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THE SABBATH-SCHOOL AS A FACTOR IN PUBLIC EDUCATION.

THE Sabbath is a day of opportunity for education both in intelligence and conscientiousness, the necessities of the life in a republic; intelligence to meet the sophistries, conscientiousness to resist the briber and the demagogue, the worst of despots. The Sabbaths of twenty-eight years amount to four years, affording as much time for self-improvement as a college course. To persons in health, especially to those who are habitually occupied on other days in mechanical and industrial employments, the best rest for the Sabbath is not idleness, but the hearing and reading that makes "a full man," and the conversation that makes "a ready man," and the thinking that makes "an exact man."

The Sabbath becomes most definitely educative in the Sabbath-school when there is direct teaching, and that too mostly of persons of school age.

It may fairly be claimed for the Sabbath-school that it was the first free school of any kind for public education in England, from whence comes our modern Sabbath-school. It was not a school for religious teaching exclusively in its inception. It was the purpose of Robert Raikes, the founder, to provide instruction in the three "Rs" for the children who must work on week-days (a plan somewhat like modern night schools) and also to give such children something to do on the Sabbath, when their idleness and ignorance were a menace to the public welfare. Teachers were paid for their labors in Raikes' school as teachers in secular schools are now paid. The immediate purpose was to teach reading, while a secondary purpose, recognized by the teachers but not much by the pupils, was to teach the Bible, by making it one of the reading books. Thus Vice was attacked by a flank movement against its ally, Ignorance.

The Sabbath-schools of England, to-day, retain some of the

characteristics of Raikes' schools, in that they are mainly for neglected children. Other children are supposed to be taught by their Christian parents, who quite resent the idea that this home teaching may wisely be supplemented by the Sabbathschool teaching. This, however, is not the case in Wales, when children of all conditions are taught in the Sabbathschools to read their Welsh Bibles,-English alone being taught in the public schools.

In American Sabbath-schools, conversion, not education is the direct purpose, and the Bible is the only text book. In them, the rich and poor are brought together as equals, and thus an unconscious education is given in the principle of human equality, while the growth of class prejudice is prevented. There is a strong desire on the part of leaders in the work, that not only the rich and poor shall be gathered together, but old and young as well, that all classes and ages shall have their places both in the preaching and the teaching services of the church. This ideal, however, is not largely realized, for the constituency of the Sabbath-school is still mostly children and youth.

While the American Sabbath-school is not conducted for educational purposes, it incidentally and indirectly contributes not a little to public intelligence, and greatly re-enforces the secular schools on many of their own lines.

The Bible contains the oldest history, the sublimest poetry, the loftiest ethics. One who has not been familiarized with Bible history from the earliest years of impressible childhood is hardly prepared to appreciate the new sciences of Assyriology and Egyptology. Webster and Ruskin have told us that whatever is excellent in their literary style is due to their lifelong Bible reading. No man can be a finished writer of English who has not thus fed from the best storehouse of "English undefiled."

The geography of the ancient world becomes familiar to the Sabbath-school children before they need it at college as the background of their classics. Missionary lessons do a like service in modern geography, contributing much knowledge of ethnography also.

Not a little does the Sabbath-school aid the secular school in musical training. The department of hygiene, recently introduced in public schools, is re-enforced by the quarterly temperance lesson in the Sabbath-school, supplemented often by more frequent lessons in the week-day Temperance Band or Children's Meeting, with which the Sabbath-school often connects itself.

The Sabbath-school library, very crudely at first, but recently with increasing wisdom, furnishes not a little of the education that comes by reading the literature of knowledge and the literature of power. There are several library lists prepared by associations of suitable persons, with no respect to the interests of publishers, that make it possible to select literature that will really contribute both wisdom and noble impulses.

