BV 1534 .P43 1912 
 Pell, Edward Leigh, 1861- 
 Secrets of Sunday-school 
 teaching 
 
SECRETS OF SUNDAY-SCHOOL 
 TEACHING 
 
Secrets of Sunday-School 
 Teaching 
 
 By y 
 
 EDWARD LEIGH PELL 
 
 Author of the ''Life Worth While,'' " Little 
 Guide-posts in the Way to Life,'' etc. 
 
 New York Chicago Toronto 
 
 Fleming H. Revell Company 
 
 London and Edinburgh 
 
Copyright, 19 12, by 
 FLEMING H. REVELL COMPANY 
 
 New York: 158 Fifth Avenue 
 Chicago: 125 North Wabash Ave. 
 Toronto: 25 Richmond Street, W. 
 London : 2 1 Paternoster Square 
 Edinburgh: 100 Princes Street 
 
Preface 
 
 IN" this book I have tried to point out as 
 plainly as I know how the fundamental 
 principles underlying successful teaching, 
 together with the hundred and one practical 
 methods that successful teachers have developed 
 therefrom. 
 
 In the matter of methods I have tried to 
 avoid extremes. I have long recognized the 
 fact that a method is not good because it is 
 new, nor bad because it is old. Every method 
 must stand on its merits, not on its years. If 
 grandfather's sword is eaten through with rust 
 let us not carry it into battle ; but if it is a tried 
 and true Damascus blade it should not be dis- 
 carded for one of your modern make that may 
 be as brittle as it is bright. If our fathers 
 knew how to produce better spiritual fibre than 
 we are producing there is little reason for turn- 
 ing up our noses at old fogy ways. And if the 
 old-time Sunday-schools made rock foundations 
 of faith for the strong men and women of to- 
 day, there may be something in their methods 
 not too moldy for use. 
 
 But I have tried not to lay too much stress 
 on methods. The supreme need of the average 
 
 5 
 
6 Preface 
 
 Sunday-school teacher is not a method of work 
 but a motive for work. Pour a note-book full 
 of new methods into a cold brain and they will 
 accomplish about as much as a tank full of cold 
 water emptied into a cold engine. You've got 
 to have fire beneath the water. You've got to 
 get a motive that will kindle a fire in your 
 heart beneath your brain. 
 

 Contents 
 
 
 I. 
 
 What the Sunday-School is For 
 
 9 
 
 II. 
 
 What the Teacher is For 
 
 H 
 
 III. 
 
 The Heart of the Matter 
 
 20 
 
 IV. 
 
 The Very First Secret 
 
 24 
 
 V. 
 
 Where to Begin . . . . 
 
 26 
 
 VI. 
 
 Know Thyself 
 
 3> 
 
 VII. 
 
 How TO Keep Wide Awake 
 
 35 
 
 VIII. 
 
 How TO Stir Up Your Enthusiasm 
 
 40 
 
 IX. 
 
 A Settled Mind 
 
 46 
 
 X. 
 
 How TO Study the Lesson . 
 
 54 
 
 XI. 
 
 How TO Plan the Lesson . 
 
 60 
 
 XII. 
 
 The Teacher's Personal PREPARATIO^ 
 
 r 65 
 
 XIII. 
 
 Getting the Point of Contact . 
 
 73 
 
 XIV. 
 
 How TO Teach the Lesson 
 
 . 78 
 
 XV. 
 
 How TO Ask Questions 
 
 82 
 
 XVI. 
 
 How TO Illustrate the Lesson . 
 
 . 89 
 
 XVII. 
 
 How TO Make the Most of a Bibli 
 
 
 
 Story 
 
 I 96 
 
 XVIII. 
 
 Pressing Home the Central Truth 
 
 • 99 
 
 XIX. 
 
 How to Close the Lesson 
 
 . 103 
 
 XX. 
 
 Other Teaching Points . 
 
 . 108 
 
 XXI. 
 
 How TO Keep the Pupils Interested 
 
 . 117 
 
 XXII. 
 
 The Secret of Good Order 
 
 . 123 
 
 XXIII. 
 
 Common Sense in Teaching 
 
 . 129 
 
 XXIV. 
 
 Honesty in Teaching 
 
 . 133 
 
 XXV. 
 
 If Your Pupils Are to be Like Chris- 
 
 r 137 
 
 XXVI. 
 
 Seeds TO Sow .... 
 
 . 14' 
 
8 
 
 Contents 
 
 XXVII. 
 
 Some Class Problems 
 
 148 
 
 XXVIII. 
 
 Reaching the Pupils During the 
 
 
 
 Week 
 
 158 
 
 XXIX. 
 
 Helping the Pupils With Every-day 
 
 
 
 Problems ..... 
 
 162 
 
 XXX. 
 
 How TO Increase the Attendance . 
 
 ,65 
 
 XXXI. 
 
 How TO Organize a Bible Class 
 
 169 
 
 XXXII. 
 
 The Way of a Child 
 
 173 
 
 XXXIII. 
 
 About Boys ..... 
 
 180 
 
 XXXIV. 
 
 Some Boy Problems 
 
 188 
 
 XXXV. 
 
 Additional Points .... 
 
