Author. 
 
 Title 
 
 aa8s.LBM.5„. 
 
 Imprint 
 
 10—36299-1 GPO 
 
®l)e iSibIc, tl)c Hoi, anb Religion, in j 
 Common Scl)oob. 
 
 THE ARK OF GOD 0^^ A NEW CART: 
 
 A SERMON. BY REV. M. HALE /SMITM. 
 
 Bfl1t«^^ 
 
 REVIEW OF THE SERMON, 
 
 BY WM. B. FOWLE, PtTBLISHER OF THE MASS. COMMOX SCHOOT. JOUUNAr-. 
 
 STRICTURES 
 
 ON THE 
 
 SECTARIAN CHARACTER OF THE COMMON SCHOOL JOURNAL 
 
 BY A MEMBER OF THE MASS. BOARD OF EDUCATION. 
 
 CORRESPONDENCE 
 
 BETWEEN THE 
 
 HON. HORACE MANN, SEC. OF THE BOARD OF EDUCATION, 
 
 AND 
 
 REV. MATTHEW HALE SMITH. 
 
 BOSTON: 
 
 REDDING & CO., 8 STATE STREET. 
 
 18 4 7. 
 
ai)c Bible, H]c iloi), aub Ucligion, in 
 Gammon Scljools. 
 
 THE ARK OF GOD 0^ A NEW CART: 
 
 A SERMON, BY REV. M. HALE SMITH. 
 
 A REVIEW OF THE SERMON, 
 
 SY WM. B. FGWLE, BUBLISHER OF THE MASS. COMMON SCHOOL JOURNAL. 
 
 STRICTURES 
 
 ON THE 
 
 SECTARIAN CHARACTER OF THE COMMON SCHOOL JOURNAL, 
 
 BY A MEMBER OF THE MASS. BOARD OF EDUCATION. 
 
 CORRESPONDENCE 
 
 BETWEEN THE 
 
 HON. HORACE MANxN, SEC. OF THE BOARD OF EDUCATION, 
 
 AND 
 
 REV. MATTHEW HALE SMITH. 
 
 BOSTON: 
 
 REDDING & CO., 8 STATE STREET. 
 
 1847. 
 

TO THE READER. 
 
 I have been unexpectedly called to a discussion of the subject 
 matter of this pamphlet. I have been publicly, repeatedly, and 
 officially assailed, on account of some positions I have Bssiimed ia 
 relation to religion and irreligion in common schools. Those who 
 complain, speak, as the reader will perceive, in their own words. 
 I make such defence as I think the occasion demands. I leave the 
 matter to the judgment of those who have great interest in the right 
 teaching of the young — ^ the Christians and patriots of the Com- 
 raonwealth. M. H. S, 
 
THE BIBLE, THE ROD, AND RELIGION, 
 
 IN 
 
 COMMON SCHOOLS. 
 
 Prom the Boston Rbcordee, Oct. 15, 1846. 
 
 THE ARK OF GOD ON A NEW CART. 
 
 [The following discourse contains an expose of the present moral con- 
 dition of this city. Some may think that it presents too dark a picture, 
 but the question is, "is it true.'" Let any one go through our city and 
 see our gambling establishments, grogshops, theatres. Sabbath desecration, 
 courtsof justice, jails and penitentiaries, and he will not doubt the cor- 
 rectness of these statements. In view of all this, the question that presses 
 itself upon the conscience of every good citizen is. What can be done 
 to stay the further progress of this plague .'' 
 
 This sermon was called out by a public meeting held in Faneuil Hall, 
 to consider the morals of Boston. The crowd upon its first delivery was 
 80 great that a large number were unable to gain admittance. At the 
 earnest request of many, it was repeated to a large congregation last Sab- 
 bath morning. — Eds.] 
 I 
 
O THE BIBLE, THE ROD, AND 
 
 Increase OF Intemperance. Crime and Juvenile Depravity — 
 Its cause and cure. A Sermon preached before the Church 
 and Society of the Pilgrims, in Boston, Oct. 10, 1846. 
 
 BY MATTHEW HALE SMITH. 
 
 II. Sam. vi : 3. "And they set the ark of God upon a new cart." 
 
 King David sent chosen men to bring the ark of God from its 
 resting place to Hebron. Positive legislation had been given by 
 Jehovah in respect to the removal of that symbol of his presence. 
 Uzzah and his associates took counsel of their own wisdom, and re- 
 solved to do the work of God in their own way. The ark was put 
 upon a new cart, instead of being borne on the shoulders of the 
 priests of God. On its passage, the ark jostled ; Uzzah reached 
 forth his hand to keep it steady. God smote him because he violat- 
 ed positive law, and he died before the ark. His motive may 
 have been good, but a right thing must not be done in a 
 WRONG WAY. So this history, so all experience, teach. 
 
 All men are sinners ; the results of a depraved nature are daily 
 developed. To purify men, to roll back the flood of guilt, to ele- 
 vate our race, has been the desire of many hearts. Some lean upon 
 Divine Wisdom ; many philanthropists lean on their own, and in their 
 opmion, superior wisdom. Much has been attempted during the past 
 twelve years, and little done. Indeed, society is-— like the woman 
 in the gospel who, after a sickness of twelve years, had spent all her 
 living, — "no better, but rather the worse." The increase of 
 crime, of all forms and degrees, is apparent and alarming. 
 
 L Crime is on the increase. 
 
 1. This is seen in Sabbath desecration. It is more bold ; in it 
 there is more of defiance than usual. You see this in the open 
 shops ; in the exhibition of statuary, falsely called religious ; in Sab- 
 
RELIGION, IN COMMON SCHOOLS. 7 
 
 bath newspapers, thrown with great impertinence into the doors of 
 Christian people upon the Sabbath. You see it in the very tone of 
 those presses which are professedly the guardians of the morals of 
 the city. One paper at least, started and sustained on moral 
 grounds, pledged to oppose theatres and support the observance of 
 the Sabbath,'has so far presumed upon such a change in public sen- 
 timent, as to advertise theatres, w^hich in the opinion of many are 
 cause and effect of crime, and has also commended t^iis recently 
 established Sabbath newspaper without one word of rebuke. 
 
 2. It is seen in the increase of intemperance. Places for the 
 manufacture of drunkenness increase. The business is more open- 
 ly conducted, and in defiance of law. Bands of nfiusic are among 
 other attractions to call multitudes to those avenues of hell. The 
 records of our courts prove that intemperance increases. Pledged 
 men relapse. The pledge seems to have lost its power. Years of 
 toil and sacrifice are lost. And the burning, fiery flood seems to 
 have broken its bounds, and is with fearful surges gaining upon us 
 every hour. 
 
 3. Depraved men were never bolder than now. Our judges, 
 who are not alarmists, who are not orthodox, say so. Murders, 
 robberies, housebreaking, are deeds of daily occurrence. Highway 
 robbery in the streets of Boston at 10 and 11 o'clock at night, is 
 not uncommon. Few feel safe ; few leave their homes at dark 
 without some fear. 
 
 4. Boys and youth are increasing in boldness aad crime. This 
 is one of the most startling developements of this age. A large 
 proportion of our criminals are boys, lads and youth. They steal, 
 they rob, they burn, they kill. It has been officially announced that 
 the House of Correction is full. Soon the same will be said of the 
 State's Prison. Such is the true state of the case;. We ought to 
 look at it as it actually is. 
 
 II. The Cause. 
 
 Many attribute all this evil to rumselling. I do not. I believe if 
 all rumselling to-day was checked by a stringent law, the depravity 
 that now abounds would find another outlet. The cause lies back 
 
8 
 
 THE BIBLE, THE ROD, AND 
 
 of that ; it sustains that. The boldness and success of that business, 
 finds a support in the same causes which increase crime. 
 
 1. Whj does intemperance increase. I answer. Temperance 
 has been divorced from religion, and has lost its power. It has been 
 made the handmaid of impiety. In the house of its friend it has 
 been wounded. The tree has been girdled by those who have sat 
 under its shade. At the door of professed friends, much of this 
 evil will be found. The cause of temperance in this country began 
 in principle and in the fear of God. While God was acknowledged, 
 wonders were wrought. The cup was banished, and habits and 
 customs, riveted by years, gave way in a day. But the cause has 
 changed hands, and its tone and temper have gradually but surely 
 changed. Old friends and tried have been pushed back ; and by 
 insolence, censoriousness and denunciation, they have been assured 
 that they were no longer needed in the field. Under the plea of 
 no sectarianism, a Universalist preacher would be allowed to go the 
 whole length of his creed, and tell all that lie helieved about the 
 evils of drunkenness; while another man that believed more than 
 he, who believed that the drunkard would go to hell, would be cut 
 short in his speech, because he was sectarian. I have known a 
 speaker called to order, in a so-called temperance meeting, because 
 he repeated the text, " No drunkard shall inherit the kingdom of 
 God." Temperance has been identified with Sabbath desecration. 
 Washingtonianism has been called Christianity, and said to be gos- 
 pel enough for men. It has been substituted for the preaching of 
 Jesus Christ upon the Sabbath. Crowds have been collected upon 
 church steps during divine service, and gatherings held in the streets 
 and on the wharves, during the hours of public worship. Meetings 
 are held on Sabbath evening on the principle of a shilling theatre, 
 to which admittance is gained at 12 1-2 cents per head, to hear 
 glees, jokes and noise. 
 
 The cause has been divorced from religion ; and yet the leaders 
 of this movement affect to be surprised that clergymen and churches 
 stand aloof from the present organization. At a public meeting 
 in Faneuil Hall last week, a public rebuke was administered to the 
 
RELIGION, IN COMMON SCHOOLS, 9 
 
 clergy of the city, for their want of boldness. But do these men 
 suppose that the friend of religion will endorse this yoking of tem- 
 perance and impiety together? and that when the alternative is, 
 intemperance or Sabbath desecration, they will hesitate one moment 
 which to choose ? Intemperance destroys the man ; Sabbath dese- 
 cration the nation. These people need not be told that we are unwil- 
 ling to help cast out one devil, if the only thing to be gained is the 
 introduction of seven others more wicked than he. 
 
 It is not true that the many stand back, who once were active, be- 
 cause they are afraid of their popularity. The ministry and the 
 church, in the infancy of the cause, before public favor was secured, 
 when there was something to be afraid of, when some sacrifice and 
 toil were necessary, were not afraid to speak and suffer for humani- 
 ty. Nor do I believe the love of gain lies at the basis of this un- 
 willingness to act. That men will sell rum while it is profitable so 
 to do, I have no doubt. But it is not true of the citizens of Boston, 
 that they love gain more than principle. Let them know what hu- 
 manity demands, and they will respond to that demand. The spirit 
 of Hancock yet lives. When it became necessary to burn Boston, 
 as it was thought, to save the country, Hancock assured his friends 
 that such an act would leave him in poverty. But, said he, if the 
 country demand the sacrifice, let the torch be applied. To other 
 causes you must look. 
 
 You must divorce the temperance movement from impiety. It 
 must cease to be a platform on which reckless persons can insult 
 religious institutions ; and cease to be an engine by which evil men 
 can assail the good. You must come back to principle. Till then, 
 temperance must languish ; intemperance triumph. There is not 
 moral power enough in evil men to sustain a good cause. Satan 
 cannot cast out devils. 
 
 2. Why does crime increase ? I reply, the harvest has come. 
 The seed was sown long since ; the fruit is legitimate : it was pre- 
 dicted and expected. For some years there has been a growing 
 sympathy with crime, and crime has kept pace with it. We live in 
 an age in which that sympathy is organized to stand between the 
 1* 
 
10 THE BIBLE, THE ROD, AND 
 
 villain and his punishment. The fruit of this sympathy is seen all 
 around us. We have a pale, gaunt, sickly humanity. It liovers 
 over the cells of the infamous. A moderate criminal enjoys but 
 little of its favor; but one of the desperate class will be deluged 
 with it. It will be in waiting for him at his cell before he enters it; 
 in the court it will, if possible, hinder the process of justice. The 
 poor, the deceased, the victim, are forgotten. But the vile are 
 cared for. Men who were never visited in their innocence, become 
 martyrs in their guilt. Let blood be upon their hands, and they 
 will lack neither society nor sympathy. Bad men know this. They 
 know how hard it is to get convicted ; how easy it is to obtain a par- 
 don. Thus law is weakened. Its execution is difficult. Restraint 
 is lifted up. Crime is encouraged. If a man kill his wife, his 
 brother, or his mistress, he is in little danger. It will be proved 
 that he had a sudden fit of insanity ; or, if that be too stale, a sudden 
 fit of somnambulism. He will be let loose to seek another victim. 
 We shall soon have among us a paradise for rogues ; desperate men 
 will be invited to our homes, with ample assurance of sympathy and 
 protection from such philanthropists. Soon men will be compelled 
 to wear arms, to protect themselves ; this they will do, if law does 
 not protect them. At the door of this non-resistance, no capital 
 punishment, no Sabbath, no ministry, no church, no law philanthro- 
 py, sickly and miserable as it is, lies this increase of crime, so ap- 
 parent, so awful. A man in New Hampshire under sentence of 
 death, admitted that when he committed murder he believed that 
 capital punishment was abolished ! 
 
 3. Cause of juvenile depravity. The root of much of this evil 
 is found in the absence of good home instruction ; and in the attempt 
 made by those who have influence over the young, to mend the le- 
 gislation of God. Modern reformers have taken the education of 
 youth under their special care. Men, wise above that which is writ- 
 ten, have made common schools the theatre of their experiments and 
 labors. The end is worthy of the toil. Throwing themselves 
 across the word of God. they practically oppose its lessons. They 
 deny the propriety of an early religious training ; they ridicule, as 
 
RELIGION, IN COMMON SCHOOLS. 11 
 
 Well as forbid, the use of the rod. They would take the Bible away 
 from our youth, save such portions as they may think proper to 
 place in their hands. 
 
