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Schools 1902

Anthon H. Lund, Conference Reports (CR), October 1902, p.80

Religion classes have also been started in our midst; and now that the day schools are opened, we want these classes started, too, that the instruction given in the district school may be supplemented with religious instruction. It is not intended, however, to mix the two. We cannot interfere with the state schools. We do not desire to take any rights from our friends living here; but we do claim the right to see to it that our own children are given the privilege of learning that which we believe to be of the utmost importance. Presidents of stakes and Bishops of wards, we depend upon you to put forth a strong effort to the end that in every ward a religion class be established, if there be not one already. We have quite a number of Church schools, and we encourage our your men and young women to attend them. We are pleased to hear from all our academies that they have opened with better prospects than ever before. A greater interest seems to be taken in these institutions, and the First Presidency and the Church board of education, realizing the importance of this work, have made a greater appropriation in favor of it than ever before. We feel that the expenditure of means for the education of our children in these schools is profitable. We cannot fully estimate the value of these institutions. It may cost us a great deal, but if we can save if it were but one soul, how great will be our joy, saith the Lord. I believe these institutions will be the means of saving thousands of souls. In our academies missionary courses have been established, which many of our young men have been called to attend, in order to study the principles of the Gospel and get a systematic knowledge of the plan of salvation, so that when they go out into the world they may know how to teach that which they believe. These courses are doing a great deal of good.

I started by saying that we want all to attend the district schools. Now, we have in this state an excellent university, There has been some talk that the First presidency and other authorities of the Church were inimical to that institution, and did not want our people to send their young men and young women there. We want it understood that this is not the case. In the past our legislatures have been composed mostly of men belonging to this Church, and they have made large appropriations in favor of that institution, to equip it and make it worthy the name of a university. We feel that our people should avail themselves of the advantages of that institution. Many who go east for education could go to that institution and receive just as much, I believe, as they do at the eastern institutions of learning, are want it understood that we are not against the university, but we favor our people getting the advantages which it offers. Religion cannot be taught there, of course. There all sects and denominations must meet on neutral ground. But for the students belonging to the Latter-day Saints it is possible that some means can be found whereby they could be given religious instruction outside of the institution. If any of them could make arrangement to attend the theological course in the Latter-day Saints university, it is open to them.

Reed Smoot, CR, October 1903, p.61-62

"I wish we could require from every freshman a Sunday school diploma that would certify that he knew by heart the ten commandments, the sermon on the mount, a church catechism of some kind, a score of scripture psalms and best classic hymns. This university will join any association of universities and colleges that, will demand this as an entrance requirement. So much as in us lies, we will make the college a place for preserving and strengthening reverence for things divine."

President Brigham Young, when establishing the Brigham Young Academy at Provo, and the Brigham Young College at Logan, told the people, and required of those who had these institutions in charge, that nothing should be taught therein, not even the simplest studies in arithmetic, reading, or grammar, or a lesson on any subject, without the Spirit of God being with the teacher and in his instructions. I see in Chancellor McCracken's remark that they are beginning to see the light, and I care not whether the world gives us credit as the original teachers of these truths or not. The honest people of the world, those who read and think, those who are watching the events of life as they pass, will learn ere long who were the first teachers of these great truths; and ascertain what Church first taught the law of tithing in this dispensation, and that it was the Lord's revealed plan for raising means to carry on His work. The world will have to acknowledge sooner or later that it was no other than the Latter-day Saints; that it was the Prophet Joseph Smith who received that revelation in this dispensation. The truths revealed to the Prophet Joseph Smith, that we are presenting to the world, will demonstrate that he was a Prophet of God, and not a man with false ideas or vicious doctrines, as our enemies declare. I feel that every step forward, every advance we have made is towards the goal of success, and the firm establishment of the Church of Jesus Christ, representing the little stone cut out of the mountain that will roll forth and fill the whole earth.

Anthon H. Lund, CR, October 1904, p.11

Before I conclude, I want to speak of another organization not an auxiliary organization of the priesthood, but an organization pertaining to the Church school system, I mean the religion classes, which we are trying to establish in our midst. This meets opposition, both from without and, I am sorry to say, from within. The object of these classes is to teach our children what they cannot be taught in the district schools, namely, the principles of the Gospel. We do not want in any way to interfere with the rights of our fellow citizens who do not belong to our Church. We do not want to force any of this religion class work upon their children. We do believe, however, that an education without a God is a faulty one. We do believe that children should be taught morality and faith in God. But as the laws of the land are, this cannot be done in our district schools. We must keep the public schools free from all theological doctrines. No one need to fear this movement of ours. It is not intended for propaganda amongst those who are not of us. But we claim the right to teach our own children what we want them taught. We believe that there is a great necessity of teaching them morality, principles of sound conduct, faith in God, and doctrines of salvation. The children may be taught the secular branches by the most polished teachers, but if they are not taught morality and, faith their education will be deficient and they will not know how to reach the object for which they have come upon the earth. We like our children to receive a good education and to become mentally strong, and we encourage all the Latter-day Saints to take advantage of the district schools, of the high schools and the universities for the branches that are taught there, but we do feel that our children need more than they can get in those institutions, and for that reason we have established religion classes. Now, we have no objections to our friends of other denominations establishing classes and, teaching their children the principles that they believe in. Our Catholic friends set us a good example in this respect. They will not let their children be neglected in religious instruction. We do not object to others teaching their children so long as they do not teach our children what we do not want them taught. We want our children to receive the kind of instruction that we know to be all-important to them. This is all there is to the religion classes. We are not attempting to mix church and state; we do not want to intrude our religion into the state schools; but we do claim the right to have our own children taught in the principles that we believe; and for this purpose we gather them together. In places where there are but few, if any, non-"Mormons" we may hire the schoolhouse after the school has been dismissed; but we particularly urge those in charge of the religion classes not to interfere with the children of non-"Mormons." I want to say to the Latter-day Saints, do not underestimate the importance of having your children taught the principles of the Gospel in early life. We have church schools established, but as a general thing the children do not go there until they are out of the grades. Now, from seven to fourteen years of age is the time when the child's mind is plastic, and when you can make lasting impressions upon it. We do not want that time to go by without our doing something for the spiritual growth of the child; we want to teach our young children faith in Christ, and have them well grounded in His doctrines. I see it is time to dismiss the meeting. May the Lord bless you all, is my prayer in the name of Jesus. Amen.

Joseph M. Tanner, CR, April 1905, p.80; 82

It may seem anomalous to you to state tonight that the ministers of the world have less religion, less spirituality than the very congregations that they speak to. Why? Because these ministers go into schools of training. They commence by analyzing the scriptures. They criticize the scriptures. We have an educated ministry that has gone over to those who call themselves "the higher critics;" and the ministers of the world while they may be theologians in their sense of the term are not religionist. They have a very little of religion. Now can you imagine the results of religious teaching done by men who have evidently far less religion, far less spirituality, far less love of God and devotion to Him and His cause in their hearts that the people whom they are addressing--than their congregations?

So I implore you, fathers and mothers, let not the spirit of criticism enter your homes. Never permit yourselves to criticize your brethren in the presence of your children. You can tell a child that comes into the schoolroom if he comes with a critical attitude, especially if he has a critical attitude to the teacher. Children with this Spirit show it. They never make great progress in study. Children have a right to confidence and they should have encouraged within them the most perfect confidence, because love cannot exist without confidence. You may criticize, you may think you have detected some weakness, you may find fault, but, when you do so, you destroy confidence and you can never have love where there is no confidence. There must be perfect confidence, of the teacher in the child as well as of the pupils in the teacher, and in the authorities of the Church. Now I hope that you will not think that these Outlines are to afford you opportunities for excellent discussion, I hope you will not think that you can get up some good arguments to present knotty questions that are difficult to solve, because such discussions not only waste time, but they do that which is infinitely worse, they create a critical attitude in the mind of the child; and when that feeling of criticism is encouraged in the child, it is difficult in after life to overcome it. We can hear criticisms in our older years and throw them aside very much easier than we can throw the criticisms aside that we heard in our youth; and so I say that it is one of the sacred rights of childhood to enjoy confidence to enjoy love; and we should refrain scrupulously from ever doing or saying anything that will destroy the confidence of our youth in humanity in their brethren and sisters, in the presiding authority. They will find in later years enough to criticize. I remember once in the law school listening to one of the great lawyers of this country. He said that often the boy in the schoolroom who Has the most competent in discussing subjects of law made the poorest lawyer in after life; because he Who is to be the great lawyer is the lawyer that sees in the law equity and justice; it is the lawyer whose feelings are strengthened and deepened by his knowledge of the law. And so in our schools let us educate the feelings of our children. And I want to say this: here are two teachers coming before the class; one teacher will send his students away with a considerable fund of information; the other teacher may not give so much information, will not have imparted so many facts, but will send the children away feeling good. "What did he tell you? "Well, I do not know particularly, only I know that it made me feel nice, it made me feel happy." Now then with what feelings do you send your children out of the Sabbath School? Are they sweet feelings? Do you appeal to the feelings of your children, for in the feelings are to be found the religious life of man and they should be scrupulously and carefully cultivated. But you must have that which you give; there must be a background to your teachings, the background of purity, of integrity, of devotion, of love and you should have happy and cheerful natures and impart the quality of happiness and love to the children with whom you are associated. In this way our children will learn to love the work, they will learn to admire it, and so when they leave the schoolroom and go out into life they go out men and women full of confidence and consequently of faith and love. And when we see in our fellows, in our students, a tendency towards criticism, we may always be certain that it is not a religious tendency, because it will destroy their religious life.

George F. Richards, CR, April 1910, p.80, 82

Brethren and sisters, I think it is of the utmost importance that we choose for our children the books which they read; and that we choose for them as far as lies in our power the associations that they keep. The public schools, maintained as they are by public taxation, are by law forbidden teaching religion in those schools. The result is an exclusively secular education, an education godless in its character; and such an education is most imperfect. What, then, are the schools going to do for us in the proper education of our children ? Who has not looked upon his little boy or girl, five or six years of age, the child approaching the years when he or she will be expected to enter the district school, but experiences a great deal of concern and anxiety, fearing that the morals of that child may be weakened, instead of being stimulated and encouraged, by attendance at the district schools. The restrictive influence in the schoolroom is scarcely sufficient to overcome the unhallowed and unwholesome environment often encountered on the playground. The church, then, has something to do as also the home, for they are to supply the entire moral needs of the child. The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints has undertaken to do this mighty work for those who have gotten beyond the grades and have reached the high school period. We have established Church schools throughout the land, some thirty in number, accommodating something like eight or ten thousand boys and girls, principally sons and daughters of the Latter-day Saints; there are some exceptions, and those schools are making converts of some of these exceptions. It was but a few days ago I learned of one young man here in Salt Lake being baptized into the Church as the result of his attendance at the Church school, having come from abroad and of non-Mormon parentage. Such is the influence, in part, that these schools are exercising upon those who attend them.

"The aim and object of this work is not so much to teach pupils to know as to lead them to do and to form proper habits of life; and there should be constantly in the mind of the teacher this thought: Each of these lessons has for its purpose the forming of some religious habit. To encourage proper application of these lessons, review, at the beginning of each session, the assignment of outside work given at last meeting. All work outside of class should consist not in the preparations of lessons but in the practical application of truths learned. Teachers remember that this course is a training in practical work and habits, and not merely the teaching of Gospel lessons. Training in practical religious habits is the work of the Religion class. Habits depend on many successive repetitions of the same act."

Joseph W. McMurrin, CR, October 1910, p.21-22

In traveling among the people, in visiting the various stake conferences, it has been my privilege, frequently, to meet with the young people who are studying in these various Church academies. I have been very greatly impressed with the evidences of the spirit of inspiration, the spirit of the Lord that is manifest in the students and in the men and women who are engaged in this work, in our various Church schools. I am glad that the people appreciate, to a very great extent, the wonderful advantages that are given wherever church schools have been established, and that as a general thing these schools are well attended. They ought to be attended to their fullest capacity. It ought to be the cry of every one of these organizations that they are crowded to the very doors. This would be the condition if the people, the fathers and the mothers of the young folks, properly appreciated the great blessings that come to the youth of Israel in being trained in the things of God. While the children obtain this precious religious instruction in the Church schools they obtain every other educational advantage that can be had in any of the high schools of the state. We should not forget that this religious education is desirable and profitable above all other education. It is a serious thing, indeed, to have an education in the secular things of the world, and be ignorant concerning the will of God our Creator, and feel that we do not owe any allegiance to the Father that has created us, and has planted within us the wonderful power and intelligence that has so distinguished the human family. I say to all the fathers, and to all the mothers in Israel, take advantage of the Church school system that has been established, that your sons and daughters may be educated to believe in the precious things that have been revealed. In these schools your children are under gospel influences not alone for the half hour or more that may be given to special religious instruction, but they are finder the spirit and inspiration of the Lord, in these blessed institutions, from the moment they enter the building in the morning until they leave in the afternoon. Hard indeed will be the heart of the boy or girl who can be brought under such influences, day after day, and not have their hearts touched and be eventually brought to believe in the doctrines of the Church, as they have been revealed in the age in which we are living.