 194 
 
WHAT THE SUNDAY-SCHOOL IS FOE 
 
 THE Sunday-school is not something 
 apart from the church. Nor is it a 
 part of the church. Nor is it an ap- 
 pendix to the church. It is the church itself 
 organized for a specific purpose. That purpose 
 is not to conduct a day-school on Sunday. It 
 is not to conduct a theological school. It is 
 not solely to impart religious knowledge. It is 
 not solely to teach the Bible. The aim of the 
 church organized into a Sunday-school is the 
 development of character by means of the 
 study of the Word of God. It is designed for 
 every man, woman and child who has not at- 
 tained unto the perfect image of Christ. That 
 is to say, it is designed for every man, woman 
 and child in the church, and whom the church 
 can reach. Its chief text-book is the Bible, be- 
 cause the Bible is the Word of God, not because 
 the Bible contains good history or good liter- 
 ature. It has to do with the facts of the Bible 
 simply because these facts are vehicles of the 
 truth. By the truth I mean the sum of God's 
 revelations to men ;— all that He has revealed 
 9 
 
lo Secrets of Sunday-School Teaching 
 
 to us in His Word about Himself and about 
 His will concerning us ; — the light He has 
 given us by which we may find our way to 
 Him. The main business of the Sunday-school 
 is with this light. It has no more to do with 
 the facts of the Bible apart from the light 
 which they shed on God and God's will than it 
 has to do with the facts of secular history. It 
 is no more concerned with the story of David 
 and Goliath, for example, apart from its re- 
 ligious teachings than it is concerned about the 
 newspaper accounts of the last prize-fight. Its 
 business is to teach, not merely in order that 
 its pupils may know something, important 
 as the knowledge may be, but in order that 
 they may be something and do something. It 
 does not undervalue knowing^ but it places the 
 emphasis upon hein^. 
 
 It has been quite the thing in recent years to 
 magnify the Sunday-school as an educational 
 institution pure and simple, and many very in- 
 telligent persons have been led to expect great 
 things from it as such. In their desire to get 
 away from the old error of trying to reach the 
 heart without due regard for the mind, many 
 teachers have swung to the opposite extreme of 
 trying to reach the mind without concern for 
 the heart. These good people tell us that the 
 chief business of the Sunday-school is to train 
 and store the minds of children by and with 
 
What the Sunday-School is For 1 1 
 
 religious knowledge in the same way that a 
 public school trains and stores the minds of the 
 children by and with secular knowledge. They 
 tell us that the Sunday-school has been largely 
 a failure because it has ignored educational 
 methods, and that if it is to be a success it 
 must be organized and equipped as far as pos- 
 sible like any other school. "Give us trained 
 teachers and a graded lesson system and a 
 modern plant," they tell us, " and the problem 
 will be solved." And here and there the 
 trained teachers and the graded lesson system 
 and the modern plant have been furnished, and 
 great expectations have been raised — and the 
 problem is still unsolved. Some report results, 
 some report no results, comparatively few re- 
 port the expected results. Somehow as a purely 
 educational institution the Sunday-school does 
 not turn out a brilliant success. 
 
 And why should it ? Would a public school 
 turn out a brilliant success on thirty minutes a 
 week ? Would a public school teacher under- 
 take to train and store the minds of your chil- 
 dren on thirty minutes a week ? We might as 
 well quit expecting the impossible. As a mind- 
 training, mind-filling institution the Sunday- 
 school, however well equipped it may be, can- 
 not accomplish in thirty minutes what the 
 public school undertakes to accomplish in 
 twenty-five hours. 
 
1 2 Secrets of Sunday-School Teaching 
 
 But do not let me be misunderstood. I 
 do not undervalue trained teachers, pedagog-. 
 ical methods and modern plants. I believe in 
 them. I believe that the teachers of the past 
 as a rule gave too little attention to the mind. 
 Sometimes, indeed, they ignored it altogether. 
 But what I want to emphasize is the fact that 
 trained teachers and pedagogical methods and 
 modern plants alone do not and cannot make a 
 Sunday-school. They cannot make a school 
 that will bring forth the fruit the Sunday- 
 school is designed to bring forth. The great 
 business of the Sunday-school is to bring the 
 pupils in contact w4th the "Word of God, and 
 in contact with a teacher whose life has heen 
 transformed hy that Word, with the hope that 
 from the pages of the printed book, or from the 
 hand-touch or heart-touch of the teacher, there 
 may find its way into the heart of the pupil 
 that which will transform his life and develop 
 him into a man like unto the Man of Galilee. 
 If a Sunday-school succeeds in imparting vital, 
 transforming truth it is a success ; if it fails to 
 impart vital, transforming truth it is a failure. 
 
 What then do I think of trained teachers 
 and graded lessons and modern plants ? I 
 think they are of value just in so far as they 
 help the Sunday-school in its chief business of 
 imparting vital, transforming truth, and no 
 further. Other things being equal they are 
 
What the Sunday-School is For 13 
 
 helpful — exceedingly helpful — but they are not 
 the fundamental things, and if we look to them 
 alone or chiefly for great results we shall be 
 disappointed. I could tell you of a holy woman 
 who has been instrumental in the development 
 of more boys into Christian men than any dozen 
 trained teachers I know, and she does not know 
 pedagogy from a potato. Doubtless she would 
 have done still better if she had been trained 
 for her work, but no amount of training can 
 take the place of that essential thing which has 
 made her the most successful Sunday-school 
 teacher in her community. Let us have trained 
 teachers by all means, provided they have that 
 essential thing — provided they are living epis- 
 tles of Christ written so plainly that little 
 children can read them in their eyes and in 
 their hand-touch ; provided love has given them 
 the touch of the artist that will enable them to 
 mold the little rosy lumps of clay placed in 
 their hands in the image of the Christ who 
 lives in their hearts. 
 