 An effort has been made, and that too with some success, to do 
 three things with our common schools. 1. To get out of them the 
 Bible and all religious instruction. 2. To abolish the use of the 
 rod, and all correction, but a little talk. 3. To make common 
 schools a counterpoise to religious instruction at home and in Sab* 
 bath schools. The Board of Education in Massachusetts has aided 
 in this work in two ways. 1. By allowing an individual, under the 
 sanction of its authority, to disseminate through the land crude and 
 destructive principles, principles believed to be at war with the Bi- 
 ble and with the best interests of the young for time and eternityi 
 2. By a library which excludes books as sectarian that inculcate 
 truths, which nine-tenths of professed Christians of all names helievei 
 while it accepts others that inculcate the most deadly heresy — even 
 universal salvation. We ask not that religion shall be sustained by 
 law ; but we do ask that impiety and irreligion shall not be support- 
 ed by the state. When religious and intellectual culture are divorc* 
 ed, is it strange that we have a harvest of crime.' When, under 
 the sanction of the highest powers, punishments are ridiculed as 
 well as denounced, is it strange that the arm of parental authority 
 is weakened, and the master finds his law without a penalty ? Is it 
 strange that our juvenile courtesy, is of that Doric sort which ex- 
 presses itself in "Yes and No," "I will and I won't.'" Is it 
 strange that we have such a harvest of rebellion and crime ? One 
 of the reformers of this day said in a lecture in New York, that he 
 had no hope of the clergy, none of the church ; but his hope was in 
 the lyceum and the common school. Before the lyceum last winter, 
 in this city, a course of atheistical lectures were given. We see 
 what is to be done with the schools, and what the hope is. Soon Chris* 
 tians will have to consider the question, whether a mere intellectual 
 education with no moral basis is worth the having.' Already the 
 question has been before the Presbyterian church of the United 
 States, whether the time has not come when they must establish 
 
12 THE BIBLE, THE ROB, AKD 
 
 schools of their own, in which moral training shall be blended with 
 intellectual, and the Bible be allowed in schools. 
 
 From causes such as I have named, has this harvest of crime 
 sprung up. And while we boast of our common schools as the 
 glory of our land, let us beware that they do not become our shame. 
 Even now, in our best schools in this city, insubordination and licen- 
 tiousness abound. They are developed in the circulation of obscene 
 French prints in school, and in the efforts of girls in school to cor* 
 rupt their associates. The boys and girls, some of them, have a 
 room in this city, furnished with all that panders to base and wicked 
 passions, where youth of both sexes, belonging to public schools, 
 assemble at night. We shall see more developements ; fruit will 
 fellow such labors, that tears of blood and years of toil will not re* 
 move. No effort Is now^ spared to corrupt our youth. Base women, 
 as they trade in stores, boldly thrust their cards of invitation into 
 the hands of young men, and personally invite them to walk with 
 them the road to hell. 
 
 Christians have a work to do in New England, as well as in Italy 
 and the West. If New England is not kept sound, the hope of the 
 world is gone. Men may be frightened at the moral condition of 
 society, and hold mass meetings for months to give utterance to their 
 fears ; they may fill Faneuil Hall with resolutions, still intempe- 
 rance and crime will continue to grow upon us, till religion and prin* 
 ciple, as given in the word of God, shall guide moral movements 
 and direct their aim. 
 
 I speak for no one but myself I am no one's organ. But I 
 know I speak the sentiments of thousands in our city and country. 
 Let us try our ways, and turn to the Lord. 
 
RELIGION, IN COMMON SCHOOLS. 13 
 
 Review of the Sermon, in the Boston Cocjrier, Oct. 27, 1846. 
 
 BY WM. B. FOWLE, 
 
 Publisher of the Massachusetts " Common School Journal.'' 
 
 [I owe an apology to (hose into whose hands this pamphlet may fall, for 
 permitting so foul a production to soil its pages. But as it is the only 
 Review I have seen, — and coming from the Publisher of the Common 
 School Journal, the co-associate in that paper, with the Hon. Secretary of 
 the Board, it seems fitting that this semi-official Review should follow the 
 Sermon. It answers another end. Its author is identified with the "Reform 
 party," as it is called ; he has been years connected with efforts to make com- 
 mon schools what they ought to be ; his style and language show what 
 the intercourse between gentlemen will be when all the children of the 
 State shall reach the elevation on which he stands. I have spoken in 
 my. Sermon of a peculiar sort of courtesy, that is growing up in schools. 1 
 offer the subjoined as a specimen of that courtesy which is more t)oric than 
 decent.] 
 
 THE REV. MATTHEW HALE SMITH. 
 
 to the editor of the courier: 
 
 The last Boston Recorder contains a sermon by the person whose 
 name is placed at the head of these remarks. The text is — "^nd 
 they set the ark of God upon a new cart.'''' [II Sam., vi, 3.) 
 
 We have rarely read such a tissue of impudence and ignorance, 
 as this reverend preacher has woven into what he calls a sermon. 
 He maintains, in the first place, that all that has been done to reform 
 society in the last twelve years, has made society " no better, but 
 rather the worse." Crime, he says, is on the increase — and this 
 
14 THE BIBLE, THE ROD, AND 
 
 is seen in desecration of the Sabbath, in the increase of intennpe- 
 rance, in the boldness of offenders, and in the increasing propor- 
 tion of young criminals. Now it seems to us that the man who 
 asserts that the world, on the whole, is growing worse, must be a 
 knave, or an idiot, or both. If our common schools, and our Sun- 
 day schools, our churches, and our revivals, our Bible societies, and 
 missionaries, our charitable institutions, and our benevolent societies, 
 do not enable the world " to hold its own," then Christianity is a 
 farce, and the Rev. Mr. Smith, being one of the actors, is a knave 
 for endeavoring to keep it up. On the other hand, if millions have 
 been redeemed from the destroyer by Father Matthew and his fel- 
 low laborers here and elsewhere ; if crime rarely escapes undiscov- 
 ered and unpunished ; if even half that we are told of the blessed 
 effect of missions and of Sunday schools is true ; if such sermons 
 as this of the preacher are considered more suitable exercises for a 
 Sabbath evening, than a lecture on temperance, which he con- 
 demns — and yet the reverend preacher does not know this — then 
 he is a very ignorant man. When our Savior was asked to rebuke 
 certain, who cast out devils in his name, but were not his dis- 
 ciples, he refused to do so, on the ground that those who co-ope- 
 rated with him must be let alone, if not encouraged. But the rev- 
 erend preacher, speaking of the Washingtonians, says they cast out 
 one devil, to introduce seven others more wicked ; and all these 
 seven are the desecration of the Sabbath by holding temperance 
 meetings on Sunday evening, and nothing more. He wishes the tem- 
 perance movement to go back where it was before the Washingtoni- 
 ans took hold, viz., into the hands of the clergy, whom he would have 
 us consider the ark of God, not to be touched. And yet, who does 
 not know that this ark cried out for help, and called and welcomed 
 the Washingtonians to the rescue ? If there was any crime in put- 
 ting the ark into " the new cart," the preacher is the Abinadab, and 
 before we have done with his sermon, we may show that he, and not 
 the ark, should have had the ride in a cart. 
 
 The reverend reviler calls upon the Prison Discipline Society, the 
 abolition of capital punishmenters, and all others who would ameli- 
 
RELIGION, IN COMMON SCHOOLS. 15 
 
 orate the criminal code of our State, and make it one degree milder 
 than that of the Hebrews, although by that, if we mistake not, a 
 renegade was to be stoned. We know not why a professed preach- 
 er of the gospel of peace and good will to men, should be so blood- 
 thirsty, and so determined to have life for life, and eye for eye, 
 but we are compelled to believe that it arises from a want of that 
 change of heart, without which the spirit of Christ cannot be dis- 
 cerned. The reverend preacher, if half is true that is said of him, 
 has met with changes enough in veering from the east to the west 
 end of doctrines, but it is evident that change of opinion is not 
 change of heart. 
 
 After despatching the philanthropic societies above mentioned, 
 the modern Uzzah pounces upon the Board of Education, the ma- 
 jority of whom are, and always have been, not only orthodox men, 
 but distinguished as leaders and lights among the evangelical sects. 
 The assault upon the common or public schools of Boston, and upon 
 the Board of Education, is, if possible, more outrageous than that 
 upon the Washingtonians, the benevolent societies, and missionaries, 
 and we must look at it a little more in detail, for if a tythe of the 
 charges be true, the schools ought to be abolished at once. 
 
 The preacher objects to all attempts to improve the discipline 
 that has prevailed in our schools, and calls it " mending the legisla- 
 tion of God." " Throwing themselves," says he, " across the word 
 of God, they practically oppose its lessons ; they deny the proprie- 
 ty of any early religious training ; they ridicule as well as forbid 
 the use of the rod ; they would take the Bible away from our youth." 
 We have a right to demand of the preacher. Who does this ? — 
 Who denies the authority of the word of God ? Who denies the 
 propriety of early religious training. Who but the Romanists would 
 take the Bible away from our youth ? The connection in which 
 these charges are made, shows very plainly that the alleged culprits 
 are the Board of Education. We will give the whole tirade, that 
 the malignity and falsehood of the preacher may be distinctly seen : 
 
 " An effort has been made, and that too with some success, to do three 
 things with our common schools. 1. To get out of them the Bible and all 
 
16 THE BIBLE, THE ROD, AND 
 
 religious instruction. 2. To abolish the use of the rod, and all correction, 
 but a little talk. 3. To make common schools a counterpoise to religious 
 instruction at home and in Sabbath schools. The Board of Education in 
 Massachusetts has aided in this work in two ways. 1. By allowing an in- 
 dividual, under the sanction of its authority, to disseminate through the 
 land crude and destructive principles, principles believed to be at war with 
 the Bible and with the best interests of the young for time and eternity. 
 2. By a library which excludes books as sectarian that inculcate truths, 
 which nine-tenths of professing Christians of all names believe, while it 
 accepts others that inculcate the most deadly heresy — even universal sal- 
 vation. We ask not that religion shall be sustained by law ; but we do 
 ask that impiety and irreligion shall not be supported by the state. When 
 religious and intellectual culture are divorced, is it strange that we have 
 a harvest of crime ? When, under the sanction of the highest powers, 
 punishments are ridiculed as well as denounced, is it strange that the arm 
 of parental authority is weakened, and the master finds his law without a 
 penalty .' Is it strange that our juvenile courtesy is of that Doric sort, 
 which expresses itself in 'Yes and No,' '1 will and I won't.'' Is it 
 strange that we have such a harvest of rebellion and crime -' One of the 
 reformers of this day said in a lecture in New York, that he had no hope 
 of the clergy, none of the church ; but his hope was in the lyceum and the 
 common school. Before the lyceum last winter, in this city, a course of 
 atheistical lectures were given. We see what is to be done with the 
 schools, and what the hope is. Soon Christians will have to consider the 
 question, whether a mere intellectual education, with no moral basis, is 
 worth the having.'' Already the question has been before the Presbyterian 
 church of the United States, whether the time has not come when they 
 must establish schools of their own, in which moral training shall be 
 blended with intellectual, and the Bible be allowed in schools." 
 
 Now be it remembered that the Board of Education is composed 
 of the Governor, who is a communicant of an Orthodox Baptist 
 church ; of Professor Sears, the distinguished head of the Orthodox 
 Baptist College at Newton ; of Dr. Humphrey, late President of the 
 Orthodox College at Amherst; of the Rev. H. B. Hooker, an 
 Orthodox Congregational minister, of whom Falmouth has reason to 
 be proud ; of the Lieutenant Governor, and the Hon. Wm. G. Bates, 
 who are members of Orthodox congregations, and, for aught we 
 know, of Orthodox churches ; of J. W. James, Esq., who, we be- 
 lieve, is an Episcopalian; of the Hon. Stephen C. Phillips, who, 
 
RELIGION, IN COMMON SCHOOLS. 17 
 
 though a Unitarian, is one of the warmest champions of the Sunday 
 School ; and finally, of the Rev. E. H. Chapin, who is distinguished 
 among the se.:t that his reverend reviler so lately deserted, not only 
 for his talents, but for the earnestness with which he addresses the 
 souls of men. Let the character and standing of these men, who 
 constitute the Board of Education, be remembered ; and then put 
 on your spectacles and look at him who wrote and preached the 
 sermon from which the above extract was taken. 
 
 Perhaps it would be enough to leave the matter here — but as the 
 public are not fully acquainted with the facts, it may be well to ad- 
 vert to them, to expose the barefaced ness of the charges. First, 
 then, the Board have never said a word against the use of the Bibl 
 in schools, but on the contrary, have required it to be used in the 
 only schools under their control, viz. — the Normal Schools. If it 
 has been excluded from the public schools, the blame must rest with 
 School Committees, and not with the Board, whose power does not 
 extend to school books. But the fact is, the Bible is probably read 
 daily in every public school in the State, and it is required to be 
 read in the schools of this city. Secondly, the Board have always 
 and every where strenuously urged the importance of early religious 
 instruction — and, if the preacher does not know this, he is ignorant 
 beyond excuse, and if he does know it, he is wicked beyond pardon. 
 Let him read the ninth report of the Secretary of the Board, which 
 was published last winter under the sanction of the Board and of 
 the Legislature, if he wishes to read his own condemnation. 
 
 Secondly, the Board, nehher themselves nor by their Secretary, 
 have ever recommended the entire disuse of the rod ; the utmost 
 they have done is to not recommend the dbxise of it. We assert 
 this boldly, and challenge the preacher to show the contrary, if he 
 can. Thirdly, the Board have never attempted "to make the com- 
 mon schools a counterpoise to religious instruction at home and in 
 Sabbath schools." By this the reviler probably means, that the Board 
 have endeavored, in the public schools, to erase all the good impres- 
 sions that may have been made in the Sunday schools. If so, who 
 have been the agents of the Board } In this city more than half the 
 2 
 
18 THE BIBLE, THE ROD, AND 
 
 teachers are Orthodox professors, and those who are not, are friends 
 of the Sunday school, and by no means disposed to carry out this or 
 any other plan of the Board or their Secretary, Out of the city, we 
 believe, and we have the means of forming a very accurate esti- 
 mate, that more than nineteen-twentieths of the public teachers are 
 either Orthodox Christians, or nominally Orthodox, and under the 
 direction of Orthodox Committees, usually containing one or more 
 Orthodox clergymen. Is it at all likely, is it possible for the Board 
 or their Secretary to carry out any such design, if it were possible 
 for such a Board ever to have "conceived it ? 
 