It ought to be known to all the people that the Religion Class organization has come into existence in a legitimate manner. It has had birth under the direction of the presiding authorities of the Church, the Presidency and the Twelve, and in our general conference, year after year, if you will take note, we lift up our hands supporting the general authorities of the Religion Class organization, President Anthon H. Lund standing as the general superintendent, with Elder Rudger Clawson and Elder Hyrum M. Smith of the council of the twelve, as his assistants. We thus give evidence, by our vote in general conference, that we recognize the worth of this organization, and that it has a place and a right in the midst of the people. It ought to be known to every president, and to every bishop, in Zion, to every father and mother, and to every man and woman who labors for the up-building of Zion, that there cannot be a properly and fully organized ward in any of the stakes of Zion where there is not a Religion Class organization. It has come by divine appointment. It is for the blessing and preservation and education of the youth of the Latter-day Saints. The ideal to which the general board, and the authorities in the Religion Classes are laboring, is to bring to the children instruction in religion every day that they attend the public schools. It is not their desire to bring this religious instruction into the school, or in any way interfere with the rights and privileges of children of parents who are not of us--for every church organization should have the liberty to teach to the children belonging to parents of such organization, those principles that they believe necessary to their proper education in religious and moral truth. And that is our right, no matter who may oppose it. It is not only our right, but it is a responsibility that rests upon us as men exercising authority, to take advantage of the opportunities that abound, and bring to the children not only one day in the week but two days, or more days, as it may be possible, according to our circumstances, a Religion Class instruction. When our children graduate from the public schools in secular learning they should be ready to graduate also in religious learning,. As a result of proper attention to Religion Class work, faith in God would be established in our children, and they would love the truth as it has been revealed, and grow up to manhood and womanhood, honoring God, honoring the authority of His Priesthood, recognizing the fact that there are men called, in the age in which we live, to hear the authority of God.

Anthon H. Lund, CR, October 1911, p.15

I want to say a word in regard to our Church schools. The Church expends a great deal of means for Church school education. It is not simply to give our young men and women an education. We have splendid state institutions, and now high schools are springing up everywhere, where a good secular education can be obtained. Our Church schools are not running in opposition to any of these. Of course, it may be that some of the courses are running parallel. That can not be entirely avoided. But in our Church schools we are teaching the principles of the Gospel; our religion, and this can not be done in the high schools or state institutions. It is necessary that the latter be kept free from religious teaching, because nobody would like to send children to an institution where they would be taught a religion not believed in by their parents, and hence our state institutions and common schools are kept free from religious instruction. The Latter-day Saints, however, feel that of all teaching, the teaching that leads to God and gives the children a knowledge of why they are here upon the earth, and what they must do to obtain eternal salvation, is of the greatest importance. This is what we are trying to give in the Church schools. We are glad that our people are in favor of education, and that they make so many sacrifices to have their children educated. I hope that our children are taking advantage of these opportunities, and that they are striving for an education for education's sake, and not with the idea in mind that by being educated they can make money without labor, and that labor is beneath them. We want our children taught that all labor is honorable, and that the hand ought to be trained just as well as the brain. This will make the best citizens. And again, brethren and sisters, remember that in the Church schools we are at liberty to teach the principles of religion and morality, and to instill in the hearts of our young men and women love of God and the things pertaining to Him. I would like to encourage our people to take advantage of the Church school system at the side of the others, and any man who is going on a mission--and nearly all our young men will have that privilege--ought to have an opportunity of going to a Church school. We find that when such go abroad they are better qualified for the work to which they have been called.

Rudger Clawson, CR, October 1913, p.58

Now somebody will say: "Brother Clawson, is it not a fact that the law of tithing is absolutely and purely and simply a temporal law ?" I would answer and say that the law of tithing, it is true, has to do with temporal things; but in a far deeper sense, the law of tithing is spiritual, and that is the thing I want to come to, to show that it is spiritual. Everything that we do connected with this law of tithing points to spiritual things. What is tithing for? It is for the building up of Zion, It is to build temples to God. You take material substances, the material things of the earth; and put them into the form of a temple. It takes money to build a temple. Money comes from the earth, it belongs to the earth. But what does that temple represent; what does it amount to in and of itself? It is simply a building of wood and stone. That is all it is, nothing more. It is not the temple; it is what the temple represents to us that gives it importance and value. It is what we get in the temple, and we there obtain great and glorious spiritual blessings. That is the important thing. We get our washings and our anointings, and our sealings and do work for the living and the dead. That is spiritual, very spiritual. Beautiful! We have built a number of temples. We are building one in Canada now. I would not be surprised if you will yet see temples all over the land of Zion, all over America. Take the tabernacle here. That is a material thing, isn't it? Very material, It is built of wood and stone. It is nothing but a house; that is all. It is what the tabernacle represents to us; it is what is being done in the tabernacle, It is what is being done right now in the tabernacle that gives importance and value to it. In and of itself it amounts to but little; many people come and look at it, and say it is a wonderful building. I do not care about that. Its size and appearance is the least part of it. There is a wonderful organ in the tabernacle. This is a small consideration. It is what is said there; it is the valuable instructions that are given, counsels of the priesthood, admonitions, warnings, reproof, all intended to build up and strengthen the soul. That is spiritual, and it grows out of the law of tithing, because that great tabernacle was built from the tithes and the offerings of the people. And so we might go on. There is a vast amount of the funds that comes from the tithing that is used for our Church schools. This is a great movement in Zion. We do not know, we do not appreciate what the Church schools are doing. But I will tell you who will appreciate it. The father that has his sons going to the Church schools, the parents that have daughters going there; and when they see that these children are imbibing Gospel principles, that faith is springing up in their hearts, that they are getting testimonies and being prepared to carry on the work of their fathers, they then begin to know what the Church schools mean to Zion. And let me tell you, brethren and sisters, in a wide sense, and in a very deep and important sense that is spiritual. I do not care anything about the great school buildings any more than to appreciate them, and to know that we have them. But they are only stone and wood and so on, with a little ornamentation. It is what is taking place in them, it is what is coming to your children and my children, what is being done for them. You know what it means, brethren and sisters, if you send your children to gentile schools. Now I do not speak of them in a spirit of disrespect. I mean to send children to schools where they never hear, and where it is even against the law for them to hear, instruction concerning the Gospel, or concerning the Lord. They may get some moral teachings, but they do not get any religious teaching, no theological instruction. You know what that means. I tell you it is very disastrous to your children, very, and would be to mine. The great educators of the earth, the President of the Chicago University and others are crying out today, right now today, for some religious instruction in the schools of our country. That is what is lacking in our schools, they say; we ought to have some religious training, some religious instruction. They are not getting it in those schools, but we are bringing it into our Church schools, and we are trying to bring it as near to the district schools as we can without getting into them, by the religion classes. Every now and then some bigot will rise up and make an awful cry, and condemn the religion class movement, yet it is recognized, by those who are in positions to know, that if we do not get some religious training in our universities and colleges, it means disaster to the nation. That is spiritual. The means that are expended in bringing our missionaries home from the missions, and in maintaining missionary expenses, and so on--that is spiritual too. The great amounts that are expended in building meeting houses, and in building up the stakes of Zion, come out of the tithes, and these things constitute a marvelously spiritual work in the Church. But that is not all.

Nephi L. Morris, CR, October 1913, p.76

The moral education of the youth is one of the most serious problems which iS presented to the educators of our nation. The Bible has been tabooed for many years. I am not advocating religious training in public schools, but I do believe that there is not sufficient moral and religious training among the youth of our land today. The Latter-day Saints believe that children should be taught reverence for God and have developed in their hearts faith in Him, and a comprehension of their obligation even as children to God. Therefore the "Mormon" people have established this Religion Class Work to promote faith and moral growth in connection with the education of the youth. Now then, under these circumstances, it occurs to me that this is one great gigantic institution of which we may all be proud.

Joseph W. McMurrin, CR, October 1914, p.117, 119

'We suggest that in every ward where a Church School is not established, that some brother or sister, or brethren or sisters, well adapted to such a responsible position by their intelligence and devotion as well as their love for the young, be called, as on a mission, by the Bishop, after consultation with the president of the stake, to take charge of a school in which the first principles of the Gospel, Church history, and kindred subjects shall be taught."

My brethren and sisters, when we think of nineteen million souls being more or less interested in the need of religious training in the public schools, here in our own land, to say nothing of the same sentiment so strongly working upon the minds of men in other countries, we should discern the wisdom of our leaders as shown in their action of twenty four years ago.

Anthon H. Lund, CR, April 1916, p.9-12

At the beginning of Brother Woodruff's administration, the First Presidency were impressed to start more Church schools. They felt that places should be prepared where our young people could receive a systematic training in the principles of the Gospel. A Church Board of Education was organized whose members came together and discussed the problem of what would be the best plan for educating our children in the branch of theology, which could not be taught in the secular schools. The Church schools were started and were organized on the plan of the Brigham Young Academy. The Principal of that school, the able and devoted teacher, Brother Maeser, was appointed superintendent of the Church school system. You know how faithfully he worked to organize the Church schools, and how thankful hundreds and thousands of our young people are that they were favored by receiving an education in these institutions. These schools have continued to prosper, and their membership reaches as high a number as we are able to accommodate. They have done and are doing a world of good among our young people. We would like to have all our children educated in an institution where not only the hand and the brain could be trained, but where spiritual matters could also be attended to; but it is not possible for us to reach so far with the means at our disposal, although millions have been spent, of the tithing, to sustain the Church schools.

We have a splendid public school system in this State. Our grade schools, our high schools, our agricultural college and university stand high. I believe they compare favorably with any in the land. Of course there are higher institutions of learning, in other states much more highly endowed than our university, and able to do more; but for the means that are invested and have been spent here in the state, I think we see good results. Last year, our Governor told me, we spent on education in the state schools from eighty-six to eighty-eight per cent of the state taxes. This shows how great an interest is taken in education. I doubt that any other state in the Union can show so great a percentage of state means set apart for educational purposes as the Utah legislatures have done. But although the school system of Utah stands as high as any, there is a defect in schools that are conducted without religious instruction. Educators east and west who have Studied this matter have come to that conclusion.

Recently a large convention was held in Chicago, in which educators discussed the problem of teaching religion in our public schools. It is not so easy to do this here as it is in countries where they have a state religion, and consequently can teach that religion in their educational institutions, but here, where the public schools are open to children of parents belonging to different denominations, it is more difficult. Some of the educators present at this convention suggested that a certain time for studying religion might be put into the curriculum of the schools, and the children go into rooms where teachers or ministers could teach them the religion of their fathers. I don't know what conclusion was arrived at, as I have not read the full proceedings of the convention, but the suggestion referred to was something like what they do in Canada. There they have a law that provides for religious education in the public schools, and those who teach it are paid by the state. Their statesmen know that it is for the good of the children not only to have their intellects trained, but also the heart and the emotions, and to learn concerning God and His will with men. In Canada the public school is the same as here, free and open to all denominations, and the ministers of these have been given the right to gather the children around them in the school house and teach them the principles their parents believe in.

As these classes were parts of the Church school system, Brother Maeser was placed in charge of them also, and tinting his last years be worked hard to make them a success. His whole soul was absorbed in studying the best way of reaching the children's hearts. Once when he was going to a place to organize the Religion Class, he asked himself the question. "What shall he the procedure?" He prayed about it, and the method we follow, called the six steps, came to his mind, and we have found this mode very successful.

We would like you who have not attended a session of the Religion Classes to do so and see how our brethren and sisters are teaching the young that attend the classes. The classes are opened by singing, led by the teacher or by one of the children, as he or she may direct. The singing is not accompanied with instrumental music. We like them to be independent of such help and able to strike the right pitch themselves. When our young men are called to go out into the missionary field, you know what a blessing it is to them to be able to sing. When they stand on the street corner, with their backs to a lamppost and a large congregation before them, they have no instrument to help them in starting the song, it is well for them if they are able to do it correctly. How many of you brethren have not had experience of this kind?

After the children have sung a hymn, their hearts are attuned for the second step, which is prayer. Here one of the boys or girls will volunteer to offer the prayer when the teacher calls on them to do so, and the boy or girl chosen to lead will utter a short sentence or a short phrase, which all repeat in concert, and then the next sentence will be given and repeated, and so on until the prayer is ended. Repeating the words spoken by the one offering the prayer secures attention, for all are alert to join in the prayers and to pronounce the words which the leader has spoken.

The third step is to learn a memory gem, or good thought. The teacher will lead out with a short part of the quotation and the children repeat it after her. When it is learned the next part of the quotation is given, and so to the end of it. By this method a great many precious thoughts are stored away in the minds of the children that will help them in time to come.

Then comes the fourth step, which is the real lesson, and takes the longest time. The lesson and the memory gem are generally so related that one explains the other. The lessons generally consist in narratives and concrete examples, which the children love to hear, and which will make such an impression upon their minds that they will remember them, and will try to carry out that which has been taught them.

