The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1896-12-13
sunday school literature.

Sunday school Literature.
What kind of literature is placed IN the
hands of children by Sunday school libra
ries? Is it always good, wholesome,
strengthening reading matter? Agnes
Reppler. in an article in scribner's.
doubts that it is. 1t is not questioned that
the officials who select the books are sin
cere in their desire and painstaking in
their efforts to choose only such books
as are good for young readers. But are
the selections made with good judgment?
Miss Repplier says that usually they are
not. and speaks Of the little heroes and
heroines of the tales as little Pharisees
in fiction" Too often the whole stock Of
a Sunday school llsrary is made up of
tales of the style of the good little boy
who died." and the bad little boy who
went to a murderer's grave. The leading
characters in most of the stories are Grip
pied lads, consumptive mothers, angelic
little girls with spinal trouble, infidel or
drunken fathers, prosecuted school boys
or girls. The principle scenes have to do
with death BEDS slow starvation, acts of
cruelty by unnatural parents practiced
upon sanity children, and the like.
The stories are not quite so grewsome
as "Fox's Book of Martyrs" or "Harveys
Meditations Among the Tombs." But they
are hardly less depressing to young read
ers. Miss Repplier knew bright and
lively little maiden who, after reading a
book obtained from the Sunday school IL
brary, was greatly depressed, and be-
came almost ILL., The book was examined,
and the chapter headings were found to
be as follows: THE Inhdel. The Dying
Banker, The Drunkard's Death,
The Mlsers Death. The Hospital.
The Wanderers Death, The Dying
Shirt-maker, The Broken Heart The Des-
titute Poor" 1t is not to be wondered at
that the little maiden was depressed,
nervous and without appetite. The head
ings are such as might have been taken
out of the magazine supplement" of
New York Sunday newspaper Of the new
school of journalism.
The majority of the "perniciously
good" children who perambulate through
the stories with an ever ready scriptural
verse upon the tips of their tongues, are
conceited little prigs, in Miss Repplier's
opinion. They feel that they have mis-
sion in this world, in the way of minis
tering to the spiritual well-beng of their
parents, cousins, uncles, aunts, and even
venerable grandmothers sometimes. They
are taught the commandment, Honor
thy father and thy mother" and they
proceed to put it into practice by con-
victing them of falsehood upon the first
occasion, in order that their own saintli-
ness may shine effulgently through the
gloom of sin enveloping the remainder of
the household. The sighs and tears, and
prayers, and tribulations of the good lit
tie people in the stories are stretched out
through a hundred or more pages. with
triumph at the end, in a manner calculated
to induce youthful readers to set out at
once for the reformation of their amiable
and harmless parents.
Some of the books are ludicrous, when it
is considered that they are nominally in
tended for youthful minds. Miss Rep
plier quotes from one of the kind. A lit
tie girl named Helen asked her father for
some trihing information. He gave it to
| her, with considerable grandiloquence,
and then added by way of commencing
her for asking: MANY children are so
| foolish as to be ashamed to let those they
converse with discover that they do not
comprehend everything that is said to
them, by which means they often imbibe
erroneous ideas, and perhaps remain in
! ignorance on many essential subjects,
when by questioning their friends they
might easily have obtained correct and
useful knowledge Presumably the blow
almost killed Helen.