 But the Board have recommended a library which, we are told, 
 " excludes, as sectarian, books that inculcate truths, which nine^ 
 tenths of professing Christians of all sects believe, while it accepts oth- 
 ers that inculcate the most deadly heresy — even universal salvation." 
 We deny that any such heretical book is included among those recom- 
 mended by the Board ; but, if it were true, who does not see that 
 such books must have been inadvertently omitted, for there never 
 was but one Universalist on the Board, and he was not appointed 
 until some years after the library was published. Nothing can be more 
 amusing than this display of a weakness common to changelings* 
 The reverend preacher has hardly left the Universalists, but he i& 
 not ashamed to denounce their chief doctrine as " the most deadly 
 heresy." We know of but one changeling that is a match for him, 
 and Mr. Brownson would denounce Mr. Smith, as Mr. Smith, if he 
 walks much further in the steps of his father, will denounce those 
 with whom he is now trying his fortune. 
 
 The unfairness of the preacher, as well as his grosser falsehood, 
 is displayed in what he says of a lecturer in New York, and of an» 
 other before the Boston Lyceum. These are mentioned as if they 
 were under the control of the Board of Education, and as if they 
 were connected with the city schools, for, says the preacher, imme- 
 diately after mentioning them, " We see what is to be done with the 
 schools, and what the hope is." He then goes on to say what must 
 astonish the citizens of Boston, and compel the school committee 
 instantly to call on him to prove, that it may be corrected, or to die- 
 
EELIGION, IN COMMON SCHOOLS. 19 
 
 avow, that the fair fame of the Boston schools may not be blasted. 
 Where are tlie thirty-one who flew at their best friend, the Secretary 
 of the Board, for not alluding to them or their schools in his report, 
 while they are quiet under such charges as the following : — 
 
 " From causes such as I have named, has tliis harvest of crime sprung up. 
 And while we boast of our common schools as the glory of our land, let 
 us beware that they do not become our shame. Even now, in our best 
 schools in this city, insubordination and licentiousness abound. They are 
 developed in the circulation of obscene French prints in school, and in the 
 efforts of girls in school to corrupt their associates. The boys and girls, 
 some of them, have a room in this city, furnished with all that panders to 
 base and wicked passions, where youth of both sexes, belonging to public 
 schools, assemble at night. We shall see more developments ; fruit will 
 follow such labors, that tears of blood and years of toil will not remove." 
 
 The preacher assures us that Uzzah was struck dead because 
 " hz endeavored to do a right thing in a wrong waTj."" If, then, all 
 the modern plans for teaching and improving mankind are the new 
 cart in which men are carrying the Ark of God, is it not the case 
 that the preacher, pretending to fear for the safety of the Ark, has 
 laid his unhallowed hand upon it, has traduced men better than him- 
 self, has attempted to do, not a right, but a wrong thing in a wrong 
 way, and stands self-condemned before the public whom he has at- 
 tempted to deceive ? 
 
 Allow me, Mr. Editor, one line more, in which to express my 
 surprise that the senior editor of the Recorder should have allowed 
 such wholesale calumny a place in his paper, and that twenty-four 
 hours should have elapsed before he, or somebody else, should have 
 declared, as I now do, that the sermon, from beginning to end, is 
 a falsehood, which, if we believed in the utility of capital punish- 
 ment, we should say, entitles the preacher to a ride in a cart tha\ 
 would leave him standing, as his whole sermon stands, on — nothing. 
 
 Teemont. 
 
20 the bible, the rod, and 
 
 Reply, in the Boston Courier, Oct. 29, 1846, 
 
 TO THE editor OF THE COURIER : 
 
 I am indebted to the courtesy of a friend for a copy of the Cou- 
 rier of tills morning. I find myself assailed, in no gentle terms, by 
 one, who, though unsparing in his epithets, chooses to intrench him- 
 self behind a fictitious name. It affords me sincere regret that my 
 sermon does not commend itself to the fastidious taste of " Tremont." 
 So far from this, he calls it " a tissue of impudence and ignorance," 
 delivered by " a knave or idiot, or both." He calls me " a rever- 
 end reviler," " a renegade," and " blood-thirsty." My sermon, he 
 says, " displays the weakness common to changelings," and in it, I am 
 " guilty of unfairness as well as gross falsehood." He closes with the 
 very comfortable assurance that " the ser7non,fro7n leginning to end, 
 is a JaJsehood'''' — "it stands on nothing." The writer is certainly 
 an adept at calling hard names : he is very familiar with a vocabu- 
 lary that gentlemen seldom use. But why waste so much warmth, 
 intellect and ink, upon such an afl^air ? Whom can it harm .' who 
 can be benefitted by such a review 1 He has devoted a column to 
 review what he calls " nothing," or, at best, a production false, all 
 of it, in all things. Is the intelligence of Boston in danger.'' Can 
 it not discern between idiocy and intellect.? Or does the writer 
 stand upon an elevation so precarious that 
 
 " Tales told by an idiot " 
 
 can shake him down ? I shall defend no positions I affirm, at the 
 call of an anonymous writer. If " Tremont" will publish his name^ 
 and give assurances that he will observe the courtesies of life, and 
 use language such as gentlemen are expected to employ, I may an- 
 swer his queries, and, if need be, defend my positions. The whole 
 review itself is worthy of no attention. The very respectable me- 
 dium that my assailant has chosen for his assault, is all that entitles 
 it to even this passing notice. 
 
 Very truly, your obedient servant, 
 
 M. HALE SMITH. 
 Boylston street, 42, Oct. 27, 1846. 
 
religion, in common schools. 21 
 
 Strictures on the Sectarian Character of the Combion School 
 Journal, Edited by the Hon. Horace Mann, By a membeb 
 OF THE Board of Education. 
 
 From the N. E. Puritan, Oct. 29, 1846. 
 
 THE COMMON SCHOOL JOURNAL. 
 
 In the last numbci' of the " Common School Journal," printed in 
 Boston, and designed for universal circulation throughout the Com- 
 monwealth, I find this sentence, p. 316 — " Almost all children are 
 as pure as Eve icas ; hut the templing apples are left hanging so 
 thickly around, that it would he a marvel if they did not eaty 
 
 This is from the pen of Dr. Howe, Principal of the Institution 
 for the instruction of the Blind, in South Boston, and is found in his 
 special report to the Trustees, upon the case of Laura Bridgman, 
 copied into the Journal as above. In casting my eye over the sen- 
 tence, my first inquiry was. How came it here ? It would have 
 been no matter of surprise to have found the sentiment, that " almost 
 all children are as pure as Eve was," in the Christian Register, or 
 Examiner, for they are the professed exponents and defenders of 
 what is called Liberal Christianity. But what right has the Common 
 School Journal, which goes indiscriminately into Unitarian and Or- 
 thodox families, of all denominations, in the State, to put forth a 
 theological dogma, which the Editor must know is rejected by the 
 great body of Christians in Massachusetts ; or, indeed, to introduce 
 any controverted theological point at all ? The understanding, I 
 take to be, on all sides, that in order to act harmoniously together, 
 in furthering the great cause of popular education, we must keep 
 our denominational creeds and differences out of sight. 
 
 Suppose that we, who believe in the entire corruption of human 
 nature since the fall, had the command of the Common School Jour- 
 nal, and were to introduce an article, asserting, among other things, 
 hat children were all horn in sin, and depraved from the birth ; 
 would not the Unitarians complain, and have a right to complain, of 
 the offensive obtrusion ^ Would they not protest against our smug* 
 3* 
 
22 THE BIBLE, THE ROD, AND 
 
 gling our Calvinism into a journal which they patronize and help to 
 circulate ? And may they take liberties which we should have no 
 right to expect they would concede to us ? 
 
 Let us look at the objectionable sentiment again. "Almost all 
 children are as pure as Eve was ; but the tempting apples are left 
 hanging so thick around them that it would be a marvel if they did 
 not eat." If this is not a mere rhetorical flourish, if it means any- 
 thing, it entirely denies the doctrine of the Fall^ as it has been un- 
 derstood in all ages, at least so far as the majority of the race are 
 concerned. So far from being born in sin, they are perfectly pure, 
 and are put upon their probation just as Eve was. " The tempting 
 apples hang thick around them." If they pluck and eat, they fall 
 in exactly the same sense that she did ; if they resist the temptation, 
 they remain pure and holy, just as she would have done had she not 
 put forth her hand to the forbidden fruit: — so that, instead of there 
 having been one great original apostacy, involving the whole race of 
 man in guilt and ruin, there are just as many apostacies, precisely 
 like that of our first parents, as there are children who, overcome 
 by temptation, transgress the laws of their Creator. 
 
 "Almost all children are as pure as Eve was I " Then they have 
 a moral character ; they are perfectly holy as she was, till they fall 
 from their " original righteousness," as she did. It is not our hap- 
 piness to have any such children as these ; and we do not wish to 
 have Dr. Howe, or any other religionist of the same school, come 
 mto our families, by the aid of the Common School Journal, and tell 
 them they are or ever were " as pure as Eve was." We do not 
 believe it. We have not so read our Bibles. We believe with 
 Paul, that " they are by nature children of wrath, even as others ; " 
 and that however young they may die, they must be renewed by 
 the Holy Spirit and washed in the blood of Christ, or they cannot 
 be saved. This is our honest belief; but we would not obtrude it 
 upon our friends of an opposite faith, through a common vehicle 
 of popular education, if we could. When such sectarianism as we 
 have exposed, finds its way into a periodical which is intended for 
 general circulation, it ought to be promptly protested against. 
 
 Watchman, 
 
BELIGION, IN COMMON SCHOOLS. 23 
 
 CORRESP ONDEN C E 
 
 BETWEEN THE 
 
 HON. HORACE MANN AND REV. MATTHEW HALE SMITH, 
 
 OCCASIONED BY THE SERMON ENTITLED "THE ARK OF GOD 
 ON A NEW CART." 
 
 LETTER TO MR. SMITH. 
 
 Boston, Oct. 19, 1846. 
 
 Rev. M. H. Smith. 
 Dear Sir : — 
 
 I have just seen, in a copy of the Boston Recorder of the 15th 
 inst., what purports to be a report of a sermon twice delivered by 
 you in this city. 
 
 As the Massachusetts Board of Education, as well as myself, per" 
 sonally, are deeply inculpated by that report, I trust you will not 
 think the inquiry obtrusive, whether that part of it which comes un- 
 der the third division, and is entitled, " Cause of Juvenile Deprav- 
 ity," is a correct representation of what you said ? 
 
 It is there alleged that you charged the Board of Education with 
 aiding in an effort " to get the Bible and all religious instruction" out 
 of our common schools. I shall be slow to believe that you ever 
 made this charge ; for it is well known to every person who has 
 had the honesty to ascertain the facts on the subject, to be wholly 
 
^ THE BIBLE, THE ROD, AND 
 
 untrue^ The whole influence of the Board of Education, from the 
 day of its organization to the present time, has been to promote and 
 encourage, and, whenever they have had any power, as in the case 
 of the Normal Schools, to direct the daily use of the Bible in school* 
 
 I could hardly believe that any one would venture upon that grave 
 charge, without having read the reports of the Board ; and yet it is 
 much harder to believe that any one would dare to make it who had 
 t-ead them. As an exposition of the views and counsels of the 
 Board, on this subject, I send you a copy of their eighth Report, 
 made two years ago, which I request you to read. 
 
 So efficient have been the efforts of the Board to get the Bible 
 into the common schools, — instead of out of them, as the report 
 affirms — that, when I last made the inquiry, I found that the Bible 
 was used in the schools in all the towns in the State, excepting three ; 
 and those three towns returned no answer to the inquiry. It mighty 
 therefore, be used in those three towns also. 
 
 In the second place, the Board has never done any thing " to aboh 
 ish the use of the rod in schools, or all correction, but a little talk.'* 
 On the contrary, it has always upheld and defended the use of the 
 rod, when other measures of restraint had been tried and failed, 
 They go cordially, and, as I believe, unanimously, against those 
 enormous abuses of the rod, which have been perpetrated by incom« 
 petence and bad passions. But on all occasions, they have upheld 
 the doctrine of authority and good order in school, and so much of 
 punishment, as, with other and higher influences, might be necessary 
 to maintain them. 
 
 I do not understand what is meant under the third specification, 
 about the Common Schools being a counterpoise to religious instruc 
 tion, &c. ; and though this expression is found in very bad company^ 
 I will not impute it to a bad purpose, until I know better what it was 
 intended to imply. 
 
 In describing the manner in which the Board is said to have aided 
 in this work, there is an unequivocal reference to myself. I am re- 
 ferred to as having disseminated "through the Board, crude and 
 destructive principles," &c. 
 
RELIGION, IN COMMON SCHOOLS. 25 
 
 Will you be so good as to inform me what those " crude and de- 
 structive principles " are, and what your proofs are that I have diS' 
 seminated such 7 for if this be the fact, no person is so much interested 
 to recall them, and I assure you that no person can be more ready 
 to do so than I shall be. I cannot acknowledge my hope and trust 
 in truth to be second to yours, or that of any other person. 
 
 In the second place, it is affirmed that the Board have accepted, 
 as a part of their Library, books " that inculcate the most deadly 
 heresy, even universal salvation." May I ask you to tell me what 
 those books are .'' 
 