The fifth step is testimony-bearing. We ask the children to bear testimony of what they have themselves experienced, what they know of the goodness of God, the goodness of their parents, and of others, what joy has come to their hearts in performing a good act, an unselfish act to others. All of this we consider good material for testimony bearing, and if you listen to these children bearing their testimony, it will often melt your heart, for you know they are innocent and honest in what they say, and we can see how the Spirit of the Lord is working upon their young hearts. They will tell of visiting a sick comrade and comforting them, perhaps bringing him flowers; they will tell of taking part in cutting the wood of a widow for winter use, and of so many other things that they have done. The object of the Religion Class is to imbue their hearts with practical religion, that is, as James defines it, "to visit the fatherless and the widows in their affliction, and to keep themselves unspotted from the world." The sixth step is singing and prayer, conducted as were the opening exercises.

A short time ago I attended the dedication of the Brigham City Theological Seminary. It has been erected for the purpose of giving the students of our faith, who attend the high school there, an opportunity to study the history of the Bible and the principles of the Gospel. More than two hundred students are enrolled, and are enthusiastic in taking this branch of study. Having a school building on an adjoining lot to that of the high school gives the students attending it nearly all the benefits of a Church school education. There are a few other seminaries similarly located in the neighborhood of high schools, which are also doing excellent work. We do not want to induce the children of parents not belonging to our faith to attend these classes, but we would like our own students to do so, for we do see a great need of having their hearts fortified against the many theories that will be presented before them, and which tend to taking away their faith. We want to have them fortified against the insinuating suggestions they may hear of learned men, that the world is a self-sustaining machine, and consequently there is no need of a God, that there is no spirit in man, and hence there will be no resurrection; that everything is ruled by law and therefore prayer is useless. Now, we want a foundation of faith in God laid so firmly in the hearts of our children that it cannot be shaken. But some ask are you afraid, then, of evolution and other theories that are taught so extensively ? We are not afraid that the revealed Gospel shall be proved untrue by anything that men may discover; for truth will always square with truth, but theories of men are not always true; the scientists often take hypotheses as proven facts, and they assume that it has taken millions of years to produce the changes which they claim have gradually taken place in plants and animals, during the different periods of the earth.

Joseph F. Smith, Jr., CR, April 1916, p.70-71

During the year 1914, and running into the year 1915, a number of articles appeared in the New York Independent, one of the leading weekly papers of the United States which has a circulation in all the states of the Union and in many countries abroad. These articles appeared at intervals of a week or two during that year and were entitled, "What I believe and Why." The writers were men who are molding the thought religiously and educationally, of the people of this land. I read quite a number of these articles, and as I remember it now, there was not among them all, one declaration, clear cut and without modification, accepting Jesus Christ as the Only Begotten Son of God, and the Redeemer of the world; and yet these articles were written by men who profess to be ministers of His gospel. They call themselves Christians, but they taught most everything else except the fact that Jesus of Nazareth was the Son of God. They were very modern in their views, and accepted the theories and the ideas that prevail so largely now in the world, in contrast and contradiction to the Gospel of our Lord, as His doctrine is set forth in the Holy Scriptures. The final article of these papers, appeared in the issue of that weekly for March 15, 1915, and was entitled "The Sum of the Whole Matter. What I Believe and Why," and was introduced as the final paper or word on these religious subjects. The author of this final paper was Dr. William Hays Ward. I want to read to you just a few sentences. Mr. Ward said:

"The sum of the whole matter is this: Reason is the last arbiter; our own reason, our individual reason, my reason, nobody's else. There are various sources of authority. Bible, or church, or God, but each one must be tested by our personal reason before it is believed. We are all of us at bottom rationalists, can not help being. What God is, whether there be a God, we must decide by the best reason we have. If we are made in the image of God, that image is in reason, not in body." Now I want you to reflect and remember that. "If we are made in the image of God," he says, "that image is in reason, not in body; and our little reason can and must get some true view of God, just as our little blinking myopic eyes can truly, if imperfectly, decry the infinite spangled universe. Reason may see faintly, even erringly, but it is all we have to guide us. It may rest on custom, tradition, social inheritance, the teaching from childhood of those whom we think possessed of more knowledge and judgment than we, but all our beliefs rest on such reason as we have. * * It is by reason that we too must test the Bible as well as the Veda, Moses as well as Hesiod or Zarathustra. If we find in our Bible anything of cosmogony, or history or morals that does not approve itself to our reason, we must reject it, we can not help it. That did not, could not come direct from God, but came through fallible men, the framework and the chord of whose harp was constructed after the fashion of their day, and could not sound perfect music. Reason prefers our school textbook to our Bible on matters of geology and astronomy, sifts Bible history by comparison with contemporary records recovered from the sands and clay of ancient empires: and reason it is that judges the teachings of Jesus to be superior to the sacrificial cult of Leviticus, or the cursing of Ezekiel and Amos. Our light is better than theirs, for our reason has more knowledge, more experience, on which to rest. The best human reason--I think I do not err--whether whether it looks outward or inward, finds God."

And I say it does not! Reason is all right when intelligently used. There is not a principle of the gospel that will not appeal to the reason of man, for every principle of the Gospel of Jesus Christ is reasonable, clear and easily understood with the aid of the spirit of truth. But man cannot determine upon the strength of his own reason unaided by the Spirit of God the power and saving grace of the gospel principles, and expect to find out God. He cannot do it! The judgment of these men in the world, is not by any means as good as the judgment of Ezekiel, the judgment of Amos and the judgment of Leviticus, that is, the word of the Lord as found in the book of Leviticus; neither is it as good as the judgment of Moses or any other of the old prophets, for the very good reason that Moses and the prophets were led and directed by the Spirit of God. These men are not so led, they have rejected the Lord and in His place have set up, as they did at one time in the nation of France, the god of reason which they worship, and which leads them into all kinds of errors because of their faulty and erroneous reasoning, such as these sentences express which I have read to you.

Joseph F. Smith, CR, October 1915, p.4

I am happy to say, so far as the records show, that the tithing funds of the Church have been a little over the average of 1914. So far throughout this year (1915), the tithing funds have been a little in advance of those of the previous year. This is certainly very necessary, as the work is growing, the demands upon the Church are increasing, our schools are enlarging, and needing more and more assistance; we have already appropriated a very large sum of the yearly tithing to maintain our various Church schools. These schools need no praise from me on this occasion. Those who are associated with them or live within the stakes where they are conducted have come to realize what a great benefit they are to the youth of Zion, and we hope that they will continue to be conducted in the spirit of the Gospel of Jesus Christ. The object, I may say almost the only purpose, for the maintenance of Church schools is that true religion and undefiled before God the Father, may be inculcated in the minds and hearts of our children while they are getting an education, to enable the heart, the soul and the spirit of our children to develop with proper teaching, in connection with the secular training that they receive in schools.

I hope that I may be pardoned for giving expression to my real conviction with reference to the question of education in the State of Utah. The government of the State has provided for the common schools up to the eighth grade, and meets the general expenses of these schools. The treasury of this state has provided for one of the best universities that can be found in any state in the Union; thoroughly equipped for the highest education in the land. The State Legislature has also provided out of the State treasury, for an agricultural college, a most worthy and efficient institution of instruction and training for the youth of the people of the state. In addition to these, we are having forced upon the people high schools throughout every part of the land. I believe that we are running education mad. I believe that we are taxing the people more for education than they should be taxed. This is my sentiment. And especially is it my sentiment when the fact is known that all these burdens are placed upon the tax payers of the state to teach the learning or education of this world. God is not in it. Religion is excluded from it. The Bible is excluded from it. And those who desire to have their children receive the advantages of moral and religious education are excluded from all these state organizations, and if we will have our children properly taught in principles of righteousness, morality and religion, we have to establish Church schools or institutions of education of our own, and thus the burdens of taxation are increased upon the people. We have to do it in order that our children may have the advantages of moral training in their youth. I know that I shall be criticized by professional "lovers of education," for expressing my idea in relation to this matter.

Joseph F. Smith, Jr., CR, April 1917, p.65

The Lord has very clearly set forth the doctrine of the resurrection. He declared shortly before his crucifixion that the hour was coming and, he said, now is, when the dead shall hear the voice of the Son of God, and they that hear shall live. Even his disciples wondered what he meant. They marveled at it, they could not fully comprehend it, notwithstanding the fact that they believed in the literal resurrection of the body in those days, and the Savior seeing their perplexity said unto them and unto the people who were there assembled: "Marvel not at this: for the hour is coming in the which all that are in their graves shall hear his voice and shall come forth, they that have done good unto the resurrection of life, and they that have done evil unto the resurrection of damnation." Now the world interprets that to mean those who are dead in trespasses and sin, those who are in bondage of iniquity should hear his voice, but the Lord meant literally just what he said when he declared that the dead should hear his voice and should come forth, they that had done good unto the resurrection of life, and they that had done evil unto the resurrection of damnation, for the resurrection shall come upon all mankind for they are not responsible for death. The Lord will not punish them for Adam's transgression. Therefore, he took upon him the sins of all mankind and redeemed every creature from death and granted unto each one of us a resurrection, but not eternal life, not salvation, not an existence in the presence of his Father in the celestial kingdom. That comes through faithfulness, through diligence, through perseverance on our part and through our belief and acceptance and our keeping of the commandments of the Lord. Now I said in the beginning that the world is full of philosophy. One prominent and intelligent writer has called these theories, "scientific fiction." I think he is right. We have the theories of evolution, of higher criticism, the ideas that prevail in the schools throughout our land that are dangerous, that are striking at the fundamentals of the gospel of Jesus Christ, trying to destroy the faith in the minds of the students who attend the schools. We are troubled with it to some extent even in our own state and the colleges throughout the country are full of it, and the professors teach it, they believe in it, at least they profess to believe in it, and it seems to me that the sole purpose of it is to undermine and destroy the gospel of Jesus Christ. I want to say to the Latter-day Saints that it is our duty to put our faith in the revealed word of God, to accept that which has come through inspiration, through revelation unto his servants, the prophets, both ancient and modern, and whenever you find any doctrine, any idea, any expression from any source whatsoever, that is in conflict with that which the Lord has revealed and which is found in the holy scriptures, you may be assured that it is false and you should put it aside and stand firmly grounded in the truth in prayer and in faith, relying upon the Spirit of the Lord, for knowledge, for wisdom, concerning these principles of truth. If you will walk in the light as I have read here, and will receive the doctrines of our Redeemer, he will grant unto you, through the inspiration that will come from the Spirit of the Lord, a testimony of the truth and you need not walk in darkness nor in doubt, but may have a clear and a distinct comprehension, and understanding of the truth which will make you free. It is our duty to seek the Lord, to obey his laws, to keep his commandments, to put away from us lightmindedness, foolishness, and the false theories, notions, and philosophies of the world, and to accept with fullness of heart and in humility these solemn, God-given principles which will bring unto us eternal life in the Celestial kingdom. That we may do this is my prayer in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ. Amen.

Anthony W. Ivins, CR, October 1917, p.68

My brethren and sisters, the thought which I wish to leave with you is this, in your search after knowledge, in your desire to become profound, in your study of philosophy, do not lose sight of this one thought that God, the Creator of heaven and earth is the author of intelligence and all the light, and knowledge, and wisdom which has come to man or which will ever come to him emanates from that source. Do not allow yourselves, because of the words of men, of cunning device and flattering words--they are here just as they were among the Nephites, to delude you and lead you away from the eternal truth, that we must recognize God our Father, who is the author of all things, the Creator of heaven and earth, to whom all men owe deference, and allegiance, and service, whether they render it or not. Do not deny the atonement wrought out by his only begotten son. Do not become obsessed with the thought that this life is all there is to human existence, because it is a fallacy. I bear witness of it to you in all humility. I have tried to understand, I have studied, I have sought the Lord from my youth until the present time when I am growing old. I find from my own observation, my own study, and the testimony which God has given me, the eternal truth of these things growing stronger and stronger, if that were possible. He has restored the truth to the earth through the agency of the Prophet Joseph Smith; the fullness of the gospel is here; it is the power of God unto salvation and has in it everlasting life to all of those who believe and obey.

Joseph F. Smith, Jr., CR, October 1917, p.71

Now, I could continue to read--I shall not take the time--and show you that the creation that was made spiritually was in the same likeness of the creation that was later made temporally, when man, beast and plant were placed upon the earth. All were created before the foundation of this world was prepare--created spiritually--and existed in the kingdom of God. When the earth was formed and ready to receive them they were clothed with bodies that were physical and thus not only man, but the animals and the plants upon the face of the earth, became living souls, because they were composed of the spirit and the body combined. I like to believe this. I know it is true. It appeals to my reason, it appeals to my spirit, I accept it as the truth which God has revealed, and I rejoice in the knowledge that I have received regarding it. There is no theory in the world that can compare with it. These ideas of men, their foolish doctrines regarding the origin of life which are taught in many of the schools and against our protest very largely--and I am sorry to say, in too many cases without our protest, for I believe we ought to protest against these things--constitute the wisdom of uninspired men and must perish. I do not believe that the falsely called scientific theory Of man's origin has any more right to a place in the public schools than the principles of the gospel of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ have--and not half as much!

