has not discriminated sharply between instruction and training. There is a vast difference between moral instruction and moral training. Instruction is telling how to do, training involves the doing under the eye of the instructor. Those children must have in our schools the opportunity of acting from the same motives they will act from when they go out into the world. In our large study hall, seating over 300 pupils, a teacher is always stationed to prevent a disaster from a panic in case of fire. That teacher, however, is not responsible for the activity of the room. She grant's no permissions. Any pupil, by raising the hand, says to the teacher, "I am about to take the responsibility of doing something." The teacher by a nod says "I see you are." Every act of the child then is determined by the same mental and moral powers as he must use in after life. We thus have moral training. Instruction in morals is not enough. Gentlemen, does the teaching hygiene and the facts of the use of narcotics and stimulants in school stop men from becoming drunkards? Do you not know many physicians who are going down to their death from the use of stimulants? They have, however, learned at death-beds better than the children can, what is the effect of alcohol on the system. It is not enough to know what is right; we must have the power to execute what is right. I speak of psychological terms with much hesitancy in the presence of so many learned men. The will embraces the power of choice and the power of execution. We may have the power to choose right, but fail in carrying out our choice in the presence of temptation. In the presence of temptation a man must have power to hold to the right. We must then have our children in such environment that the executive part of their will will be trained. We may show them that for selfseeking there is but one typical character - that of Satan. For self-sacrifice there is but one typical character-that of God. Nobody "no" to that.

will say

I have never felt any of those restraints alluded to. Perhaps others have been more unfortunate. I know many in this State just as fortunate as I. One thing more. It is a different thing to tell a child that it ought to have a certain feeling, and to awaken that emotion in him.

How shall we awaken the moral sentiment? To illustrate by a single method. In a room of children of seven or eight years of age, I asked how many of you made your own shoes? No one. How many made

any part of your dress?

No one. How many provided their own breakfast? No one. If others held us to all that we have what ought we to do to help others? A feeling of obligation was thus awakened and first voiced by the children.

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REMARKS OF PRINCIPAL A. G. BENEDICT.

MR. CHANCELLOR AND GENTLEMEN OF THE CONVOCATION.—I would most heartily approve the words spoken by Dr. Bradley yesterday in reference to the value of definite moral training and instruction in moral philosophy. The testimony of our pupils in our institution in the last ten or fifteen years is uniform to the effect that instruction in moral philosophy, together with the life of the teacher, has been a most strong and definite element in forming character. A few years ago I was taken by a friend to the studio of an artist. There was a picture on an easel representing an interior. A clock marked the hour of nine. A mother was standing beside the cradle of a sleeping babe, with one hand on the head of a little one who had crept from a cot, and with the other hand on the head of her son, a lad of some twelve years, who had just come in from the street, overpowered by the conviction that had just come to him that his father was a drunkard. He had vainly tried to bring his father from a saloon. The mother, with hands on her children, raises her head in prayer that this trial upon the boy may not be too great; that grace might be given her to bear the burden of a drunkard's wife. There was grief, pain, depicted on her face, yet, suffusing all, there was visible a faith in a Supreme Being which gave a radiant beauty to her countenance. The artist said that it took him about three months to paint the face of the mother. He could not work at it at all times. Only after preparation by prayer could he use his brush to finish that figure. But, turning to another large canvas on which was a figure of Pilate in the trial scene, in strong, contrasting colors, the artist said: "When I painted that figure all the preparation I needed was to let out the devil in me, and I could paint as rapidly as my brush could move."

That, gentlemen, stated the case of the teachers of moral instruction in schools. Good results in the lives of others are obtained only by the use of what is best in ourselves.

REMARKS OF PRINCIPAL A. C. HILL.

