^ i-^ ■ V PRCXBLEMS^ OF YhE CITY. nv^ No. Ill Xhe Bii^le in Schools. W. W. EVERTS, D.D CHICAGO : KENXEY & SUMNER, PUBLISHERS Xo. no Dearborn Street. 1870. ORJCAL SURVEY PROBLEMS OF THE CITY. No. Ill The Bible in Schools, W. W. EVERTS, D.D. CHICAGO : KENNEY & SUMNER, PUBLISHERS, No. no Dearborn Strebt. 1870. PROBLEMS OF THE CITY. The first three numbers of the series are now published. The appearance of "Bible in Schools" may not appear inap- propriate to this series if it is considered that cities will be the scene of the School controversy. The chief problems of human welfare and destiny are reached, and pressed for solution, in cities, I. Theater ; or. Popular Amusements. II. Temptations of City Life. III. The Bible In Schools. IV. Social Position and Influence of Aggregated Populations. V. Principles and Frauds of Commerce. VI. Responsibilities of Service ; or, Employers and Employed. VII. Power and Responsibility of the Press, especially Journalism. VIII. Sphere and Influence of Fine Arts. IX. Charity; its Claims and True Methods. X. The Sabbath ; Its Restoration and Promise. XI. Christian Profession ; its Purity and Perils. This series of publications will be pursued as suitable contri- butions are offered, and encouragement warrants. KENNEY & SUMNER, no Dearborn Street, Chicago. Entered, according to Act of Congress, in the year 1870, by W. W. EVERTS, In the Clerk's Office of the District Court of the United States for the District of Northern Illinois, £vS5t THE BIBLE IN THE PUBLIC SCHOOLS. THE WORD OF GOD. DivmE thought or will expressed is the word of God. Repeated and multiplied expressions of Divine will grew, necessarily, into a body of sacred traditions, or holy writings. The prophets accepted the histories and laws of Moses as the word of God. Christ came not to destroy, but to fulfill the law and the prophets. By frequent allusions, he recognizes the Divine authority and universal obKgation of this collection of sacred writings. The supremacy of Christ attests the supreme author- ity of the Christian Scriptures, completed in the record of his life and doctrines. In them is closed up the canon of Divine revelation. Miracles performed, prophecies fulfilled, their beneficent influence, self- evidencing power and wonderful preservation, together with testimony of the wise and good, proclaim these sacred writings the book of God, and the god of books. Already the sacred book of the master-races, it is des- tined to become the sacred book of all the world. 4 THE BIBLE IN SCHOOLS. But, should this book continue to hold the place assigned to it by our fathers in public education ? COVENANTS OF THE PAST. As source of distinguishing and formative elements and traditions of the Republic, the Bible should be recognized and honored in public education. All society is established on some system of fundamental opinions, giving scope to thought and feeling, con- science and duty, usage and law. These antecedent judgments, traditions, and customs, in the origin of states are incorporated into law and order. They are the inspiration of patriotism, and heroic spirit, cher- ished by the eloquence and minstrelsy of bards, till moulded into institutional forms. They are a law of national development and obligation. The great English orator and statesman, Burke, declares that "this great law does not arise from conventions* and compacts. On the contrary, it gives to conventions and compacts all the force they have. It does not arise from our own institutions, but from the will of God, revealed in the order of Providence, out of which they were formed — their source and superior in authority." This law, interpreted and sanctioned by religion, has shaped the civilization and enforced the political institutions of all ages. In Buddhism, it gave force to the political institutions of China and Japan, and assured the veneration and loyalty of countless mil- lions of subjects. In the Yeda and Koran, it has moulded states and empires, given permanence to their civilization and sanction to their laws. THE BIBLE IN SCHOOLS. 6 In the Bible, it has imparted new forms of law and order to the nations of Europe. In freer and more distinctive operation, it has determined the civilization and political institutions of our Kepublic. All that is different from the civilization of Asia and Europe is traceable to the character of om* Pilgrim Fathers, their open Bible, and purer Christianitj. " "What sought they thus afar ? Bright jewels of the mines ? The wealth of seas, the spoils of war ? They sought a faith's pure shrine ! Freedom to worship God." What brought they thus afar ? Highest Christian manhood, enthusiasm for civil and religious liberty — a holy book — a holy day — a holy faith — a holy brotherhood — equality before God — belief in the spiritual nature and destiny of man — and the divine sanction of virtue. These new, all-pervading elements of our civilization are the only philosophical explana- tion of its superiority and promise — the mould in which the state was cast — the die that has given expression to national character, and designated us, in the language of history and the speech of the world, a Christian nation. A late historian of morals declares " Christianity is the most powerful lever ever applied to the affairs of men." " ^o other religion has ever combined so many distinct elements and attractions." Unlike Judaism, stoical philosophy, and the religions of Egypt, " it united with its distinctive teachings a pure and noble system of ethics, and proved itself capable of realizing it in action." Edward Everett, in an address before the Bible 6 THE BIBLE IN SCHOOLS. Society, with equal explicitness, declares that all the distinctive features and superiority of our civilization and republican institutions are derived from the teach- ings of Christianity; that our purer law and order are the exponents of our holier religion, as the low condition of the population of India is of the inferior faith of the Koran and Yeda. Entrusted with this mission of freedom, shall we go back to the Egypt of political bondage, or follow guiding pillars of Provi- dence to the Canaan of the world's political aspiration and destiny. There must be limits to the right of the present to reverse the order of the past. There is a popular fallacy, derivable from an ignorant or narrow interpretation of our famous proclamation, that government is derived from the sense of the gov- erned. It is a great truth, asserted of the accumu- lated experience and enlightened sense of the age, interpreting the obligations of former traditions, exist- ing laws, and providential directions ; but a dangerous sophism affirmed of the superficial judgment of a generation deriding old landmarks, swayed by the passion of the hour, eager, aspiring, self-sufficient. The voice of the people should be heard above the utterance of ruler, cabinet, or court ; but, while they may be authoritative interpreters, there is a law immu- table, an obligation imperative, and this is the voice of God in the history of the world. The idea that current opinion, or capricious popular judgment, and not the wisdom of ages, is the sole arbiter of law, would make law and order impossible. Law cannot delay its sanction and penalties till men in each generation deliberate and accept its jurisdic- THE BIBLE IN SCHOOLS. 