Joseph F. Smith, Jr., CR, October 1917, p.71

Joseph F. Smith, CR, April 1918, p.52

It is our duty also to maintain schools and seminaries throughout the length and breadth of Zion, where our children who are in the district schools where no religion is permitted to be taught, may have the privilege of being instructed in connect:on with the secular learning that is given to them, those principles which are necessary for their faith and for their establishment in the knowledge of the gospel of Jesus Christ. It is our duty to use the means that are committed into our hands for the assistance of the missions that are appointed and established throughout the nations of the world, and in many other ways legitimately for the building up of Zion and for the spread of the truth, the proclamation of the gospel, the maintenance of the authorities of the priesthood, whose time and talent are devoted exclusively to the ministry, that they may be fed, not luxuriantly, not superabundantly but in sufficient measure that they may not suffer for the necessaries of life. Part of our means is distributed to assist the bishops in the arduous duties that they have to perform, for services that are necessary in keeping the records of the Church, of the tithing and of other records necessary to be kept. All these things we esteem as legitimate and proper within the sphere of our authority and we do not, under such circumstances, publicly ask for approval of the Church at large for sanction in the discharge of our duties in this regard.

Anthony W. Ivins, CR, October 1918, p.49-51

I shall read a paragraph from the first general epistle of John to the Church, from the third verse: "Every spirit that confesseth not that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is not of God; and this is that spirit of Anti-christ whereof ye have heard that it should come; and even now already is it in the world."

The scripture which I have read makes plain the fact that any spirit which assumes the guise of Christ, but is in opposition to him, and the doctrines which he taught, is Antichrist. Knowledge of the great plan of human redemption, and the part which was to be taken in it by Jesus Christ, did not have its origin with the personal appearance of the Redeemer and his ministry, in the meridian of time.

Since a very early period of the world's history, I presume if we had authentic record of it from the very beginning, there have existed two schools of philosophy, each purporting to have as its basis the welfare of mankind while in mortality, and his redemption in the life to come. The doctrines taught by these two schools, while having the same purpose in view were diametrically opposed.

Upon the one hand it was urged that the redemption of the human family could best be accomplished through an agency which should assume responsibility for the life and actions of the individual, guaranteeing redemption, and a return to the presence of the Creator, without regard to his conduct while in the flesh, the condition being that in consideration of salvation the individual should render service, and acknowledge allegiance to the power thus assuming responsibility for his conduct during his mortal life. It was, in effect, a plan to save and redeem mankind, whether he desired and labored for it or not. In contrast to this compulsory plan of redemption, and directly opposed to it, was the doctrine that man, endowed as he is with reason, and possessed, in a limited degree, with the intelligence of the Creator, in whose image he is formed, endowed with knowledge which enabled him to discern between right and wrong, between good and evil, became a responsible agent, and that his status in the life to come was governed by his conduct while in mortality. That in order to attain to exaltation he must live a righteous life, not because he was compelled to do so by superior force, but because he loved righteousness. In one case it was the doctrine of force, of compulsion, in the other the voluntary will of man to do right for right's sake.

Christ was the exponent, the embodiment of the latter idea, and that which conflicts with it is Antichrist. A great struggle has always existed between these two ideas. Systems of religion have been evolved which made compliance with certain rules indispensable to the eternal welfare of man, and compulsory laws enacted by which it was sought to compel compliance with them, regardless of the will of the individual.

Civil governments have been established in which this doctrine of compulsory obedience to law was imperative, notwithstanding the fact that the individual had no participation in framing the law or its administration. It is the principle that whoever has the power to impose his will upon another is justified in doing so, that the weak have no rights which the strong are under obligation to respect.

Opposed to this idea is the doctrine of Christianity, which teaches self sacrifice, that the strong should not only respect but help the weak, that he, too, may become strong, that in both civil and religious life man should follow his own inclination, framing such laws as seem best adapted to his condition, and administering them in his own way, worshiping whom or what he may desire, or not worshiping at all, but with this one fundamental truth written in his creed, that whether great or small, he has no authority, either in civil or religious life, to infringe upon the rights of his neighbor or exercise coercion or unrighteous dominion over him. He must do to others as he would that others do to him under like circumstances.

Exemplifying this doctrine Christ testified that he came not into the world to do his own will, but the will of the Father, who sent him. That he came not to seek his own aggrandizement, and dominate others, but to serve them. Testifying that he who would be greatest in the kingdom of heaven must be the servant, not the master, of all.

In the general epistle to the Church, from which I have quoted. John warns his brethren to beware of any spirit which may come into the world teaching doctrines which are contrary to those taught by the Redeemer, and declares that such are Anti-christ. The scripture warns us to be especially careful in the latter days, the dispensation of the fullness of times, when we are told that this spirit will manifest itself.

I do not think it necessary to enter into any argument to convince this congregation of thoughtful, observing people, that the spirit of Anti-christ is in the world today, and is making the greatest effort to obtain world dominion, and the overthrow of Christianity that has ever been made since the beginning of time. That I may justify this assertion permit me to draw the contrast between the teachings of Christ and the outspoken declarations and teachings of the men who control the lives, and to a great extent the thought of the German people, who are in some respects among the most civilized people of the world. The statement that world dominion is sought is justified, it appears to me, by the following:

Stephen L Richards, CR, October 1918, p.65

Aside from the quorums of the priesthood there are the auxiliary organizations of the Church, given through the providence of the Lord as helps to the priesthood, for the establishment of his word and truth in the hearts of the people. These organizations are chiefly devoted to the care and nurture of the young in the principles of the gospel. What remarkable opportunities we enjoy in these splendid organizations, but how essential it is that every one of them be used to its full extent. To my thinking, there has never been a time in the history of the Church when there was more real need of using these great auxiliary organizations of the Church to the full measure of their capacity, than there is today. Our young people are surrounded with influences, the like of which have seldom, if ever, been brought to them in such large measure as we see now. Everywhere and on every hand come the influences of the world. In our schools, in the work in which our young people engage, in every environment of their lives is to be found prominently and predominantly the influence of the world. Our schools are devoted to the culture that comes to the mind. They do something to help improve the bodies of the boys and girls, but they eliminate every single thing that would contribute to their spiritual growth and advancement. They will not even permit the reading of the word of God without comment in many of them, and they place the ban upon any teaching that tends to teach boys and girls their relationship to God, and their true relationship to each other. All that partakes of the Spirit has been banished from the schools. What a great need there is for something to take the place of this great loss in the educational processes of the day. How necessary it is then that the Sunday Schools, the Mutual Improvement Associations, the Religion Classes, and the Primary Associations, receive the support and the cooperative assistance of every man and every woman in this Church.

I tell you, my brethren and sisters, we cannot hope to counteract these outside influences unless we unite in bringing to bear upon the minds and the hearts and the souls of our boys and girls the precious influences of the gospel of Jesus Christ. We must let them know the beauty, the comprehensiveness, the desirability of the incorporation of these great principles of the gospel in their lives. We must counteract this environment. We must let them know that the spirit of the world will lead them away from the Spirit of God, and we must infuse. into them a testimony of the truth of this gospel, and a desire to live it and to keep the commandments of God. To that end I take it we must use the utmost of our endeavor to teach our boys and girls to keep themselves ever clean and pure and wholesome, so that they may be in condition to receive of the Spirit of God and a testimony of the truth. The Spirit of God cannot dwell in unclean persons, and whenever our boys and girls are permitted to go astray, they alienate themselves from this benign Spirit which keeps them true, and which will lead them back into the presence of their Father in heaven.

Heber C. Iverson, CR, April 1920, p.85

"If you want to know what has de-Christianized the country, I point my finger to the provided school from which Christ has been turned out and the door slammed in his face.

"The thought of it makes me bury my face in my hands and sob with sorrow and shame."

Levi Edgar Young, CR, October 1921, p.91-92

I was very much impressed with the words of Bishop Charles W. Nibley this morning. They contained much food for thought. They suggested to me a very important question for us all to think about: "Is the world to the point of a moral collapse?" This question, though one of large proportions, should be of interest to every one who has an interest in life. I am an optimist, and know full well that every child of God has more good in him than bad, but I have come to believe that mankind is suffering for the want of spiritual light, and that old standards of morality are fading away. The Christian sects today are teaching many false doctrines in the name of the Master; and our universities and schools are giving foolish theories in the name of truth. Much of our teaching has become nothing but a suppression of the powers of the individual child to live; and the planting in his heart of false conceptions of life. Today, our teaching has become mechanized; and much of our education reminds me of a "Tibetan prayer-wheel, busily turning, but barren of purpose." Teachers today are following an old time groove; they are traveling in a rut, and their words are barren of spiritual life and inspiration. I have a right to speak thus, for I am a teacher, and I realize something of our faults. It is due largely to the lack of spiritualizing of our children in the schools and churches that the world is lacking in high standards of morals. Our methods of teaching are wrong, because we are wanting in knowledge and spiritual insight into humanity's heart. Our schools and churches must be revolutionized and made to come into the new age in standards and in a knowledge of God's purposes.

Last evening, I had the pleasure of listening to our friend, Dr. Schwartz. He made a plea for Russia and the Russian people. Not only Russia, but all the nations of Europe need help, for their people are starving. They need not only bread; but they are in sore need of the "bread of life," for they have strayed from the teachings of Christ, the Master. I wish to say to Dr. Schwartz and his people that the gospel of Christ Jesus is again restored to the earth in its purity; and there is only one way in which his people and all peoples can come into the light, and that is through the Gate of Eternal Life as revealed by our Savior. All people must yet seek the "way, the truth, and the light," and mankind must unselfishly and humbly go to God for divine guidance. The Latter-day Saints declare that the Priesthood of God is again on the earth, and that the lives of those holding the Priesthood must be clean and pure.

The spirit of man is divine. We are of God, with the same powers in embryo likened unto a God. We believe with all our might and strength that the light within us and the divinity of our own spirits will yet cause us to be truly and greatly educated children; and we base our testimony of life on the inner light, the power and light of God within us. We Latter-day Saints are not basing our lives on gold and silver and worldly goods. While we know that we are in a life wherein we are to deal with materiality with the world, we do not believe in "pinned-on" religion or frivolous and conventional facts called education, but we take a stand for the real development of the individual and his unity and unification with God almighty and his great work. We are hoping that the time will come when it may be said of us that the Latter-day Saints are not only the most intellectual people in all the world, but they are the most spiritual, and they win souls unto the true and living God by the spiritual life they express in their words, actions and thoughts. "Mormonism," or the gospel of Jesus Christ, teaches us that the Master, Jesus Christ, is the Redeemer of the world. He is the Son of the living God. He is blessing us, and is watching the nations and all his children. We know fall well that every individual born of woman is a child of this living God; and we bear testimony to the fact that the living God has spoken, and therefore it is imperative that we base our lives upon a knowledge of him who created all things. He lives in heaven as our Father, whose kingdom is to be established upon the earth. We must therefore become children of the light. There is too much stuck on religion in the world. We do hold that that word "religion" has become more or less false throughout the world, but we bear our testimony to you that pure religion, the relationship of God to man, is known through the Spirit of God and in no other way. All the teachings of Jesus might he put into a small brochure and read possibly within a period of thirty minutes. Why has the Master's life influenced the world as it has done? Because he not only knew the truth, but was of the truth, and the greatest man is the man of the truth. His whole spiritual, mental, and moral life is the expression of the power and divinity of Almighty God.

Joseph Fielding Smith, CR, October 1921, p.185

These are the words of an ancient prophet. I believe them most sincerely. My reason for quoting them is due to the fact that at a meeting, this morning, the statement was made, in remarks by one of our educators, that the Lord has been eliminated from our education and that he is being eliminated from the doctrines of some of the so called Christian churches, for they are attempting to harmonize their teachings with certain ideas that prevail in the world which are in conflict with the truth. This same brother made a statement to the effect that a student, seeking advice regarding a certain course including certain subjects in science, was informed by his teacher that he would have to choose between his faith and the course of study that would be given in the school, for they could not be harmonized.

I regret exceedingly that courses in study in the public schools, in the colleges and places of learning throughout the land, are in conflict with fundamental truths of the Christian faith; and, for one, I desire to express my feelings, and to declare that I consider it an outrage against the liberties of the people, when we are denied the privilege of teaching principles of eternal truth, in the realm of religion; when we are denied the privilege of praying to our heavenly Father in the schools, or referring to the Supreme Being, for fear that, we will offend someone; and at the same time instructors are permitted to advocate that in the school which the teachers themselves profess and declare to be in conflict with the fundamentals of the faith which I believe, and which thousands of others accept throughout this nation and other nations of the world as divine truth.

