Popular Education / For the use of Parents and Teachers, and for Young Persons of Both Sexes

by Ira Mayhew

I remark again, that were the Bible made a school-book throughout the commonwealth and throughout the land, an amount of scriptural knowledge would be insensibly treasured up, which would be of inestimable value in after life. Every observing teacher must have been surprised to find how much the dullest scholar will learn by the ear, without seeming to pay any attention to what others are reading or reciting. The boy that sits half the time upon his little bench nodding or playing with his shoe-strings, will, in the course of a winter, commit whole pages and chapters to memory from the books he hears read, when you can hardly beat any thing into him by dint of the most diligent instruction. Indeed, I have sometimes thought that children in our common schools learn more by the ear, without any effort, than by the study of their own class-books; and I am quite sure this is the case with the most of the younger scholars. Let any book be read for a series of years in the same school, and half of the children will know most of it by heart. Wherever there are free schools—and the free school system is now becoming extensively adopted in every part of the United States—the great mass of the children are kept at school from four or five years of age, to nine or ten, through the year; and in the winter season, from nine or ten to fifteen or sixteen. The average of time thus devoted to their education is from eight to ten years. Now let the Bible be read daily as a class-book during all this time, in every school, and how much of it will, without effort, and without interfering in the least with other studies, be committed to memory. And who can estimate the value of such an acquisition? What pure morality; what maxims of supreme wisdom for guidance along the slippery paths of youth, and onward through every stage of life; what bright examples of early piety, and of its glorious rewards, even in the present world; what sublime revelations of the being and perfections of God; what incentives to love and serve him, and to discharge with fidelity all the duties which we owe to our fellow-men! and all these enforced by the highest sanctions of future accountability. Let any man tell, if he can, how much all this store of divine knowledge, thus insensibly acquired, would be worth to the millions of children who are growing up in these United States of America. They might not be at all sensible of its value at the time, but how happily and safely would it contribute to shape their future opinions and characters, both as men and as citizens.

Another cogent reason for using the Bible as a common school-book is, that it is the firmest basis, and, indeed, the only sure basis of our free institutions, and, as such, ought to be familiar to all the children in the state from their earliest years. While it recognizes the existence of civil governments, and enjoins obedience to magistrates as ministers of God for the good of the people, it regards all men as free and equal, the children of one common Father, and entitled to the same civil and religious privileges. I do not believe that any people could ever be enslaved who should be thoroughly and universally educated in the principles of the Bible.

It was no less truly than eloquently said by Daniel Webster, in his Bunker Hill address, that "the American colonists brought with them from the Old World a full portion of all the riches of the past in science and art, and in morals, religion, and literature. The Bible came with them. And it is not to be doubted that to the free and universal use of the Bible it is to be ascribed that in that age men were much indebted for right views of civil liberty. The Bible is a book of faith and a book of doctrine; but it is also a book which teaches man his individual responsibility, his own dignity, and equality with his fellow-men."

These sentiments of the great American statesman are worthy to be engraved in golden capitals upon the monument under whose shade they were uttered! Yes, it was the free and universal use of the Bible which made our Puritan fathers what they were; and it is because, in these degenerate times, multitudes of children will be taught to read it nowhere else, that I am so anxious to have it read as a school-book. One other, and the only additional reason which I shall suggest, is that, as the Bible is infinitely the best, so it is the only decidedly religious book which can be introduced into our popular systems of early education. So jealous are the different sects and denominations of each other, that it would be hardly possible to write or compile a religious school-book with which all would be satisfied. But here is a book prepared to our hands, which we all receive as the inspired record of our faith, and as containing the purest morality that has ever been taught in this lower world. Episcopalians can not object to it, because they believe it teaches the doctrines and polity of their own church; and this is just what they want. Neither Congregationalists, Presbyterians, Baptists, Methodists, Universalists, nor any other denomination, can object to it for the same reason. Every denomination believes, so far as it differs from the rest, that the Bible is on its side, and, of course, that the more it is read by all, the better.

For me to object to having the Bible read as a common school-book on account of any doctrine which those who differ from me suppose it to teach, would be virtually to confess that I had not full confidence in my own creed, and was afraid it would not bear a scriptural test. It seems to me an infinite advantage, for which we are bound devoutly to thank the Author of all good, that he has given us a religious book of incomparable excellence, which we may fearlessly put into the hands of all the children in the state, with the assurance that it is able to make them "wise unto salvation," and will certainly make them better children, better friends, and better members of society, so far as it influences them at all. But some persons who highly approve of daily scriptural reading in common schools are in favor of using selections rather than the whole Bible. I should certainly prefer this, provided the selections are judiciously made, to excluding the Scriptures altogether; but I think there are weighty and obvious reasons why the whole Bible should be taken rather than a part. The whole is cheaper than half would be in a separate volume; and when the whole is introduced, "without note or comment," there can be no possible ground for sectarian jealousy.