Mr. CHANCELLOR.-The writer of this paper has stated very clearly and forcibly the fundamental fallacy of the State in its efforts at moral education, viz., that "morality can be taught without reference to religion." I think he is the first man I have ever heard say that religion is the outgrowth of morality, rather than the opposite. It seems to me that the legitimate conclusion to be drawn from the position taken in this paper is that the State can do nothing whatever in the matter of the moral training of its youth. It must be admitted that moral training must be done by teachers who are themselves moral, and largely by

the silent influence of personal character. We have no way by which such teachers can be put into our public schools and others excluded. Professor Norton, for example, is a Christian man. He can successfully teach morality in his school, if the trustees and officers do not prevent him, but there is no provision of the State whereby Professor Norton's place in Elmira can be filled by one fitted to continue the work he has begun so well. It may be said that an applicant for a license to teach must be of good moral character, but so must one who asks for a license to sell liquor. There is no standard of morality. I say, therefore, that the State, as a State, can do nothing in teaching morality.

The only way out of the dilemma in which this conclusion leaves us is, as it seems to me, to recognize two facts: First, that there are two stages in the teaching of morality, the stage of childhood and the stage of youth. Second, that during the first stage moral instruction can be left to parents, and during the latter the State should have nothing to do either with intellectual or moral culture.

A child takes the precepts of morality as they are given to him. He is told to be honest and he is honest without asking any questions, just as he eats an apple and does'nt ask where it came from. But when the child advances from boyhood to youth and from the elementary to the high school, he is no longer willing to accept statements without reasons. In this second stage of development it is just as impossible to divorce morality from religion as to take the spirit out of a man and have him still exist. Emerson says, "the fatal mistake of religion in our day is its divorce from morality." Christians have been too willing to have the Bible, and the moral teaching based upon it excluded from the schools. They have relied too much upon the churches and Sunday schools to do the work of moral training. They have allowed the cry of "sectarianism' to prevail and handed our schools over to infidelity. The fact is there is no sectarianism in schools to-day and the warfare against it is really against religion itself. To quote a phrase used last evening by our Roman Catholic friend: "Better any religion than no religion." We are the only nation on the earth that brings up its youth in ignorance of its sacred books. Since the tide is setting toward the entire separation of the State and religion, the only logical and just accompaniment of this tendency is a limitation of the function. of the State in education to the most elementary and essential instruction. All secondary and higher instruction should be left to voluntary agencies.

I am glad that the reader of this paper, the representative of a State institution, has stated so clearly the position of the State in the matter,

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viz., that morality must be taught but religion ignored in the public schools. The battle is fairly drawn. We are beginning to see the effects of the fallacy that such a thing is possible and it will be more and more apparent as time advances.

VII.

Overcrowded Courses of Study.

By Principal GEORGE A. BACON, Syracuse High School.

The Quixotic amusement of mistaking windmills for giants not being entirely a thing of the past, it behooves one to examine carefully the object of attack before putting one's lance in rest. Are courses of study really overcrowded? Unfortunately there is a general feeling that the discussion of educational matters requires no special study or knowledge, and therefore it happens that crude utterances and wild misstatements form the bulk of our literature on this subject. A wellknown physician (Dr. William Hammond), in the Popular Science Monthly, for April, recently entered the field, and, not content with general statements, which are difficult to disprove, allowed himself to be led into definite misstatements. Every week some writer indulges in a popular tirade which has no real result except to encourage antagonism where there should be co-operation. Yet even such utterances are not entirely without their value to those who seek by a true diagnosis to find a real remedy, though they may be likened to the peevish fretfulness of the ailing child which cannot locate or describe its trouble. They may at least be taken as evidence that there is trouble of some sort, though its nature is not really known.

That overcrowded courses of study are to-day a prime defect of our educational schemes, the writer firmly believes. The grounds of this belief are broad, and may, perhaps, be properly enunciated here, at least in part.

First. The printed courses of study of various schools may be put in evidence to show that a priori they prescribe too much. During the past year the writer has sent to every city superintendent in the United States for his annual report. He has also asked for information contained in catalogues or other form from nearly 2,000 schools. From a considerable number no response has been received, but the literature thus collected has an important bearing on the question under discussion and offers a valuable mass of evidence. In many cases it is plain that the courses of study have been made to present the largest possible showing on paper, and superintendents and principals have vied