t the wash of years and the
acids of doubt have never robbed him of it. The Psalms and gospels
then learned stay by us yet, responsive to the prick of temptation,
the stroke of sorrow, the sunlight of joy. When strongly moved we
unconsciously fall into Scriptural phraseology. God's promises then
learned are our song in the house of our pilgrimage. We do not
confound patriarchs with prophets, or passages from the epistles with
the Psalms of David.

I am continually confronted by illustrations of the truth that the
"contract system" prevails in religious teaching as extensively as in
the manufacture of garments and food and furniture, and that the
results in all cases are the same. Machine work cannot compare in
neatness and durability with hand-made goods. The complaint, "I cannot
get my Bible class to study the lessons," is almost universal. I have
known large classes of adults to be made up with the express proviso
that none of the members should be expected to prepare the lesson.
Their appearance in the classroom at the stated hour fulfills their
part of the compact. In thus presenting themselves they "press the
button." The teacher does the rest. The mother, taking her afternoon
siesta, or reading her Sunday novel at home, rarely knows the subject
of the Bible lesson, much less what the teacher's treatment of it is.

I do not mention the pastor purposely. Except when he sees them in the
Sunday-school, the faces of the children belonging (by courtesy) to
his cure of souls are seldom beheld by him. The Sunday-school
originally intended for the neglected children of the illiterate poor,
has come to be the chief instrumentality upon which well-to-do church
members depend for the spiritual upbuilding of those who are to form
the church of the future. If one is tempted to challenge the
assertion, let him compare the number of children (not infants)
enrolled in our Sunday-schools with those who habitually attend upon
divine service. The absence of the sunny, restless polls from the rows
of worshipers in the pews, the troops of boys and girls who wend
their way homeward at the conclusion of the Sunday-school exercises
are accounted for by so-called humane apologists by the plea that two
services in one day are burdensome to the little folk. And mothers
"enjoy the service far more when they are not disturbed by fidgety or
drowsy children." "Then, too, much of the sermon is unintelligible to
them. Why torture them by a mere