Oxford eagle. (Oxford, Lafayette Co., Miss.) 1876-current, 1921-10-27
The Home, The Schools, and
Church as Agencies Of Education

most of our town and city communities
everything seems to conspire to keep
the average child, to fourteen and
even eighteen years of age, practical
Ily idle. OF course, he goes to school;
but under the usual machine methods
methods necessary by too large
classes and too small appropriations
= the child gets scarcely five minutes
of personal attention and is forced
during most of the school day to sit in
a stuffy room and go through the mo-
tions Of doing lessons which fail to
engage his mid Moreover this in
adequate school work occupies much
less than one-half Of his waking time.
The rest of his education is carried on,
as rule, without supervision in back
yards and streets. The result is that
nine children out of ten pick up that
part of their education which deter
mines character from older compan-
ions, from loafers, and from other UNI
ldesirables. With mistaken kindness
we have relieved the child of regular
labor; but in so doing we have i'm
posed the far heavier burden of aim
less idleness. Fortunately majority
of boys and girls survive this educa-
tional neglect and become good citi-
zens, but an appallingly large minority
unable to rescue themselves from idle
ness, fall an easy prey to evil influ-
ences,. within or without themselves.
From this class is made up the huge
army Of loafers, unemployables, and
criminals that threaten the body poll
tic.
The edict of Herod was mild COM
pared with our modern, needless
slaughter of the innocent through our
neglect; what society suffers each
day because of the unframed minds,
the weak wills, the undeveloped con-
sciences, and the blunted social in
stincts of its members, is at once the
cause and the measure of human suf-
fering and sin. To prevent all this
is really the important business of
education.
A group of splendid boys was seen
on the streets of a small city in Mis-
sissippi. They were apparently very
much interested in very young, a
very active and splendid specimen
of young bird-dog, thoroughbred,
the property of one of the boys in the
group. Anyone could covet the pos
session of such prize. The eyes,
the ears, the sleek coat, the very spine
and tail bespoke the pedigree. A man
of middle age, poorly dressed, and
with tobacco stains at his mouth cor
ners approached and began admiring-
ly to pat the little bundle of hunters
wealth. But the most interesting
thing about this gathering was not
the admiration of the crowd for the
dog, nor was it the aristocracy of the
dog himself, but rather the remark
of the middle aged man to the boy
as he picked up the dog to depart
with him. With one last admiring
look the man said to the boy: "Take
him home and keep him there, he'll
never amount to nothing if yer keep
him on the street"
Royal blood, pedigreed stock, des-
cendent of long line of aristocrats,
and yet doomed to nothing if kept on
the streets. 1t was an interesting COM
mentary on blooded dog, but equal
ly as applicable to humans. Take
those boys themselves as an illustra-
ton. Descendants of pure white stock,
fathered by long line of Anglo
Saxon forebears; bright-eyed, clean
| limbed, sound of heart and mind;
proud posSessOrs of aristocratic Amer
lean ancestors, and yet they wouldn't
amount to nothing" if you leave them
on the street. Heredity alone won't
save them. What their ancestors
were counts for nothing if society to-
day neglects to give them training off
the street. To bring up boys and girls
that shall not be, as most of them now
are, physically, domestically, socially
and morally ignorant is problem that
calls for the best in the home, the
school and the church.
1t it is now a trite saying that our
material progress as people is far in
advance of our spiritual and moral de-
velopment. It follows then that the
real problem of the home, the school,
and the church, is how these agencies
may so influence the individual that
he may keep pace in his moral and
spiritual life with the material pro-
gress of the race. Happily we are not
without an example of the fullest CO
operation of these agencies for the