get home at night. 
 
 I6 7 
 
THE SOUL OF A CHILD 
 
 And the Father, who has missed us 
 When so weary we did roam, 
 
 And the Savior, who has loved us, 
 Will receive us, "Welcome Home. 
 
 168 
 
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