II 
 
 WHAT THE TEACHEE IS FOE 
 
 I HA YE just compared the teacher at work 
 to an artist engaged in molding a lump of 
 clay. Of course if the word molding is 
 taken in the restricted sense in which it is 
 ordinarily used such a comparison would not 
 be proper. The wise teacher does not take his 
 pupil in hand as an artist takes a lump of 
 lifeless clay to do with it as he will ; rather he 
 approaches his pupil as a gardener approaches 
 a tender plant to aid and encourage and direct 
 its growth. But it should be remembered that 
 the gardener takes a hand in the shaping of the 
 plant and does not leave it wholly to develop- 
 ment from within. He follows JSTature, which 
 does not leave the shaping of plants wholly to 
 growth from within but aids in the shaping by 
 bringing to bear upon them certain forces or 
 influences from without. So then while the 
 teacher is not a molder of lifeless clay (it would 
 be criminal for him to undertake to shape a 
 child according to his own pleasure to the de- 
 struction of the child's initiative and person- 
 ality), he is a molder of living clay as the 
 gardener is a molder of living plants ; and with 
 14 
 
What the Teacher is For 15 
 
 this explanation I shall continue to use this 
 term as most convenient for my purpose. 
 
 If you should go to a school of art and your 
 teacher should place in your hands a lump of 
 clay and tell you to mold it, your first duty 
 would be to settle clearly in your mind just 
 what you would try to mold. You know that 
 you would never make anything worth speak- 
 ing of if you did not settle that matter and 
 settle it at the beginning. So if God has 
 placed in your hands a half-dozen little roseate 
 lumps of living clay, and told you to mold 
 them for Him, your first duty would be to settle 
 clearly in your mind just what God expects 
 you to make of them. If you take the lump 
 of clay from your art teacher's hands, and be- 
 gin to press in here and to press out there with- 
 out thought or design, you will never make 
 anything either of the clay or of yourself, and 
 you will have to answer for the precious mo- 
 ments which you have frittered away in your 
 random molding. And if you take these little 
 rosy lumps from God's hands — these half a 
 dozen pupils that have been tolled off for your 
 class — and begin your work with them without 
 thought or design, without having a single clear 
 notion of what you want to accomplish, you 
 will not make anything either of them or of 
 yourself, and you will have to ansAver not only 
 for the precious moments which you may have 
 
l6 Secrets of Sunday-School Teaching 
 
 frittered away, but also for the precious lumps 
 of living clay which you may mar in your 
 thoughtless handling. 
 
 What does God want me to do with these 
 living, throbbing, pliable little lumps of human 
 clay which He has placed in my hands ? This 
 is the question you want to answer — and with- 
 out making yourself miserable over it. Does 
 He simply want me to see to it that they are 
 kept as they are and not permitted to be 
 marred ? This is what some good people you 
 and I know seem to think. You know they 
 never have any higher ambition than just to 
 keep their pupils from drifting downward. It 
 is not a question of lifting them up, but of keep- 
 ing them out of the ditch — of keeping them 
 respectable and thereby preserving the self- 
 respect of the teacher. 
 
 Perhaps you have noticed that there are two 
 kinds of teachers : those who are trying to save 
 their pupils and those who are trying to save 
 their self-respect. 
 
 Whatsoever God may have intended when 
 He placed those pupils in my hands, I may be 
 sure that He did not intend to deposit them in 
 a safety vault. He never gave a teacher a 
 talent to bury in a napkin. 
 
 I do not need a revelation to make it plain 
 that when an unformed, pliable living thing is 
 placed in my hands it is placed there for me to 
 
What the Teacher is For 17 
 
 mold it — to use this term again in its broadest 
 sense. The children that have been given me 
 have been given me to mold. To mold into 
 what ? you ask. Into men and women ? Yes ; 
 but not any sort of men and women, or your sort 
 of men and women. This is a matter which God 
 never leaves to us. He may be willing that we 
 may have our own notions about some things, 
 but He is not willing that we may have our own 
 notions about these children that He has given 
 us to mold. The great Master-teacher would 
 never have placed a pupil in my hands if He 
 had not already prepared a Pattern for me to 
 work by. God does not want us to mold chil- 
 dren into men and women just to be molding 
 them into men and women. He wants us to 
 mold them after a certain pattern, because He 
 loves these children enough to desire the best 
 for them, and because He loves His own Son 
 so much that He is not willing that these chil- 
 dren shall be molded by any other pattern 
 than that of His Son. 
 
 And so we have our question answered for 
 us. God has given us these children to mold 
 and He has given us a Pattern along with 
 them. "Strive to make these children like 
 My Son." This is our great order from our 
 Commander — our Master-teacher. 
 
 But how shall I mold this child that has 
 been placed in my hands into the image of 
 
l8 Secrets of Sunday-School Teaching 
 
 Christ? In the first place I must win his 
 attention to Christ. I must get him to think- 
 ing about Christ. This is not the work of one 
 Sunday or of a month. It may prove to be 
 the work of years. For, to begin with, I must 
 first win his attention to myself. This does 
 not merely mean getting a pupil to listen to 
 what I am talking about. A child may listen 
 to what I am talking about and not be inter- 
 ested in me, but if he is interested in me he 
 may be easily interested in what I am talking 
 about. If you are going to lead that wild, 
 frisky pony yonder to water you must first get 
 hold of him and bind him to yourself. And if 
 you are going to lead a child to Christ you 
 must first get hold of him and bind him to 
 yourself. You do not think it wasted time to 
 cultivate the acquaintance of the pony who is 
 afraid to let you come near him. You cannot 
 spend your time better at the beginning of your 
 work than by cultivating these little ones who, 
 as yet, are unwilling for you to come near them. 
 It is not easy to lay down rules for this sort 
 of thing. Some teachers wiii the hearts and 
 minds of their pupils without knowing how 
 they do it. Some teachers spend their lives in 
 an unsuccessful effort to win their pupils by 
 main strength and awkwardness. The best 
 way to win a child is to win him. The best 
 way to get near to a child is to get near to him. 
 