7 tion. The Divine appointment of the Sabbath law was not delayed until the race experienced its necessity and voluntarily chose its authority. It did not grow out of their spiritual culture and choice, but to pro- mote and assure that culture. So, the Decalogue was not adjusted to existing moral judgments and volun- tary requirements of the Hebrews, but to correct those judgments and elevate moral character and aims. And so the majesty of law does not submit its authority to the voluntary approval of each generation before enforcing its claims. It is not at the option of each generation rising to intelligence to accept or not the order of Providence, constitution and government. Or then would order be impossible, anarchy universal, the race no wiser than a generation or individual. While Paganism, Mohammedanism, Papacy, work out the problem of their civilization, shall Christianity be denied the methods and instruments for accom- plishing her mission ? Paganism has made India and China what they are in the characters, habits, and hopes of the people. Papacy has made Italy, Spain and Mexico just what they are in ignorance, supersti- tion, and bad government. Christianity, with its open Bible, has made the sentiments, principles, usages, law and order of the Republic, what they are. Shall our holiest traditions be ignored in educa- tion ? Shall the life-blood of the state be obstructed in its circulation ? Shall the tree of political insti- tution be girdled, or removed from native and con- genial soil to accursed ground of atheism or false religion, to wither and die ? Shall the temple of lib- erty be unsettled from its providential foundations, to 8 THE BIBLE IN SCHOOLS. fall into ruins at the first shock of revolutionary vio- lence, or the first storm of political agitation ? RELIGION ALWAYS A PART OF EDUCATION. The incorporation of religion in the education of all lands and ages requires the continuance of the Bible in our schools. The call of Abraham; the exodus from Egypt; the law given from Sinai ; providential deliverances through the wilderness ; covenants of promise and prophecies of the coming Messiah, were taught in all the education of the Hebrews, in every period and opportunity of instruction. In Egypt, Greece, and Kome, supernatural histories, religious sanctions, and ideas of the gods, were blended in all forms of public instruction. Bedagata and Yeda are treasures of thought and sentiment, and source and standard of public education of China, Japan, and Hindostan. Throughout the wide domain of Islam the Koran is the chief text-book in all schools. Papacy questions the utility of any education without religion. In Protestant, as well as Catholic countries, religious instruction is connected with every school system. In Prussia, instruction is given in "the Bible, and the Catechism, in the positive truths of Christianity." In Austria, it is "based on religion and governed and moulded by the state." Switzerland, France, Holland, provide for and require religious training. Lord Brougham, in judicial decision upon the school system of England, declared " courts of equity in this THE BIBLE IN SCHOOLS. 9 country will not sanction any system of education in wliicli reliction is not included." In foundins: Harvard, Yale, and other American colleges, the propagation of Christianity as a leading purpose of higher, as well as of popular education, was avowed by their founders, and by all provisions and grants of government. Thus, in all nations and ages, and all forms of faith and civilizations, religion is recognized as a necessary part of public education. An order so universally observed must be an order of nature — a law of God. As judgment of the race against lying, stealing, adultery, attests the judgment of God, so universal recognition of vital relations of religion to education attests natural and binding law. The fanaticism branding what is universal as false ; what mankind cling to as arrant imposture ; and hold- ing only that true which is blasphemous ; the highest wisdom the widest dissent from the judgment of mankind ; and the most manly independence contempt for truth and duty — would, of course, scorn the authority of this universal precedent. Following its instincts, we might cast away our hats, so commonly worn ; refuse to sleep, eat, or walk — such vulgar exercises ! protest against the order of the seasons and the law of gravitation, ignorant masses so obse- quiously conform to ! As mankind have believed ideas of the supernatural the atmosphere of great thought, lofty sentiment and ennobling aspiration in popular education, we should at once and forever discard such ancient and common- place notions ! As religion has been enforced as a necessary part of 1^ 10 THE BIBLE IN SCHOOLS. education, in all lands and ages, it ouglit, according to this philosophy, to be wholly divorced from the schools of this enlightened age ! Let not the Republic be misled by this mania for reform, and venture upon the odious singularity, the exceptional impiety, the profane experiment, of divor- cing religion from popular education. Especially let it not be betrayed into this experiment in defiance of organic law and constitutional provisions, venerable precedent, and the enlightened public opinion of the country, by adventurous politicians, instigated by a revolutionary infidelity and a despotic hierarchy, owing no allegiance to the country, while plotting for the overthrow of our free education and our free institu- tions. COMMON LAW RECOGNIZED IN EDUCATION. As a part of tlie common law, Christianity should constitute a part of the common education. As there can be no religion without some form or symbol of worship, appeal to religious sanctions, in the Declaration of Independence, in the Articles of Confederation of the States, in the charter of the E'orthwestern Territory, in provisions for education, endowments of charitable and reform institutions, and in the constitution of legislative assemblies and courts, is manifestly an appeal to the Christian Scriptures, as the accepted form and law of religion, brought to the new world by the framers of the Republic, cherished in the homes of the Colonists, and revered throughout the land as the word of God. This interpretation is made certain by the history of the Government. Ap- THE BIBLE IN SCHOOLS. 