The record-union., 1897-09-05
IN RELIGIONS REALM.
EXPRESSIONS FROM VARIOUS
RELIGIOUS NEWSPAPERS.
The Religious Thought of the Day
as Expressed in the Sec
tartan Press.


tartan Press.
1T is necessary, unless the public
| school is to fail desperately in its good
purpose, that it should be a school OF
character says the New York
| 'Churchman" P. Ed. ITO certain
extent, it is that easily and inevitably.
1t teaches promptness and punctuality
and neatness; it brings children under
wholesome and salutary discipline But
it must do more, if it is to fulfill the
purpose for which the community sus-
tains it. 1t must not only compel them
to do right, leaving the policeman TO
continue the compulsion, but 1t must so
train them that they will desire to do
right. And by what means? There has
| been long debate in this country con-
corning the reading of the Bible IN the
schools. There is at present arising
debate in England as to the compulsory
recitation of the Apostles Greed IN the
schools. Neither will avail OF ITSELF
Character is formed neither by reading
nor by recitation. Words Will not make
it. Character depends on character. 1t
| is communicated from one personality
| to another. 1t is formed In children
by the good examples of their elders
and associates. The Bible and the creed,
to be brought effectively into the school,
must come breathing and alive in the
person of the teacher. Thus, the School
waits upon the teacher. And the teach
err the trainer of the new and better
citizenship, who shall shape the school
to the accomplishment of its high pur-
pose, waits upon the gracious personal
influences of the Christian religion
ga movement to which some attention
has been given in former decades starts
again in the Protestant Episcopal
Church." says the New York Christian
Advocate" (Meth.), lin a church CLUB
to make the canons Of the Protestant
Episcopal Church agree with the laws
of the Roman Catholic Church in re
fusing recognition of divorce for any
cause. In view of the scandal that
has occurred in the diocese of Long
Island, winked at by several Bishops,
and a similar scandal in the diocese of
Massachusetts, it is not wonderful that
some agitation should result. But as
one of the Gospels plainly allows dl-
vorce for adultery, and st. Paul so dis
cusses the subject with reference TO
| willful and obstinate desertion that
nearly all the reformed churches allow
divorce for that cause, there is no rea-
son to believe that the Catholic view
| will ever prevail in any considerable
number of Protestant churches, espe-
cialIy as the Catholic view, to protect
| itself, has been compelled to allow a
large number of reasons for separation,
| : 11ka ~iSri6
rule as laid down by that church with
much leniency. 1t is regretted by
great majority of thoughtful persons,
duly impressed with the baneful infiu-
ences of the situation, that the most
conservative report of the Committee
on the State of the Church, in 1884, up
| on this subject, was rejected without
anything worthy the name of debate,
at a time when about 100 members of
the General Conference were absent, by
vote of the conference, preparing their
nominations for the standing commit
tees-a practice which we rejoice to be
able to say has passed away"
There are those who ask for new
Bible" SAYS the New York observer
| Pres.). "The old Bible does not quite
been in the hands of the critics ever
since there was any scripture at all that
could be discussed or decimated. Some
thing is wrong with the old book-either
it says too little or, more likely, it says
too much 1t fails to speak soft word
for sin, and makes certain awkward
declarations concerning sins desert.
Many of it's statements have been ir-
| r. n arit a
stops to inquire whether it's own cri-
terra and processes are themselves quite
reasonable. SO the Bible has never been
wholly successful in commencing itself
to the prejudices of many minds. And,
strange to say, the Bible makes no pre-
tence of suiting everybody, nor seems to
court the title of a popular book. 1t
is this intractable temper, this uncom-
promising attitude, of scripture that
leads many to ask for a new Bible; and
SO much in earnest are such critics that
they are resolved that if God will not
himself supply them with newer rev.
elation they will themselves set to work
to rebuild and revamp the old edifice OF
scripture, pulling down a few of the
rooms and setting up here and there a
dormer window which will look out to-
wards more genial skies"
|
mo term in the whole realm of the
illogical SCIENCE" says the Standard
(Bapt) of Chicago, 'is so misused to-
day as higher criticism In the mouths
of men who ought to know better, in the
columns of religious papers whose ed
| itors, we hope, do know better, the
phrase is used to represent, not meth
Cd of inquiry into the date and author
ship of books, but the radical conclu-
sions arrived at by some small or large
class of men who follow this sort of
study. Other writer's, hopelessly at sea
| as to what the term signifies in the lam
guage of scholars and of the diction-
aries, use it of any statement about the
| Bible or any part of the Bible which
they wish to condemn. An instance of
this occurs in an article in one of our
Baptist exchanges, Directing to a COM
ment of the Advanced Quarterly on
a certain verse in the Sunday-school les
son. The groundless assumptions of
the higher criticism are in the air. saws
the editor. The comment to which he
| objects whether justly or not is i'm
materiaD has no more to do with the
higher criticism than it has with the
Dingley tariff. 1t is a question of inter-
probation, pure and simple. In view
of the widespread ignorance as to what
| higher criticism is, it becomes a ques-
ton whether it is better in the critic
to suffer the sings and arrows of out
rageous' Misrepresentation Will
ilr1 o nd Hlvr- I'D ID