To thoughtful people there is a crisis scarcely less serious than foreign war in that the youth of all faiths in American cities are tempted beyond their fathers, with far less Bible knowledge as a shield; many of them dying before their time, and more of them falling a prey to vice. And there are social perils in the great race, class and sect hatreds which abound in our mixed. population and threaten conflicts like that which has convulsed Europe. In the presence of these perils we should again forget our sectarian shibboleths, and unite to give our children in the public schools the great fundamental principles of morality and religion in which we all believe, and which afford the only cure for the evil propensities of human nature. ALL-WEEK PLAN OF BIBLE STUDY. All this Bible work in public schools should be coördinated with Bible work in the Sunday schools, both graded and uniform, and Bible work in the home and church, in an ALL-WEEK PLAN OF BIBLE STUDY FOR ALL PEOPLE. For we do not agree with those who think American Christian homes will forever refuse to do their part in the Bible teaching of their own children. The writer when a pastor made a course of daily home readings, "Bible Selections No. 5," the means of restoring family worship to great churches in Chicago, Brooklyn and New York. The preacher's part, after presenting the printed list to his people, was to find in the selections for each week at least one of his sermons, and so keep up the interest. Let these testimonials be thrust under the eye of parents: DANIEL WEBSTER: "I remember the time when at my mother's feet or on my father's knee I learned to lisp the phrases of the sacred Scripture that have since been my daily study and vigilant contemplation. If there be anything in my style to be commended the credit is due to my parents in instilling into my mind in early life the sacred Scripture." RUSKIN: "Whatever I have done in life has simply been due to the fact that when I was a child my mother daily read with me a part of the Bible, and daily made me learn a part of it by heart." But even if home worship should be generally revived in Christian homes by some miraculous awakening, and if the quality of Sunday school teaching should be greatly improved by the influence of the North Dakota plan, we should still have to face the fact that half of our youth who are not in any Sunday school and hear no Bible reading at home, must miss the help of the Bible unless it is brought to bear on their lives in the public schools. WHAT CHURCHES SHOULD ASK OF THE STATE. What, then, should be said by the churches, through their educational It should not be supposed that the action of the Council of Church Boards of Education in giving or withholding endorsement to the tried and proved "plans" in this volume will decide their value. It may not even show the real views of the major part of the Council, for all federations and associations that include a dozen or more denominations have one serious disadvantage, namely, that in the desire to hold conservatives and radicals together, the rear rank often decides the pace. At the organization of the greatest of Church federations, the trustees of the International Reform Bureau sought to prevent this handicap by asking that a rule should be adopted that all proposals endorsed by one or more delegates from each of four denominations should be put to vote on a secret written ballot, and if adopted by a two-thirds vote should be a part of the federation program, and if the rear rank was not willing to accept proposals so adopted they could be allowed to withdraw rather than to hold back the forward march. Only those who have actively campaigned for the Bible in the Schools can realize how much the rear rank of Protestantism has prevented union religious organizations from promoting this supreme reform, which nine-tenths of their members favor. Better a league of ten bodies that will move forward courageously than a league of a dozen or a hundred that can scarcely agree on anything progressive, boards, as to the part which the State should take in the moral and religious education which all admit to be most important, but which the churches cannot give even to their own children adequately, much less to great numbers outside of church families, who need it most of all? The Presbyterian Assembly in 1914 gave the following direction to its Board of Education: "Recognizing the need of religious instruction for the children in our public schools, and that the responsibility for promoting this rests with the churches, the General Assembly instructs the Board of Education to take steps looking toward the solution of this problem." Accordingly the Board has heard a summary of the facts contained in this volume and voted to give them special consideration. The Council of Church Boards of Education, which includes the educational agencies of the following churches: Methodist, Baptist, Lutheran (both Council and Synod), Presbyterian (Northern, Southern and United), Disciples, Congregationalist, Reformed, Episcopal, and Friends, at its annual meeting in January, 1911, recognized, with keen insight, that the secret of Australia's success in maintaining for half a century the most harmonious and effective plan of Bible instruction in public schools is that teachers are supplied with books of Bible selections that have been carefully compiled by union committees with special reference to the psychological needs of childhood and youth; and the Council also recognized that it was appropriate that Church Boards of Education should search the world over for other available lists and books of Bible selections for schools, that it might commend the best of them to public school teachers. HOW TO RESTORE THE BANISHED BIBLE Books of Bible selections have pecome a matter of supreme importance because there are ten States in whose public schools the use of the Bible as a whole has been discountenanced by the State Supreme Court or by some State official, in which "extracts" from the Bible, as suggested by the Wisconsin Supreme Court, might be read, especially if the unsectarian character of these "extracts" was certified by the signatures of representative educators of many religious bodies. Such a book is "Bible Stories and