The Jersey City news. (Jersey City [N.J.]) 1889-1906, 1895-05-27
4 Vicious DIVISION.
The Rev. DR.. Stoddard Says the
Present System Of Eduea-
ton Is All Wrong.

ton Is All Wrong.
The Rev. E. L. Stoddard in st Johns
P. e. Church. Summit avenue, yesterday
morning preached an impressive sermon
to the graduating members and alumni of
the Rector's Bible class. Among other
thinge he said
st is said that the last utterance of the
great German poet Goethe was the cry
more light, more light This Is preeni-.
nently the cry of the generation in which
we live. 1t is an age of education. Never
were the needs of education so extensive
ly felt; never We're the means of educatic1f
so widely diffused. There are two reasons
for this. Ono is the marvellous develop
ment of the realm of knowledge and the
other is the spread of republican prin-
ciples. In America, therefore, the school
house is more important than the Court
House. In this country we have practi-
cally wide education into three parts,
We nave called it secular, physical and re-
ligious. The common hoo attends to
the first. Our athletic associations, con-
Quoted often with our schools and col
leges. attend to the second and develop
the body. AS for the religious part of
man. it is often forced to shift for itself.
In some cases the Sunday school pro-
vides for 1t one Jour a week. More rarely
still. attention is paid to 1t in the home
circle. To speak at the present time
against this system Of dividing man III
and educating him in sections, is as
futile as whistling in the teeth of a
popular hurricane. But the time will
come when these words will be remem-
bered. We believe this division to be
vicious. First it is unsound in theory.
MAN is A UNIT.
Man is a unit. You can't take him to
pieces and educate one part Sunday and
one part Monday. He Should not be
taught that geography concerns this
world and the catechism the next, but
that God is the author of geography
as well as the catechism; that there is
religion in the study of arithmetic as
well as in the study of the Bible; that
all education should be religious and
that all religion should be rational and
wise. A boy should feel that to ill-use
q body. whether it be his own or that
of his horse. is a crime against God,
as well as against himself, and that
TO remain in ignorance of this fair and
beautiful world is as much a sin as not
to know his creed. 1 believe then that
our theory of separate education is all
wrong as a theory. 1t gives too much
time to inferior education and relegates
the training of the higher manhood to
a corner. 1t divorces the world of men,
commerce and science from the world
of God. when both are really one.
THE BIBLE TEACHES BETTER.
The Bible teaching is better. That
says. In the beginning God created the
heavens and the earth. The foundation
of all things is God. There is no differ
ence in the Bible between mans world
and Gods world. God is in this world
10 be studied, to be obeyed. According
to the Bible. the laws which govern
arithmetic or tides. the discovery of
America or the unfolding of a flower,
are Gods laws. and to be taught as
such. By separating God from His
world. by setting up a fetch called law,
as science has done. and worshipping
that instead of the law-maker behind
IT, by revealing to a child the inexor-
ableness OF nature while some feeble
as a good natured. distant and dotfng
grandfather, the child. while he learns
that he can't, fool nature is finally per-
suaded that he can fool God. He will
therefore. break a commandment when
he will not break a law of gravitation.
Separated from the %seculaF, religious
-unimportant. while the secular man
grows narrow. material and purblind
We believe in training the child as q
unit, in teaching that all knowledge
is related, that all truth is religious
truth. and that all life should be sacred
and holy. But since this cannot be, &C
best we can with the means we have.
The church. to which we belong, has
taken the utmost care that If possible
training. She has. therefore, her IA
nous educational orders from which ]
have SO often quote, though even lately
men deny that they were in the prayer
book. They. are there. however, for all
to read 1 as TER pFsff e. CHURCH.
This church of ours gives her com.
mand concerning children because one Of
her great chaEacteristdes is that Of 4
thing to tell them. Her mission is. u
this or that congregation wish, nor what
this or that body of ministers vote upon.
but what she has received of Christ and
| What She has to do and just what she
has to say. THIS is why she admits SO
many TO her fold who4cannot get in any
where else A man cannot unite with a
sect which exists to uphold this or thai
special form of doctrine unless sbe
nel1eVeS the p6CulldT ana Exclusive IalIN
of that sect. But he can come into the
church by accepting the simplest form
of Christian faith because the chief thing
which the church desires of a man is
that he himself have a desire for light.
There is no liberty like this outside the
church nor can there be. The church,
however, does not tolesate error, bur
| erring men. Because she has no fear
| or uncertainty herself, she can disregard
his uncertainty. She claims to have.
the refore, the largest.. liberty and de-
clares hat these. ~queslons about which
men have divided and left her fold are
of no vital consequence. She welcomes
members of other denominations, there
fore. ION a broader and higher ground.
Her body of truth is enshrined in her
liturgy and she has a body of teachers
trained to deliver it.
This teaching church of ours is apt TO
forget sometimes that preaching is not
/ teaching, that cratory is net Instruction.
that elocuence Is not n-ourishment for
the soul who needs light more h heat
WHY THE GLASS WAS FORMED.
II have sometimes felt that our church
gave too much time to preaching ane
lost sight of teaching. For that rease9
I Determined long g to form what Is
| seldom found IN our churches, a ~rcstor's
Bible class. Overseeing generally the
! church school / gave up an hour on Sun
Gay to instructing the older boys and
girls. I did It first as o duty, am office of
the church which / felt was neglected.
| But I did 1t also because / loved 1t.
THE graduating class today consists