ing. Psalm 92. It is a Good Thing to Give Thanks. Psalm 96. A new Song to Jehovah. Psalm 135. Brethren in Unity. Luke VI. 27-38. Love your Enemies. Luke XII. 22-34. Luke XV. 3-32. Consider the Lilies. He Eateth with Sinners-three parables. Luke XXIV. 1-9. At the Tomb. Romans VIII. 14-17. Sons of the Spirit. I Corinthians XIII. 1-13. On Love. Ephesians VI. 10-17. The Armor of God. I John IV. 7-11. Love One Another. Revelation IV. 1-14. The Four and Twenty Elders. III. Exodus XX. 1-17. The Commandments. Deuteronomy XXX. 8-29. An Oration of Moses. I Kings XVIII. 22-39. Elijah and the Prophets of Baal. Ruth I. 6-18. The pact of Ruth and Naomi. Psalm XXVI. Personal Integrity. Psalm LXII. My High Tower. Psalm XCIII. Jehovah Reigneth Clothed with Majesty. Psalm XCIX. Let the Floods Clap Their Hands. Psalm CIV. He stretcheth out the Heavens like a Tent. Psalm CXXXIX. Though I take the Wings of the Morn Isaiah LX. The Redeemed City. Isaiah LXI. The Restored Country. John XIV and XV. The Leave-taking. Acts XVII. The Sermon on Mars' Hill. Acts XXVI. 1-23. Paul's Defense Before Agrippa. I Corinthians XI. 23-26. The Communion. Hebrews XI and XII 1-3. James I 2-29 and II 1-26. The Cloud of Witnesses. The practical Christian. I John IV. 7-21. The Idealistic Christian. Religious Instruction and Religiousness in Germany* EDWARD O. SISSON, Ph. D. Professor of Pedagogy, The University of Washington, Seattle There is probably no country in the world in which religious instruction is so universal as in Germany; moreover the lessons in religion are marked by the same thoroughness of plan and execution that distinguish the German school in general. What are the results of this vast performance, comprising, as it does, about one-sixth of the whole curriculum in the people's schools, and one-twelfth in the higher schools? Does it produce religious men and women? We may consider the question under two interpretations of the term religious, first as denoting devotion to the visible church, and second as referring rather to an inner and spiritual condition. First, then, does the religious instruction produce "churchliness"? All official and nearly all unofficial statements of the aim of the religious instruction emphasize its function with respect to the visible church; the aim set by the government regulations for the Volksschulen, in particular, names explicitly only devotion to the church and its observances, and the regulations for the higher schools put churchly-mindedness in the chief place. Moreover, the subject matter of the instruction is in the great mass conditioned by this churchly aim; the book of the church, the creed of the church, the hymns and the liturgy and the history of the church make up the whole content of the religious lessons. Does this instruction actually produce devotion to the church and its life and work? It would be hard to find any question touching the German people in general, and Prussia in particular, upon which such complete unanimity reigns; all voices agree that the tendency of the time is overwhelmingly away from the church. Nearly every writer on the religious instruction takes occasion to deplore the wide and growing estrangement of all classes from the church and its whole life. Citation of evidence is made embarrassing by the mere *For a brief general account of the German Religious Instruction, see paper by the writer in the Proceedings of the R. E. A. for 1905, pp. 261-266. mass of the material: teachers, clergymen, university professors, government officials, and all other classes of men in public life agree on this question. Not a few books have been written and widely read, whose whole theme is the remedy of this condition. A few quotations may serve to indicate the nature of the testimony: Professor Rein, the most distinguished of German professors of pedagogy, says: "The desertion of the church ... is no isolated occurrence, but the attitude of the masses, both educated and uncultured . . . millions are no longer willing to live in the shadow of the church, but in large part are filled with hate and enmity against it." Doerpfeld, as early as 1870, wrote: "The educated classes are . . . turning their backs on the church; and in the last decades the lower classes begin to follow their example in throngs." Baumgarten writes: "Trust to no pleasant illusions. We must reckon with the antipathy of the great majority of the working classes against everything that has to do with the church." ... It will naturally be urged at this point that the desertion of the church is by no means confined to Germany, but is common to all civilized lands. Be it so; it is still true that the religious instruction has not availed to prevent the estrangement; it has not been able to provide any positive counteraction to the trend of the age. It can not be denied that the church has suffered at least as much in Germany as in other cultured lands, and, if we may credit the testimony of the Germans, even more. We must conclude, then, that the religious instruction has not accomplished the results planned for it with respect to the church; it has not produced churchliness. Indifference or even hostility to the visible church by no means in itself proves lack of true religion in the heart; so that we may still ask whether the