ances of
life, to whom our conduct matters, gives a soul to morality. The Old
Testament is a record of the growth of a nation more fully conscious of
God than is the record of any other nation, and because of this children
can understand God in human life when they read such stories as the
childhood of Moses and of Samuel. Children resemble the young Jewish
nation in this respect: they accept the direct intervention of God in
the life of every day. Their primitive sense of justice, which is an eye
for an eye, will make them welcome joyfully the plagues of Egypt and the
crossing of the Red Sea. It would be premature to force on them the more
mature idea of mercy, which would probably lead to confusion of
judgement: they must be clear about the balance of things before they
readjust it for themselves.

Much of the material in the Old Testament is hardly suitable for very
young children, but the most should be made of what there is: the lives
of Eastern people are interesting to children and help to make the
phraseology of the Psalms and even of the narratives clear to them.
Wonder stories such as the Creation, the Flood, the Burning Bush,
Elijah's experiences, appeal to them on another side, the side that is
eager to wonder: the accounts of the childhood of Ishmael, Isaac,
Joseph, Moses, David and Samuel, and the little Syrian maid, come very
close to them. Such stories should be given to young children so that
they form part of the enchanted memory of childhood--which is permanent.

With the New Testament the problem is more difficult: one hesitates to
bring the life of Christ before children until they are ready to
understand, even in some degree, its significance; the subject is apt to
be dealt with either too familiarly, and made too commonplace and
everyday a matter, or as something so far removed from human affairs as
to be mysterious and remote to a child. To mix Old and New Testament
indiscriminately, as, for example, by taking them on alternate days, is
unforgivable, and no teacher who has studied the Bible seriously could
do so, if she cared about the religious training of her children, and
understood the Bible.

If the children can realise something of the sense in which Christ
helped human beings, then some of the incidents in His life might be
given, such as His birth, His work of healing, feeding and helping the
poor, and some of His stories, such as the lost sheep, the lost son, the
sower, the good Samar