 As I have an extraordinary pressure of engagements, at the pres- 
 ent time, I pass by other points, suggested by the report referred to. 
 To those above enumerated, I feel that I have a right to call your 
 attention. I wish to do it in a candid and courteous manner. Your 
 character, not for common intelligence, merely, but for truth, stands 
 implicated by the statements made in the Recorder ; and it is due to 
 the Board of Education, to myself and to yourself, that the charges 
 there made should be either substantiated or withdrawn. 
 Very respectfully, 
 
 Yours, &c., HORACE MANN. 
 
 REPLY. 
 
 To THE Hon. Horace Mann. 
 Dear Sir — 
 1 embrace the earliest opportunity to reply at length to your letter 
 of the 19th inst. The report of my sermon in the Recorder, to 
 which you refer, is correct. A large part of your letter is occupied 
 in setting forth what the Board of Education have attempted to do. 
 I can believe they have attempted to do all this, and yet aid indi- 
 rectly and even unconsciously, in all I have said. I was careful to 
 specify the exact thing in which, in my opinion, its influence was 
 not directed to the best results. The Board is a public Institute^ 
 
26 THE BIBLE, THE ROD, AND 
 
 Its acts are open to review, and if need be, to rebuke, as much so as 
 the Legislature that appoints it. It occupies an important field. Its 
 influence must be very good, or very bad. Its effect upon the young 
 is powerful. The system of measures it adopts must be felt for 
 ages to come. The Board has not secured the entire approbation of 
 the community. The discussions in the Legislature and the remarks 
 in public prints, religious and secular, prove this. I believe our 
 common schools would be better without the supervision or the laws 
 of the Board. I can indulge in this opinion without impeaching the 
 moral or the religious character of that body. But this is foreign to 
 my purpose. The subject of your letter calls me to consider the 
 relation of the Board to yourself, and to the common school library. 
 In relation to yourself — with your private views, I have nothing 
 to do. I accede to you the right which 1 claim for myself. I speak 
 of you only as a public man. Your views and opinions on Educa- 
 tion exert an influence, in my opinion, not salutary, and they get 
 their power from your official position. I was familiar with the or- 
 ganization of the Board — of the part you bore in the Legislature in 
 making the laws which now you execute. I have read your jour- 
 nals and your reports — have heard you lecture and have met you in 
 conventions. 1. I regard you as the representative of a system, or its 
 head, which seeks to change, slowly, perhaps, but surely, tlie whole 
 system of education in common schools — the result of which will 
 be to elevate the intellectual over the moral, and man above God. 
 jn detail and in element I conceive your notions, in this matter, to 
 be crude, their fruits destructive ; and the more I have seen your 
 system explained, the worse, to my mind, it appears. 2. I under- 
 stand you to be opposed to the use of the Bible in school as a school 
 book. I mean the lohole Bible ; the Law, the Prophets, the Psalms, 
 the New Testament. I suppose you to be willing that parts shall be 
 read. But are you in favor of the w/w?e Bible as a school book.'' 
 3. Are you in favor of the use of the rod as a principal means of 
 enforcing obedience } That you tolerate it in deference to public 
 sentiment, I do not dispute. But I am misinformed if you. are not 
 against its use, and do not, as you have opportunity, discountenance 
 
RELIGION, IN COMMON SCHOOLS, 2? 
 
 its use. 4. I understand you to be opposed to religious instruction 
 jn schools ; that you rule out as far as you have power truths and 
 sanctions which nine tenths of professing Christians believe essential 
 to sound morals and an honest life, no less than to the salvation of 
 ^he soul. If you are in favor of religious instruction in schools, will 
 you please state what you mean by that term, 'and what you recom. 
 mend to be taught .'' ' I believe you hold such opinions as I have 
 alluded to. I regard the position and the authority with which you 
 are clothed as giving you great power to work disaster and ruin to 
 many who come under your influence. Those who clothe you with 
 power aid you in all the work you do. You may suppose that in all 
 this work you are serving well your country. I may entertain a dif-- 
 ferent opinion. 
 
 In relation to the Library. In its moral and religious reading the 
 library is calculated to exert an evil influence. It calls that religious 
 which I do not. It furnishes Sabbath reading that few Christians 
 would be willing to place in the hands of their children on the Sab- 
 bath. It rests its morality on an insecure basis, and leaves it without 
 % true sanctions. All that savors of evangelical truth is carefully 
 removed — sentiments abound which no evangelical Christian can 
 sanction. And in a volume edited by the late Dr. Greenwood of 
 this city, who was a Restorationist, you find that idea plainly asserted. 
 My attention was first called to it by a preacher of Universalism.* 
 
 You express a wish to call my attention to this subject, " in a can- 
 did and courteous manner." I suppose gentlemen never conduct 
 ^heir correspondence in any other way. 
 Very respectfully, 
 
 Your obedient servant, 
 
 M. HALE SMITH. 
 
 Boston, Oct. 27, 1846. ) 
 
 Boylston St., No. 42. j 
 
 * Tlie Life of Rev. David Brainard, edited liy Mr. Peabody, of Springfield, hue 
 been so clianj^ed by its editor as to make it a different tini g from that whicli raine 
 from tile pen of President Edwards, while it goe« down to posterity as the veritable 
 work of Edwards, endorsed by the Mags. Board of Education. 
 
»8 THE BIBLE, THE HOD, AND 
 
 LETTER TO MR. SMITH. 
 
 West Newton, Nov. 9th, 1846. 
 
 Rev. M. H. Smith. 
 Dear Sir : — 
 
 I have just returned, after an almost continuous absence of six 
 weeks, during which time I have been attending Teacher's Insti* 
 tutes, in different parts of the CommonweaUh. Yours of the 27th 
 ult., reached me about a week since, (together with your note ac- 
 knowledging the receipt of mine of the 19th Oct.,) but until now, 
 I have not had a minute to spare to answer it. 
 
 In your letter you acknowledge the report of your sermon, as 
 found in the Recorder, to be correct. It is true, then, that you 
 made a series of direct, unqualified charges, against the Board of 
 Education and myself, — publicly, — in a sermon, — on the Sabbath, 
 — and that after a report of that sermon furnished by yourself or by 
 some one else, had appeared in a newspaper, you declare it to be a 
 " correct " report. Permit me to say, that this introduces us to 
 very grave and serious matters. If the Board of Education and 
 myself are guilty of the offences you allege, we must expect no 
 stinted measure of public reprobation ; if we are not, then all that 
 reprobation, and more, belongs of right to you. 
 
 Your acknowledgement of the correctness of the Recorder's re- 
 port, establishes my right to demand that the charges therein made 
 should be either substantiated or withdrawn. I have looked in vain 
 through your letter, to find either any proof of their truth, or any 
 reparation for their injury. On the contrary, without a tittle of evi- 
 dence, you reiterate the charges, and in some respects, present 
 them in an aggravated form. I feel bound to examine a few of the 
 points made in your reply. 
 
 You say, " A large portion of your letter is occupied in setting 
 forth what the Board of Education has attempted to do." A repe- 
 
RELIGION, IN COMMON SCHOOLS. 
 
 29 
 
 rusal of my letter will show this to be erroneous. You have sub- 
 stituted an attempt, for a result. A portion of my letter was occu- 
 pied in setting forth, — not what the Board had attempted to do, in 
 regard to introducing the Bible into our schools, — but what it had 
 actually done. 
 
 Your letter evades the point made in your sermon. The sermon 
 declared that the Board had aided to get the Bible out of our 
 schools. It averred, further, that the effort to do so had been made 
 " with some success," which is directly contrary to the fact, because, 
 from the official reports and letters of the school-committees, it ap- 
 pears that the Bible was never so extensively used in our schools as 
 at the present time, and that its use has been constantly increasing, 
 ever since the influence of the Board was brought to bear upon the 
 subject. But you say the Board may have " indirectly and even un- 
 consciously aided" in producing such a result. How can the Board 
 have aided in producing a result which does not exist ? At the time 
 of the organization of the Board, there was a number of towns in 
 which the Bible was excluded from the schools, — the one in which 
 you then resided, being, if I do not mistake, one of them. All, or 
 at the most, all but two or three, have since introduced it. Your 
 main position, therefore, fails you. The Board has not "aided" in 
 any such work as you assert, for no such work has been done. You 
 say, " 1 can believe they [ the Board] have attempted " to get the 
 Bible into the schools. After reading the Eighth Annual Report, 
 how can you believe any thing else .' Do you not know from the 
 language of that Report, as well as from the characters of the men 
 who signed it, that they are as sincere in their efforts for this object, 
 as any man or body of men in the community .'' If any officer of 
 theirs was counteracting their efforts, would they not know it as soon 
 as yourself.-* 
 
 Is there any possibility that one could counteract their efforts, and 
 not have that counteraction known .' And, still further, if the Board 
 are earnestly and honestly striving for this object, why did you not 
 give them credit, at least for sincerity, in your discourse ? Even in 
 aondemning the wrongful act of an upright, but a deluded man, 
 3 
 
30 THE BIBLE, THE ROD, AND 
 
 common justice demands that we should concede to him the credit 
 of good intentions. This your sermon did not do. 
 
 " I was careful," say you, " to specify the exact things in which, 
 in my opinion, its influence [the influence of the Board,] was not 
 directed to the best result." This statement is highly erroneous. 
 You said nothing in your sermon about their influence not being di- 
 rected " to the best result." You charged them with aiding in pro- 
 ducing the worst results. The Board may not have produced the 
 best possible results, and it would not be discreditable to them if 
 they had not done so, but they may still have produced results high- 
 ly salutary and beneficent. But you charged them with helping to 
 produce results, which you knew your hearers would consider 
 the most mischievous and fatal. It is impossible for any honest 
 man to overlook the distinction between saying, that a man may 
 not have promoted the best end, and that he lias promoted the 
 worst. Your letter has not noticed the distinction. 
 
 You proceed to say that " the Board is a public institution," and 
 that " its acts are open to review, and if need be, to rebuke." No 
 member of the Board, nor any person in their behalf, so far as I 
 know, has ever questioned the right of the public to scrutinize their 
 proceedings. But while the right of scrutiny is conceded to the 
 public, the Board, on its part, has a right to impartiality and justice 
 in the decisions that are pronounced upon it, and to truth in the evi- 
 dence that is brought against it. Its amenability to public opinion, 
 gives no license to misrepresentation. 
 
 You go on to afllirm that " the Board has not secured the entire 
 approbation of the community." Did you ever know a body of 
 public men, whose duties afTected various and conflicting interests, 
 who had the fortune to be universally approved ? Do you offer it 
 as an impeachment either of the integrity or of the wisdom of the 
 Board, that, amid all hostile parties and sects, they have failed to 
 obtain "an entire approbation.^" And if you cite against the 
 Board, the occasional opposition they have encountered, does not 
 common justice require you to add that they have come triumphant 
 out of every trial to which they have been subjected ; that every at- 
 
RELIGION, IN COMMON SCHOOLS. 
 
 tack made upon them, has only hastened the progress of the meas- 
 ures they have recommended ; that in no instance have they ever 
 been required, either by the Legislature of the State, or by the law 
 of public opinion, to retrace a single step they had taken ! 
 
 The ground you have taken, in reference to what you said against 
 me, seems not to be less obnoxious to just censure. Your sermon 
 contained assertions highly injurious to me, and calculated, wherever 
 you were entitled to credit, or wherever you could inspire suspicion, 
 to injure my reputation and impair my influence. As I had a right 
 to do, I asked you for the proofs of these assertions. And what is 
 your reply .^ Not a syllable even pretending to be proof; but a 
 new series of charges or insinuations, as devoid of truth as the 
 original ones. Whose character is safe, if, when arraigned and 
 falsely accused, the calumniator adduces no proof, but only fabri- 
 cates new accusations ? What sense of justice can be left in the 
 mind of a man, who indulges himself in holding a fellow-citizen up 
 to odium, but acknowledges no obligation to prove his words, or to 
 recall them ? "I understand you," say you, " to be opposed to the 
 use of the Bible in schools, as a school book." I reply to this, 
 that you do not understand so on any competent authority. My 
 writings abound in proofs that this is not true ; and if you had used 
 ny diligence in searching for the truth, you would have found it 
 .). " But," say you, catechisingly, " are you in favor of the whole 
 Bible, as a school book ? " Is this, sir, your whole sense of jus- 
 tice ? Do you feel at liberty to accuse at random, and when call- 
 ed upon for proof, to ask the accused himself, if your false allega- 
 tion be not true .-* Such is the course you have taken. You 
 averred that an effort has been made, " with some success," to get 
 the Bible out of the Common Schools, and that the Board of Edu- 
 cation had aided in this work, by allowing an individual, under the 
 sanction of its authority, to disseminate through the land " princi- 
 ples believed to be at war with the Bible," &c. I called upon you 
 for proof or retraction. Instead of either, you turn upon me, and 
 say, " But are you in favor of the whole Bible, as a school book ? " 
 Did you. Sir, ask this question, because you did not know, and if 
 
32 THE BIBLE, THE ROB, AND 
 
 you did not know, why did you assert 1 In the first place, let me 
 say, you are entitled to no arlswer to such a question. It would ex- 
 tirpate all justice from the affairs of men, if such a course of pro- 
 ceeding were sanctioned. In the second place, I say that if you 
 have read my writings, (and you had no right to pronounce public- 
 ly upon my opinions, without reading them,) — if you have read 
 my writinys, you know that I have said, without qualification, with- 
 out exception, and in so many words, that it is my belief that the 
 Bible makes known to us the rule of life, and the means of salva- 
 tion, and that it is my wish [I have no authority in the matter] that 
 it should continue to be used in our schools. The very Journals 
 which I sent you prove the same thing. You adopt the same un- 
 warrantable course in regard to the next point. You ask, " Are 
 you in favor of the use of the rod, as a principle means of enforc- 
 ing obedience .? " (I follow your orthography in this quotation.) — 
 While I protest against your right to accuse, and then, after the 
 manner of the inquisition, to put me to the question,' in order to ob- 
 tain evidence, I will reply. In the above interrogatory, you have 
 evidently made some mistake, either in spelling, or in omitting some 
 words essential to the sense ; because, as it stands, it is sheer non- 
 sense. By your words " a principle means," do you mean a prin- 
 cipal means ; or do you mean " a7i authorized or acknotoledged prin- 
 ciple in the means.'''' If you mean to inquire whether I am in favor 
 of using the rod as the principal, the main, the chief, or the most 
 important means of enforcing obedience, I answer decidedly in the 
 negative. I would not use it as the principal, but as an auxiliary, 
 or supplementary means only ; — not primarily, but when other 
 means had been tried and had failed. If, on the other hand, you 
 mean to ask, whether I consider the use of the rod, after all higher 
 motives have been exhausted, as an authorized and acknowledged 
 " principle," in enforcing obedience, I answer you in the affirma- 
 tive. It would, however, better express my own views to say, that 
 I should make it a " principle " to secure obedience ; and after try- 
 ing in vain the highest persuasives to good and dissuasives from evil, 
 I should then make it equally a " principle " to use the rod. If, as 
 
RELIGION, IN COMMON SCHOOLS. 33 
 
 you say, you have heard me lecture, and read my reports, &;c., then 
 you have had the means of knowing that the above is a true repre- 
 sentation of the doctrines I have always advocated, in reference to 
 the use of the rod. 
 
