safer than they are now. The parent who says, I do not send
my child to school to learn religion, but to be taught reading, and
writing, and grammar, knows not 'what manner of spirit he is of.' It is
very certain, that such a father will teach his children any thing but
religion at home; and is it right that they should be left to grow up as
heathens in a Christian land? If he says to the schoolmaster, I do not
wish you to make my son an Episcopalian, a Baptist, a Presbyterian, or a
Methodist, very well. That is not the schoolmaster's business. He was
not hired to teach sectarianism. But if the parent means to say, I do
not send my child to school to have you teach him to fear God and keep
his commandments, to be temperate, honest, and true, to be a good son
and a good man, then the child is to be pitied for having such a father;
and with good reason might we tremble for all that we hold most dear, if
such remonstrances were to be multiplied and to prevail.

"In this connection I can not refrain from earnestly recommending the
daily reading of the Scriptures, and prayer,[26] in all our schools, as
eminently calculated to exert a powerful moral influence upon the
scholars. It is melancholy to think what swarms of children are growing
up even in Massachusetts--and what multitudes of them in every one of
these United States--who will seldom, if ever, hear the voice of prayer
if they do not hear it in the schools, and to whom the Bible will remain
a sealed book if it be not opened there. I would not insist that _every_
primary teacher should be absolutely required to open or close the
school daily with prayer. Great and good as I think the influence of
such an arrangement would be, it might be impossible, at present, to
find a sufficient number of instructors otherwise well qualified who are
fitted to lead in this exercise. The number, however, I believe is
steadily increasing. It is probably too late for me, but I hope that
some of you, gentlemen, may live to see the time when the voice of
prayer, and of praise too, will be heard in every school-house of the
land. Could I know that this would be the case, it would give me a
confidence in the perpetuity of our civil and religious liberties which
I should exceedingly rejoice to cherish as I pass off from the stage."

[26] I would not be understood to recommend that any person who does not
love the Bible, and the doctrines which it inculcates, and who does not
seek af