11 pealing to religion, in oaths of office, the Chief Magis- trate, members of Cabinet, members of Congress, and of the Judiciary, governors, legislators, and other officials of the States, are sworn upon the Bible, the source of these religious sanctions. Witnesses before courts deliver their testimony upon the authority of the same holy book. In providing for religious instruc- tion in the army and navy, in reform schools and prisons, copies of the Scriptures are placed in the hands of the teachers of religion. The Bible was the symbol of religion recognized by our fathers, and incorporated into the forms of education, and the sanctions of law and order. They did not recognize Koran, Veda, Bedagata, Age of Reason, book of Pos- itive Philosophy, as equal to the Bible. Such an attempt would have awakened universal dissatisfaction, if not universal indignation throughout the colonies. Always and everywhere declaring that "religion, morality, and kno^vdedge are essentially necessary to good government," they referred to the teachings and authority of the Christian Scriptures as the religion, and consequently part of the common law of the land. As Yeda and. Koran enter into the common law of the nations of the East ; particular forms of Christian- ity into the political constitutions of Europe, Christian- ity itself, the purest law, the highest standard of religion, the formative element of national character, the holiest tradition of our ancestors, must be accepted as a part of the common law of the Republic. What more effective rules of common law obtain than the family order, the Decalogue, and the Sermon on the Mount? All legislation is held amenable to these 12 THE BIBLE IN SCHOOLS. institutes of Christianity. No statute contrary to them would be constitutional. Blackstone declares " Chris- tianity is part of the common law of England." For the same reasons of tradition, popular faith, recognized sanction, assimilating power, enforced use, it must be a part of the common law of the Republic. Thus Judge Story, in commenting upon the Constitu- tion, declares, " It is impossible for those who believe in the truth of Christianity as a Divine revelation, to doubt that it is the special duty of government to fos- ter and cherish it among all the citizens and subjects." At the time of the adoption of the Constitution, he adds, " The attempt to level all religions, and to make it a matter of State policy to hold all in utter indiffer- ence, would have created universal disapprobation, if not universal indignation." Webster says, " There is nothing we look upon with more certainty than this principle — that Christianity is the law of the land. This was the case among the Puritans of 'New England, the Episcopalians of the Southern States, the Pennsylvania Quakers, the Bap- tists, the mass of the followers of Whiteiield and Wesley, and the Presbyterians. All brought, and all have adopted, this great truth, and all have sustained it. And where there is any religious sentiment among men at all, this sentiment incorporates itself with the law. Everything declares it. " The generations which have gone before speak to it, and pronounce it from the tomb. We feel it. All, all, proclaim that Christianity, general tolerant Chris- tianity, Christianity independent of sects and parties, that Christianity to which the ^word and fagot are THE BIBLE IN SCHOOLS. 13 unknown, general tolerant Christianity, is the law of the land." Judge Duncan, of Pennsylvania, says : " Chris- tianity is and always has been part of the common law." In the constitutional convention of Xew York, such men as Chancellor Kent, Chief Justice Spencer, Rufus King, and Martin Yan Buren, agreed that " the Chris- tian religion was engrafted upon the law, and entitled to protection as the basis of our morals and the strength of our government." Dr. Hodge says : " This country is a Christian and Protestant country, granting universal toleration ; i. e.^ allowing men of all religions to live within our borders, to acquire pro- perty, to exercise the rights of citizens, and to conduct their religious services according to their own convic- tions of duty. Turkey is a Mohammedan state, grant, ing a very large measure of toleration to men of other religions. Most of the governments in Europe are Roman Catholic states, granting little or no toleration to Protestants. Sweden is a Protestant state, allowing freedom of action only to the Lutheran Church. What is meant by all this ? It means that in Turkey the religion of Mohammed is the common law of the land ; that the Koran regulates and determines the legisla- tive, judicial and executive action of the government. 1^0 law in the country, which does violence to Chris- tianity, can be rightfully enacted by Congress, or by any State legislature. jSTo judicial decision, inconsis- tent with the Bible, can be, according to the supreme law of the land, or morally, obligatory." The manner in which the Bible has incorporated 14 THE BIBLE IN SCHOOLS. itself into the national character, and hence into the common law of this Protestant country, is forcibly de- scribed by a Roman Catholic writer. Dr. ^^ewman : " Who will not say that the uncommon beauty and marvelous English of the Protestant Bible is not one of the great strongholds of heresy in this country ? It lives on the ear like music that can never be forgotten ; like the sound of church bells which the convert hardly knows how he can forego. Its felicities often seem to be almost things rather than mere words. It is part of the national mind, and the anchor of national serious- ness. The memory of the dead passes into it. The potent traditions of childhood are stereotyped in its verses. The power of all the griefs and trials of man are hidden beneath its words. It is the representative of his best moments, and all that has been about him of soft, and gentle, and pure and penitent and good, speaks to him out of his English Bible. It is his sacred thing, which doubt has never dimmed and controversy never soiled. In the length and breadth of the land there is not a Protestant with one spark of religiousness about him, whose spiritual biography is not in the Saxon Bible." Can the Bepublic, in the process of education, vitiate its life-blood and retain political health ? Will she cast away the strong rod and beautiful staif on which she has leaned coming up out of political bondage ? Will she discard the pillar of cloud and of lire which has guided her march through the wilderness of political experiment, and grope after the precedents of extinct nations, or the promise of visionary reformers ? To escape the obligation of Christianity as part of THE BIBLE IN SCHOOLS. 