religious instruction does not perhaps develop inward religion, though it does not stimulate the churchly sense. It will be plain at the outset that this is a far more elusive and difficult question than the previous one; that dealt avowedly with the outward and visible, while this assumes to probe into the unseen region of thought and feeling. We cannot hope for any such clear and decided answer to our present question, but must be content with such a degree of probability as we can reach. The first consideration which naturally suggests itself is the mere antecedent improbability that a discipline so strongly aimed at producing external piety and devotion to the church, and failing conspicuously in that aim, should succeed in a task at once more difficult and less directly aimed at. An examination of the actual content of the religious instruction shows that the ecclesiastical idea dominates the whole instruction; the subject matter is made up of the traditional literature of the church; and the very method of the lessons is marked by formality and externalism; it would be strange indeed if such teaching should bear fruit in inward piety, while it is barren of the outer results for which it is calculated. But this is mere probability and we must seek for facts. First, what is the verdict of the men whose position and work make them competent to judge? In this we find hardly less unanimity than on the earlier question; in most cases the same writers who deny the churchly influence of the religious instruction also deny its effect upon real religiousness. Irreligion. is as common a word of complaint as desertion of church. Lietz speaks of "the present religious and moral indifference or even hostility toward everything relating to God or Jesus." Diesterweg, quoted approvingly by Reukauf, accuses the religious instruction of being responsible for the present "comfortless” religious situation. Dr. Friedrich Kirschner, a teacher of forty years' experience, declares that inward religion and its manifestation in the family life are rapidly vanishing. "Just as in many ranks of society it is not good form to mention religious matters in any way, so in the majority of families one never hears a word from the Bible, a prayer, or a hymn. To most people Christianity, creed, indeed religion itself, are antiquated ideas." Pastor Luther of Charlottenburg, speaks of "the irreligious state of the rising generation, which is partly due to faults in the religious instruction." An interesting expression is that of H. Keferstein: "A far-reaching verbal knowledge, and an infinite poverty of religious spirit and feeling." It is important to note that these men do not merely declare that the religious spirit is diminishing, but accuse the instruction in religion of responsibility there for. We may cite two of the most eminent and active men concerned: Rein says, "The re ligious instruction has worked into the hands of the downfall of religion, both in the higher schools and in the Volksschulen." Thraendorf writes: "It is in general the most gifted pupils who leave school with their sympathies completely deadened for everything which reminds them of the religious teaching in the school." There is an oft-quoted epigram, coined, I think, by the theologian Rothe, "There must be much religion in the hearts of the German people, inasmuch as the religious instruction has not yet succeeded in rooting it all out." A writer in the "Christliche Welt" speaks as follows: "Our religious instruction is actually a source of danger to religion. It produces the most startling indifference toward everything religious, and repels the pupils in both higher and lower schools." It is manifest that we cannot in this place undertake any extensive analysis of the actual state of religion in Germany; and even if that state could be determined and formulated, the question would still remain how far it was due to the influence of the religious instruction in the schools, and how far to the many other co-operating causes. We wish, however, to mention here two facts which seem to indicate a low state of religion in Germany, and morover, in the very respect in which the religious instruction might be expected to stimulate it, that is, actual interest in religious questions and spiritual life and observances. First, what is called in England dissent, and in America denominationalism, is practically absent in Germany. It is well known that the number of protestants in Germany who do not "belong" to the state church is infinitesimally small. That this is not due to warm devotion to the state church is evident from what has already been adduced; is it then due to the lack of any such interest and independent thinking on religious questions as that which has produced dissent and denominations so abundantly in the two other great protestant nations? The other face of the same fact is the absolute formality and emptiness of the church relation maintained by the great majority of members; practically every inhabitant who is not professedly Catholic or Jew "belongs" to the established church; that is, has been baptized and confirmed. And the great majority have no other connection with the church except these rites, with the addition of marriage, the baptism and confirmation of their chil |