 Again you say, " I understand you to be opposed to religious in- 
 struction in schools." To this I say, as I said before, you do not 
 understand so on any competent authority ; and if you had examined 
 the proper sources of information, you would have "understood" 
 precisely the reverse. Every one who has availed himself of the 
 means of arriving at the truth, on this point, knows that I am in fa- 
 vor of religious instruction in our schools, to the extremest verge to 
 which it can be carried without invading those rights of conscience 
 which are established by the laws of God, and guarantied to us by 
 the Constitution of the State. 
 
 As to the Library, your sermon declared that the Board of Edu- 
 cation accepts, as a part of it, books " that inculcate the most deadly 
 heresy, even universal salvation." I asked you to tell me what those 
 books are. Justice and honor require you to do it, or to take back 
 the assertion in as public a manner as it was made. Why, then, do 
 you not name the books? Copies of the library are every where 
 accessible. Mine is at your service. On a point of this kind, is 
 any reasonable man to be satisfied with any thing less than a citation 
 of the " books " and the passages. Again I say, prove your charge, 
 or withdraw it, or ask no man hereafter to believe you. 
 
 You aver that " all that savors of evangelical truth is carefully re- 
 moved " from the library. What a sentence is this against evangeli- 
 cal doctrines or sentiments ! Read the library. Ponder upon all 
 the glorious, divine. Christian truths which it contains — its advocacy 
 of the Bible as the word of God, its recognition of Christ as the 
 Savior of the world, its earnest enforcement of the great principles 
 which are declared to contain the whole duty of man — and then 
 declare that all this does not even savor of evangelical religion. What, 
 then, must " evangelical religion " be .'' 
 
 Once more. In a note, you say, " The Life of Rev. David Brain- 
 ard, edited by Mr. Peabody, of Springfield, has been so changed 
 3* 
 
34 THE BIBLE, THE ROD, AND 
 
 by its editor as to make it a very different thing from that which 
 came from the pen of President Edwards, while it goes down to pos- 
 terity as the veritable work of Edwards, endorsed by the Mass. 
 Board of Education." Now, nothing can be more untrue than all 
 this. The work does not go down to posterity as " the veritable 
 work of Edwards." It does not claim to be " the work of Ed- 
 wards " anymore than Washington Irving's Columbus, which consti- 
 tutes the first volume of the library, claims to be the veritable work 
 of Robertson. Mr. Peabody's " Life of David Brainard " is as dis- 
 tinct a work from the " Account of the Life of David Brainard " by 
 Edwards, as Sparks's Life of Washington is from Marshall's Life of 
 Washington. It so appears on the title page, and in the preface to 
 the book. — See School Library, Vol. 4, pp. 77-79. 
 
 Mr. Peabody's Life of Brainard was written without any com- 
 munication with the Board. I am not positive about the date, but 
 believe it was written years before the existence of the Board, — 
 certainly long before that body ever entertained the project of pre" 
 paring a library for schools. The Board found this work in exist- 
 ence, — for sale at all the book-stores, and considered as one of the 
 standard works of the age. They thought it w^ould be a useful 
 work for the young, because of the fervid religious character and 
 benevolence of its subject ; and they adopted it as they would adopt 
 any other valuable work. But they never pretended that it was the 
 " veritable work of Edwards ; " and no man who has thought it to 
 be his duty to inform himself on this subject, ever supposed it to be 
 so. 
 
 Thus, sir, I have reviewed the principal points in your letter, and 
 have shown, as I believe, that it meets neither of the points to which 
 you were bound, — proof or withdrawal. I entreat you to reconsider 
 the subject. If, from inadvertence, from want of information, or 
 from any other cause, you have been led to do injustice to the Board 
 of Education and to myself, and to wrong a great and sacred cause, 
 have the religion, have the Christianity, at least, have the worldly 
 magnanimity and honor, to make redress. 
 Very truly. 
 
 Yours, &c., HORACE MANN. 
 
RELIGION, IN COMMON SCHOOLS. 35 
 
 REPLY. 
 
 To THE Hon. Horace Mann. 
 Dear Sir : 
 
 I give the first leisure at my disposal, to reply to your letter of the 
 9th of November. Before I notice those things to which you call 
 my attention, I wish to call yours to two things. 1st. There are ex- 
 pressions and epithets, in your letter, which imply a wilful ignorance 
 on my part, where I ought to know ; or an inability to weigh evi- 
 dence, and appreciate facts. You say, " It is impossible for any 
 honest mind lo overlook " what I am charged with overlooking — 
 " Authority to review and rebuke," your remark " gives no li- 
 cense to misrepresentation." Certain things will be done by a man, 
 who would " be thought entitled to credit." You ask, " What sewse 
 of justice can be left in the mind of a man" who does what you 
 affirm I have done. " Any reasonable man " will see things as you 
 see them. And conclusions to which I have come, you are confi- 
 dent could be reached by " no man, who has thought it his duty to 
 inform himself." 
 
 Such expressions are in bad taste. They are not essential to the 
 argument, and had better be omitted. I shall treat you as a gentle- 
 man, for 1 believe you to be one. No one has a higher respect for 
 your zeal, industry, and talents. But the system you defend, I consid- 
 er wrong in principle, and destructive in results. Your commanding 
 official position, the tone of authority with which you speak upon all 
 matters relating to common schools, gives you great power. Gen- 
 erations to come are to feel that power. Temporal and immortal 
 interests are to be affected by your labors. 2d. You make my al- 
 lusions to you in your official capacity, a matter personal to your- 
 self. You say I have held you up to odium. You apply to me the 
 epithet of " calumniator." It is not obvious to my mind that the 
 personal influence of any man is harmed by calling in question the 
 soundness or good results of certain measures with which he may 
 
36 THE BIBLE, THE ROD, AND 
 
 officially, be identified. You are the Agent of the Board of Edu- 
 cation. You say you do their pleasure, and execute their com- 
 mands. To question the wisdom of the one, or the good result of 
 the other, can no more affect you, than can the recording of cer- 
 tain acts of the Legislature impair the personal standing of ihe Sec- 
 retary of State, who records them. 
 
 THE ACCUSATION. 
 
 In defending those parts- of my sermon to which you call my at- 
 tention, I shall defend what I have said, and only that. I do not 
 feel under obligation to vindicate any application you may choose to 
 make, or inferences you may draw. For any misinterpretation or 
 misapplication, I am in no way responsible. What, then, have I 
 said ? This : The Massachusetts Board of Education have aided 
 in an effort to get the Bible out of Common Schools — to get out 
 the rod and all correction, but a little talk — and also to get religion 
 out of school. It has done so in two ways. First, by throwing the 
 pall of its authority over your system and acts ; second, by a part of 
 the library that goes out under its sanction. I have said so much : 
 so much shall I defend. You call upon me for " proof or with- 
 drawal." With the proof in my possession that led me to make the 
 assertion at first, withdrawal is out of the question. To specimens 
 of my proof I will now call your attention. I shall assume two 
 points. First, you are sustained by the Board of Education ; 
 second, that Board endorses its library. The last I shall prove. 
 
 YOUR INFLUENCE IS AGAINST THE BIBLE IN SCHOOLS. 
 
 You may introduce the Bible into every school in the State, yet 
 if it goes in any other light than the Inspired Word of God — the 
 rule of faith and duty — a Book "able to make men wise unto sal- 
 vation" — a Book full of inspired maxims, sustained by sanctions 
 
RELIGION, IN COMMON SCHOOLS. 37 
 
 S^iven by its author — if its binding force is thrown ofi' or inipaired, 
 your influence is against the Book — it ceases to bo the Bible, as 
 Christians cherish it — its moral power is gone. If it be introduced 
 into our schools, as a Book inspired in part — a Book containing 
 some very good things, and some things not as good — if those who 
 introduce it, do so with reservations or implications that it lacks in- 
 spiration — their influence is against tlie Bible : those who endorse 
 them, aid in all the influence they exert. 
 
 I proposed to you the question, whether you were in favor of the 
 whole Bible in schools, as a school hook. You decline to answer 
 me. You impeach my sense of justice in asking the question. You 
 affirm, thai to reply, would " extirpate all sense of justice from the 
 affairs of men." How, then, could you reply to my second ques- 
 tion } or does the extirpation of justice only follow from a reply to 
 questions of a particular character? I cannot perceive how the 
 fact that you answer my second question, and the reason you give 
 for not replying to my first and third, can be reconciled. A simple 
 affirmative answer to my query would have made my work, per- 
 haps, more arduous than at present I conceive it to be. Your re- 
 fusal to say that you are in favor of the whole Bible, as a school 
 book, is significant. You are confident that I have obtained my in- 
 formation " from no competent authority " that you are not favorable 
 to the whole Bible in schools. That remains to be seen. You have 
 no where in your public writings said that you were. You will not 
 say so much to me. You have said the contrary. And if your 
 own voluntary testimony is to be taken, you do not believe the whole 
 Bible to be the inspired Word of God. 
 
 In the New England Puritan, published in this city, of December 
 11, 1845, an article was published, giving an account of the State 
 Convention of Teachers, in VVorcester, Mass. Some allusions were 
 made in that article to yourself, as the head of a system which was 
 to exert a disastrous influence upon the young. You felt aggrieved, 
 and called upon the Rev. J. E. Woodbridge, the resident editor, 
 and asked him to do you justice. You held a long conversation, to 
 show Mr. Woodbridge that you were misunderstood. You gave 
 
38 THE BIBLE, THE ROD, AND 
 
 your views upon the Bible, the rod, and religious instruction in 
 schools. In that interview, you admitted that you did not believe 
 the whole Bihle to he the inspired Word of God — that parts were 
 not proper to be read in school. The editor could make no cor- 
 rection, for you acknowledged the truth of, at least, a part. 
 
 The man who rejects a part of the Bible, must, in my opinion, 
 reject the whole. It claims entire inspiration. If it be not so in- 
 spired, it is not true. " All Scripture is given by the inspiration of 
 God, and is pro^iaWe for doctrine ; * * for instruction in right- 
 eousness, that the man of God may be perfect, thoroughly 
 furnished unto all good works." — II. Tim iii. 16, 17. " For the 
 prophecy came not in old time by the will of man — but holy men 
 of God spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost." — II. Peter, 
 i., 21. It was the Old Testament that Timothy read, when a 
 child, that was "able to make him wise unto salvation." Such 
 declarations are false, if the Bible be inspired only in part — be not 
 fit for our children. These " Holy Scriptures," which made young 
 Timothy " wise unto salvation," cannot do harm to American youth. 
 The Divine Redeemer said to the Jews, " Had ye believed Moses, 
 ye would have believed me, for he wrote of me." By a parity of 
 reasoning, we may say. Had ye believed Christ, ye would have 
 believed Moses, for Christ spake of liim. 
 
 You inform me in your letter, that I cannot prove this or that 
 from your writings. In your letter, you demand that I shall sustain 
 what I have said, from what you have written. It may be difficult 
 for me to do so, for you may hold certain opinions that you do not 
 choose to print. But is this proof that you do not hold them, or 
 that they are not destructive ? I must be allowed to prove my 
 position by calling to the stand such proof as I may think proper. 
 If the Bible, entire, open, without omission or expurgation, be not 
 the inspired word of God, infallible in all matters of faith and duty, 
 what do we want of it in schools, or any where else ? How can 
 you be in favor of it as a school book ? For what is it essential, if 
 it sink to a level with human composition at best, while its worst 
 aspect is, that it claims to a distinction and authority, to which it is 
 
RELIGION IN COMMON SCHOOLS. 39 
 
 not entitled in truth ? Officially you recommend it, but with that, 
 goes out the fact, that its claims to inspiration, in the opinion of the 
 Secretary, are not to be conceded — for they are not founded in 
 truth. What is the Bible worth if it have no authority ? You 
 throw aside as obsolete, the system of education it originates, Avhy 
 not the source from whence that system sprung ? You aim to 
 improve Common Schools, why not begin at the fount ? If not 
 inspired, what advantage has Moses over Dr. Howe — Solomon 
 over W. B. Fowie — or Paul over yourself .? Why may not the 
 substitute be fairly made ? Indeed, it is so, as far as the School 
 Journal of Massachusetts is concerned. 
 
 I believe you to be honest in your views, therefore you can have 
 no very strong motive to throw the affections of children around 
 the Bible. No plan can so effectually get the Bible, ultimately, 
 out of Common Schools, as that which rejects a part as not true, 
 and another part as not fit to be read. The bitterest enemy the 
 Bible ever had, could do no more — would ask no more — than this. 
 You condemn the Bible out of its own mouth. Those who believe 
 and so teach, are displacing the Bible for human codes of ethics. 
 All who authorize and endorse such influence, aid in all the evil 
 that is done, though they command a thousand copies per day to be 
 introduced into public Schools. I here leave my first proposition. 
 
