Teach a child what is wise, that is morality. Teach him what is wise and beautiful, that is religion!
People may talk about intellectual teaching, but what we principally want is the moral teaching.
We are in the midst of a gigantic movement greater than that which preceded and produced the Reformation, and really only the continuation of that movement. But there is nothing new in the ideas which lie at the bottom of the movement, nor is any reconcilement possible between free thought and traditional authority. One or other will have to succumb after a struggle of unknown duration, which will have as side issues vast political and social troubles. I have no more doubt that free thought will win in the long run than I have that I sit here writing to you, or that this free thought will organize itself into a coherent system, embracing human life and the world as one harmonious whole. But this organization will be the work of generations of men, and those who further it most will be those who teach men to rest in no lie, and to rest in no verbal delusions.
Make up your mind to act decidedly and take the consequences. No good is ever done in this world by hesitation.
The world is neither wise nor just, but it makes up for all its folly and injustice by being damnably sentimental.