George Albert Smith, CR, April 1922, p.49

"Here we come upon the whole great problem of national education, its successes and its disappointments, its achievements and its problems yet un-solved. Education is not merely instruction -- far from it. It is the leading of the youth out into a comprehension of his environment, that, comprehending, he may so act and so conduct himself as to leave the world better and happier for his having lived in it. This environment is not by any means a material thing alone. It is material, of course, but, in addition, it iS intellectual, it is spiritual. The youth who is led to an understanding of nature and of economics and left blind and deaf to the appeals of literature, of art, of morals and of religion, has been shown but a part of that great environment which is his inheritance as a human being. The school and the college do much, but the school and the college cannot do all. Since Protestantism broke up the solidarity of the ecclesiastical organization in the western world, and since democracy made intermingling of state and church impossible, it has been necessary, if religion is to be saved for men, that the family and the church do their vital cooperative part in a national organization of educational effort. The school, the family and the Church are three cooperative educational agencies, each of which has its weight of responsibility to bear. If the family be weakened in respect to its moral and spiritual basis, or if the Church be neglectful of its obligation to offer systematic, continuous and convincing religious instruction to the young who are within its sphere of influence, there can be no hope for a Christian education or for the powerful perpetuation of the

Heber J. Grant, CR, April 1922, p.167

I have here a note from Elder Stephen L. Richards, who is an attorney, and he says: "A notion seems to be prevalent among educational people that the offering of prayer in our public schools contravenes the law of the State. I believe a reputable legal opinion will not support this view; since provision is made for prayer in the Federal Congress, the State Legislatures, and other public assemblies, why prohibit prayer for the children?"

President Brigham Young said: "Prayer keeps a man from sin, and sin keeps a man from prayer." We ought to have enough interest in our children to have prayers. I will thank the Lord when the public sentiment of America shall say that a man who does not believe in prayer cannot teach our children, at the expense of the public. Why should my money be used to employ a man to teach my children infidelity and a lack of faith in God? I remember as a boy, when we had our small common schools, that they hired a non-"Mormon," to teach in the Twelfth Ward school. He got up and said: "I understand that in the past you have prayed in this school. We will not have any more prayers, because we do not know whether or not there is anybody to pray to." I consider it an outrage that the money of people who believe in the Lord God Almighty can be spent to teach our children that kind of "rot." I endorse Nicholas Murray Butler's words. "The fool who says in his heart: 'There is no God,' finds his god when he is looking in a mirror."

John A. Widtsoe, CR, October 1922, p.45-46

We imagine too often that we can place most of our burdens, with respect to our children, upon the schools; yet, this is not possible, for our public schools are not permitted to teach all that should be taught mankind. As all know, in our free land, there is a provision in the constitution of the United States -- perhaps the finest in the constitution -- which provides for religious freedom; and in consonance with that constitutional provision, religious instruction is not permitted in our public schools. Since man is not merely physiological, or intellectual, but also spiritual, our schools do not wholly suffice for the full training of man. Yet it is quite as natural for a man to desire religious education as to desire education for his body and mind. This truth is borne out by human experience to such a degree that I have no need to dwell long on it here; but it came to my attention again with renewed force just a few weeks ago. I had the privilege of visiting, in company with two members of our Church, and several who were not members, the great Rainbow bridge, or Rainbow Arch, located in southeastern Utah, not far from the Arizona line. It is one of the most beautiful of all known works of nature -- a gigantic, perfectly formed bridge or arch of brilliant red sandstones spanning the canyon symmetrically from side to side. Through the efforts of President R. D. Young of Sevier stake, there was found, in a squirrel's hole, the registration book which had been used since 1909 by the occasional visitors to this bridge. In this book the visitors had written their names and comments that had occurred to them. Some very distinguished names were found in this book. Theodore Roosevelt and three of his sons had been there, I think in 1913, and had written their names in the book. The names of other men and women of national prominence were inscribed in the book. One man of national renown had written below his name: "Here hath the Master wrought with consummate skill." This man, not primarily a religious man, a well known scientist, standing before this marvelous creation of God, this great, wonderful natural bridge, felt himself drawn to God, and left a testimony of faith to all who might follow. Another man, under his signature, wrote, "This is a wonderful work of God. Remain here and worship God in all His glory." He also turned from the physical beauty of the bridge to the great spiritual beauty of the Maker of the bridge. This is the natural and normal instinct of all men. We are spiritual, as well as mental and physical; and our education, to be complete, and fully satisfactory, must take into account the demands of the spiritual nature of man, and provide for religious instruction. The man whose mind and body alone are trained is not necessarily a safe citizen, because such education is no guarantee against a criminal life or a life of lawlessness.

Education frequently helps the criminal in his lawless deeds. Spiritual education is the best known means of causing men to use their powers for human good. We are not justified in sending our children to schools and colleges to be developed mentally, with just the barest opportunity for spiritual development during the most critical period of their lives.

Since religious training is not permitted in the public schools, because it is against the law of the land, the question is how are we to supplement the work done in our public schools, so that our boys and girls may be spiritually developed, and thereby become better able to do the things that have been called to our attention in this conference? I am dwelling on this for a few moments -- realizing that there is no time, since there are many speakers, to develop this subject -- merely to call the attention of the Latter-day Saints to the necessity of not placing the whole burden of education upon the schools of the land. Too often, of course, school trustees and school teachers are afraid of doing what they really might do, under the constitution of the United States. This is not a God-forsaken country; this is essentially a God-fearing country, and there is no reason why, in our public schools, we should not teach the love and the fear of God. Since, however, we may not do this as fully as we would like, we must go for help to the home and to the church -- the two remaining agencies for the rounding out of education.

Those who have read the history of recent human thought, will remember that during the last forty or fifty years, the fathers and mothers of our land, having witnessed the wonderful development of the educational system within this country, have gradually placed increasingly much of their responsibility upon the school. The home has been minimized in importance; the school has been made larger in importance than was ever intended by the clear thinkers within the field of education. The home still retains its duty -- the duty of teaching and training and developing young men and women spiritually, filling in where the school under the constitution is unable to do its full duty. The home must not, and can not, in safety, shift its responsibilities to the school.

The Church should likewise be of tremendous importance in spiritual training. In this Church we have auxiliaries of various kinds, the chief purpose of which, as I view it, is to spiritually train our school-trained generation. I would like to leave the thought with the Latter-day Saints on this occasion, that the prime purpose of the auxiliary institutions of this Church is to supplement our educational efforts, as made through the public schools. The Church has also provided a system of Church schools -- in possibilities, the ideal school of course -- in which the child the youth and the maiden may receive instruction, not only out of books of learning made by man, but also out of books of God; where man may be trained physically, mentally and spiritually for complete living, and be better fitted thereby to obey the law and to do all other necessary things in living up to the teachings that are taught in this and similar pulpits throughout this Church, and throughout other churches. A number of splendid high schools, junior colleges and normal colleges are maintained by the Church, to the great advantage of thousands of students.

But, it is impossible for the Church to maintain church schools that will reach all the people, nor would it be wise or proper to maintain an educational system, competitive with the public school system, and therefore, we have in this Church a wonderful organization, scarcely understood by the people, known as the Religion Class, which is a definite attempt under the law to correlate religious instruction with the work which the law permits to be done within the elementary public schools. I take the liberty to call your attention to the religion classes, from this point of view, in the hope that all Latter-day Saints may give special attention to the meaning and purpose of this great movement in the Church. Then, continuing the religion class, the Church provides for the same purpose -- the development of the spiritual man, so that, educationally, he may be rounded out fully, the Seminaries which are maintained for the religious training of high school students, and in close proximity of the high school, but not in connection with it. In these institutions the young men and women who attend high school, may receive an hour a day, if possible, proper religious instruction. The Religion Classes and the Seminaries provide means by which the training of the boy and gift may proceed symmetrically, step by step -- not in mental chunks one year and religious chunks another -- but so that each year throughout the whole course of education, we may teach and train all the faculties of man.

Heber J. Grant, CR, April 1923, p.158

"Why is it that most of the able men in our great industries came from the country districts? The reason is that the country boy is trained to work. Statistics indicate that very seldom does a child, brought up in a city apartment house, amount to much; while the children of well-to-do city people are seriously handicapped. The great educator of the previous generation was not the public school, but rather the wood box."

Anthony W. Ivins, CR, October 1925, p.21-23

The world war, instead of bringing the allied nations closer together, as we had hoped that it might, threatens, because of the financial complications which have arisen, to drive us farther apart, while in the school of religion conflicting opinions threaten to bring chaos to existing theories regarding our relationship to God, and the present and future state of man, as it applies to eternal life.

Already the people are assembling in two hostile camps, one calling itself fundamentalists, the other modernists, one professing to base its conclusions on the truths brought out by modern scientific research, the other on the Word of the Lord, as it has come down to us in sacred writ, regardless of its harmony, or lack of harmony with modern thought, or the onward march of scientific investigation.

It is not a new controversy, but one which has characterized every gospel dispensation which has existed from the beginning to the present.

Men highly educated, and trained in certain fields of scientific research, with but limited knowledge of the great plan of human redemption, provided by the Lord for the blessing of his children, proceed to point out certain obscure passages which may be found in the Bible, and which may have no bearing at all on the relationship of man to his Maker, thus seeking to bring the entire book to ridicule, and destroy faith in it as a divine revelation from God.

On the other hand men knowing little of the great truths which have come to the world through the investigations of men, denounce all modern thought, sometimes even when it is demonstrated truth, if it does not appear to harmonize with their interpretation of the written word of the Lord.

The controversy, it appears to me, is one which might be more readily composed if the parties to it better understood both sides of the question under discussion, and were governed by a spirit of tolerance and reason, rather than one of dogmatism.

What is the difference between a fundamentalist and a modernist? If asked this question I would answer somewhat as follows: A fundamentalist is one who believes in the teachings and customs of the past, as they have come down to us by means of the written word contained in sacred writ, or secular history, preferring, where the ideas and teachings of today conflict with the past, and where definite evidence is lacking to establish one or the other theory to accept the old, rather than the more modern interpretation.

The modernist prefers, and accepts, the customs, philosophy and thought of the present in preference to that of the remote past.

The fact that a person may profess to be a fundamentalist is no evidence that he is either right or wrong, and the same rule may be applied to the modernist. Fundamentalism is that upon which a system or structure is builded.

The same may be said in truth of the modernist. Looking back over the history of the past it is plain that man cannot with safety ignore the lessons which it teaches, for truth, no matter when revealed, remains the same, and that great truths have been made known to man in the remote past cannot be denied.

Neither can we ignore the truths which have come to the world as a result of scientific research in the dispensation in which we live. The sure anchor, then, upon which we are safe in building our structure, is demonstrated truth, whether it be the truth of the remote past, or the living present. Thus we become both fundamentalists and modernists, with our feet firmly planted on solid ground.

Stephen L Richards, CR, October 1925, p.120

It is a matter of great regret that in our schools and colleges there are those who pass under the designation of educated men and women, who seem to rejoice in the destruction of the testimony and the faith of young people. I warn them that a persistence on their part to destroy faith and to keep this great thing we call testimony from reaching the hearts of students, young men and young women, will constitute an offense in the sight of God for which they shall be held accountable.

I could wish that the faith of our young folks were so well established as to give them security, even in the face of these dangerous situations. We can say to them, God has revealed the truth, that truth will never change, all the discoveries of science will in the end but serve to confirm it. Therefore, young men, young women, keep your minds open, do not forsake the wisdom of the ages for the theories of a Ph. D.

Heber J. Grant, CR, April 1926, p.8

"I sincerely hope that these things are merely a phase and that the American people are still a God-fearing race. If not, these things are a tremendous indictment of schools and colleges as well as parents. Yes, America has every material blessing at the present time and if we will keep our feet on the ground, the present era of prosperity should continue for years. On the other hand, all wealth is a mere tool which can be used either to up-build or to destroy. Everything depends on the motives, ambition and tastes of the people who have this tool in their hands."

George Albert Smith, CR, April 1926, p.144

We have in our public schools and in our universities, men and women who are trained, their minds are lighted up by the teachings of men, and it is remarkable to what a degree the business of life has been brought to the attention of the human family; but most of our schools operate as a result of the wisdom of man and exclude God, the source of all truth. We spend millions of dollars in the education of the hand and of the mind, and we exclude from many of these institutions all knowledge of our heavenly Father, who gave to us the hand and the mind. In fact, there has been an effort made by some educators to create in the minds of pupils under their watchcare a contempt for the fact that the world we live in is controlled by our Father in heaven.

So my brethren and sisters, while we can have our children educated in the arts and sciences as taught by men, there still remains a commandment of our heavenly Father that we shall supplement those teachings and that our children shall be reared in light and truth. I find in this same section a reference that is made to one of the men of that time. It says:

Joseph F. Merrill, CR, April 1928, p.38

You understand of course that in all of our system of education we are not trying to get into, we are not trying to dominate, we are not trying to influence improperly, we are not trying to interfere in any way with the public school system of education. All that we are asking is that the members of the Church may voluntarily go during school hours into our buildings, and our own property, and receive religious education. And this religious education was given daily last year, as President Grant announced this morning, to more than 14,000 who were in daily attendance at high schools and colleges. This year more than 15,000 high school and college students are attending week-day religion classes.