The internal arrangements of Sabbath-schools are such as to recognize and foster not only the spiritual but also the intellectual growth of the pupils, those of the same age and like capacity being placed in groups called classes, and these classes graded in different departments, primary, intermediate, junior and senior. In the best schools all these several departments have the same lesson, adaptation being made by the teachers in their manner of presenting it, and by means of the graded lesson helps with which the pupils are provided, from the "Picture Lesson Paper" for the very little folks, and the lesson leaves and quarterlies for the somewhat older scholars, to the dignified "Notes" for teachers and the most advanced pupils.

There occasionally comes to light in the columns of some paper a theory about another system of grading that there should be several series of Bible lessons, different in topics as well as in treatment, for the several grades of pupils. The plan of teaching only the gospel life of Christ to young children, and the Old Testament and the Epistles to older folks only, is a fallacious imitation of public school methods. It was the Old Testament Scriptures that Timothy knew "from a babe," and it was through them that he was in childhood made "wise unto salvation." It was of the profoundest of

Epistles that John said: "I have written unto you, little children." Twenty years trial of the International lessons shows that the grading of Sabbath-schools may be well accomplished without sacrificing the manifold advantages of having all the classes of one school, indeed of all schools in all lands, studying the same lesson.

Through this universal course of lessons, the whole religious press, and many of the secular papers furnishing comments, are linked with the Sabbath-school in the truest and best education of the public.

Still another element in the educating power of the Sabbath-school is the effect upon those who become teachers. Not only is their intellectual and spiritual vision increased, but a knowledge of the science of teaching is gained.

Extensive and persevering efforts have been made by the leaders of the Sabbath-school movement to secure the training of teachers, so that the quality of their work may, in some degree, compare with the truth which they have to teach. To this end the Chautauqua Assembly was organized in the year 1874; since then, at least seventy similar assemblies have been developed, summer schools where Sabbath-school teachers may learn fundamental facts about the Bible, and the very best ways of presenting those facts, and the most approved methods of organizing and carrying on Sabbath-school work in all its details. The leaders have not been satisfied with the assemblies alone, but the Institute and Convention have been arranged for the Sabbath-school teachers-an annual convention for each state in the Union, and a county convention for each county in the state, when the direct purpose is to give instruction in methods of teaching. Some states in their zeal have done still more, providing an annual district convention in addition to the county and state conventions. This work is under the direction of the "International Sunday-school Association," members of which, and delegates from the several states and provinces of Canada meet in a triennial International Convention. Nor does this fully. describe the Sabbath-school movement, for beyond the organization for the United States and the provinces of Canada,

there is a "World's Sunday-school Convention," the next session of which is to be held in the spring of 1893, in St. Louis.

When the educational force of the Sabbath-school is being measured, "The Chautauqua Literary and Scientific Circle," with its thousands of readers, must not be omitted. This most successful of all schemes for home education, this "people's college," was born of a Sabbath-school assembly, intended by its founder, Bishop John H. Vincent, to spread the influence of the church and Sabbath-school over the whole world, and mold the intellectual as well as the moral life.

But while the Sabbath-school is undoubtedly a large factor in public education, containing as it does 8,649,131 scholars and 1,151,340 teachers in the United States alone, with a total of 20,078,565 for the whole world, it is much less so than it might and ought to be. This becomes apparent when by careful investigation, made by the International Association, it is found that only forty per cent of the children of school age in our land have yet been gathered into the Sabbathschool. It is especially important for the Republic as well as for the children left out, that they should be reached by this agency, because the teaching of Christian morals in the public schools becomes increasingly difficult every year. seem to be losing sight of the principle that "whatever the state would have appear in its future citizens, it must put into the public schools." If only to defend our Republic against death by wholesale bribery, the public school must build on the platform, "Common schools must teach common morals." The combined efforts of the Sabbath-school and the public school will be needed to keep up the standard of virtuous living and Christian patriotism. Neither can be safely considered a substitute for the other, nor both for the yet mightier teaching of the young by the pulpit and home. WILBUR F. CRAFTS.

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