What the Teacher is For 19 
 
 Cultivate your love for children — not for ideal 
 childhood, but for real flesh and blood children ; 
 not for the idealized child — the pretty poem of 
 a child with eyes of unfathomable azure — but 
 for the real child ; the besmeared child ; the 
 homely child ; the outwardly repulsive child. 
 Your love is not a love for children until 
 you can get behind the besmeared face deep 
 down into the unsmeared heart. You would 
 be surprised to know how much a matter of 
 habit it may be. I found my love for children 
 growing luke-warm, and I deliberately formed 
 the habit of interesting myself in every child 
 I met. There is nothing like it. Walk the 
 streets with an eye for children. Look straight 
 into the eyes of every child you meet — attractive 
 or unattractive ; pink and white babe or repul- 
 sive street urchin. Look straight into his eyes, 
 and with your own send him a bit of a wireless 
 message, and you will soon find your heart 
 warming towards every child in the world. 
 You want to love a child not because he is this 
 or that sort of a child, but because he is yet an 
 unformed, pliable lump of human clay capable 
 of being molded by the grace of God into the 
 image of Him who is the fairest among ten 
 thousand, and altogether lovely. 
 
in 
 
 THE HEAKT OF THE MATTEE 
 
 ARE we getting at the heart of the 
 matter? That is the question. Are 
 we getting at the heart of the matter 
 in the Sunday-school ? We are doing things — 
 ever so many things — doing them vigorously, — 
 but are we doing the things that tell? We 
 are getting results, but are we getting the re- 
 sults that are worth while ? We have remod- 
 elled the Sunday-school room, and put in a new 
 carpet, and put little chairs in the primary 
 department so that the babies can rest their 
 feet on the floor, and we have graded the 
 school, and we have a new order of exercises, 
 and a lot of new millinery and flummery and 
 all that ; but are we getting at the heart of the 
 matter ? Are we reaching the hearts of our 
 pupils? Have we any other mission than to 
 reach the hearts of our pupils, and if these 
 things that we are doing are not reaching their 
 hearts are they worth while? Is the game 
 worth the candle ? Is it worth the trouble of 
 having a Sunday-school if we cannot report 
 anything but a good attendance and a pleasant 
 time? 
 
 20 
 
The Heart of the Matter 2 1 
 
 How shall we reach the hearts of our pupils ? 
 We are given to saying that the way to a man's 
 heart is through his stomach. We don't quite 
 believe it when we say it, but some of us really 
 imagine that the way to a child's heart is 
 through picnics and Easter egg-hunts, and 
 pretty cards with little stars sewed on them, 
 and ribbons and tinsel and all sorts of gew- 
 gaws. These things win a child's attention but 
 they do not reach his heart. It takes heart to 
 reach heart. You may reach a child's heart 
 with your heart through your hand-touch, 
 through love- warmed lips, through love-lit eyes. 
 You may reach a child's heart with God's heart 
 by laying the Word which comes from God's 
 heart on the child's mind. If you are not 
 reaching the hearts of your pupils in either of 
 these ways you are not reaching them : there 
 is no other way. 
 
 How can I lay the Word of God on the 
 minds of my pupils so that it may find its way 
 down into their hearts ? In the first place, I 
 must get possession of the Word myself. I 
 cannot lay it on the mind of the pupil if I do 
 not have it on my own mind. I must possess 
 the Truth — God's revelation of Himself. More- 
 over, that Word is not likely to find its way 
 down into the heart of the pupil unless it has 
 found its way into my own heart. I must not 
 only possess the Truth but the Truth must pos- 
 
22 Secrets of Sunday-School Teaching 
 
 sess me. And I am not going to get possession 
 of it by looking up the subject and the Golden 
 Text on the way to Sunday-school. If I am 
 going to put anything into the minds of my 
 pupils I must have something in my own mind, 
 and if I am going to fill up my own mind I 
 must go to work and dig it out of my Bible with 
 the aid of the best lesson helps I can find. If I 
 had to teach a class about baseball next Sunday, 
 and I knew nothing more about it than the aver- 
 age man knows about his Bible would I buy a 
 half-cent leaflet of instructions about baseball, 
 and take it home and put it away and forget it, 
 and go spinning around in search of it Sunday 
 morning, and hurriedly read it over as I hur- 
 ried up the street to Sunday-school ? Wouldn't 
 I be ashamed to go before that class knowing 
 as little about baseball as I usually know about 
 the Bible lesson ? Wouldn't I find out every- 
 thing I could about baseball from all the books 
 and pamphlets and leaflets and " rooters " and 
 " fans " I could lay my hands on ? And if I 
 kept getting hold of baseball knowledge until 
 it got hold of me would I not get hold of my 
 pupils? Wouldn't I get at the heart of the 
 matter ? Wouldn't I get at the hearts of my 
 pupils ? 
 
 We might as well face this matter squarely. 
 We try to persuade ourselves that our Sunday- 
 school is a success because we have the largest 
 
The Heart of the Matter 23 
 
 average attendance or the best offerings, or 
 because we are graded up to date, but unless 
 our teachers are really teaching — unless they 
 are reaching the hearts and minds of their 
 pupils with the saving truths of the lesson — our 
 school is a failure. It makes no difference what 
 kind of a show we may make, it makes no dif- 
 ference what the distinguished visitor thinks of 
 our up-to-date methods and our fine singing, it 
 makes no difference how high we may stand 
 in the statistical reports of our Sunday-school 
 association — if we are not reaching the hearts 
 of our pupils with the Truth that saves, that 
 transforms us into the image of Christ, we are 
 not fulfilling our mission and our school is a 
 failure. And we are not going to put the 
 Truth into the hearts of our pupils until we 
 have set our own hearts on fire with it.' If 
 your school is equipped with teachers who burn 
 with desire to know the Word of God and who 
 study that Word until their blood fairly tingles 
 with desire to impart it to their pupils you have 
 a successful Sunday-school though you may 
 have no equipment but a log to sit on. Let 
 us not deceive ourselves. The Sunday-school 
 is not going to be saved by this or that new 
 method, or contrivance, or theory ; it is going 
 to be saved by saved and saving teachers ! 
 