Joseph Fielding Smith, CR, April 1928, p.66

A man may have a wonderful education and not be on the road to salvation. It matters not if a man is acquainted with them principles of science, history, literature, and all the branches of education as they are taught in the schools of our land, these truths, of education as will not save him in the kingdom of God. He must have in his heart the spirit of faith in the mission of Jesus Christ; he must have in his heart the principle of repentance; he must understand the principle by which the remission of sins may be obtained, which is baptism by immersion by one having authority. In fact, he must understand of the first principles of the gospel and obey them. These truths are fundamental to salvation. If a man has not complied with these principles and received the gift of the Holy Ghost by the laying on of hands, and obtained entrance into the kingdom of God, he is not on the road to salvation, no matter what else his knowledge may be. The great learning he obtains in the world will not save him.

David O. McKay, CR, April 1928, p.106

I said that the greatest obligation upon society is the proper training of youth. The home, our quorums, our officers in the community are three great educational factors, and all three subject to our sentiment, our approval.

"It matters not what I shall gain

By fleeting gold or fame,

My hope of joy depends alone

On what my boy shall claim.

My glory must be told through him,

For him I work and plan--

Man's greatest duty is to be

The father of a man."

George Albert Smith, CR, October 1928, p.94

We live in a great and wonderful age. The glory of this century is beyond that of any other century; but I feel that we are in just as great danger as were those who lived in the days of Noah, or those who lived in the days of Nephi upon this great western land. We are in as great danger as any nation that has ever lived, because God has given us more than any other nation, and if in arrogance and in pride we turn aside from the Father of us all, and in our carelessness and indifference towards sacred things we spend our lives for the things of this world, it will not be very long until the chastening hand of an all-wise Father may come upon us as a nation, and we be counted as the nations of the past, among those that have withered away. I pray that we may be worthy of our heritage, that the example of the members of this Church in every nation where they live, may be such that others observing their good works may be constrained to glorify our Father in heaven. How I pray that we as the servants of the Lord may have charity for mankind, may have patience with those who err, and in kindness and love go forward teaching the simple principles of the gospel of our Lord to the blessing of every soul with whom we come in contact.

Heber J. Grant, CR, April 1929, p.4; 7

It is only fair to say that the religious instruction given in our seminaries is equally as extensive and as thorough as that given in our Church schools. We have appeals from all over the Church, wherever Church schools are located, that we do not close these institutions. The people in each stake feel that their particular school is the one that ought not to be closed. While we are expending more now and have done so for the past three years than all the tithes paid by the people in the various stakes of Zion from Canada to Mexico, it is an impossibility to further extend our seminary system--which has been greatly expanded in the last three years--and still continue our Church schools. When you stop to reflect that it only costs a little less than one-tenth as much to educate our young people religiously in the seminaries as it does in the Church schools you will realize that we are justified in curtailing our schools and in enlarging our seminaries--when we can give for the same amount as much if not a little more religious education to ten people in a seminary as we can give to one person in a school. We would be delighted if it were possible not only to keep each and every one of our Church schools operating, but to have more of them. I am sure that figuratively speaking it breaks the hearts of the presidency and of each and all of the general authorities of the Church to close any one of the Church schools. We appreciate the wonderful labors that have been accomplished and the wonderful good that has been done in these schools, but we cannot, without facing a deficit, continue to expend three or four times as much money for building meeting houses and Church schools with only a very slight increase in our tithes.

Because of these facts we would like the people to understand that in closing Church schools and opening seminaries we shall be able to give religious instruction to about ten times as many students....

"I would plead for a conception of education large enough to take into itself everything that deepens the human consciousness, that inspires the human soul, and gives one a vision of the eternities. This, a moral education, to use the word in the highest sense, will do. As every historian can show, morals divorced from religion are sorry affairs without any point. But morals not so divorced can rise to the height that religion itself has attained."

"Our doctrine of equality and liberty, and humanity and charity, comes from our belief in the brotherhood of man through the fatherhood of God. The whole foundation of enlightened civilization, in government, in society, and in business, rests on religion. Unless our people are thoroughly instructed in its great truths they are not fitted either to understand our institutions or to provide them with adequate support. For our independent colleges and secondary schools to be neglectful of their responsibilities in this direction is to turn their graduates loose with simply an increased capacity to prey upon each other. Such a dereliction of duty would put in jeopardy the whole fabric of society. For our chartered institutions of learning to turn back to the material and neglect the spiritual would be treason, not only to the cause for which they were founded but to man and to God."

George Albert Smith, CR, April 1929, p.32-33

We should stress the necessity of morality among the rising generation. It is not safe for us to leave to our public schools and to other institutions outside of our homes the training of our boys and girls with reference to a proper conduct in life. If we do not teach them the sacredness of these bodies of ours, if we do not inspire in them a desire to build character that is beyond reproach, if we fail to impress upon them the danger that confronts them in their contact with the evils that afflict mankind, we will not be justified by saying that we did not realize how serious it was. God has warned us that we should teach our children to pray and to walk uprightly before him. He has given us schoolmasters after his own heart who have been instructing us from year to year in the things that we should do. If our children grow up in idleness we know that that is displeasing to the Lord. If those of our households neglect to hold in reverence the things of God, we must know that sooner or later sorrow will come into their lives; and if it comes into the lives of our children then we, too, must join them in sorrow and remorse.

I am thinking of the time when ancient Israel went astray. They worshiped false gods. They listened to that which was popular, but false, and then destruction overtook them. We are in just as much danger, my brethren and sisters, as any people who have ever lived upon the earth, unless we listen to our Heavenly Father. His is the only voice, and the teachings of those whom he directs are the only teachings that we are safe in following. We know that the adversary is alert. If he can, betray the rising generation, if he can lay pitfalls for their feet and ensnare them in evil his desire has been realized and their downfall is accomplished.

Rulon S. Wells, CR, April 1929, p.103

President Grant emphasized in his opening address the importance of religion and quoted from some eminent authorities an opinion that religion is the true basis of all morality. I heartily concur in that opinion. I do not believe that there is any morality independent of religion. The present policy of the Church, as announced by President Grant, in withdrawing from secular education, must not be construed by the people as a withdrawal from the great cause of education; but it does seem like an unnecessary duplication of work for the Church to undertake to do, in an adequate way, what is already being so well done by our public schools.

The greatest work of the Almighty is to educate his children. This Church itself is a great institution of learning and is charged with the responsibility of educating the world, and, in this connection, with particular reference to our secular education, our public schools are rendering to us and to our Church in common with our fellow citizens of other religious views and their churches, a splendid service in the accomplishment of this divine purpose, namely, the education of mankind.

David O. McKay, CR, October 1930, p.11

In one of our school districts great strides have been taken in guiding and taking care of the leisure hours of youth, particularly during summer vacations, not only in recreation but in vocation. A few years ago the Granite School District inaugurated a plan of guiding these students in the proper way of citizenship. Brother Francis Kirkham, who is now a member of the national committee to which I have referred, was instrumental in introducing this, and Superintendent D. C. Jensen is carrying the work nobly forward. I am mentioning it now because it is an example worthy of imitation by all educators in the state and nation. Summer supervision for Junior and Senior high school students was inaugurated in 1920, when 1227 students were enrolled. In the summer of 1921, the enrollment increased to 1500. In 1930 in two important respects the policy in this district was changed in respect to compulsory enrollment. "School officials do not now require enrollment in the activities of the summer, nor do they make a formal record of the credits earned as a requisite to unconditional promotion. Enrollment is wholly voluntary and the joy obtained through participation is the only reward offered." Notwithstanding they give no credits, make no compulsion, last year there were enrolled 4303 in activities as follows:

Richard R. Lyman, CR, April 1931, p.72-73

The indifference, if not the actual antagonism, toward religion on the part of many who are college-trained, is due primarily to the fact that their religious education has been neglected. Their religious ideals and motives have not been developed along with the growth of ideas and ideals in science, literature, and the arts. Our aim, therefore, is to produce a generation of college men and women who will understand, appreciate, and enjoy Gospel incentives, motives, and ideals, with the same interest, enthusiasm, and devotion that they develop for the new ideas they acquire in science, literature, and art.

To any who regard training in science, language, and mathematics as most valuable, I put these questions: Is not religion more weighty than other subjects? Is not character of more consequence than a knowledge of science? Honesty of greater moment than a knowledge of mathematics ? Dependability more important than a knowledge of languages ?

Give your children all the training you can in these other subjects, but see to it that along with their school instruction they are given this most valuable branch of education--a study of the Gospel of Jesus Christ, a study of the life and teachings of our Lord and Savior. For the prime purpose of this line of Gospel education, this training in religion, is to make people happier and better.

Let me make it clear and definite that religion is not founded primarily on logic; religion is rounded on faith. Faith, like electricity, is hard to define; but, like electricity, it has tremendous power. Faith is that satisfying something which comes into humble human hearts as a result of prayerful life and righteous living.

Affection, like faith, is not based on the logical operations of the human mind. It does not obey the dictates of the will, neither is it controlled by the rules of logic.

We are endeavoring to teach faith--faith in our fellowmen, faith in God, faith in a life beyond the grave.

Rulon S. Wells, CR, October 1931, p.63, 66

The Bible and these other scriptures are the words of eternal life, concerning which it has been said that "Heaven and earth may pass away, but my word shall not pass away." All shall be fulfilled. For this purpose they are given unto us. A great many people, in investigating the scriptures and searching in them, do it rather for the purpose of wresting them, and putting upon them private interpretations, or endeavoring to disprove them. It ought to be remembered that the Bible and the books of the inspired word are not given to us for the purpose of teaching us astronomy, geology, chronology, or any of these particular sciences. But they do have a specific purpose of educating us in the things of God. Education is important to all mankind. No man can be saved in his ignorance. How grateful we ought to be for that army of men and women who are engaged in our public school systems, our teachers, the teachers of our children, for our professors, for our scientists, for our inventors and discoverers: for these too are servants of God, engaged in the great task of educating mankind.

If we are, however, to be educated in the higher branches of education--and by that I mean those particular ones that are of necessity excluded from our public schools on account of our differing opinions--if we are to be educated in those things particularly that pertain to the things of God, we need a particular kind of teachers. For this purpose we need apostles and prophets. We need inspired teachers--men who speak as they are moved by the Holy Ghost, for "no man knoweth the things of God but the Spirit of God." As well might a man try to teach chemistry or algebra without knowing them as to undertake the teaching of the things of God without the Spirit of God. It cannot be done in either case.

Education, then, is the purpose of the Almighty, and we are here in God's great school. Our education did not begin when we entered the school rooms, neither does it end when we emerge from these institutions of learning. And as we come forth from them we very appropriately celebrate the affair by commencement exercises, for it is another commencement for which we have been preparing ourselves.

When I speak of education I mean that all-round education which contemplates the full development of all our faculties--physical, mental and spiritual--that we may indeed become like God. It is for this purpose he has sent us here. We are in attendance at God's Great School--a school of experience in bodies of flesh and bones--the earth life school with all of its potentialities for development and growth. And when we emerge from this great school and are called hence, let us hope that we will have so far advanced in our education and training that we may receive our diplomas, and then, that suitable commencement exercises may also be given: for this is indeed still another commencement as we enter into that still higher institution of learning, God's Great University, wherein we may continue to learn until we shall attain to that perfection which is contemplated in the words of the Savior: "Be ye therefore perfect, even as your Father which is in heaven is perfect."

Is this secular education which we receive in our public schools an essential part of our education? Most assuredly. If we have any rational idea of God we must conceive that he is a great scholar, a scientist, an inventor, a discoverer, with full knowledge of the forces of the universe, a chemist, a mathematician. He who framed the universe is surely educated along all these lines....

Some people say they are not religions; they are not religiously inclined. They don't mean what they say, they are thinking of the devil's counterfeit. Don't despise the pure gold of religion because the devil makes a counterfeit of it in hypocrisy. Be religious but don't be a hypocrite. Our higher education consists then in developing the genuine, the divine attributes and casting out the false, the counterfeits. To do the former is an exercise in faith, the latter is one in repentance. That we might obtain this education our first parents partook of the fruit of the tree of knowledge of good and evil. We are still partaking of that forbidden fruit notwithstanding the dire consequences of earth life, its trials, its tribulations, its sorrow, its suffering and finally death. "For in the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die." But also with the full assurance of an unconditional redemption from that fall and an exaltation predicated upon our diligence in this preparatory school during the period of our mortal existence. Blessed are we then if we have accepted the good and rejected the evil, or, in other words, developed the genuine and cast out the counterfeits. God help us to do so. Amen.

David O. McKay, CR, April 1932, p.64

There is not time this morning even to mention further these various phases of the Church, each one of which will apply to the needs, to the education, to the peace of individuals. I should like to take, as an example, however, the principle already named. Considering this will illustrate also how even a teacher may himself become warped in his attitude toward what he might consider merely a dogma You know there are occasionally men in the profession of teaching--as that is my profession I can speak plainly--who pride themselves on being iconoclasts; but unfortunately, when such teachers break their so-called images they supply nothing to replace them. They destroy ideals but offer no others, thus leaving the young boy in doubt and uncertainty. Such a one seems to me to be heaving anchor and starting out on the ocean of life before his course is even charted. It is well not only for church people but for educators everywhere when teaching the young to have in mind the three "C's" as well as the three "R's" mentioned so proverbially. By those three "C's" I mean character, conduct, citizenship. The teaching of religion in public schools is prohibited, but the teaching of character and citizenship is required.