15 the common law, and the consequent duty of teaching it in education, we must ignore our traditions, revise our constitution and laws, unmake our history, defy the precedents of all lands and ages, and repeat the French experiment of political atheism. Majorities have no right to subvert foundations of government and hurry nations to destruction ! Laws may be derived from the sense of the governed in interpreting and applying existing obligations, not in setting them aside. The sense of the governed is always of higher authority in interpreting law and order than the capricious or selfish judgment of rulers. But the sense of rulers or ruled, capriciously or hastily formed, can no more set aside the order of civil gov- ernment than the law of gravitation, order of the seasons, or motions of the heavenly bodies ! These are above people and rulers, interpreted and operative through the course of events and existing institutions. Could the "sense of the governed" deny rights of property, displace family order, blot out the Decalogue, or set aside the Divine sanction of government ? Only the irreligious fanaticism that rejected Christ can plot against the ascendency of Christianity over public opinion, education, and the law and order of the Eepublic. Ignored in education, Christianity is dethroned before the people. RELIGION FORMATIVE PROCESS IN EDUCATION. The necessity of religious ideas and sanctions to the normal process of education requu-es the presence of the Bible in school. The period of education is the period of the plasticity 16 THE BIBLE IN SCHOOLS. of elements of character. Education is the process of moulding these elements. Conducting that process in the absence of religious ideas and obligations, so essential to the symmetry and expression of true ijianhood, is like casting metal into a defective mould. In hardening, the casting must retain that defective type. 'No supplement- ary process can remedy it. Education is the coinage of national character. Any form, feature, or expression of beauty attained, must be represented on the die when the plastic character is subjected to it. Shall the die remain blank ? Shall it bear the cold, distrustful exjDression of scepticism and atheism, or the divine image of faith and virtue ? Education is making and stereotyping national his- tory. After the edition is published, errata pages, with whatever pains and expense introduced, imperfectly amend the reading. Every thought and sentiment necessary to complete history, must be incorporated in setting up type and making up pages in education. The influence of religion in education does not depend so much upon the amount of instruction, as on its vital relation and formative power. Oxygen is but a fifth of the volume of atmosphere, but it is the vital- izing element, nourishing the life and vigor of the breathing world. Eemove the oxygen, and man and beast would perish in the unvitalized air. Take relio^ious thouo:ht, sentiment and sanction from the atmosphere of education, and conscience and char- acter would become enervated, and the race demoral- ized — animalized ! In the photographic process of education, light must fall upon the object from above, and not from THE BIBLE IN SCHOOLS. 17 beneath. As well expect good pictures from tlie flick- ering radiance of a smoking lamp, as resplendent character from the uncertain illumination of mere secular education. All social and political virtues must effloresce from religious faith. In his farewell address, Washington, contemplating the 'very spii'it and class of opinions now disturbing the country in the school question, warned his country- men against the delusion that moral virtues can be trusted to any basis except that of profound religious convictions. " Of all the dispositions and habits which lead to political prosperity, rehgion and moral- ity are indispensable supports. In vain would that man claim the tribute of patriotism who should labor to subvert these great pillars of human happiness, the purest props of the duties of men and citizens. The mere poHtician, equally with the pious man, ought to respect and cherish them. A volume could not trace all their connections with private and public felicity. Whatever may be conceded to the influ- ence of refined education upon minds of a peculiar structure, reason and experience both forbid us to ex- pect that national morality can prevail in exclusion of religious principle." And Webster says : " Our ancestors established this system of government on morality and religious senti- ment. Moral habits, they believed, cannot safely be trusted to any other foundation than religious prin- ciples, nor any government be secure which is not supported by moral habits." Horace Mann, never suspected of sectarianism, says : 18 THK BIBLE IN SCHOOLS. "All intelligent thinkers npon the subject now utterly discard and repudiate the idea that reading and writ- ing, with a knowledge of accounts, constitute educa- ^ tion. The lowest claim which any intelligent man now profess in its behalf is, that its domain extends over the three-fold nature of man — over his body, training it by the systematic, and intelligent observ- ance of those benign laws which secure health, impart strength and prolong life ; over his intellect, invigorat- ing the mind, replenishing it with knowledge, and cultivating all those tastes which are allied to virtue ; and over his mind and religious susceptibilities also, dethroning selfishness, enthroning conscience, leading the affections outwardly in good will towards man, and upward in gratitude and reverence to God. The whole form and constitution of the soul show that, if man be not a religious being, he is among the most depraved and monstrous of all possible existences. His propensities and passions need the fear of God, as a restraint for evil ; and his sentiments and affections need the love of God as a condition, and preliminary to everything worthy of the name of happiness. With- out a capability, therefore, of knowing and venerating his Maker and Preserver, his whole nature is a contra- diction and solecism ; it is a moral absurdity, as strictly go as a triangle with two sides, or a circle without a circumference, is a mathematical absurdity." Lowering the aims of education from developing a true manhood, and shaping character and habits to familiarity with textr-books of science, artH, and history, is as degrading as to sink them from intellecttuil cul- ture and acquisition of knowledge to gymnastic train- THE BIBLE IN SCHOOLS. 