 * " How may we set our hearts on fire? " See page 139. 
 
IV 
 THE VEEY FIEST SECEET 
 
 THE reason a great many teachers never 
 accomplish anything is because they 
 never aim at anything. If you go 
 into business or politics, you go vdth the ex- 
 pectation of arriving. You go into it to ac- 
 complish something and you knov7 v^hat you 
 want to accomplish. I have seen some people 
 just drop into business and they dropped to the 
 bottom. So with politics. So with everything. 
 No man who just drops into a thing ever attains 
 to anything. You never drop upward. Yet 
 thousands of men and women every year drop 
 into teaching and wonder why they strike 
 bottom. That is what we always strike when 
 we fail to strike for something higher. 
 
 Jones took a class because the superintendent 
 asked him. Smith took a class because his wife 
 kept after him. Brown took a class because 
 his conscience would not let hiin be idle. All 
 three just " dropped " into teaching. And all 
 three dropped to the bottom. Then there 
 was Williams. Williams took it into his head 
 that he wanted to do something for his Master. 
 It weighed on his mind day and night. "What 
 24 
 
The Very First Secret 25 
 
 can I do that will count most for His cause ? " 
 he asked himself day after day. Williams was 
 always ambitious. He was never content with 
 less than the best. When he proposed to do 
 something for his Master, he proposed to do 
 the very best thing. What better thing could 
 he do than mold a life — a dozen lives— after the 
 image of his Master ? He would do that very 
 thing. He would go to the superintendent and 
 ask for a class. Not that he might have a class, 
 not that he might have something to do, not 
 that he might have a quiet conscience, but that 
 he might have an opportunity to mold a life 
 after the image of his Master. He went. He 
 got the class. He got to work. He kept his 
 eye on the goal. The goal was high. He 
 began to climb. He has been climbing ever 
 since. His teaching has improved every Sun- 
 day. Likewise his ability to win and manage 
 his pupils. Likewise his love for his pupils. 
 And the work of molding is^going on. Johnny 
 has given his heart to Christ. Charley has 
 gotten rid of his miserable selfish ways. Bob, 
 the eternal bother, is developing into a hero. 
 Williams is "getting there." He is arriving 
 because when he started he started somewhere. 
 If you want to be a successful teacher aim at 
 something ! 
 
WHEEE TO BEGIN 
 
 MOST beginners try to find out what 
 is the teacher's hardest problem, and 
 then undertake to solve that. That 
 is just what you should not do. You ought not 
 to know what is the teacher's hardest problem. 
 At least, there are a great many things you 
 need to know before you will need to know 
 that. You should want to know what is the 
 least problem to begin with, and I am not sure 
 you will need to go to any one about that, for 
 you will run against it soon enough and when 
 you do you will recognize it. After that you 
 will want to know what is the next to the least, 
 and the next, and the next, and the next ; and 
 by and by when you have cut your eye-teeth in 
 the teaching service it may or may not be worth 
 your while to sit down and try to decide what 
 is the greatest of all the problems with which 
 the teacher has to do. 
 
 It is one of the mistakes we are always mak- 
 ing. We want to try the hard things first. 
 We don't like A B C's ; we prefer graduating 
 theses. The first day you took drawing lessons 
 26 
 
Where to Begin 27 
 
 you thought you would like to try your hand 
 on the Angelus. Happily there was one near 
 by with the wisdom and authority to say : " E'o, 
 not yet." But unhappily when a teacher enters 
 upon his work there is usually no one to look 
 over his shoulder, and he is left to follow the 
 devices of his own heart. I want to save you 
 from the discouragement which inevitably 
 comes sooner or later to every teacher who is 
 ambitious to master the greatest difficulties at 
 the beginning. You do not want to wrestle 
 with any great problems now. You do not 
 want to devour all the books on pedagogy the 
 first year. I would not trouble myself very 
 much now about an elaborate equipment. I 
 would not allow myself to become interested 
 in the beginning in the science of teaching. 
 Art first, then science. I would not become 
 unduly exercised over the problems which lie 
 at the foundation of teaching. For example, I 
 would not puzzle my mind over what the new 
 psychology is teaching us about adolescence. 
 As for Froebel I would treat him as most people 
 nowadays treat Milton — as one to be admired 
 rather than read. Not that you will never have 
 use for Froebel. There will come a day when 
 you will bind him to your brain and heart as 
 with hooks of steel. But to-day you want to 
 confine yourself to simple matters. You want 
 to dare to remain ignorant f o the great ques- 
 
28 Secrets of Sunday-School Teaching 
 
 tions while you try for a little while to master 
 a few of the simplest things in teaching. 
 
 And you need to learn these things more at 
 the beginning by the study of your own heart 
 and mind and the study of the hearts and minds 
 of your pupils than by the study of books. Of 
 course you should study books, but a child needs 
 to study the geography of his own neighbour- 
 hood with his own eyes before he needs a 
 text-book to study the geography of other 
 neighbourhoods. Begin at the beginning. 
 Question your own heart. First of all I would 
 settle this matter of the teacher's motive — 
 rather, of your own motive. Why did you 
 accept the call to teach a class ? Whose call 
 did you accept ? Did you enter upon your 
 work deliberately and with intelligent purpose, 
 or did you drop into it ? Or were you dragged 
 into it ? I do not mean to intimate that if you 
 came into this service with a poor motive, or 
 without any motive at all, you should im- 
 mediately retire from it. Many a man has 
 started in a good cause with a very poor motive 
 and has found a better one on the way. But I do 
 insist that until you have come into possession 
 of, and have become possessed by, a worthy 
 motive you are not going to accomplish any- 
 thing worth accomplishing as a teacher, and if 
 your mind is not perfectly clear on this point 
 your very first duty is to make it clear. 
 
