In that country precisely our present problem arose through the same cause-the multiplicity of jealous religious beliefs. There, too, religious freedom was constitutionally guaranteed and there, too, occurred that same consequent elimination of religious teaching from the curriculum of the school. The nation realized that in a time of stress its life would be threatened if public education and moral training were allowed completely and permanently to become divorced. A national commission, accordingly, after studying the problem carefully, chose the solution now being recommended, and arranged to utilize patriotism as a moral agent. The result is that at this moment Japanese primers and readers are giving inspiring knowledge of the greatest personalities, not only of Japan but of all the world -their splendid private character, their heroism in war, their public service in peace. (It is said in this connection that the average Japanese boy knows today more definitely and concretely our American heroes than our own youngsters). Wall mottoes express such sentiments as, that the welfare of Nippon requires self-restraint, kindness to playmates, considerateness and obedience to parents. In fact, throughout the length of Japan, is found in schools and other public places what is called the "Imperial Rescript of 1890", setting forth the moral requirements of good citizenship. "By so doing" this statement of the educational and moral Decalogue of the Japanese concludes, "you will not only prove yourselves as our loyal subjects and good citizens, but you will also continue and perpetuate the noblest traditions of your ancestors." (Note here the weaving together of the two motives, patriotic and religious). Says Baron Kaneko, formerly Minister of Agriculture and Commerce, and Minister of Justice in the Imperial Cabinet of Japan, "This rescript ever before the eyes of the people may be taken as the essence, the soul, of the national policy. It may serve as some explanation, to those who wonder at the loyalty and self-sacrifice which has characterized every day of the recent war. The school with us is the great developing-ground of character. The Japanese constitution guarantees complete religious freedom, but it is the care of the national government to impress upon every subject the principles of morality. The value of the policy may be judged by the results of the recent struggle."

This is the point of view of Japan and this has been Japan's experience. In our own more religious and less sophisticated country our results ought to be even more satisfactory.

This adaptation of patriotism to the accomplishment of moral purposes in our schools is, to be sure, a delicate problem, but not too great to be solved by a carefully chosen committee of men, familiar with the present school methods, text-books, American conditions, American temperament, and possest of abundant confidence in American idealism. It would not be necessary to lug in much extra school machinery in the shape of additional text-books, but rather, after the manner of Japan, to embody the desired teaching in the books and exercises already in use. This would, to be sure, make necessary a complete revision of many text-books; but the whole system would be immensely more successful if thus woven into the life of the school instead of being patched on in the conscious, go-to-nowlet-us-study-morality method.

The primers, for instance, in place of some of the present savorless selections, would give the simplest examples of such virtues as appeal to children, and would have in mind that desire for information which characterizes the youngest intellect. More advanced readers would acquaint the scholar with the great characters of history, and would endeavor to take advantage of that period when boys are appealed to most strongly by ambition to achieve, the selections endeavoring to direct these ambitions along proper lines. Perhaps, indeed, it might be well to revolutionize the whole teaching-method of history, approaching it from the point of view of character-study, events being looked at as nothing more nor less than personality in action. Books for declamation and similar studies could perhaps be made to help form proper points of view regarding such modern evils as graft and bossism. Perhaps also a text-book on civics, telling not simply of the machinery of the state but amplifying and emphasizing this idea of the connection between private character and national welfare, could be profitably used. Morning exercises of sufficient dignity and loftiness might be devised. The problem would be simply this: to make the teaching broad enough not to conflict with any American creed, yet not too tenuous or abstract to be easily understood by children; to remember that

the greatest of all forces in human activity and development is personality, whether expressed in the warmth of flesh and blood or in the mute, though moving, coldness of biographical ink; to realize that the greatest lessons are learned by unconscious attention; and lastly to recognize that, in the plan proposed, the feeling of patriotism, as ordinarily conceived, is not the end, but the means.

The difficulties are of such a sort as to constitute a most attractive challenge to the purposes, the abilities and the energies of the Religious Education Association. If the Association thought sufficiently well of the proposal, it could appoint, probably among its own members, a commission of ten or twelve able men, who, after giving the matter serious study, could work out a detalied system, at once attractive, practicable, and productive of the ideal results desired. Their suggested system could then be given the approval and the advocacy of the whole Association, working perhaps in concert with the National Educational Association, effort being made by the proper committee to give the system such publicity as would help to secure its adoption at the hands of the state educational boards and superintendents.