Anthony W. Ivins, CR, October 1932, p.4

We know it was a great disappointment to the people of the Church when the Church schools were discontinued. It was to us. We did so regretfully, but we do know that we are giving religious instruction now to nearly four times the number of children that we instructed in the Church schools when they were at their peak. So we believe again in the good result which is to come from this change.

David O. McKay, CR, October 1932, p.67

Next to the home the school is the responsible factor in child training. We have in the state forty school districts, with a school population of approximately 150,000. In 1929 fourteen districts had persons specially appointed to deal with attendance and school coordination problems. Of these fourteen only seven districts had the services of one or more persons on full time, and were serving about sixty-five per cent of the school children of the state. Thirty-five percent, in round numbers, are without such service.

Sylvester Q. Cannon, CR, April 1934, p.75

We should strive to promote even better general education for our young people, wherein will be inculcated in larger measure an appreciation of moral and ethical principles and practices. We need to provide also for the application of theoretical instruction to the problems which prevail in our various communities. There should be more vocational and applied courses suited to the conditions in the different localities, so that the young people may have the opportunity to fit into the local situations, and not have to drift away to other places and probably lose opportunities that might be theirs. It is to be expected that the teachers in all schools shall have characters above reproach and temperaments and habits such that their lives will prove a powerful stimulus for good with their students in their preparation for life's activities.

J. Reuben Clark, Jr., CR, April 1934, p.93-94

For the third point that I want to make to you, I want to read you what the Savior said at the Feast of the Tabernacle, when he began teaching the people openly. The Jews had sought him, and the Jews had marvelled, saying: "How knoweth this man letters, having never learned?"

Let us pause here a moment, for this is the challenge of today. How can men teach the word of God who are not learned? My brethren and sisters, some of the greatest achievements in pure thought (the nearest kin to pure religion) that have ever been made in the history of the world, have been made by men who did not know the chemical formula for water, nor the mathematical formula expressing the law which controls falling bodies. How difficult would have been the work of Christ himself had he had to depend upon the learned. The lowly only were his reliance; the learned sought him by night or not at all.

"The glory of God is intelligence." Intelligence is given to us to use, to cultivate, and to develop. Knowledge is the handmaid of intelligence and priceless beyond all words, and knowledge implies within it not alone learning but experience. Mere learning without knowledge in the true sense is of no avail. The Pharisees who made this inquiry knew that the Savior had not attended the school of Gamaliel, but the Lord did not need to master any curriculum; the full truth does not lie in any one curriculum. Learning is beyond price if it be accompanied by the spirit which should follow it. But if the Gospel is only for the learned, how few there are of us who could have any use for it.

Now, I am not arguing against learning, I am only asking that the youth of Zion be relieved from the thought which is growing in their minds that a partial mastering of one curriculum is the full truth. There is spiritual learning just as there is material learning, and the one without the other is not complete; yet, speaking for myself, if I could have only one sort of learning, that which I would take would be the learning of the spirit, because in the hereafter I shall have opportunity in the eternities which are to come to get the other, and without spiritual learning here my handicaps in the hereafter would be all but overwhelming.

But the Lord has so made it today that we and our children may have both, and that is one of the great glories and blessings which we have today, that we may be learned in the sciences and the arts, and we may also be learned in the spirit. In other words, we may have true knowledge.

Melvin J. Ballard, CR, October 1934, p.116-117

That is the tribute I want to pay to him, because it was just shortly after this that I had graduated from the Brigham Young College at Logan and was planning to go East and continue my work at Harvard, for I had aspirations and hopes to acquire a higher education. I found myself without funds to accomplish that; so, having an offer to teach, I accepted it and taught for two years. I thought I could save enough to take me through at least a year of school.

In my second year of teaching there came into my class a very charming young woman. I taught her that winter, and she has been trying to teach me ever since.

Two weeks before that school closed and the happy event of our marriage was to take place, I received a call from President Wilford Woodruff to go with Brothers B. H. Roberts and George D. Pyper to open the missionary work in the large cities of the United States. That was a crushing blow to all my hopes and aspirations as I had worked so long and planned and saved to get the means to continue my education. We debated the question but a short time, and before night came the answer had gone back, bidding goodbye to our hopes, then, of further education; and the means we had saved, which would put us through the first year of college, we used on that mission. It is true we got married all right, but she stayed home--the bride of two weeks. That was no small trial to me. She volunteered to teach school and assist me in the completion of that mission.

I want to pause here to pay tribute to the wives of these General Authorities of the Church, and to the wives of you stake presidents and you bishops, for these women are all the same kind. No men in any part of the world have been blessed with such wonderful women as the wives of the men who have been leading and directing the affairs of this work. How willing they have been to make their sacrifice, to stand in reflected glory and "play second fiddle," and let us go on while they perform the great service, often as father and mother in the home. God bless them for it.

I was not in that mission long, however, until the greatest disappointment of my life came in the release from the particular work we were doing, and an assignment to become a traveling missionary, and it came at a time when I was alone. I wept all night about that, and the devil tempted me, to quit and come home. But I thank the Lord that I turned to him for aid and help. Before morning came I had mastered my own spirit and had written a letter accepting the disappointment.

It was then I found the song that I have been singing for all these thirty-eight years, and which I brought into the literature of the Church. I found it in a little book called "Make His Praise Glorious":

I'll go where you want me to go, dear Lord;

I'll be what you want me to be.

It was like a message from heaven to me, and what a, joy it has brought to my life to try to live up to the sentiments expressed in it.

I also recall being impressed when the call came to leave the business that I had built up, and that was so profitable, to go out to the Northwest. I suffered financial loss, and some of my associates thought it was foolish. I remarked that had the sacrifice been ten times as great, it would be no sacrifice for me to leave it, because I owed the Lord more than I could ever pay him if I gave him my whole life.

I got back to Harvard later but I was thirty-five years late. I was installing a mission president and it was vacation time. As I stood on the threshold of that great institution I saw myself as I might have come thirty-five years earlier, with hopes, with successes that might have been; and notwithstanding I appreciate titles and degrees I was not disappointed. I saw on the other hand what had happened to me: Eleven years as a bishop's counselor and high councilor; fourteen years as a missionary of the Church; fifteen years as a member of the Council of the Twelve--forty years of glorious living! The joy that had come out of it, the honors and the favors of the Almighty, I would not change for all the titles and degrees that Harvard offers, much as I admire them, if I had to sacrifice for them the joys and the happiness that came to me through yielding obedience.

This is the lesson that I learned: If I do what the Lord wants me to do I shall live to fulfil my life in the fullest and the most glorious way. I cannot always see what he wants me to do, but he often inspires those whom he has called and appointed to direct the labors of my life, so that if I am obedient to them and listen I shall come to find myself prepared.

Stephen L Richards, CR, October 1935, p.95-96

I do not mean to impugn an express and predetermined purpose on the part of many teachers in the country to undermine the faith of their pupils. I think that relatively few would have at heart such a sinister purpose. I cannot believe that they would be so inclined. But I feel certain that in the determination that is in the minds of that great body of men and women who constitute the public school system of the country to keep completely separate, as we should always keep separate, church and state affairs, there has been the neglect of some perfectly legitimate opportunities to foster the best things that can be given to the youth of America.

I have been pleased to note that an effort has been and is being made to utilize our school system for the teaching of character and those principles that go to make for honesty, for virtue, dependability, and other worthwhile characteristics. But I feel certain that a careful study and consideration of these very items would convince those engaged in that endeavor that there is nothing so potential, so effective for its accomplishment as to encourage the youth to abide by the faith, the time-honored traditions, the morality and the spirit of their fathers.

I believe that as I make appeal to the teachers of the country to encourage their students to keep open minds on all these questions that affect the faith of their fathers, I not only speak the sentiment of our own Church but likewise the sentiment of all good religious people who seek to bring to the youth of their churches the spirit, the theology and the traditions which they foster.

It is such an easy thing to discourage faith in this world of materiality, in this world of science, where we have laid so much emphasis on all the scientific processes and developments that have been so much in evidence the last few decades. It is so easy to say a word to undermine faith. I wish that those who have within their power the formation of the views of youth, the cultivation of their character, I do wish that they would be careful.

As a taxpayer and a supporter of the public school system, which I admire, which I regard as one of the greatest factors for the civilization of the race, which I have always regarded as being an essential constituent of a democracy and on which my children are dependent for education, I have always entertained the view that there is no right on the part of those to whom that education is entrusted to in any way say one single word or promote one thought that will tear down the faith of my children and lead them from the philosophy of faith.

I wish that it were possible for us to teach our youth that all the enduring satisfactions they may ever hope for, all the real joys and pleasures of life, are to be had in pursuance of and not in contravention of Gospel principles. I wish they could feel what we here feel today. I wish they could know the warmth of church companionship. I wish they could feel the spirit that emanates from on high to mellow our hearts, to make us truly love one another and love God. I wish their ears could be attuned to hear the lovely things of truth, as the ears of these musicians hear the melodies and the sounds that some of us cannot hear. If they could be made to realize that these great blessings are to be had through compliance with the laws of God, through application, activity, diligence and loyalty, I am persuaded that many more would now be amenable to the influence of our organizations, many more would derive the joy and satisfactions which relatively few of us enjoy.

John A. Widtsoe, CR, April 1936, p.70-72

May I for a few moments direct your minds to some thoughts of mine in connection with the work that I have been doing the last few months? I have been engaged in a direct, positive experiment to solve some of the social and economic ills that have been talked about today and yesterday in this conference. I have had the privilege of teaching Mormonism, the principles, practice, and history of it, to university classes for university credit if the subject were one of the recognized university subjects. It has been a rare opportunity. Four other churches have had the same privilege. It is a courageous experiment undertaken by the University of Southern California. The reason for undertaking this experiment is simple enough. Thinking men have come to the conclusion that there is only one way out of our difficulties in the country and throughout the world. No plan made by congress or by private individuals for economic and social recovery will succeed except upon the basis of the acceptance of religion. By the acceptance and practice of spiritual truth alone shall we find our way back to economic stability and social happiness.

We have attempted at the University of Southern California this winter to teach religion, living religion, followed by large groups of living people, to those who have cared to listen, in the hope that thereby they might be made better citizens than they otherwise could be and that they would go out tO contribute to the solution of our national and international difficulties. Our nation, as we know, is today a school-made nation. The schools are making our citizens. The school has made most of us who are here today. The schools are training our children for life's activities; and as the schools teach, as the schools direct the thinking of our young people, so our nation will become, indeed has become.

It is a curious fact that a child, an American child, may go through the elementary schools, compelled to do so by the law, may go through high school, may go through the state college and university and never hear the name of God mentioned nor take any subject of study telling him how he shall conduct himself in life. Character--we all admit the importance of it--practically forgotten in the curriculum of the schools of the United States. Thinkers talk about it, there is much said about it on the public platform, but little is done about it.

It is for that reason that the university with which I have been associated the last few months has had the courage to say, "We will raise religion to academic dignity. We will give it a place in the sun, in the educational sun, that thereby we may help change the thinking and improve the conscience, as Professor Young has just said, of the people of this great country. It has been said that there is no substitute for character. Character is the thing that makes us do certain things. Our conduct depends upon our character. Nevertheless, one great university president, the president of one of the great universities of America, said at a public meeting in my hearing, and later published the statement in pamphlet form, that the purpose of a university is to train men and women mentally and that character must be a byproduct of education. We Latter-day Saints take just the opposite view, that the direct purpose of all life, of every life activity, of our schools in particular, of all training and teaching institutions, must be the formation and development of a proper character. We do not accept the doctrine that character is a byproduct of education. That doctrine, intolerable to Latter-day Saint understanding, has much to do with the social and economic chaos in which we find ourselves in this country at the present time.

That is not all. Character may be built on ethics, on simple laws of human conduct to avoid offending our neighbor. We believe that an acceptable character must include, as Professor Young has stated, belief in the living God, a God of whose race we are. Here, again, we find a difficulty to be considered, at least by Latter-day Saints. I heard the leader of one of the greatest divinity schools in America, the trainer for a generation of time of the ministers of churches in America, say in so many words that man is but the product of cosmic forces, unknown forces, and that the word God is but a name for those cosmic forces, and nothing more. To Latter-day Saints God is a personage, the greatest intelligence in the universe, our spiritual Father. We are of his kind and we may approach nearer and nearer his likeness, if with all our might we live righteously throughout our eternal life.

We need to teach the youth of our Church and of the world the reality of the living God. Not only that, but that God lives in the unseen world, and that the unseen world is real. Into that unseen world we shall go some day, and there we shall find those who have gone before us. In course of time there will be a resurrection of the body, a reunion of the spirit and the body. There will come a judgment based upon our deeds. These are real concepts that America needs to understand and to accept and must understand and accept before peace can be fully restored in our economic and social life. The whole program of life is governed by law, according to a great plan in the mind of the Creator. He governs and directs all that happens on this earth. We can not defeat the purposes of the Almighty, though we may delay them through Our stubbornness. A plan for human salvation has been laid out, and somehow the Lord through his power will see to it that his purposes fall not. "The God of Israel, he slumbers not nor sleeps."