Where to Begin 29 
 
 Settle this question of motive and settle it 
 now. What am I aiming at ? What do I want 
 to accomplish? What sort of a record do I 
 want to make for myself as a teacher ? What 
 sort of a record do I want to make for my pu- 
 pils ? What do I want to do for my pupils ? 
 A great many teachers have found it very easy 
 to answer this last question to very little pur- 
 pose. They want to do their pupils " good." 
 Of course. But it is easy to deceive oneself 
 with hazy mottoes, and " doing good " is one 
 of them. A motive, to be of any service, must 
 be clear cut. It must blaze like the sun at the 
 meridian. The teacher above all men has no 
 business with vague generalities. He must be 
 specific. In what specific way do I want to do 
 good ? If I am to be a help to a pupil in general 
 I must be a help to him in particular. And 
 just here let me warn you against the notion of 
 helping your pupil simply as a pupil. The fact 
 is " pupil " is a dangerous word. It is almost 
 as dangerous as ^' class." The teacher who falls 
 into the habit of thinking and speaking of his 
 *' class " requires of his heart an impossibility. 
 His heart cannot love a class. No one ever 
 became deeply concerned about a class. We 
 become concerned about individuals, not about 
 classes, congregations or crowds. There is the 
 same danger in the use of the word " soul." A 
 great many pious people are always talking 
 
30 Secrets of Sunday-School Teaching 
 
 about saving the souls of men. They have 
 been thinking of the soul as something apart 
 from the man, and while their concern for that 
 impalpable something has increased, their in- 
 terest in the palpable man has evaporated. 
 And so I would not ask in what way do I want 
 to help the " souls " of my " pupils," but in what 
 way do I want to help John, and Mary, and 
 Henry ? 
 
VI 
 
 KNOW THYSELF 
 
 EYEEY teacher teaches two lessons at a 
 time — one from his lesson help and the 
 other from himself. What he teaches 
 from the lesson help often goes wide of the 
 mark; but the teaching that goes out from 
 himself — his personality, his character, his life 
 — ^goes without aim or effort straight to the 
 hearts of his pupils. The brightest child in the 
 class may fail to grasp the truth that comes 
 from the teacher's lips, but the dullest child in 
 the class will not fail to absorb the truth that 
 comes from the teacher's life. 
 
 I know a good-natured, loud-voiced, harum- 
 scarum sort of a girl — not a very young girl 
 either — who has been teaching for I know not 
 how many years. I do not believe that she 
 has ever succeeded in teaching a lesson given 
 her to teach, but she has been the most success- 
 ful teacher of irreverence and disorder I have 
 ever known. She not only teaches these two 
 subjects to her own class but she teaches them 
 to all the classes in her part of the schoolroom 
 — and without even trying. 
 
 I could tell you about a man whose faithful- 
 s' 
 
32 Secrets of Sunday-School Teaching 
 
 ness in sticking to Sunday-school work is a 
 proverb, but whose adhesive qualities, when it 
 comes to sticking to the truth, are not of the 
 best, and who has raised a class of boys that 
 are as proficient in the unholy art of prevarica- 
 tion as any gang of hobos you will find on the 
 street. 
 
 And I could tell you about a woman — and 
 you could tell me about one too — who has yet 
 to learn the simplest rules of the art of teaching, 
 but who has never been to her class without 
 teaching successfully some lesson in the art of 
 being kind or gentle or charitable — and all 
 without knowing that she was teaching any- 
 thing at all. 
 
 It is not what the teacher teaches purposely 
 or by earnest effort that goes deepest into the 
 hearts of his pupils, but what he teaches un- 
 consciously and without any purpose at all. It 
 is not what the teacher says so much as what 
 he is that makes for success in his holy calling. 
 
 If this is true then it ought to go without 
 saying that the best part of a teacher's prepara- 
 tion for his class is the preparation of himself. 
 He may spend a whole week in an intelligent 
 study of the lesson, and in a sympathetic study 
 of his pupils, and in deciding upon the applica- 
 tion of the truths of the lesson to the needs of 
 his pupils, but if he does not go further it would 
 perhaps be just as well if he did not go to his 
 
Know Thyself 33 
 
 class at all. The teacher sits before his class 
 as its supreme object lesson. He is always be- 
 fore his pupils. They are always within his 
 reach. He is always teaching them whether 
 he intends to teach them or not. He is always 
 teaching whether his pupils intend that they 
 shall be taught or not. No one but a corpse 
 can sit in the presence of children without 
 teaching them some lesson, and even a corpse 
 will teach them one lesson. 
 
 I do not mean to say that the pupils are going 
 to pattern after the teacher in all things. I do 
 not mean to say that if he is always gentle they 
 will be always gentle, or if he is peevish and im- 
 patient he is going to teach them to be peevish 
 and impatient. But he is going to teach them, 
 all the same. The little child who thinks that 
 whatever teacher does is right is going to be 
 taught gentle ways by the teacher's gentleness. 
 The big boy who has reached the point where 
 he does not find it easy to trust anybody is not 
 going to be taught impatience by the teacher's 
 impatience, but when the teacher exhibits im- 
 patience he is going to say to himself that if 
 that is religion he does not want any of it. 
 Every time a teacher exhibits an unchristian 
 temper in the presence of little children they 
 are taught that it is all right because teacher 
 does it : and every time a teacher exhibits an 
 unchristian temper in the presence of older 
 
34 Secrets of Sunday-School Teaching 
 
 pupils he drives them further and further away 
 from the Christian life. 
 