 YOUR INFLUENCE IS AGAINST THE ROD IN SCHOOLS. 
 
 You have said that I have either misunderstood your views on 
 corporal punishment, or " have not thought it my duty to inform my- 
 self." You have so charged almost every person who has contro- 
 verted your positions. 1. You have said something upon this subject. 
 Your words are, " at different times in my reports, lectures, and other 
 writings, 1 have dealt, at some length, on the subject of ' School 
 Discipline,' and have been led to consider more particularly one of 
 its instrumentalities, namely, corporal punishment. [Reply to 
 Boston Masters, 119.] 2. No one has understood you, as far as I 
 can learn, to advocate, or be in favor of the use of the rod [^ 
 
40 THE BIBLE, THE ROD, AND 
 
 Common Schools, as that phrase is commonly understood. The 
 man is yet to speak, who has so understood you ; the paragraph 
 is yet to be written, that so asserts. Almost all classes, all sorts 
 of people, all denominations, religious papers of every name, as- 
 cribe to you hostility to the rod. 3. The impression is almost 
 universal, from what you have published, that you desire and seek 
 to abolish the use of the rod, and all correction, but a little talk. 
 The unanimity of] opinion, if erroneous, is perfectly marvellous. 
 So thought the Boston 'Masters. Else why address to you an ar- 
 gument of 24 pages in defence of the rod .'' So have thought the 
 Editors of the Episcopal Witness, the New England Puritan, and 
 the Recorder. No man, whose writings I have read, is better 
 capable of making himself understood, than yourself. Yet, ac- 
 cording to your complaints, almost every man has misunderstood 
 you upon the subject of corporal punishment. You mean one 
 thing; your language and your speech conveys another thing. 
 4. If you defend any thing, say any thing, it is in favor of the abo- 
 lition of crporal punishment. If you aim at any thing, it is this. 
 You do allow the use of the rod from necessity. But it is not the 
 necessity that springs from the nature of the child, but from the 
 incompetency of the master. You say you have only in a few in- 
 stances secured teachers who can govern without it. Your own 
 words are, " the great desiratum is, \ojind teachers who can govern 
 without resorting to p/t?/sicaZ ^orce. If this is not done, or cannot 
 be done, then the next step is to prepare such teachers as fast as the 
 time will allow." [Common School Journal, Vol. viii: 67.] Those 
 who use the rod and contend for its necessity, you hold up as adopt- 
 ing " the terrible motto. Authority, Force, Fear, Pain." [Reply, Bos- 
 ton Masters, 132.] You quote and endorse the sentiment that the rod 
 would never be needed, if right instruction were given to a child. 
 [Reply, 139.] You estimate the ability and fitness of a teacher, 
 by his capacity to govern without punishment. [Fifth Annnal Re- 
 port, 58.] You say " the use of the rod in school, is twice cursed, 
 cursing him that gives, and him that takes, — nay, three times 
 cursed." Masters who use the rod, you designate as " consenting 
 to turn flagelators to the parish ; " and you affirm that it is a 
 
RELIGION, IN COMMON SCHOOLS. 41 
 
 greater evil to keep boys ia subjection by the terror of the rod, 
 than to turn them loose into the streets. [Common School Journal, 
 Vol. III. : 153, 154.] In your Eighth Annual Report, which you have 
 kindly sent to me, with the request that I would read it, I find in 
 almost every instance, in the school returns, in which any thing is 
 said against the use of the rod, or the ability to govern without it 
 for a season, the fact has a conspicuous place in the Report, — 
 published in capitals or italics. You further say that when the 
 right kind of teachers shall be secured, the rod, or corporal punish- 
 ment will come into " total disuse." [Re-Reply, Boston Masters, 12.] 
 
 You inform me that the Board of Education has control over 
 Normal Schools in this State. What is the system in those schools 
 on corporal punishment ? Mr. Pierce, the head of the West 
 Newton Normal School, as quoted in the " Remarks of Boston Mas- 
 ters," [p. 13,] says : " I would state, that my theory goes to the 
 entire exclusion of the premium and emulation system, and of corpo- 
 ral punishment.'''' Dr. Howe is in raptures with the system on which 
 the Normal School is based, " because it rejects all appeals to bod- 
 ily fears, and all appeal to selfish feelings." [Common School Jour- 
 nal, Vol. II., 238.] 
 
 Already five hundred teachers, with these views, and pledged to this 
 system, have gone out to teach ; others, you say, are to be multiplied 
 "as fast as time will allow." When none but teachers so trained 
 shall be in common schools, the day whose dawn you perceive wilt 
 appear, and the " total disuse " of the rod will take place. 
 
 In view of all this, will you say that no " effort has been made to 
 get the rod out of schools ? " Will you say that there is no settled 
 purpose to do this. You inform me that you are opposed to the 
 excessive, the barbarous use of the rod — and who is not? That 
 is one thing, and making its occasional use evil and only evil, curs- 
 ing both master and scholar, with a threefold curse, is another thing. 
 There is quite a difference between the excessive use of a penalty 
 in government, and an experiment to govern without any penalty at 
 all. Should the Secretary of State, of Massachusetts, throw himself 
 against all penalty in principle, and contend that it was only tolerated 
 4 
 
42 THE BIBLE, THE ROD, AND 
 
 on account of the incompetency of present rulers — and that when 
 Massachusetts should choose the right sort of men, who could gov- 
 ern without fines or imprisonment, then an end would come to 
 " authority, force, fear, pain" — to fines, imprisonment, halters — 
 it would be a lame defence for him, meekly to reply, that he was 
 opposed to unmerciful punishments. 
 
 Such I conceive to be your position. In the conversation with 
 the Editor of the Puritan, you informed him, that he did not under- 
 stand your views upon school discipline. Mr. AVoodbridge made 
 you this fair offer — he said if you would write, in so many words, 
 that you were in favor of the rod in schools, uvder cerlain circum- 
 stances, and sign it, he would publish it in the Puritan, and all mis- 
 apprehension would cease. You declined to do it ; nor would you 
 allow him to say it for you. 
 
 I object to your theory of school discipline, because of its theolog- 
 ical character. You are opposed, you say, to " dogmatic theology," 
 and to " sectarianism " in schools, and so am 1. On this account, 
 I am opposed to your discipline theory. To get a foundation for your 
 views, with a stroke of your pen you dispose of certain funda- 
 mental truths which lie at the base of the scheme of redemption. 
 You assume the native purity of children in opposition to the Bible, 
 which asserts that our race are " by nature, children of wrath." 
 On this "sectarian" assumption, you build your theory to abolish 
 the rod. I advocate the use of the rod because God sanctions it in 
 the Bible. He who made the moral nature of the child gave the 
 Bible. He knew^ best what discipline and sanction the child needs. 
 God says, " Foolishness is bound in the heart of a child, (not 
 in the masters,) but the rod of correction shall drive it far from 
 him." — Prov. xxii., 15. Your theory denies this. You thus throw 
 yourself across the Word of God. You become wise above what 
 is written. 
 
 You also settle one of the gravest questions in theology, when 
 you affirm that punishment is simply for the good of the punished. 
 That it has this in view, to some extent, I admit. That it fails of 
 its aim when the refractory are not reformed, I deny. The model of 
 
RELIGION, IN COMMON SCHOOLS, 43 
 
 human government is the Divine. Was the flood sent for the benefit 
 of the anti-deluvians ? or will you arraign the judgment of God ? 
 Were Sodom and Gommorah overwhelmed with the fiery flood for 
 their own profit ? I mention these instances, in the chance that they 
 be in that part of the Bible you do not reject ; if so, tliey will have force. 
 In all cases in which the incorrigible are more hardened by punish- 
 ment, must the bolt be drawn, the doors unbarred, and the vile and 
 abandoned bs permitted to go forth and destroy, because punishment 
 has done them no good ? If men are made better by penaltj^, well ; if 
 not, the order, stability, and security around us, prove that righteous 
 penalty is not in vain. So with the rod. I now leave my second 
 position- 
 
 YOU ARE OPPOSED TO RELIGION IN SCHOOLS. 
 
 Wishing to do you full justice in this, as in other mattei-s, I 
 requested you to state what you meant by the term " religious 
 instruction," and what you recommended to be taught. You 
 decline to answer mc. You decline to define a term you are using 
 frequently. You are willing, you say, religion should be taught in 
 schools; but what you mean by religion, you will not define. You 
 xfer me to " the proper sources of information." I was simple 
 nough to suppose that an application to yourself was the most 
 proper of all sources. But it seems I am mistaken. Your writings 
 come next ; to them I must refer. The Common School Journal 
 you edit, as Secretary of the Board of Education. In it the Board 
 speak occasionally ; you constantly. It professes to be the " Expo- 
 nent of the Common School S3'Stem, Ei'erij page is subject to the 
 rigid rule of the Editor ;" so says the publisher. [Vol. viii., p. 1.] 
 You inform tne that I do not understand you to be opposed to reli- 
 gious instruction in schools, " on any competent authority." I differ 
 from you in opinion. You also say that you are " in favor of religious 
 instruction (though you tell not what you mean) in our schools, to the 
 extreme verge to which it can be carried without invading the rights 
 of conscience, which are established by the laws of God, and 
 
44 THE BIBLE, THE ROD, AND 
 
 guarantied to us by the Constitution of the State." More than this 
 I do not ask ; more, I would not receive. Nor can you put your 
 finger on the request, from any respectable class of the community, 
 for more than this. I am prepared to show two things. 1. Neither 
 the amount, nor kind of religious instruction allowed by the Con- 
 stitution, is recommended. 2. In that which is presented, neither 
 the rights of conscience, nor the Constitution of the State, are 
 observed. 
 
 The Constitution commands that " the principles of piety " 
 shall be taught in schools. It is made the duty of masters to teach 
 those " principles of piety," as much as it is their duly to teach Arith- 
 metic or Grammar. Who is to judge what those principles of piety 
 are ? How they shall be taught.^ By what sanctions they shall be 
 enforced ^ Who shall decide what sectarianism is ? Who, speak- 
 ing by authority, shall proclaim what we may teach, what we may 
 not, of religion in schools ? You have already done this, by author- 
 ity, or without it. Certain views that you entertain, you call reli- 
 gion, or " piety." These you allow to be taught in schools. You 
 enforce them in your lectures, reports, and Journal. Those which 
 clash with your peculiar views, you reject as " dogmatic theology," 
 or " sectarianism." By what authority do you settle those grave 
 and important questions for every town and school district in Mas- 
 sachusetts ? Flave the Board of Education decided these questions? 
 If so, on what grounds? Have you, by virtue of your office, 
 decided these points ? Certain I am, that practically they have 
 been decided, and in that decision common truths have been ruled 
 out, which are essential to a virtuous life, as well as to the salvation 
 of the soul. You substitute, as far as you have influence, for the 
 principles of piety allowed by the Constitution, nothing above, noth- 
 ing more than Deism, bald and blank. This I am prepared to show 
 from what you publish, from what you admit. 
 
 The Principal of the Normal School, at West Newton, has issued 
 a circular, in which he makes it the duty of his scholars, wind and 
 weather permitting, to attend church a half day on the Sabbath, and do 
 their walking for recreation on that day, in the morning and cvenmg. 
 
RELIGION, IN COMMON SCHOOLS. 45 
 
 Is there no settlement by authority in the " State School," how 
 often it is best to attend church. Is there no " sectarianism " in 
 such a decision? President Everett, of Harvard University, makes 
 it the duty of all his students to attend church both parts of the 
 Sabbath. 
 
 Under the caption, " What shall be my Sabbath Reading ? " your 
 Journal teaches that we must read no books, except those of a liberal 
 character. " Sermons and religious tracts " I must not read " if 
 they make me selfish ;" i, e., inculcate the difference between the 
 righteous and the wicked ; or make me " distrustful of my fellow 
 man, or despairing of his advancement ; " i. e., that teach natural 
 depravity ; such books are to be avoided on the Sabbath. I commend 
 the good sense of the writer in making no allusion to the Bible, in 
 such a category, as a book fit to be read upon the Sabbath. [Jour- 
 nal, Vol. v., 246.] Is there no dogmatism here .'' 
 
 You base your theory of no rod — no corporal punishment — on 
 the native purity of the child, in opposition to his native depravity. 
 The language of your journal is — and "every page is subject to 
 your rigid rule " — " We cannot doubt that the capacity for all that 
 is good and noble, exists in every child, and needs only to be roused 
 and brought forth." [Vol. ii., 76.] 
 
 Dr. Howe says, in your Journal of October 15, 1846, that 
 " almost all children are as pure as Eve was." I might let this 
 pass, with the rebuke in the Puritan, of October 29, from the pen of 
 a member of the Board of Education, to whose Orthodoxy you re- 
 fer me in vindication of yourself. But I cannot resist the expression 
 of my grief, that those in the Perkins Institution for the Blind, who 
 are shut out from the light of nature, should also be shut out from the 
 light of grace. The statement of Dr. Howe is made in his report 
 upon the case of Laura Bridgman. The whole report proves that 
 that poor girl is seeking an atoning Savior, burdened with her sins, 
 and asking for the Cross at which she may lay them down. She 
 has, indeed, been told of " a man who lived a great many years 
 ago, who always did right." But she has not, as the report proves, 
 heard of Jesus the Savior, nor listened to that voice which says, 
 4* 
 
46 
 
 THE BIBLE, THE ROD, AND 
 
 " Daughter, be of good clieer ; thy sins are forgiven thee." If the 
 account in your Journal, of October 15, is a specimen of the re- 
 ligious instruction given to the blind, religious parents, who have 
 blind children to place under such tuition, may well weep over their 
 double calamity — " for if the blind lead the blind, shall they not loth 
 fall into the ditch?" 
 