19 ing. It is no justification of the dissociation of religion from education by the state, that the family and the church can supply spiritual culture. As we have shown, the religious spirit and appeal should pervade the whole period and process of educa- tion. Whenever and wherever it is left out, the culture must be incomplete, and the type of character formed defective. Besides, when the dissociation is ordered by the state, there is judgment against religion. It is declared to be unnecessary, superfluous. And, if there can be a school without God, there may be a state without God ! But to repudiate the Bible now, to remove it from its time-honoored place in our educational system, is an act of deeper significance than could have been its omission in the beginning of our existence. Infidelity must see in this a national judgment against Chris- tianity. To the world, by such an act, we say, " Reli- gion is no longer important to the state ; it is passing away with the darkness of ages. The Republic has outgrown her faith !" While the state furnishes all deemed important to citizenship — wealth, honor, oflice — why should more be sought ? If the state, with her vast prestige, endowments, and superior opportunities, educates irreligiously, the church can accomplish the moral and spiritual educa- cation of a people only by perpe'ual miracle. Under pretence of avoiding sectarianism, the state would prac- tice atheism. Declaring its education, and law and order complete without religion, its authority and example promote irreligion. 20 THE BIBLE IN SCHOOLS. Mere tolerance is contempt. Indifference is re- proach. CONTROVEESIES. As the progress of religion against the atheism, im- piety, and depravity of the race, awakens differences, discussions, and antagonisms among men, it is sagely proposed to end and avoid these conflicts forever by outlawing religion. Because the sun, m the glare of day, sometimes pains weak eyes, bakes bad-conditioned soil, and disturbs bats and owls, the glorious orb must be removed from its sphere, and the radiance that lights up the universe extinguished in universal and eternal night. BIBLE SECTARIAN. It is assumed that the Bible is sectarian, to justify its removal from schools ! Is the great sun sectarian that shines only for the worlds in its own system ? Is the atmosphere sectarian because it nourishes only those forms of life tenanting its sphere ? Is truth sectarian because it displaces all propositions of error ? Then is the Bible sectarian ! It may be sectarian as is the con- stitution of the Republic — framed for the defence of lib- erty and the rights of men — and proscribing all political injustice. Its precepts and promises are for all. It admits of no caste or classes of privilege. " It is, in the nature of things, impossible that there should be more than one religion. If any specific propositions, or set of propositions, with reference to our unseen relations, be true, any other proposition, or set of propositions cov- ering the same ground, must be false. If Christianity be true, it is not a religion, as it is sometimes called THE BIBLE IN SCHOOLS. 21 but religion. If Judaism also be true it is so, not as distinct from, but as coincident with, Christianity — the one religion, to which it can bear only the relation borne by the part to the whole. If there be portions of truth in other religious systems, they are not por- tions of other religions, but portions of the one religion, which somehow became incorporated with fables and falsities." If sectarian, what sect does the Bible pat- ronize ? what exclude ? Some would do away with religion to avoid sectarianism. Like preventing the evils and perils of life by terminating life itself, or doing away with the evils of mankind by the extermi- nation of the race. CHUECH A]SrD STATE. " Church and state " has been the war-cry of party, and served to discredit the use of the Bible in schools. The objection to the union of church and state is not undue importance awarded to religion by it, but the curtailed freedom of other faiths unnecessarily con- nected with it. While, as a pervading element in common and organic law, Christianity is a part of the state — constituting in a general sense union of church and state. The tolerance of all other religions takes away that diBtinctive order of " church and state " so justly odious to freemen over the world. Repeated against the religious order of our schools, this cryjiiay mislead the prejudiced and unthinking, as the cry "Democracy" has betrayed the masses into the surrender of their dearest rights and the over- throw of free institutions. To avoid church and state, these reformers would drive religion out of the state. THE BIBLE IN SCHOOLS. Shying like the blind horse from one side of the bridge, they would plunge off the other into the abyss of atheism ! BILLS or RIGHTS. Provisions of bills of rights, declared by general and state governments, are fallaciously applied as for- bidding religious teaching. The exception is made to set aside the rule. The law is made nugatory under pretence of defining its terms. Constitutions and courts are stultified by reversing all their provisions. The words or purport of all specifications in these bills " not inconsistent with the rights of conscience," were designed to guard against sectarian, not religious teaching ; to prevent tyranny of sects, not the ascend- ancy of Christianity ; to prevent education of parti- sans at public expense, not Christians. It is a lying interpretation, that makes the laws of the land indif- ferent to religion — go back upon the general sense of mankind, the religious character of the education of all lands and ages, and symbolize with atheism and infidelity. They all assume, as in the law of Ohio, " religion, morality and knowledge being essentially necessary to good government, and the happiness of mankind, schools and the means of instruction shall be encour- aged by legislative provision," — religion and morality to be as clearly contemplated and provided for as knowledge, in founding schools. ENFORCED TAX. Again: it is an alleged grievance that some are xed to sa23port a school system whose order of THE BIBLE IN SCHOOLS. 23 instruction they do not approve. Admitting this plea, how shall we answer those who would object to the expensive buildings and appointments of our city schools ? or others who might condemn all outlay for musical culture? or still other cavilers, who should censure the prominence given the languages ? Allow these strictures, and you open the gates to a torrent of ignorant and prejudiced criticism, which, at flood-tide, would dismantle the stately structure which is now our national boast, destroy the only institution, which, the outgrowth of our republic, stands singly the expo- nent of our sacred theories. OPPRESSION OF CONSCIENCE. It is also alleged that the use of the Bible in public schools is an oppression of conscience. Right of con- science is a legal, reasonable right, not the caprice of individuals, or the pretense of the designing and sel- fish ! Is the moral sense of a people to rule the policy of government, or the misguided, fanatical notions of a few ? Was the Repubhc sacrificed to the deluded conscience of the rebellion ? Shall the sacred law of marriage yield to the debauched conscience of Utah ? Shall