The difficulty of securing any general adoption seems tremendous, but it must be remembered that this same difficulty will confront every educational readjustment and every educational policy which may conceivably be proposed as long as the educational and moral responsibility for the nation is not included in the larger powers accorded the federal government. And if this is true it devolves upon us as citizens to determine how far we, as Christians, shall be behind the so-called pagans of Japan in realizing the absolute and inevitable certainty of that dreadful evolution which on so many pages of the past has spelt the ruin of races as well as of nations-the irresistible evolution of national un-morality into national immorality, of national immorality into national obliquity of every kind, and of national obliquity into national oblivion.

Summer Bible Schools for Children

ROBERT G. BOVILLE*

Director Church Federation Vacation Bible Schools, New York City

The religious education of the nation's childhood, is the most fundamental obligation of the church. The strongest guarantee for the continuance of free Christian institutions is to be found, not in national documents, however venerable, but in the hearts of children, trained to limit personal liberty by due regard for the rights of others.

By religious education is meant, not the inculcation of denominational tenets, but the creation of fraternal relations with man, and filial relations with God. For the first class of relations the state holds itself, in a measure, responsible, and, it is safe to say, that the American public school is applying the most civilizing and humanizing educational process to be found in any land. In the pedagogical training of teachers, in the school curriculum and discipline, it is giving fuller recognition to character, as a necessary end to be sought. It is teaching the children of all races to live in harmony under one flag-a great moral achievement.

In the attempt to fulfill this broad and binding obligation, we touch on a serious limitation that exists, viz.: that of time. Is it possible, in the fifty-two Sundays of the year, to provide adequate religious instruction? Hence the origin of the recent movement for the closing of the public schools on Wednesday afternoon, so that opportunity may be given for a weekly session of sufficient length, devoted to the religious education of the young. This movement, however, has not yet reached the stage at which we can expect school boards to give it serious consideration. But if religious bodies were as deeply impressed as they should be with the fact that the religious education of that large part of the population, which belongs to the child or adolescent period of life, overshadows in importance all the preaching that can be done, in later years, not only would Sunday and Wednesday afternoons be utilized, but also every other opportunity available.

The Board of the National Federal of Churches has appointed Dr. Boville National Director of Daily Vacation Bible Schools. The work is now being introduced in many large cities. Resolutions passed by the national committee state that "It shall cooperate with all societies the purpose of which is to make the religious education of the young more efficient."

There is in our cities, if not in our towns, an opportunity for the religious education of children of a specially valuable character-the summer vacation. In July and August there are sixty-two consecutive days, free from school attendance, waiting to be utilized by the church, and apparently overlooked. Here is, in one sense, the greatest opportunity of the year, because it is possible to follow up the teaching day after day. The Sunday school suffers, because a week's interval works ravages in the memory and interest of children. But when instruction is given, not only line after line, but day after day, by all pedagogical laws the elements of success are multiplied. Here, in these two months, is the equivalent, in time, of a whole year's sessions of the Sunday school, and more than the equivalent in continuity and effectiveness. The failure to use this summer opportunity is one of the most striking cases, not only of religious oversight, but also of religious waste and neglect. Jacob Riis, speaking of the New York streets crowded with children, in the summer, and the closed church doors, says "The churches standing dark and silent, are a constant arraignment of our little faith," and W. H. Maxwell, Superintendent of Education in New York, looking at this fact, from a different point of view, says "There is no financial waste, that I know, in our city, comparable with that, which arises from having the schools and churches closed, during the summer, and during Saturday and the evenings." To how few of the populous centers of this nation do these statements not apply!

The conviction that the summer vacations is the greatest opportunity of the year for Christian bodies to reach vast numbers of children, by means of daily Bible schools, is the outcome of six consecutive summers' work, on this problem, in New York City. The experience thus gained has shown that, from the child's point of view, there is a social need for such work, at least in our large cities. After fresh air societies, churches, and other philanthropic bodies, have done their utmost, there are still multitudes of children in our cities, doomed by the pressure of poverty, to pass the summer in the streets. The vacation, with all its rural and sea-side attractions for more fortunate children, is for them a pathetic experience, when the novelty of the first week of freedom from school has passed, the charm of