 Again, we read in your Journal, on the subject of school disci- 
 pline, " That there is a jJ7~ina'p7e, thank God ! at the hot lorn of 
 every heart, that is a desire to do right.'''' " Read the Sermon on 
 the Mount," adds the writer, " every word was addressed to the 
 natural conscience." Thus you teach the native purity of the 
 heart. A little scum is on the surface, but it is all right, all sound 
 at the bottom. What to us, then, is the Redemption of Christ, if 
 men are not dead in sin.? or the gift of the Holy Ghost, to "shed 
 abroad the love of God in the heart," if it is already there, and was 
 always there } Or what necessity is there for a change of heart, in 
 order to be saved, if the heart is already sound and good } You 
 may say of no necessity — those who are influenced by German 
 Transcendentalism, which begins by denying the Scriptui-e doctrine 
 of human depravity, and ends by asserting the perfectability of man, 
 without God — without grace — may also respond, of no necessity. 
 But there is a religious pulsation in Massachusetts, yet. The peo- 
 ple of this State have been content to believe the Bible as the basis 
 of all the good we enjoy — they have been content to take their 
 Republicanism, their system of free schools, and their religion, from 
 that source which has made Massachusetts the glory of New Eng- 
 land — and when they see into whose hands this mighty work of 
 training the millions of our youth has fallen, they will be true to 
 themselves. The yoke our fathers would not bear — the yoke of 
 Infidelity, allied to State dogmatic theology, in any form — the 
 children will not wear. 
 
 But I have not yet done with the matter of proof. The Rev. E. 
 D. Moore, editor of the Boston Recorder, received a call from you 
 some time since. The object of your visit was, to induce him to 
 correct certain expressions made in the Recorder, which you in- 
 
KELIGION, IN COMMON SCHOOLS. 47 
 
 formed him had done you injuslice. Mr. Moore certifies thus: 
 That you assured him that you were willing to go as far as the 
 Statute Book allowed, in teaching religion ; but, as that excluded 
 everything sectarian, you must conform to it. The Editor says: 
 " I asked Mr. Mann what was, in his view, se:;tarian — whether we 
 might teach the existence of God ? " Yes. " May we inculcate 
 the duties we owe to one God ? " Yes. " May we enforce those 
 duties by an appeal to a future state of reward and punishment .'' " 
 No ! ! " Such, in substance," adds Mr. Moore, " was the conver- 
 sation. I thus learned that the Secretary of the Board of Education 
 construed the laws as excluding from public schools all but Deism, 
 and that he was unwilling that any thing better should be taught." 
 
 The " principles of piety," as you illustrate and enforce them, 
 exclude all that treats of human depravity — salvation by the blood 
 of Jesus Christ — the atonement and the sanctions to a good life, 
 drawn from the world to come. All these common truths, held by 
 nine-tenths of all in this State, who profess any form of Christian 
 faith, are ruled out of schools by the high authority of the Secretary 
 of the Board of Education ; they are declared to be sectarian and 
 unconstitutional. You have settled, by the authority of the Board, 
 or without that authority, what piety is, according to the Statute. 
 Your influence is derived from the Legislature ; through you, the 
 people are told what they must receive, and be satisfied with, as a 
 construction of the Constitution. All towns must hear — all dis- 
 tricts obey ; else incur the penalty of forfeiture of their portion of 
 the school money. 
 
 Some, perhaps, would like to interpret the phrase, " Principles of 
 piety," in the Constitution, for themselves. They have vague no- 
 tions about " the rights of conscience, established by the laws of 
 God." But you silence these clamors, by calling such persons " a 
 small, but persistent and intolerant party, who are determined to 
 force dogmatic theology into common schools, or scatter those 
 schools to the winds;" and, among other things, they are guilty 
 of " thrusting forioard private opinions.'''' [Re-Rejoinder, Boston 
 Masters— 109.] 
 
48 THE BIBLE, THE ROD, AND 
 
 Is it SO, then — that in the old Bay State, where civil freedom 
 was cradled amid the storms of December, and where, after years 
 of suffering, religious freedom was first asserted and understood — 
 that any party, I care not how small it be, may not say, openly and 
 boldly, what it believes the temporal and eternal interest of children 
 demand, without the official rebuke of thrusting forward private 
 opinions ? Are you so high, so strong in the popular will, that your- 
 self, and those who think with you, alone express public opinion, 
 and all else is the mere echo of a private mind ? And are we to 
 be told, that when a gentleman expresses his opinion upon religious 
 instruction in common schools, he is to be rebuked, as thrusting 
 those opinions forward ? I have not so leai'ned the " rights of con- 
 science," to which you make such frequent reference. My code of 
 religious freedom is not so dogmatic as this. Does your position, as 
 Secretary of the Board, give you a monopoly in this matter.? Sup- 
 pose this " small, persistent, and intolerant party, are determined to 
 force dogmatic theology into our schools " — comes not that act 
 with as good a grace, as broad a constitutional right, as from your- 
 self.^ When you assert the native purity of our race, and on that 
 assumption build your theory of no punishments in schools, do you 
 teach no sectarianism ? Do you not, with a dash of your pen, strike 
 out a fundamental truth, received by all Christian sects, save 
 one } If I may not teach native depravity in schools, because the 
 Constitution forbids it, may you teach native holiness } If I may 
 not teach the doctrine of Election, as explained in Rom. ix., may 
 you so pervert and misapply I. John, iv., 18, as you have done, to 
 sustain your view of no corporal punishment.? [Reply to Boston 
 Masters, 133.] If I may not teach the strict Divinity of Jesus 
 Christ, from John i., 18, may you so teach his humanity as to con- 
 tradict the Word of Inspiration that he was " God manifest in the 
 flesh " } If I may not warn children of future punishment, as I 
 read Matt, xxv., may you teach that there is no punishment after 
 death } 
 
 It is proper to keep dogmatic theology out of school. Let it be 
 kept out on both sides — the dogmatism of unbelief, as well as the 
 
RELIGION, IN COMMON SCHOOLS. 49 
 
 dogmatism of faith. The law that closes my mouth, closes yours. 
 The Constitution which forbids me to thrust foricard my private 
 opinions, bids you keep yours to yourself. 
 
 You have a method of disposing of this religious question, more 
 summary than satisfactory. We ask that the principles of piety 
 be taught in schools, and not the principles of infidelity — we ask 
 that, blended with intellectual culture, our children shall be taught 
 the fear of God, their accountability to him, and the great truth that 
 lies at the base of warning and promise in the Bible, that life is a season 
 of preparation ; that in the next, men will be rewarded according to 
 their works. You respond, that we are " intolerant and per- 
 sistent ;" that wc will have sectarianism, or " scatter our common 
 schools to the winds." But who originated common schools ? The 
 very class of men whom you, in your official capacity, denounce as 
 intolerant ; those very dogmatists, men of the same principles of 
 those whom you accuse, on account of those principles, of attempt- 
 ing to scatter those schools to the wind. The clergy and religious 
 men, in the hands of God, did this great work. This you allow in 
 your Journal. [Vol. 11., 61.] The love they bore the souls of 
 men, the desire they felt that all might read the Word of God, and 
 be made wise unto salvation, led to the determination to give all 
 classes an education, and to the sacrifice then necessary to carry 
 out that purpose. But for the influence of those truths, which you 
 reject as unfit to be taught to our children — truths in which the old 
 Counnonwcahli of Massachusetts has stood firmly for more than two 
 hundred years — neitlier you nor I might have been able to read. 
 And yet to keep this system, which our fathers derived from the Bible, 
 and from their love to the souls of men, on the base on which 
 they planted it, and on which, like the State, it has outrode the storms 
 and convulsions of two centuries, is to scatter it to the winds, in 
 the opinion of the Secretary of the Board of Education. I do not 
 think you can produce " any competent authority " to show that any 
 class have urged or desire the introduction of sectarianism into com- 
 mon schools. I would oppose such an effort with all the zeal you 
 could brino; to such a task. 
 
50 THE BIBLE, THE ROD, AND 
 
 If you say that teaching future retribution is sectarianism, I an- 
 swer that you use terms to mislead. A truth common to all sects, 
 is not, cannot be, sectarian. It is a truth common to Presbyterians 
 and Baptists — Episcopalians and Methodists — the Orthodox and 
 Unitarians — the Catholics and the more respectable portion of the 
 Universalists. Enlightened Deism does not reject it. The heathen 
 have embraced it, in all ages. I am informed, by Rev. Wm. M. 
 Rogers, of this city, that in his recent visit to Egypt, cut deep in 
 the rock, he found, engraved with a pen of iron, the evidence that 
 the ancient Egyptians believed in future reward and punishment. 
 Your "principles of piety," which you are willing should be taught 
 to the children of Massachusetts, is below them all — Deism, Uni- 
 versalism. Paganism. 
 
 If it be true, however, that such a truth is sectarian, then was 
 Abraham a sectarian, for he obeyed God in looking for a city — a 
 heavenly one — in which to find his reward. Then was Moses a 
 sectarian, for he chose afHiction whh the people of God, " having 
 respect to the recompense of reward." All the ancient martyrs, 
 who suffered for conscience's sake, " that they might obtain a better 
 resurrection," were all sectarians. The apostles, who were upheld 
 in their trials by the promise, " Your reward is in heaven," were 
 sectarians and dogmatists. Even the blessed Redeemer himself 
 was tainted with this dreadful evil, when, '■'■for the joy that teas set 
 before him, he endured the Cross and despised the shame." 
 
 If common, essential, vital truths, may not be taught without viola- 
 tion of the Constitution of the Slate, and without teaching dogmatic 
 theology, then His Excellency, Gov. Briggs, stands rebuked by his 
 Secretary. In his excellent Proclamation for a day of Thanks- 
 giving, he calls upon all the people in the State to give thanks to 
 God, " for spiritual mercies that will make us wise unto salvation;" 
 to remember our accountability to our Supreme Judge, and to know 
 " our only hope of pardon and acceptance with Him, held out in the 
 volume of Inspiration, is by repentance towards God, and faith in 
 our Lord Jesus Christ." If you are right, the Governor is wrong. 
 Is he to be included in the list of that " small, persistent, intolerant 
 
RELIGION, IN COMMON SCHOOLS. 51 
 
 party," who " thrust forward their private opinions ? " In a recent 
 address to the High School of Hopkinton, Gov. Briggs exhorted the 
 pupils to educate "the iriimortal gem" which God had given them, 
 ^'■for both worlds^ Was he " dogmatic " in this ? Did he violate 
 the Constitution which he has sworn to defend } And yet this is all 
 we ask — enough of the Bible to make men wise to salvation. 
 
 If you are right in your construction of the " principles of piety," 
 then does the Hon. Abbott Lawrence, of this city, make an unreason- 
 able request. In his letter, making a liberal donation to Amherst 
 College, Mr. Lawrence says : " My motto for the country is — 
 Universal Education, founded upon the morals draion from the 
 Bihley Does Mr. Lawrence rest his hopes upon a construction of 
 the Bible, that runs down its sanctions below Deism and Pagan- 
 ism ? Is Mr. Lawrence a sectarian ? 
 
 The Hon. Daniel Webster stands rebuked by your construction of 
 the Constitution. In his masterly defence of the Bible and religion 
 in schools, in the Girard case, he scattered your theory to the four 
 winds of heaven, as chaff flies before the tempest. Is Mr. Webster 
 a dogmatist or a sectarian? or is he unacquainted with the Con- 
 stitution } 
 
 I must repeat the remark made in my sermon — that an effort 
 has been, and still is made, to get religion out of common schools. 
 And what more effectual way is there, than to show tliat it is uncon- 
 stitutional to teach it ? I regret to add, that in my opinion, you 
 have not in good faith kept your pledge to keep sectarianism out of 
 your system or out of school. It would not be in good faith, for a 
 neutral paper to exclude articles in favor of a Tariff, on the ground 
 of neutrality, and then admit column after column in favor of Free 
 Trade. 
 
 That you may understand that my views are not peculiar, upon 
 the whole subject, I will select a single authority, whose respecta- 
 bility you will not question. I quote from the Princeton Review, 
 July, 1846 — pp. 438, 439 : 
 
 " It is already difficult, in many places, to retain even the reading 
 of the Scriptures in the public schools. The whole system is in the 
 
52 THE BIBLE, THE ROD, AND i 
 
 hands of men of the world, in many of our States, and is avowedly 
 secular. Now, with regard to this scheme, it may be remarked, 
 that it is a novel and fearful experiment. The idea of giving an 
 education to the cliildren of a country from which religion is to be 
 excluded, we believe to be peculiar to the nineteenth century. 
 Again, it is obvious that education without religion, is irreligious. 
 It cannot be neutral, and in fact is not neutral. The effort to keep 
 out religion from all the books and all the instructions, gives 
 them of necessity an irreligious and infidel character. Again, 
 the common school is the only place of education for a large class 
 of our people. They have neither parental nor pastoral instruc- 
 tion to supply its deficiency or correct its innuence. Again, this 
 plan is so repugnant to the convictions of the better part of the 
 community, that its introduction into our colleges has been stren- 
 uously resisted. Where is the Christian parent who would send 
 his son to a college from which religion was banished, in which 
 there were no prayers, no preaching of the Gospel, no biblical 
 instruction ? But if we shrink from such an ungodly mode of 
 instruction for the few who enjoy the advantages of a classical 
 education, why should we consent to the great mass of the chil- 
 dren of the country being subjected to this system in the com- 
 mon schools ? Under the plea and guise of liberty and equality, 
 this system is, in fact, in the highest degree tyrannical. What 
 right has the State, a majority of the people, or a mere clique, 
 which in fact commonly control such matters, to say what shall 
 be taught in schools which the people sustain ? What more 
 right have they to say that no religion shall be taught, than they 
 have to say that Popery shall be taught ? Or what right have 
 the people in one part, to control the wishes and convictions of 
 those of another part of a State, as to the education of their own 
 children ? If the people of a particular district choose to have 
 a school in which the Westminster or the Heidleberg catechism 
 is taught, we cannot see on what principle of religious liberty 
 the State has a right to interfere, and say it shall not be done ; if 
 you teach your religion, you shall not draw your own money 
 from the public fund ! This appears to us a strange doctrine in 
 
BELIGION, IN COMMON SCHOOLS. 53 
 
 a free country ; and yet it is, if we mistake not, the practical 
 working of the popular systems in every part of tlie Union. 
 We are not dispo ed to submit to any such dictation. W^e can- 
 not see, with any patience, the whole school system of a State, 
 with all its mighty influence, wielded by a Secretary of State, or 
 School Commissioner, or by a clique of Unitarian or Infidel states- 
 men, as the case may be. We regard this whole theory of a 
 mere secular education in the common schools, enforced by tho 
 penally of exclusion from the public funds and State patronage, 
 as unjust and tyrannical, as well as infidel in its whole tendency. 
 The people of each district have the right to make their schools 
 as religious <is they please ; and if they cannot agree, they have 
 the right severally of drawing their proper proportion of the public 
 stock. 
 