license be yielded to the conscience of the liquor traffic ? Shall law and order be universally surren- dered to the low moral sense of the lawless ? Is not the conscience of the many, demanding catholic reli- gious instruction, to be respected, as well as the cavils of the few ? On pretense of conscience, no one can oppose the public welfare, or the proper education of our children. That they are not compelled individu- 24 THE BIBLE IN SCHOOLS. ally to read or hear Scripture lessons, or be present at forms of worship, is all that can be awarded to weak consciences led by a designing priesthood. A prescribed order of moral and catholic religious instruction, can no more interfere with individual rights, than the prescribed order of science and litera- ture, school service and order of instruction and les- sons. Subjection itself is not oppression, else all gov- arnment is oppression. Subjection to the family order ennobles ; subjection to the law and order of the state dignifies ; subjection to the cardinal principles of moraUty and reHgion, as embodied in the Scriptures, elevates ; at once the highest freedom, virtue, and wel- fare of the race. Is it oppression to require those becoming citizens to abjure aU other pohtical alle- giance, and come under the national, state, and muni- cipal laws of the country % Bishops, priests and Jesu- its, owing allegiance to a foreign power, claiming it as their mission to overthrow our institutions, and denying our right to exist, continue to assail our schools. The Tablet for l^ovember 13, 1869, a Eoman Cath- ohc paper, says: "The Protestant may have state schools or godless schools, if he wants them ; but as we cannot in conscience send om* children to them, to be equally free with Protestants, the state must either not tax us at all, or give us our proportion of the money raised, to be expended in schools under the control of the church. Protestantism is born of hatred of God, a revolt against Christ and his church, and would have to abdicate its own nature not to seek to deprive Cath- olics of their religious freedom, and to suppress, by aid THE BIBLE IN SCHOOLS. 25 of the state, the church of God. The very breath of their life, the very reason of their being, is hostile to her, because she is faithful to Christ, and cherishes his meek and lowly spirit. How hollow, then, and hypo- critical must be all their professions of religious lib- erty! She represents God on earth; they represent Satan and the world, and how can they be otherwise than at enmity with her ? We are in this country the asserters and defenders of the rights of God, and we shall assert and defend them by all lawful means to the full extent of our power, without their leave or license." The same paper, of December 25, says : " We de- mand of the state, as our right, either such schools as our church will accept, or exemption from the school tax. If it will support schools by a general tax, we demand that it provide or give us our portion of the public fimds, and leave us to provide schools in which we can educate our children in our own religion, under the supervision of our own church. We hold educa- tion to be a function of the church, not of the state ; and, in our case, we do not, and will not, accept the state as educator." The Freeman's Journal of ITovember 13, says: " Education is not the work of the state at all. It be- longs to families, and should be left to families, and to voluntary associations. The school tax is in itself an unjust imposition." The Tablet for November 29, says : " The system of common schools, as now adopted in this country, is in the main an imitation of the system decreed by the Convention which sentenced Louis XYI. to the guil- 2 26 THE BIBLE IN SCHOOLS. lotine, abolished Christianity, and declared death an eternal sleep. The object of the Convention was, by a system of godless schools, to root out religion from the French mind, and to train up the French youth in absolute ignorance or unbelief in any life beyond this life, and any world that transcends the senses. If we adopt and carry out the same system, our American youth must grow up thoroughly unbelieving and god- less, as the order of the Cincinnati Board of Education directly foreshadows. Catholics will do well to be on their guard against forming alliances to help them get rid of one evil by fastening on the country another and infinitely greater evil — ^the very evil the forever infamous Convention sought, with devilish ingenuity, to fastem on France." The Freeman'' s Journal^ December 11, says : " Let the public school system go to where it came from — the devil. "We want Christian schools, and the state cannot tell us what Christianity is." DISASTROUS ISSUE. Urged on behalf of catholic religion, this movement, if it succeeded, could eventuate only in godless anar- chy or papal tyranny. In denial of Bible and religious observance, what is now charged would more surely be believed, that it is a " godless school." The present objection of the principal class of opposers, would be indefinitely broadened and intensified. The majority of Protest- ants would then fall in with the objection, and our school system, failing of the public confidence, would at length be given up — the very end desired by the principal party in this movement. THE BIBLE IN SCHOOLS. 27 Then the pubKc money must be given to support sectarian schools, or we must fall back upon the un- aided parish, or papal schools of the old world. And the Roman schools, cheapened by free labor of priests and nuns, already drawing from Protestant families so large and respectable patronage, would become the schools of the country, and the education of Italy, Austria, Spain, and Mexico, be inaugurated in the Republic ; and papacy, through ignorance, indiffer- ence, and political intrigue, become the dominant faith. The Catholic Review says : " Protestantism of every form has not, and never can have, any right, where Catholicity is triumphant." The Bishop of Pittsburgh says : " Religious liberty is merely endured until the opposite can be carried into effect without peril to the Catholic world." The Archbishop of St. Louis says : " If the Catho- lics ever gain — which they surely wiU — an immense numerical majority, religious freedom in this country will be at an end." Said a Romish priest, when com- menting upon the losses of the church in Italy, " We can afford to let the rags of Italy go into the hands of Garibaldi, when we are taking possession of the United States." An Italian paper says, " The Roman Court expects to be able to control the American Republic," At a meeting of Roman Catholics, held in iJ^Tew York last year, and representing all parts of the country, one of the speakers, exulting over what had ,been gained by them through special appropriations from the ^ew York legislature, said, " This