Primary Classes: What Shall We Teach?
By E. B. G.
IN the very texture of some kinds of writing paper, as it is held up to the light, may be seen letters and figures that were evidently stamped there during its manufacture. This is called the "water-mark." It is made while the paper is in a liquid state, and constitutes the trade-mark, or brand, of the paper. Metallic and glass articles often have trade-marks of some kind thus wrought into them while in the process of making. When the material is in a liquid state, these impressions are very easily made; but once hardened, the mark can never be effaced so long as the article exists. It is a part of its very substance. So it is with the mind in childhood. It receives impressions as these materials do when in a liquid state, and such impressions are apt to be as lasting as any trade-mark. How important that the principles inwrought in the child's character be such as shall fit him for life and lead him to Heaven! To this fact the public mind has been quite thoroughly aroused for a number of years. There are, no doubt, many individual cases of neglect, but in general, the theme of educating children has become as popular as could be desired. Never before did children receive such flattering attention as they do at present. Never before did the world hear of so many enterprises set on foot for their special benefit,—children's picnics, children's parties, children's concerts, children's meetings, and even children's sermons. The shelves of the book-store groan with children's books; children's magazines and papers abound, and scarcely a paper for grown-up people is without its "Children's Column." The land is full of fine schoolhouses furnished with every convenience for their instruction; and no church would think of being without a Sabbath-school or a Sunday-school. In the face of all this, perhaps few will be ready to accept the statement that the present tendency of children's teaching is toward the superficial. This is even more noticeable in the Sunday-school than in the day-school. Children are taught to read, write, and cipher in a far more rational way than they are taught the Bible, which is to be the guide of their life. The fact is that in most Sunday-schools very little effort is made to really teach children the Bible itself, but simply some of the principles of goodness and morality which it contains. This is the popular idea, and as such meets the minds of people in general. Now our course in teaching children must depend largely upon the object which we have in mind to accomplish. Shall we accept this popular theory? or shall we reach higher? We claim as a people to have taken advance steps in our religious views and practices; why should the Sabbath-school be an exception? We may get many good ideas from Sunday-school workers; but the sooner we unpin our skirts from theirs, the better it will be for our work. We have not the same aims, and cannot adopt their plans with any success. We cannot build upon their foundations, nor measure ourselves by them. Did they set out to do our work, they would doubtless be far-sighted enough to pursue a very different course than with their present object in view. But what should be our aim? To amuse the child innocently for an hour, and watch our chance to impress some good moral lesson upon his mind? This may be the only thing that can be done under some circumstances; for instance, in the large mission Sunday-schools, which are now so common in the great cities. They take children from the lowest slums of life, and cannot depend on any regular attendance or study. The best that could be done, is to make some good impressions, sow a little good seed which may spring up and bear fruit amidst the sin and ignorance which surround these poor children. But in our church schools, where the children of intelligent, Christian parents come from week to week to receive instruction, we may attempt more, may aim higher. Here we may undertake to teach thoroughly the history of the people of God, beginning with the creation, following down through the time of the patriarchs; the flood; the calling of Abraham; the vicissitudes of his descendants, the Hebrew nation, through their prosperity, their captivity, and their restoration; the work of the prophets; the coming of Christ, his life and teachings; the spread of the Christian religion through the work of his apostles; the history of the early Christian church; the papacy and its work; the Reformation; the messages; and the yet unfulfilled prophecies up to the second coming of Christ, and on to the bringing back of the earth to its Eden glory, where the people of God, their trials and wanderings at last forever ended, shall live to all eternity with Christ as their king. It should be remembered that those who begin this course of study as little children are growing older as they study. Their minds, by the discipline which they receive, are becoming as capable of grasping the more difficult subjects which come in the latter part of this history, as they were of understanding the simple narrative of its beginning. Such a natural course of study can scarcely fail to make the lessons learned from week to week as much a part of the child's very being, as the "water-mark" is of the substance of the paper. Bible facts and doctrines learned in this way must have a greater power to instill faith in God, and hold young people to a belief and practice of the truth, than can any desultory study, however well the lessons may be taught and impressed at the time. The apostle Paul, after speaking at some length of the experiences of "our fathers," says, "Now all these things happened unto them for ensamples; and they are written for our admonition, upon whom the ends of the world are come." And how better can our children obtain a definite knowledge of "these things" than by a thorough and systematic study of this history of the Lord's people from the creation down to the present time? It was written out by men called of God to the sacred work; it has been preserved through fire and blood, and handed down to us. Amid the mountain fastnesses, in the dens and caves of the earth, by the light of dim tapers, men and women have read with hushed voices and bated breath the history of God's dealings with man. These records gave them confidence in the God whom they served, and strength to meet persecution, torture, and death for his sake. Do you think they would have recanted from that portion of the Bible any sooner than the rest? Let us be careful that in acting as shepherds over the lambs of God's flock, we do not set our own wisdom above his. He has furnished boundless stores of food for them, but we shall need to use great care lest in its preparation we take away its nourishing qualities.—E. B. G., in S. S. Worker.