Poems," for which men and women of many faiths stand sponsors in the "Union Bible Selections Committee," which does not ask that its use shall be made compulsory to the exclusion of other portions of the Bible, or even that its exclusive use shall be recommended. The endorsements it has already received have listed it as one of the books of Bible selections that are adapted for reading to and by young people in school or elsewhere. New Testament readings will also be sent, to be used wherever the teacher thinks it wise to do so, but alert minds will recognize that where the Bible as a whole is excluded from the schools we may congratulate ourselves if we can get a hearing for large portions of the Old Testament, and so teach our youth of God, revelation, salvation, altruism and immortality. Conferences and correspondence connected with preparation of this book have brought together men of good will who had previously stood at two extremes, one group insisting that parts of the Bible which all wish the young to know and feel should not be read in the public schools lest other portions on which there is radical disagreement shall get in; another group insisting that nothing at all should be read unless the reading of every Bible passage, however controversial or physiological, shall be allowed. Men from both extremes have been brought together in the Union Bible Selections Committee. CONTENTS PAGE PAGI Frontispiece: U. S. Supreme Court Bible.. Action of Council of Church Boards of Digest of Bible in Schools Plans in Many Samples of Average Collegians' Igno- What Great Men Have Said of the President W. H. P. Faunce on Co- Huxley's Argument for School Bible. North Dakota and Colorado Plan Ex- North Dakota and Colorado Plan Chancellor McCracken for Entrance Presbyterian Daily Memory Verses... The Morganza Plan (Co-operation of Catholics and Protestants)...... Text-Book in Morals Proposed for Schools of National Capital..... 50 N. Y. Presbyterian Synod's Proposals Continents' Plea for Union Lessons Countries and Cities Whose Educational Plans are Discussed (When figures are in parentheses, references are to second book in this binding, "Bible Stories.") Barrows, Rev. J. H., 53, 169. Bryce, Viscount James, 29. 4. Canevin, Bishop Regis, 47. Deinard, Rabbi S. N., 72. Eliot, Pres. C. W., 68. New Hampshire, 73. New South Wales, 6, 8, New Zealand, 1, 7, 86, 87, 105. North Carolina, 73, 79. 74, 124. Nova Scotia, 108. Ohio, 73, 75. Olathe (Kan.), 38. Orange Free State, 107. Pennsylvania, 1, 6, 8, 73, 74. Pittsburg, 6. Quebec, 86, 111. PERSONS QUOTED OR CITED Fallows, Bishop S., 60. Farrington, Rev. H. W., 40. Findley, Prof. J. J., 102. 59. 29. Ireland, Archbishop, 61. Keane, Archbishop J. J., 58. Mendez, Rabbi H. P., 59. Swing, Prof. David, 53. Warner, C. D., 19, 80. Wilson, President Woodrow, 3. APROPOS BIBLE READINGS Bible Day, (12), (16), (110), (258). Fourth of July, (46), (85), (89), (237). Christmas, (120). Conscience, (71). Justice, (20), (21), (22), (25), Courage, (81), (102), (134), (205), Labor Day, (101), (172). Lincoln's Birthday, (89), (311). Music, (207), (302). Nature Lessons, (5), (39), (235). Peace Day, (263), (28), (36), (41), Trust in God, (70), (115), (144), Winter, (7), (15). Woman, (89), (134), (141), (171), I. THE NORTH DAKOTA PLAN Organized Sunday School Work Co-operating with the High School System Address at International Sunday School Convention, Chicago, June, 1914 North Dakota has a board of education consisting of nine persons. It is charged with the responsibility of determining the subjects from which the curriculum of each high school in the State must be selected. It also issues what is called "State Examinations" upon all high school subjects, and fixes the day and hour at which each of these examinations must be taken. It appoints official examiners, who determine the standing of each high school pupil in the State upon the basis of their answers to these high school examinations. The woeful ignorance of the Bible among the freshmen entering the State University in the fall of 1911 was shown by an examination which Professor, now Dean, Squires of the College of Liberal Arts of the University of North Dakota conducted with that class. In considering what means might be used to remedy this condition, there came to Dean Squires, as an inspiration, the thought, Why not challenge the Sunday schools with a course of Bible study and offer to give high school credit to any pupil who will successfully pass the State examination upon that course? He presented this idea to the State Education Association with the suggestion that they appoint a committee of five to draft the proposed syllabus. The suggestion was unanimously approved and the committee appointed. The syllabus was drafted, adopted by the State Board of Education-then called the State High School Board-and the plan was in operation. No legislation was necessary. After the appointment of the committee by the State Education Association, Dean Squires consulted with the general secretary of the State Sunday School Association, soliciting his co-operation in carrying. the plan to success. The general secretary agreed with Dean Squires that when the syllabus was finally adopted the State Association should print it, distribute the same free of charge to high school students and be the agent of publicity and promotion for bringing the plan to the attention of the people of North Dakota. As soon as the stamp of approval had been given the plan by the State High School Board, the syllabus was printed in our Sunday school magazine, "Live Wires." In order to disabuse the minds of Sunday school pupils using this syllabus of the idea that they were working only for high school credit, a request was made of the committee on education of the International Sunday School Association that they allow this high school syllabus to be substituted for the Bible work in either the first standard or the advanced teacher training course. This request was granted. Now, partially because of this fact, North Dakota boasts of having the largest percentage of her Sunday school population enrolled in teacher training of any State or province in the international field, the per cent. being 4.05. There are three basic principles upon which the unqualified suc |