, and I think it will be
agreed that modern life produces a good crop of both these kind of
defectives.

But if we believe that the permanent objective of the spirit is God--if
He be indeed for us the Fountain of Life and the sum of Reality--can we
acquiesce in these forms of loss? Surely it ought to be our first aim,
to make the sense of His universal presence and transcendent worth, and
of the self's responsibility to Him, dominant for the plastic youthful
consciousness confided to our care: to introduce that consciousness into
a world which is really a theocracy and encourage its aptitude for
generous love? If educationists do not view such a proposal with
favour, this shows how miserable and distorted our common conception of
God has become; and how small a part it really plays in our practical
life. Most of us scramble through that practical life, and are prepared
to let our children scramble too, without any clear notions of that
hygiene of the soul which has been studied for centuries by experts; and
few look upon this branch of self-knowledge as something that all men
may possess who will submit to education and work for its achievement.
Thus we have degenerated from the mediaeval standpoint; for then at least
the necessity of spiritual education was understood and accepted, and
the current psychology was in harmony with it. But now there is little
attempt to deepen and enlarge the spiritual faculties, none to encourage
their free and natural development in the young, or their application to
any richer world of experience than the circle of pious images with
which "religious education" generally deals. The result of this is seen
in the rawness, shallowness and ignorance which characterize the
attitude of many young adults to religion. Their beliefs and their
scepticism alike are often the acceptance or rejection of the obsolete.
If they be agnostics, the dogmas which they reject are frequently
theological caricatures. If they be believers, both their religious
conceptions and their prayers are found on investigation still to be of
an infantile kind, totally unrelated to the interests and outlook of
modern men.

Two facts emerge from the experience of all educationists. The first is,
that children are naturally receptive and responsive; the second, that
adolescents are naturally idealistic. In both stages, the young human
creature is full of interests and curiosities asking to be satisfied, of
energies demandin