 And so while it is an exceedingly important 
 thing to know your lesson and to have it well 
 in hand, it is a far more important thing for 
 you to know yourself and to have yourself well 
 in hand. You may sometimes be compelled to 
 go to your class without having mastered your 
 lesson, but you are never under obligation to 
 go to your class without having first mastered 
 yourself. Spend the last moments before going 
 to Sunday-school in getting this mastery. Find 
 your way into the presence of the Master. 
 Have Him cleanse your heart anew and fill you 
 with His Spirit. Kemain in His presence until 
 your heart is in a glow and your face reflects 
 the light that shines from His face ; until all 
 the harsher things in your nature disappear and 
 love reigns supreme ; until you are full of sweet- 
 ness and gentleness and loving kindness. Ke- 
 call your ideal. Think a little while on high 
 planes. Climb by prayer up to the heights 
 where petty things cease to vex; where it is 
 easy to be patient ; where trying circumstances 
 are no longer trying ; where one can suffer with 
 a smile ; where one can love the unlovely and 
 the unlovable. 
 
 And always try to go to Sunday-school by 
 way of this mountain top. 
 
VII 
 
 HOW TO KEEP WIDE AWAKE 
 
 MENTAL stagnation is the secret of 
 half of our woes. I would not say 
 that there is a lack of mentality in 
 our Sunday-schools, but there is often a distress- 
 ing repugnance to mental exercise. So many 
 of our teachers get up on Sunday morning with 
 the feeling that it is only children's work to- 
 day and there is no need to shake one's self to 
 get very wide awake. And they don't shake 
 themselves. They come to Sunday-school 
 aroused just enough to know where they are 
 and to go through the motion — with a yawn. 
 Watch one of these drowsy souls going through 
 the motion. He takes up his lesson magazine — 
 teachers of his sort always carry lesson helps 
 to Sunday-school — and turns the leaves wearily 
 to find the lesson. He did that the night 
 before when he was so sleepy he could hardly 
 find the place. He read the lesson over — 
 walked through it as it were — and left it where 
 it was and went to bed. Not an idea had en- 
 tered his head. And on this bright Sunday 
 morning he has come to Sunday-school as inno- 
 cent of ideas as a post. And he is so sleepy ! 
 35 
 
36 Secrets of Sunday-School Teaching 
 
 He has a drowsy hope that now the lesson 
 must be taught something will come to him to 
 teach. He likes to think that man's extremity 
 is God's opportunity. And he lifts up his 
 sleepy heart to God and tells Him that now is 
 His time. And then he proceeds, still wearily, 
 to ask such questions as he can find in the 
 magazine. There is a fear that he will yet 
 have to stick pins in himself to keep awake. 
 And presently before he is aware the bell 
 rings. It does not startle him. He is not 
 sorry to be interrupted. What he has been 
 doing is of no consequence anyway. And so 
 he takes it as a matter of course and closes his 
 magazine — with another yawn. 
 
 Isn't this an extreme case ? Certainly ; but 
 between this teacher of the chronic yawn and 
 the wide-awake teacher who is bringing things 
 to pass there is a vast stretch of men and 
 women in every conceivable stage of mental 
 stagnation. And these are the people who are 
 making our Sunday-school problems for us. 
 What you want to do, dear teacher, is to take 
 one good look at this drowsy army and then 
 forever hereafter cherish as your greatest 
 horror the thought of ever going over to it. 
 
 Save yourseK from stagnation and you will 
 save your pupils from starvation. 
 
 How may one overcome mental stagnation ? 
 Just as one overcomes any other sort of stag- 
 
How to Keep Wide Awake 37 
 
 nation. If it is a pond of stagnant water we 
 provide an outlet and start a stream of pure 
 fresh water through at the other end. And if 
 we want to save it permanently from stagna- 
 tion we keep the outlet open and we keep the 
 pure fresh stream running through it forever. 
 It is a matter of eternal movement. We must 
 keep pouring out and we must keep pouring in. 
 Pouring out is not enough. If you continually 
 give out from your mind and take nothing into 
 it you will soon become a mental bankrupt. 
 Pouring in is not enough. If you continually 
 receive into your mind and give nothing forth 
 you will become as helpless as a stuffed goose. 
 If you want to keep mentally alert you must see 
 to it that something is continually going out of 
 your mind and that something is continually 
 coming into it. You must be continually ac- 
 quiring knowledge and ideas and inspiring 
 truths, and you must be continually sharing 
 with others the knowledge and ideas and 
 inspiring truths which come to you. As a 
 teacher you have abundant opportunity to 
 make use of all that you may acquire. The 
 most important thing to you is to acquire all 
 that you can make use of. If you are going to 
 be a good teacher you must be a good reader. 
 You must sharpen your mind by contact with 
 other minds. You must fill up your mind with 
 ideas of other minds. You must be a good 
 
38 Secrets of Sunday-School Teaching 
 
 learner. One of our most serious problems is 
 just here. We cannot get our teachers to read. 
 A live lawyer reads up on his cases, and a live 
 doctor reads up on his cases. If the lawyer 
 and doctor cease to read up on their cases it is 
 only a question of time when they will cease 
 to have any cases to read up on. The teacher 
 needs to read up on his cases just as truly as 
 the lawyer or the doctor. He needs to read up 
 on the lesson for the next Sunday. He needs 
 to read up on the art of teaching. He needs to 
 read up on the art of management. He needs 
 to read all the good books on child study. He 
 needs to read his pupils. And occasionally he 
 needs to read himself to find out for himself 
 who he is and what are his motives and what 
 he is about. Your drowsy teacher manages to 
 pull through a single lesson help Saturday 
 night and if you suggest trying an additional 
 help he tells you that he has more than he can 
 manage already. But when a teacher with a 
 live brain has gone through one lesson help he 
 has just gotten his appetite whetted. He 
 wants more. And he reads all the lesson helps 
 he can buy, beg or borrow. 
 