 " The conviction, we are persuaded, is fast taking possession of 
 the minds of good people, that the common school system is 
 rapidly assuming not a mere negative, but a positively anti-chris- 
 tian character ; and that in self-defence, and in the discharge of 
 their highest duty to God and their country, they must set them- 
 selves against it, and adopt the system of parochial schools ; 
 schools in which each church shall teach fully, fairly, and earnestly, 
 what it believes to be the truth of God. This is the only 
 method in which a religious education has hitherto ever been 
 given to the mass of the people of any country, and the novel 
 experiment of this age and country, is really an experiment to 
 see what will be the result of bringing up the body of the peo- 
 ple in ignorance of God and his word. For if religion is ban- 
 ished from the common school, it will be excluded from the whole 
 educational training of a large part of the population. ' It is an 
 attempt to apply to the whole country, what Girard has pre- 
 scribed for his college. Under these circumstances, the church of 
 every denomination is called upon to do its duty, which is nothing 
 more or less than to teach the people Christianity, and if this can- 
 not otherwise be done thoroughly and eflfectually, as we are per- 
 suaded it cannot, than by having a school in connection with 
 
54 THE BIBLE, THE ROD, AND 
 
 every congregation, then it is the duty of the church to enter upon 
 that plan, and prosecute it with all her energy." 
 
 I feel under obligation to present you with the authority, in part, 
 on which I made my original statement. I do not feel bound to 
 make the case clear to your mind, nor to labor till you profess to be 
 satisfied. When I have given such evidence as I think the case 
 demands, and such as I am willing to present to the public, and on 
 which 1 am willing to rest my position, my work is done. You ad- 
 monish me, in your letter, that I shall be tried at the bar of Public 
 Opinion. 1 have no fear of that tribunal. What I have said, in 
 respect to the Bible, the rod, and religious instruction in schools, I 
 have said from a high sense of duty, from a regard to the welfare 
 of the young, and upon evidence that could not be gainsaycd. A 
 review of this subject has only deepened my conviction ; it has 
 frnpressed me with the fact, that the half has not been told. 
 
 THE COMMON SCHOOL LIBRARY. 
 
 To prove that I must err in what I say of a part of the School 
 Library, you do not appeal to the books, but to the Board of Edu- 
 cation. You can say nothing good of many members of that 
 Board, to which I shall not respond. His Excellency, Gov. Briggs, 
 I esteem as a model of a republican magistra ( — a pii'not and 
 Christian. I can respond to all you say of the Rev. Drs. Humphrey 
 and Sears — Rev. Mr. Hooker and Hon. S. C. Phillips. The 
 Orthodoxy of Drs. Humphrey and Sears is there own defence. 
 How it can be yours, I am not able to perceive, unless their Ortho- 
 doxy can be imputed to you by some process with which I am not 
 acquainted. Nor can I conceive how ihe fact that Gov. Briggs ia 
 sound in the faith, alters the character of certain books in the 
 library, which may have been approved before those gentlemen 
 were placed on the Board. If the Board of Education are easy 
 
RELIGION, IN COMMON SCHOOLS. 5S 
 
 and sat'sfied wilh what you call " reform," it would do little 
 towards changing the character of your system or its results. 
 That all are not so, I know and can affirm. 
 
 The system you represent and define, is generally considered to 
 be yours. The Board originated with you, in connection with 
 another 'gentleman. (Reply, Boston Masters, p. 101.) In framing 
 the laws you now execute, when in the Legislature of Massachusetts, 
 you bore a conspicuous and prominent part. My opportunity to 
 know in this matter, one of your earlier Journals records. (Vol. I., 
 p. 345.) There has been a disposition, from the outset of this ex - 
 perlment, to transcendentalize our schools — to let you have time 
 and room to give your theory a fair trial. The character or silence 
 of the Board, do little towards proving that your theory is sound or 
 safe, or that those who now sustain you are satisfied. As an illus- 
 tration, I will call your attention to a fact. On the 24th day of 
 September, 1846, the School Committee of the city of Boston 
 adopted, as a reading book in schools, a work styled, " Sequel to 
 Popular Lessons, by Eliza Robbins." On that School Committee, 
 there are several clergymen, of the Baptist, Episcopal, and Congre- 
 gational denominations. Yet that Sequel contains as much irre- 
 ligion as one would desire to have taught in a single book. 
 
 On page 42, the authoress says that " the religion of Moses spoke 
 f this life 07ihj " — that Moses who talked with God in the Mount, 
 
 and received a law written by the finger of the living God he 
 
 gave to the people a religion less perfect than the religion he left in 
 Egypt. He fled by the power of the world to come which he saw by 
 faith ; yet he spoke not of it to his people. And that people, 
 whose chief advantage was this — that to "them were committed 
 THE oracles of GOD," (Rom. iii., 2,) had less light than the Pagans, 
 who were taught by future rewards and punishment. Jesus Christ 
 expressly says: " Now that the dead are raised even Moses showed 
 at the hush." (Luke xx., 36-38.) He also says, that both Moses 
 and the prophets had so plainly taught the state of the dead, the 
 woe of the lost, the way of escape, that should one go from the 
 dead, he could add no persuasion not found in Moses. [Luke xvi.. 
 
56 THE BIBLE, THE KOD, AND 
 
 27 - 3] .] Holy men, who read nothing but Moses and the prophets, 
 saw by faith a city eternal in the heavens, embraced the blessing, and 
 asserted that in this life they were only pilgrims and strangers. [Heb. 
 xi., 13, 14, 39.] Yet our children are to be told that Christ and Paul 
 were bolli mistaken ; and that men instructed by God had less infor- 
 mation than Pagans ; for Moses taught nothing relating to u future 
 life ! ! 
 
 The authoress proceeds to expound the Decalogue. Take, as an 
 example, her illustration of the fourth commandment. On page 
 48 we read, that " the Sabbath is the day when men goto the house 
 of God in company, and meet in pleasant icalks.'''' 
 
 On page 62 it is affirmed that the resurrection of Christ is a 
 " proof, as he rose from the grave, all men shall never die, hit have 
 everlasting life.'''' Here is bald, blank, undisguised Universalism, 
 taught by a most palpable perversion and alteration of the words of 
 the Savior. The Divine teacher says " whoso liveth and believeth 
 on me shall never die." [John xi.,26.] Such is the theology read 
 day by day in the schools of Boston. The Old Testament is dis- 
 posed of — the purposes of the Sabbath settled — and all men 
 introduced into life eternal — by a vote of the School Committee of 
 the city of Boston, on the 24th of September, 1846. 
 
 In reference to the Library of the Board, I shall say but little in 
 addition to what I have said in a former letter. The Editor of the 
 "Philosophy of the Seasons," Vol. I., p. 11, admits that he has 
 *' altered " the Sabbath papers, to suit the plan of the Board of 
 Education. Those alterations make all the difference in the world. 
 Much that goes out under your auspices as Sabbath reading, is as 
 well entitled to that distinction as the Farmers' Almanack, and no 
 more so. Read their Titles — "General Aspect of Winter" — 
 " Discovery of Telescope and Microscope " — " Winter not monot- 
 onous " — " Analogy of Nature " — " Domestic Affections of Man " 
 — " Allusions to the Dew." Such subjects, divested of the reli- 
 gious character given them by their author, altered to suit the irre- 
 ligious, indicate the character of the Sabbath reading officially 
 recommended. 
 
RELIGION, IN COMMON SCHOOLS. 57 
 
 I commend to your attention an essay on Regeneration, Vol. II., 
 193-198; an article on Natural Religion, Vol. I., 5-7. The 
 mellowing of the author's remarks on Christ, the judge of the 
 world, in a note by the Editor. Vol. III., 2-4. A resurrection to 
 immortal glory of the dead, without distinction of character — 278. 
 Blessing of affliction, applied to all the afflicted, without respect to 
 character or improvement. Vol II., 248-252. The offer of the 
 world to come, in which " no death or sin is," without that limit 
 which the Bible makes. Vol. II. ,104. This is proof, in part, of 
 what I affirm of the Library. 
 
 Your reference to the abridgement of the life of Columbus, as a 
 vindication of the alterations in the life of Branard, is not in point. 
 Had President Edwards abridged his own work for your Board, it 
 would have been analogous ; or had Mr. Irving suppressed certain 
 facts in his history to suit your purpose, the cases would be parallel 
 As it was, you were bound to publish Rev. Mr. Brainard's life, so that 
 for all he was, the glory should have been given to the grace of God, 
 or you should have let it alone. Omission, in such a case, is palpa- 
 ble perversion. 
 
 When I consider what we owe to an open Bible ; when I know 
 that in the cabin of the May Flower, in Massachusetts Bay, guided 
 by its spirit, our fathers originated the form of our government in the 
 principle that majorities ought to govern ; when I see them, without 
 a precedent in the wide world, breaking away from kings, nobles, 
 hierarchies — asserting the sovereignty of God and the equality of 
 man — the right of conscience and the power of self-government, 
 with the Bible as the infallible, the only rule of faith and duty ; 
 when I see its power upon education, philanthropy, stability and 
 good order ; when 1 see that the Pilgrims, as soon as they unlearned 
 the lessons of the old world, and felt the full power of the Bible 
 upon their hearts, not only made sacred the rights of conscience, but 
 raised dissenters of every grade to a level with themselves — I 
 can find no language too strong to praise the instrumentality that is 
 placing this Blessed Book in the hands and hearts of our children — 
 no denunciation too severe for the men who would dim its light, 
 
58 
 
 THE BIBLE, THE ROD, AND 
 
 impair its authority, or deprive cliildren of all its influence and 
 power ; thus harming, irreparably, millions of our race, and striking 
 out the corner stone of our Commonwealth's stability and defence. 
 
 I will adopt the motto of the Hon. Abbott Lawrence — " A univer- 
 sal education, founded upon the morals drawn from the Bible.'''' Give 
 us this and an open Bible, and we will fear neither Pope, Pagan, 
 nor Despot. 
 
 If the good people of Massachusetts understand what experiments 
 are going on with common schools, and choose to have it so — if 
 they prefer infidelity to religion — the words of man to the word of 
 God — if they desire to hazard positive good, for the vague 
 promise of something better — if they resolve, under the specious 
 name of reform, to unsettle all that is stable, tried and true — to 
 leave the certain paths of safety, throw to the winds that *?/s/e« 
 which blends the training of the intellect, with the culture of the 
 heart — if they choose to cast away all that has made common 
 schools our glory and defence — leave those institutions, based upon 
 the deep foundations of God's Holy Word, for a gaudy mansion 
 resting on the clouds, with Its summit towards the moon — th-'n, as 
 good citizens, we must submit, and see the wave of ruin roll on from 
 sire to son. 
 
 It is no easy matter to remove a people from a system, tried, safe, 
 beneficent: it is more diflScult to bring them back: more still, to 
 save them from the curse. 
 
 The startling increase of juvenile depravity seen in our State, is 
 but the first fruits of that awful harvest that is to be gathered in 
 from seeds which mystical men and pseudo-philanthropists have 
 sown, as they have attempted to improve the Bible. 
 
 But while we submit, our warning of the coming danger will 
 be loud and constant. We still have liberty to gather our children 
 out from such influences, and, amid the sanctions of home and of the 
 church, teach them that love of the Bible and fear of God, which 
 is denied them in common schools. 
 
 You call our system of common schools "a glorious system." It 
 is so. Its founders made it glorious. We, their children, wish to 
 
RELIGION, IN COMMON SCHOOLS. 59 
 
 keep it as it is. We ask no change ; least of all, such as you prom- 
 ise. The plain, hardy, manly piety of the New England Fathers, 
 we wislv not exchanged for the mystical infidelity of the transcen- 
 dental school. 
 
 Say not that all who oppose your peculiar views, are unfriendly 
 to improvements in schools ; any or all, that do nol impair the sys- 
 tem, or start it from its deep foundations. As well say, that all who 
 censure the conduct of Capt. Hoskins, in the wreck of the Great 
 Britain, disparage the model of tiiat steamer, deride all improve- 
 ment in naval archetecture, and wish to throw navigation back to 
 the point it had reached in the lime of Ciiristopher Columbus. 
 
 " Our glorious system of common schools," I would compare to 
 the " steamer Great Britain ;" her model is splendid — her equip- 
 ments of the first order — her destination hopeful. Safe hands are 
 not at the tiller — the chart is unstudied — rash experiments are 
 made — the open sea, the usual, the safe path, is abandoned for a 
 shorter cut and a quicker trip. Her speed at the outset promised 
 well; but when no one thought of danger — while all onboard 
 were buoyant and joyous in tiie confident belief that their route was 
 the safest and the best — the good ship, in all her glory, was hard 
 and fast in Dundrum Bay — a splendid wreck on the Irish coast. 
 Very respectfully. 
 
 Your obedient servant, 
 
 MATTHEW HALE SMITH. 
 
1 
 
LIBRARY OF 
 
 CONGRESS 
 
 019 793 376 Sf