The Republican. [volume] (Oakland, Md.) 1877-current, 1915-07-22
Gated as we'll as pious.

dissatisfaction with the attitude of that
same Church of England, also broke
away from the church and sought a
purer, more intelligent, more enlighten
ed, more vital form of religion. What,
after all, was it that he aimed to do?
He attempted to brush the scales from
the eyes of the unseeing He endeavored
to make religion more sane and ap-
pealing and thus more soul satisfying
and you will remember that he had a
mighty fight to wage. But who will
today maintain that even the church
from which he revolted was not purged
by his protest against the bigotry and the
narrowness of its religious attitude?
'III. MY CONTENTION IS THIS:
THAT CIVILIZATION AT ITS BEST
MUST UNITE THE FINEST EDU-
CATION WITH THE PUREST RE-
LIGION:
The eye can not say to the ear, 4
have no need of thee, neither can the
hand say to the foot. 81 have no need
of thee. If Education is the eye, then
Religion Is the ear; and if Education is
The hand, then Religion is the foot. A
man must have both eye and ear; both
hand and foot else he is a defective
He must likewise pay tribute to both
Education and Religion, if he is to be
mentally and spiritually what he should
be.
America is solemnly obligated to
keep church and state separate. To
that policy we are unalterably COM
mitted; but all intelligent, square think
ing, far-seeing people must admit that
even if we can not have the two official
ly connected, the two must at any rate
be essentially combined in the individual
life and in the national life.
81 direct your attention to some of
the greatest men in American history;
and ask you to recall that in the hour
of supreme trial, trying bravely and
unselfishly to do their duty for their
country, they combined in most striking
fashion the intelligence of Education
and the piety of Religion.
What school boy is there who does
not know the story of George Washing
ton, who, during that terrible winter at
Valley Forge, was found from time to
time kneeling in the forest and pouring
out his heart in agonizing prayer to
-
God. to give him guidance as he tried
tosdo what he could for his bleeding
country? What school boy is there
who does not know the story of Abraham
Lincoln and how, in the terrific crisis
of the Civil War, Lincoln was driven
nearer and ever nearer the throne of
God, combining, in fact, a mind that
was vitality educated with heart that
was open to the appeals of the Infinite?
And you remember how William
Mckinley, another of our martyred
Presidents, in his last hour, when the
haze began to cover his eye and his
spirit began to hover on the brink be-
tween two worlds, repeated with calm
! trust
| Though like the wanderer.
The sun gone down.
Darkness be over me,
My rest a stone,
Yet in my dreams I'd be
| Nearer, my God, to thee,
| Nearer to thee
at is evident, then, nv friends, that
the greatest men come to their best,
privately and publicly, only by a su-
preme combination of Education and
Religion in their lives. And can there
be even a scintilla of doubt that if
this, our beloved America, is to escape
the sorry fate of the dismantled nations
of gone-by centuries, if she is to come
to her best, she must remember that
that best can not by any possibility be
attained, save by an effective combina-
ton of the highest ideals of both Educa-
ton and Religion? l need not press
you for reply. Your heads and your
hearts can make but one answer.
"St. Paul vigorously spoke to the
Athenians because they were worship
ping superstitiouslv and ignorantly:
"4e men of Athens, perceive that in
all things We are too superstitious; for
as passed by beheld an inscription,
TO AN UNKNOWN GOD. Whom
therefore We ignorantly worship, Him
declare | unto you" And even the
great Master Teacher, Jesus Christ,
constantly demonstrated with men for
unintelligent worship, for regarding
the form and not the substance, for be-
ing whited sepulchers without, but
within full of dead mems bones. No
where does Jesus say that religion is of
better quality when separated from in
telhgence; or that education is able to
satisfy mans soul without religion.
On the contrary, he always essentially
declares that the one must leaven the
lump of the other.
And so leave off as | began, that
Education can not come to its best
without Religion; nor can Religion
achieve its best without the aid of
Education. The two are Siamese twins.
/ L