St. Johnsbury Caledonian. [volume] (St. Johnsbury, Vt.) 1867-1919, 1915-04-21
The Bible il Stin Read.

In view of the recent discussion in
the Vermont legislature regarding
compulsory Bible reading I'm the
schools, and the fact that many earn
est advocates of the measure deplore
the fact that the bill was killed, IL
is well to remember that a kn1wl-
edge of the Bible is in no way de-
pendent on laws making its reading
compulsory. The Bible has probably
never been more generally and intel
ligently read and studied than 1T is
today, and not because ii Is forced
upon people but because of the in
trinsic value of it's teachings. 1t is
said that an eminent educator speak
ing not long ago at West Point Ia
mented the disregard of the
Bible on the part of the college stu
dents and the consequent loss from
the point of view of culture in good
English. AT the close of his adj
dress he was confronted by a dozen
or more cadets who proceeded to tell
him that he must have been mis-
informed, especially in relation to the
interest in the Bible at West Point,
since for more than ten years one
half of all the cadets in the corps had
been meeting weekly in Bible classes.
After further investigation among
other institutions the speaker, who
was a bishop of one of the large de-
nominations, discovered that during
the last college year somewhat more
than $4,000 undergraduates of the
colleges and universities of the Uni
ted States and Canada were reported
as. engaged for part of the year at
least in voluntary, Bible study. We
are tod that the various Sunday
schools of the world report yearly
total attendance of twenty-five to
twenty-eight million pupils, that
twenty-seven Bible societies are print
ing this book, one I'm the United
States, three in Great Britain and
twenty-three ON the continent Of
Europe, aggregating a total output
of Bibles year by year or not less
than 100000 copies. More than
100000 young men and women are
enrolled in organized Bible classes In
connection with the various churches
and Christian societies of the United
States alone, while the total annual
issue of the Scriptures, in more than
48O languages and dialects reaches
the figure of 100000 volumes,
making the Bible the best selling and
most widely distributed piece of lite
nature in print. 1t seems we have
little reason to fear that Bible read
ing and study is going out OF date
Hardwick Gazette.
Bad Case of MailOrderitis
The editor of the Arkansas Dem
ocrat must have been reading mail-or-
der catalogues until he has become
the possessor Of pair OF indigo spec
tacles. Here is what he says or the
Arkansas farmer:
HE gets up at the alarm OF
Connecticut clock; buttons his Chi
cago suspenders to Detroit overalls;
washes his face with Cincinnati
soap in a Pennsylvania pan; sits
down to a Grand Rapids table; eats
Chicago meat and Tennessee flour
cooked with Kansas lard on 81.
Louis stove; puts a New YORK
bride on a Kentucky mule fed with
Iowa corn; pIows a farm covered by
Vermont mortgage with an Indi-
ana plough; when bed time comes he
reads a chapter from bible printed
in Boston, says a prayer written In
Jerusalem, crawls under blanket
made in New Jersey, only to be Kept
awake by an Arkansas dog-the only
home product on his place. Brad
| ford Opinion,