[1] Literary Study of the Bible, passim.
But there is a leading American voice which will speak in that behalf, in President Nicholas Murray Butler, of Columbia University.In his address as President of the National Educational Association, President Butler makes strong plea for the reading of the Bible even in public schools."His reason had no connection with religion.It was based on altogether different ground.He regarded an acquaintance with the Bible as absolutely indispensable to the proper understanding of English literature." It is unfortunate in the extreme, he thought, that so many young men are growing up without that knowledge of the Bible which every one must have if he means to be capable of the greatest literary pleasure and appreciation of the literature of his own people.Not only the allusions, but the whole tone and bias of many English authors will become to one whoisignorantoftheBiblemostdifficultandevenimpossibleof comprehension.
The difficulties of calling public schools to this task appear at once.It would be monstrous if they should be sectarian or proselytizing.But the Bible is not a sectarian Book.It is the Book of greatest literature.It is the Book of mightiest morals.It is governing history.It is affecting literature as nothing else has done.A thousand pities that any petty squabbling or differences of opinion should prevent the young people in the schools from realizing the grandeur and beauty of it!
But the final and most important agency.which will magnify the influence of the Bible must necessarily be the home.It will gather up all its traits, religious, moral, and literary.Here is the fundamental opportunity and the fundamental obligation.Robert Burns was right in finding the secret of Scotia's power in such scenes as those of "The Cottar's Saturday Night." One can almost see Carlyle going back to his old home at Ecclefechan and standing outside to hear his old mother making a prayer in his behalf.A newspaper editorial of recent date says this decay of literary allusion is traceable in part to the gradual abandonment of family prayers.Answering President Butler, it is urged that it is not so important that the Bible be in the public schools as that it get back again into the homes."Thorough acquaintance with the Bible is desirable; it should be fostered.The person who will have to foster it, though," says this writer, "is not the teacher, but the parent.The parent is the person whom Dr.Butler should try to convert." Well, while there may be differences about the school, there can be none about the place of the Bible in the home.It needs to be bound up with the earliest impressions and intertwined with those impressions as they deepen and extend.
So, by the Church, which will accent its religious value; by the press, which will accent its moral power; by the school, which will spread its literary influence; and by the home, which will realize all three and make it seem a vital concern from the beginning of life, the Bible will be put and held in the place of power to-day which it has had in the years that are gone, and will steadily gain greater power.