is the little fin- ger, and we must persevere till we get the whole hand." 28 THE BIBLE IN SCHOOLS. The noted papal cliampion, Father Hecker, predicts that in 1900, " Kome will have a majority, and be bound to take this country and keep it." Also, " there is, ere long, to be a State religion in this coun- try ; that State religion is to be the Roman Catholic." Again, he predicts that papacy is soon to rise " over the grave of buried Protestantism." "Within a quarter of a century, Romanists have in- creased in this country from four per cent, of the pop- ulation to twenty per cent. Forty years ago they numbered four hundred and fifty thousand; thirty years ago, nine hundred thousand. They now claim eight millions. They have seven archbishops, forty- one bishops, seventy-two seminaries, fourteen hundred schools, three thousand churches, with property esti- mated at forty millions. In Kew York city they hold most all the civil offices, municipal, state and national. They Lave obtained hundreds of thousands in subsi- dies for their schools, and millions for church and charitable foundations from the city government. Of an appropriation of two hundred and fifteen thousand dollars made to schools, most of which were sectarian, eighty per cent, was given to Roman schools. The acceptance of any part of such subsidy, by Protestants, is made a cover for the Grand Conspiracy, that is to make the schools of Kew York first, and then in other cities, Roman schools. If the stream rises as high as the fountain — the measure to the purpose — our school system, and with it our Republic, will be overthrown ! The prelates instigating this movement are not citi- zens, and will not swear allegiance to our constitution THE BIBLE IN SCHOOLS. 29 and laws ! The success already attained . in jiTew York, in acquiring hundreds of thousands annually for their schools, and millions for permanent church endowments, may well encourage them to expect that an ascendancy Holland wrested from the Pope through thirty years of bloody war, and retained in France only after bloody revolutions, and now withstood in Austria and Spain, may be easily awarded, and with countless millions of subsidies, through wary use of balance of political power. Irreligion, indifference, ignorance, are sure precur- sors of Romish triumphs. And she divides popula- tions into skeptics and bigots ! First irreligion, then superstition, is the order of history. Allow religion deposed from the public school, and superstition will be installed as pedagogue, and become minister of pubKc instruction. BEGINNING OF STRIFE. But this movement, proposed as an end of contro- versy, will prove to be the beginning of strife. Hav- ing already interdicted Bible, Lord's Prayer, and devotional song, with the same reason it may revise school readers, compends of history, text books of morals ; and at leno^th make relio:ious convictions a disqualification of public teacher. Atheists may demand erasure from books all allusion to the being and attributes of a God, whose existence is denied. Mohammedans chancing to become citizens may require the removal of all allusions to the imposture of Islam. Pagans, all disparagement of idolatry. 'No better illustration can be given of the shoals 2'' 30 THE BIBLE IN SCHOOLS. towards which we are tending, than reference to the very happy wood-cut found in Harper's Weekly edi- tion of a few weeks since. There we have, first, a ring of happy children — " no sect," " no caste ;" Chi- naman, African, Irishman — representative of each nationality — the merry ring join happy hands, and " union forms their strength." jN^ext we find Justice, pictured as a blinded daughter of Erin, distributing the school money from public funds. At her right the rotund priest laughs over his showering bags of gold, in which he stands knee deep ; while at her left the sorrowful representative of our public schools as they have been, draws only blanks and empty bags. Lastly, we have the wild, chaotic jumble of what our public schools may be in the future. The African has the little Chinaman by the queue, the " Paddy " reviles the scornful Jew. The High Churchman engages the Methodist in close combat. Every child is fighting, and the street is lined with signs of sec- tarian schools — a school for every nationality and every creed. In opposing re-establishment of priestly control of schools, Victor Hugo says : " Ah, we know you ! We know the clerical party. It is an old party. This it is, which has found for the truth those two marvelous supporters, ignorance and error ! This it is, which forbids to science and genius the going be- yond the Missal, and which wishes to cloister thought in dogmas. Every step which the intelligence of Europe has taken, has been in spite of it. Its history is written in the history of human progress, but it is written on the back of the leaf, It is opposed to it all. This it is, which caused Prinelli to be scourged for THE BIBLE IN SCHOOLS. 31 having said that the stars would not fall. This it is, which put Campanella seven times to the torture, for having affirmed that the number of worlds was infin- ite, and for having caught a glimpse at the secret of creation. This it is, which persecuted Harvey for having proved the circulation of the blood. In the name of Jesus, it shut up Gahleo. In the name of St. Paul, it imprisoned Christopher Columbus. To dis- cover a law of the heavens was an impiety. To find a world was a heresy. This it is which anathematized Pascal in the name of religion, Montaigne in the name of morality, Moliere in the name of both morality and religion. . . . For a long time already the human conscience has revolted against you, and now demands of you, ' What is it that you wish of me ? ' For a long time already you have tried to put a gag upon the human intellect. You wish to be the masters of edu- cation. And there is not a poet, not an author, not a philosopher, not a thinker, that you accept. All that has been wi*itten, found, dreamed, deduced, inspired, imagined, invented by genius, the treasure of civiliza- tion, the venerable inheritance of generations, the common patrimony of knowledge, you reject. " There is a book — a book which is, from one end to the other, an emanation from above — a book which is for the whole world what the Koran is for Islamism, w^hat the Yedas are for India — a book which contains all human wisdom, illuminated by all divine wisdom ■ — a book which the veneration of the people call The Booh — the Bible ! Well, your censure has reached even that. Unheard-of thing ! Popes have proscribed the Bible ! How astonishing to wise spirits, how 32 THE BIBLE IN SCHOOLS. overpowering to simple hearts, to see the finger of Kome placed upon the Book of God ! " And you claim the liberty of teaching. Stop ; be sincere; let us understand the liberty which you