Doctors of divinity not only, but the most eminent statesmen in the country, hold the views here presented. The bold and noble stand taken by the Legislature of New York more than ten years ago (1838), has revived the hopes and infused fresh courage into the minds of those who believe that the safety and welfare of our country are essentially dependent on the prevalence of a "religious morality and a moral religion." The representatives of this great state, whose system of education is becoming increasingly an object of imitation in all the rest, at one and the same session doubled the amount of the public money for the purpose of improving the education given in the common schools—which, to the praise of that state, be it said, are now free—and in reply to the petition of sundry persons, praying that all religious exercises and the use of the Bible might be prohibited in the public schools, decided by a vote of one hundred and twenty-one to one! that the request of the petitioners be not granted. For the purpose of corroborating the doctrines of this volume, I will introduce a paragraph from the report of the Hon. Daniel D. Barnard on the occasion referred to, which was sustained by the noble, unequivocal, and almost unanimous testimony of the representatives of the most powerful member of the American states.

"Moral instruction is quite as important to the object had in view in popular education as intellectual instruction; it is indispensable to that object. But, to make instruction effective, it should be given according to the best code of morals known to the country and the age; and that code, it is universally conceded, is contained in the Bible. Hence the Bible, as containing that code, so far from being arbitrarily excluded from our schools, ought to be in common use in them. Keeping all the while in view the object of popular education, the fitting of the people by moral as well as by intellectual discipline for self-government, no one can doubt that any system of instruction which overlooks the training and informing of the moral faculties must be wretchedly and fatally defective. Crime and intellectual cultivation merely, so far from being dissociated in history and statistics, are unhappily old acquaintances and tried friends. To neglect the moral powers in education is to educate not quite half the man. To cultivate the intellect only is to unhinge the mind and destroy the essential balance of the mental powers; it is to light up a recess only the better to see how dark it is. And if this is all that is done in popular education, then nothing, literally nothing, is done toward establishing popular virtue and forming a moral people."

This is but a specimen of an invaluable document, which does honor to the heart and head of him who penned it, and to the Legislature of the commonwealth by which it was adopted by almost unparalleled unanimity.

The Hon. Samuel Young, the eminently distinguished superintendent of common schools in the same state, in a report made in 1843, inculcates sentiments which so well accord with my own views of the importance of weaving scriptural reading into the very warp and woof of popular education, that I gladly add his testimony. "I regard the New Testament as in all respects a suitable book to be daily read in our common schools, and I earnestly recommend its general introduction for this purpose. As a mere reading-book, intended to convey a practical knowledge of the English language, it is one of the best text-books in use; but this, although of great use to the pupils, is of minor importance when the moral influences of the book are duly considered. Education consists of something more than mere instruction. It is that training and discipline of all the faculties of the mind which shall symmetrically and harmoniously develop the future man for usefulness and for happiness in sustaining the various relations of life. It must be based upon knowledge and virtue; and its gradual advancement must be strictly subordinated to those cardinal and elementary principles of morality, which are nowhere so distinctly and beautifully inculcated as in that book from whence we all derive our common faith. The nursery and family fireside may accomplish much; the institutions of religion may exert a pervading influence; but what is commenced in the hallowed sanctuary of the domestic circle, and periodically inculcated at the altar, must be daily and hourly recognized in the common schools, that it may exert an ever-present influence, enter into and form a part of every act of life, and become thoroughly incorporated with the rapidly expanding character. The same incomparable standard of moral virtue and excellence, which is expounded from the pulpit and the altar, and which is daily held up to the admiration and imitation of the family circle, should also be reverently kept before the mind and the heart in the daily exercises of the school."

I will add the testimony of another whom we all delight to honor. Never were sentiments uttered more worthy to be remembered and repeated through all generations, than those which fell from the Father of his Country in his Farewell Address to the American people. "Of all the dispositions and habits which lead to political prosperity, religion and morality are indispensable supports. In vain would that man claim the tribute of patriotism who should labor to subvert these great pillars of human happiness, these firmest props of the duties of men and citizens. The mere politician, equally with the pious man, ought to respect and cherish them. A volume could not trace all their connections with private and public felicity. Let it simply be asked. Where is the security for property, for reputation, for life, if a sense of religious obligation desert the oaths which are the instruments of investigation in courts of justice? And let us with caution indulge the supposition that morality can be maintained without religion. Whatever may be conceded to the influence of refined education on minds of peculiar structure, reason and experience both forbid us to expect that national morality can prevail in exclusion of religious principles." How noble, how elevated, how just these parting words.