We need today to have the conception of God and the things of God that were given to Joseph Smith and Oliver Cowdery one hundred years ago last Friday, need not take the time to read it, but do ask you to read in Section 110 of the D&C the description of God as given in poor human words by Joseph Smith and Oliver Cowdery. They tried to describe the glory of the personage who stood before them--not a cosmic force, but a living being--who spoke to them with a voice like thunder. After he had gone others came, beings of the unseen world who had been upon this earth, who had lived here, who had gone into the spirit world and now were commissioned to come back to perform certain important tasks. They unrolled, as it were, the plan and purpose of human existence.

That is the type of faith, with its applications to human conduct, that we try to teach to these special classes, in living religions, so far as I am able, at the University of Southern California. I think my colleagues serving other churches are doing the same as best they can. Our country needs that kind of instruction.

I trust that we Latter-day Saints are making good use of our Sunday Schools, Primaries, Mutual Improvement Associations, seminaries and institutes, since our public schools are not yet ready to give us the character training that we need. Dare we, fathers and mothers, withhold such training from our children? And dare you, young people who are assembled here this afternoon, dare you avoid and deny yourselves the kind of training which in the end will determine your true success? God be with us, bless us in our attempts to bring righteousness into our lives and to serve God as he would desire us to serve him, I pray in the name of the Lord, Jesus Christ. Amen.

Reed Smoot, CR, October 1937, p.18-19

I thought this morning I would take the time to call the attention of this Conference to some of Doctor Karl G. Maeser's sayings, which I call Sentence Sermons. I think they are wonderful; each one is a subject for a sermon, and put so concisely that to announce the statement itself is sufficient:

The Lord never does anything arbitrarily. Make the man within your living ideal. Everyone's life is an object lesson to others. My word shall always be as good as my bond. Authority must be as an iron fist in a velvet glove. Say to thy soul: "No unclean thing shall enter here." One who has lost the Spirit of the Lord is dead spiritually. Let your first good morning be to your Heavenly Father. A man without character is like a ship without a rudder.

I would rather lose my right arm than break my word of honor. If it shall please my Heavenly Father, I shall be a teacher in heaven. It is not so much what a person says, but what makes him say it.

No man shall be more exacting of me or my conduct than I am of myself. He that deceives another is a knave; but he that deceives himself is a fool. Our patriarchal blessings are paragraphs from the book of our possibilities. Boys, when you are tempted to go into a saloon, think of me, your teacher. We go to the East for learning, but the East will come to us for wisdom. No righteous rules, however rigid, are too stringent for me; I will live above them. Eagerness to earn bread and butter has overshadowed many a golden opportunity.

School is a drill for the battle of life. If you fail in the drill you will fall in the battle. I would rather trust my child with a serpent than to place him in the hands of an irreligious teacher.

Youth demands recreation, and if it is not provided in the high places, will seek it in low places.

The truly educated man will always speak to the understanding of the most unlearned of his audience.

If you learn only the fraction of the "A" of a principle, practice at once that fraction you have learned.

What we did before we came here conditioned us here; what we do here will condition us in the world to come.

Every one of us, sooner or later, must stand at the forks of the road and choose between personal interest and some principle of right.

I owe a great deal to Brother Maeser. I graduated from the Brigham Young Academy, and I thank God that later I had a chance to demonstrate to him that I loved him loved him better than he perhaps thought. I would have done anything in the world for him. He was a man of God who fulfilled his mission, and as the years go by the members of this Church, through the students that were under him, shall know better the Work intended by God for his people in this dispensation.

Stephen L Richards, CR, October 1939, p.68

I am in favor of more concentration in our educational processes in the development of the useful skills. The student who comes out of a high school, college, or university without ability to serve in useful capacities has failed, whatever his alleged scholarship may be. I am willing that the term "useful" should be applied to every form of human endeavor that contributes to the welfare of humanity, but I demand that it be consciously useful in the mind and heart of the student himself.

Joseph L. Wirthlin, CR, October 1939, p.81

Thoughts and opinions of this kind are decidedly detrimental and dangerous to the welfare of the youth of the land, and dangerous to the welfare and the future of the Church and Government. The home is the greatest institution of learning. George Herbert once said: "The first university is the university of the home. Here the hours for recitation are the morning, the noon and the night. Here we find the round table of infancy and childhood. Here are discussed the problems of the present hour, and the possibilities of the coming years. Here sit the scholars of youth and maidenhood. Here are enthroned two great chairs, endowed by destiny and sustained by human affection, Fatherhood and Motherhood. The greatest university in the world is the home. One good mother is worth one hundred school masters."

The home being the greatest university, the great place of preparation for the men and the women of tomorrow, who are going to be faced with a most uncertain future, I wonder if in our planning and thinking, we are preparing those curriculums and courses which will give our boys and girls the training that they should have relative to their hearts, to their heads, to their minds, and some instructions pertaining to the fundamentals of health.

Levi Edgar Young, CR, April 1940, p.102

One of the largest factors for the proper teaching of the higher spiritual values of life should be our public schools and colleges. For our youth should participate in the religious life of the communities where they live. Religion should be the most constructive part of our culture, for that culture wherein religious idealism prevails, is a culture that loves beauty, truth, and goodness. The great souls who in 1776 won for us our independence and the right to have religious freedom were men and women who wanted to exercise that right. It is religion we want, but not secularism. The inhibitions written in our State laws are not against religious teaching, but against sectarian teaching. Religion and education cannot be separated. The minute education assumes an attitude that religion is for a special class of thinkers, then our schools miss that quality in human life that make for the happiness of mankind. We who advocate religious training, however, have missed the larger issue at times. We should not require credit for religious subjects, for we should think of something higher than marks. We should require something more fundamental and that is the truth that the school's responsibility should be to lay a foundation of religious principles, and this can only be done by the teachers consecrating their lives to the highest religious ideals of the Holy Bible. The consciences of teachers must be quickened and inspired with faith and courage to lift their voices against wrong and infidelity. This does not mean that teachers should adopt or accept any one rule of life or agree on any one concept of religious thoughts. "There is, however, within every soul a divine light; a divine impulse for good and truth, and when this light is developed, then life reaches its highest vision and man his greatest happiness," said the philosopher, Swedenborg. It is this light that must be made to glow in the souls of our children, for it is the light of God and immortality. Dr. James Conant, the President of Harvard College, has recently written in his report to the Board of Overseers, "Our Puritan ancestors thought of education and theology as inseparably connected. It is hard for us to recapture their point of view."

It is religion that man needs, for when all the ideals of culture find their inspiration and nourishment in the divine ideals of Jesus Christ, and take their place in the great living purpose of the world"s Savior; when thought and art and literature and knowledge and life are brought into subjection, to the obedience of Christ, then mankind shall have attained the true victory, and will say: "Thou hast conquered, O Galilean."

John A. Widtsoe, CR, October 1940, p.62-65

Such beliefs have made the Latter-day Saints supporters of all sound educational endeavors. We look upon our public schools, from kindergarten to university, as the finest expression of democracy. They are levelers and equalizers of our citizenry. They offer the even chance in life for rich and poor, weak and strong.

Therefore, we have given our public schools a great trust; and have endowed them with tremendous power. Our children are in their keeping during most of the formative years of life. As the schools teach so will the coming generation think and act. The conditions in our land today, good or bad, may well be laid at the doors of our schools, which nourished us in our immaturity with ideals which in our maturity are being translated into action.

In return for this trust we expect our schools to be preservers of the principles of human welfare; bulwarks against every insidious, subversive foe of human freedom; defenses against all invaders of human rights; teachers of the way from war to peace, from poverty to prosperity. In times of moral, social or economic upheaval, our schools, ideal-builders, must be among the nation's most powerful defenses. We rely on our schools, for example, to prevent the unspeakable, blazing evil now raging in Europe from starting a conflagration in our land. We teach with easy precision protection against communicable diseases. It is more important to teach immunity against untruth; to show how the fruits of our civilization may be preserved and increased. Among the many instruments of democracy, the schools must stand foremost in preparing the people against coming evils, and for a better future day.

We are in the midst of a changing day. It is folly to believe that we can go on happily with millions of men unemployed, and as many millions living under an inadequate standard of living. There will needs be much readjustment to secure prosperity for all. Many activities must be redirected to make every able-bodied person self-supporting. In this realignment of forces, and reorganization of resources, the schools must take an active, practical part.

To do this, to be worthy of their high commission in this troubled day, two major objectives must be courageously reemphasized and accomplished by our schools.

First, moral and religious education must be given hereafter an honorable and corresponding place by the side of the traditionally important subjects of the curriculum. For the safety of the nation, moral teaching should be given, at definite hours, in every publicly supported classroom. There must be eager cooperation with every project, such as our L. D. S. Seminaries and Institutes, to supply religious instruction outside the school. There must be no whining and hiding behind a misinterpretation of the constitutional provision for religious liberty. We still say on our coins, "In God we trust." There must be no attempt to place the sole responsibility upon the Church. The strongest defense of this or any other nation is not of sword and shot, of long range cannon and bombs from the sky. It lies in the spiritual domain of life, among the intangibles. The human will, according to its training, determines whether steel shall be shaped into swords or plowshares. The "fifth column" and other corroding influences, and all evil, often disdainful of exploding bombs, are conquered and chained only by spiritual weapons. Thinking citizens, the country over, are recognizing the danger of a citizenry, untaught and untrained in the moral and spiritual principles upon which human welfare has ever rested. Unless our schools resolutely place such training foremost, they will have sown to the whirlwind

Second, the right of way, after moral and religious training, in every school and college curriculum, must be given to useful knowledge -- knowledge that may be used in making a living, in meeting the actual and daily needs of life. Unless this is done our physical defenses will prove inadequate, and economic chaos will increase. We must dignify and ennoble the necessary tasks of life, to secure contentment among humanity.

Practical education must be featured as never before. Men and women must be taught how to use the natural resources about them for their support in life. The economic possibilities must be set forth, of waters, soils, forests, mountains and hills. To solve the problems of the day, and of tomorrow, we need more trained farmers and mechanics, skilled craftsmen, business men and housewives who are so educated that they can do their work intelligently, and therefore with respect for their calling; and who are ready to wrestle joyfully with the gifts of earth. For these are the only true producers of wealth. There would be more prosperity and home happiness if more men toiled with the hand as well as with the head, and if every girl were trained in the processes of maintaining and running a household successfully with emphasis on child care and training. Such education for boys and girls should begin in the lowest grades for some do not reach high school and many fail to enter college.

Such education does not require special industrial or vocational schools. That would defeat the spirit of democracy, for every boy, rich or poor, should learn how to support a family, and every normal girl looks forward to the joys of wifehood and motherhood. Besides in a true democracy, class consciousness must be avoided. Such important training should not be neglected nor left to chance. Our present system of education should direct from year to year, from grade to grade, the thought and training of students toward the application of knowledge to useful ends -- life-sustaining ends. The colleges should gladly receive students so trained, and continue the training under college environment.

Culture accompanies such training. The discipline of the mind is the essence of culture. The so-called "common pursuits," have in later years been invested with a variety of newly discovered knowledge. They are in this respect not surpassed by the so-called "professions." The study of agriculture and home making may be made as cultural as of astronomy; or of our own government as that of ancient Rome. Failing to recognize this, thousands of young people have failed to find their places in life. They find no jobs for they have not been trained to work, too often only to seek to avoid work. In the words of Brigham Young, "Education is the handmaid to honest labor."

Moreover, they who have learned to work, and who have acquired their belongings through personal toil, are the safest members of society. They believe in private property; and what is more, they believe in allowing others to gather about them material benefits. They will be the last to attempt to dispossess others of property won through honest toil. Teaching men and women to work and to earn a living is the best insurance against the false economic doctrines which flood the land.

If the schools shall be powerful factors in building defenses against evil, and in preparing against the enemy, they must face about from traditional views and give undivided attention on the one hand to moral and spiritual training, and on the other to practical education. Such teaching, for that matter, has been the counsel and advice of the Church from the beginning. Never was it needed more than now.

We who have been entrusted with parenthood must anxiously plan for the welfare of our children and the coming generations. If changes are needed, let us make them. The schools are ours, and the responsibility for the coming race is ours. The time has come when schools must train our children for safe living, that is for greatest usefulness, which means greatest happiness.

The vast majority of the teaching profession, looking into the future, agree in the main with the view which I have here expressed. They recognize that schools must reflect the wishes of the people, by whom they are supported; and as good citizens, themselves, are ready to help our schools foster truth and destroy evil, thus making them main defenses of our nation.

As a Church we have always tried to be in the forefront of progressive changes. An uncertain future looms before us. As far as we have influence we should turn our educational endeavors towards a secure and happy future. If we do so, we shall help build a mighty defense against threatened disaster.