claim. It is the liberty of not teaching. You wish us to give you the people to instruct. Yery well. Let us see your pupils ! Let .us see those you have pro- duced. What have you done for Italy ? What have you done for Spain? For centuries you have kept in your hands, at yotr discretion, at your school, these two great nations, illustrious among the illustrious. What have you done for them ? I am going to tell you. Thanks to you, Italy, whose name no man, who thinks, can any longer pronounce without an inexpres- sible filial emotion ; Italy, mother of genius and of nations, which has spread over the universe all the most brilliant marvels of poetry and the arts ; Italy, which has taught mankind to read, now knows not how to read ! Yes, Italy is, of aU the states of Europe, that where the smallest number of natives know how to read. " Spain, magnificently endowed ; Spain, which re- ceived from the Romans her first civilization, from the Arabs her second civilization, from Providence, and in spite of you, a world, America ; Spain, thanks to you, to your yoke of stupor, which is a yoke of degrada- tion and decay, Spain has lost this secret power, which it had from the Komans ;' this genius of art, which it had from the Arabs ; this world, which it had from God ; and in exchange for all that you have made it lose, it has received from you — the Inquisition. " The Inquisition, which certain men of the party THE BIBLE IN SCHOOLS. 33 try to-daj to re-establish, which has burned on the funeral pile millions of men ; the Inquisition, which disinterred the dead to burn them as heretics ; which declared the children of heretics, even to the second generation, infamous and incapable of any public honors, excepting only those who shall have denounced their fathers ; the Inquisition, which, while I speak, still holds in the Papal library the manuscripts of Galileo, sealed under the Papal signet ! These are your masterpieces. This fire, which we caU Italy, you have extinguished. This colossus, that we caU Spain, you have undermined. The one in ashes, the other in ruins. This is what you have done for two great na- tions. What do you wish to do for France ? " Stop ; you have just come from Rome ! I con- gratulate you. You have had fine success there. You come from gagging the Roman people ; now you wish to gag the French people, I understand. This attempt is still more fine ; but take care ; it is dangerous. France is a lion, and is alive !" Shall a Frenchman thus speak in France, and we be silent? Shall one, brought up amid Papal influ- ences, see so clearly the withering power of Romish education, and any person in this land of gospel light be blind to it ? SURRENDER OF PRINCIPLE. Does any one imagine the use of the Bible in schools an indifferent service, from the brevity of its lessons ; and therefore its entire removal from the programme of the school would be an inappreciable loss ? As well declare use of the constitution and flag of the 34 THE BIBLE IN SCHOOLS. country is ceremonial, and therefore of little impor- tance. The constitution is never read before all assembled citizens. It is never read at length before courts. It is not found in all, even public libraries. It is not in the house of one citizen in ten thousand. Yet the constitution, with silent, mighty, perpetual force of gravitation, controls general and state gov- ernments, presides over courts, shapes all political usage, and rules all classes. The recognized Bible, though not obtruded before the people on all occa- sions, or occupying large portions of the time of fam- ily, school, or State, may be a greater power over conscience, moral sense, individual and national char- acter, social and political destiny. The stars and stripes do not wave all the time, over all towns, villages, and private dwellings ; but is it any less the symbol of authority — pledging the power of the government, and the devotion and loy- alty of the people ? As that flag, whether waving over State-house, borne before armies, or streaming from ships in a foreign port, stirs the heart and assures the devotion of every American citizen, so the Bible, in family, church, or school, is the symbol of a holier faith, pledges a more heroic devotion. The soul's glance heavenward, in spiritual homage, prom- ises nobler education and manhood, than elaborate text books, when divorced from religious sentiment and sanction ! If this be surrendered. Religion is surren- dered. Concession will be vain ! The pursuing Cerberus, with appetite whetted by each sop thrown to him, will never be satisfied till he has devoured our free schools and our free institutions ! THE BIBLE IN SCHOOLS. 35 The beleaguering forces, Atheism, Kationalism and Komanism, now assailing the Republic at its vital centre, in its education, are a more formidable foe than the Yandal hordes that overthrew ancient Rome. As Herod and Pilate harmonized in counsel against Christ, so these life-long foes unite to overthrow the institutions of the Republic. They agree in false de- finitions of liberty and religion, that they may subvert them. They assert an ultimate right of individual conscience, that makes social or civil law or order impossible ! They make sense of duty, devotion of loyalty impossible, by subverting their standard, and repressing their enthusiasm ! If, then, the objections to our school system are so fallacious and unfounded, and the recognition of the Bible in public education be required from the great moral traditions of the Republic, from the association of religious ideas and sanctions with all the school systems of the world, from the fact that Christianity, as part of the common law, should constitute a part of the common education, and also from the necessary, vital, and formative relation of religion to all complete education, let the American people unite in defending and perpetuating our public schools. Surpassing all others in munificence of provision, completeness of appointments, competency of teachers ; a mighty power in developing true manhood ; the most potent agent in assimilating diverse nationalities into one homogeneous citizenship — shall it be destroyed ? That is a touching song that bids the unthinking, unsentimental woodman spare the roof-tree of the old homestead, planted and watered by the hand of fore- 36 THE BIBLE IN SCHOOLS. fathers sleeping hard by in tlie ancestral graveyard. In holier and more earnest expostulation, we entreat the political innovator, inspired by neither faith nor sentiment, to spare onr American school system, planted by our fathers, and watered by their blood, sheltering all human rights, fostering the best civiliza- tion, guarding the most beneficent institutions, and moulding diverse nationalities into the most intelli- gent and virtuous citizenship in the world ! CttuRCti, GdobMAN & boNNfeLLltY, Printers. [ g^