 The teacher should make the same sort of 
 mental preparation for his class that the public 
 speaker makes, l^o public speaker that has a 
 reputation to sustain would dare to go before 
 an audience with his mind asleep. He first 
 
How to Keep Wide Awake 39 
 
 wakes himself up. He goes over the address 
 that he is to deliver and gets the outline clearly 
 in his mind. He thinks over the matter until 
 he becomes aroused. If he has difficulty in 
 arousing himself over what he is going to say 
 he takes up a stirring book and reads a chapter 
 in that. He does anything, everything that 
 can possibly wake him up and set his heart on 
 fire. If your work is to be worth while you 
 must find time before you go to Sunday-school 
 to wake up your mind. You must get up 
 early enough to wake it up. And you must 
 not go until you are awake even if you must 
 get there late. 
 
VIII 
 HOW TO STIE UP YOUE ENTHUSIASM 
 
 A LITTLE girl went to church for the 
 first time and came away deeply im- 
 pressed by the often repeated petition, 
 " Lord, have mercy upon us, miserable sinners." 
 And all through the week the little thing was 
 going around the house with her little hands 
 folded and uttering in a low tone, " Lord, have 
 mercy upon us miserable sinners; Lord, have 
 mercy upon us miserable sinners." One day 
 her father overheard her in the hall and said to 
 her, " Yes, my darling, we are all miserable sin 
 ners." She looked up into his face in surprise 
 and exclaimed, " Oh, no, papa, we ain't ! " 
 " Yes," he said, " we are all miserable sinners." 
 ** But, papa, not sho nuff ; not weally." And 
 this dear little thing, even at her tender age, 
 had already learned that a great many things 
 that we may say in this world are merely 
 make-believes. We don't mean them "sho 
 nuff; weally." 
 
 I think sometimes that this is our chief 
 trouble in our Sunday-school work. We insist 
 that the Sunday-school is the biggest thing in 
 the world, that the work of molding a little 
 life in the image of Christ is the greatest work 
 40 
 
How to Stir Up Your Enthusiasm 41 
 
 m the world; but when we go to our work 
 we say by our actions, which speak louder than 
 words, that we don't mean it "sho nuff; 
 weally." And because we don't mean it " sho 
 nuff " we have no enthusiasm for our work. 
 
 J^ow enthusiasm is something we have got 
 to have or our work will not be worth while. 
 How can we stir up our enthusiasm? One 
 way is to think about our work — not about the 
 discouraging things that relate to our own ef- 
 forts, but about the stirring things that relate 
 to our work as a whole. For example, let me 
 give you two rousing facts that will warm your 
 heart every time you revert to them. One of 
 these is the fact that it was Jesus who first ex- 
 alted the child to his true place in the world. 
 Has it ever occurred to you that you may search 
 pagan literature in vain for a word that may 
 be interpreted as a worthy estimate of child- 
 hood ? Paganism never dreamed of giving the 
 child the first place in the kingdom of heaven : 
 it does not even give him a footstool in the 
 kingdom of heaven. The heathen world valued 
 a child not for what he was but for what he 
 would become. The child was only the promise 
 of which man was the fulfillment. It was Jesus 
 who first taught that the child is worthy of our 
 thoughts for what he is in himself without re- 
 gard to what he may become. He did not look 
 upon the dead child as a bud of promise 
 
42 Secrets of Sunday-School Teaching 
 
 blighted. "The maid is not dead but sleep 
 eth." And He did not value the child as 
 father to the man. He valued him for ihe 
 spirit that was in him — the spirit which pecul- 
 iarly fitted him to become a subject in the 
 kingdom of heaven ; the spirit which gives one 
 the right to a high place in the kingdom of 
 heaven. This idea the world never had, and 
 even after Jesus came the world was so slow 
 to receive it that it was not until the days of 
 Froebel that men began to realize its full mean- 
 ing, for it was Froebel who first showed the 
 folly of educating a child as a man in embryo. 
 
 In the literature of the Jews you will find 
 an apparent exception. As Trumbull has 
 pointed out the writings of the rabbis teem 
 with sentiments which would flow naturally 
 from the pen of the most progressive Christian 
 teacher of our own day. The education of the 
 child is boldly declared to be the greatest duty 
 of man. The school is the greatest institution 
 in the world. The calling of the teacher is the 
 greatest calling in the world. "He who 
 teaches the child of his fellow man," says a 
 Talmudic proverb, " shall occupy a prominent 
 place among the saints above." "The true 
 guardians of the city are the teachers." " The 
 child must not be detained from the schools 
 even though it might help build the temple." 
 " He who refuses a pupil one lesson has, as it 
 
How to Stir Up Your Enthusiasm 43 
 
 were, robbed him of his parental inheritance." 
 But while these sayings indicate that the Jews 
 laid great stress upon the training of the young, 
 the exception, as Trumbull insists, is only seem- 
 ing, for there is no evidence that the Jews had 
 any such conception of the exaltation of the 
 child as that which Jesus taught. They did not 
 value the child for what he was but only for 
 what he was to become. 
 
 The other fact about which you need to re- 
 fresh your memory now and then is that since 
 the days of Jesus pure and undefiled religion 
 has prospered just in proportion as the Church 
 has emulated the example of our Lord and set 
 the child in the midst. Whenever the Church 
 has been dominated by the thought that while 
 the most serious business in life is living the 
 next most serious business is teaching children 
 how to live, religion has prospered regardless of 
 all adverse conditions. On the other hand, 
 when the interest of the Church in children'and 
 in childhood has declined religion has declined 
 regardless of all favouring conditions. From 
 the very beginning the men to whom was com- 
 mitted the spreading of the Gospel took to 
 heart the injunctions of our blessed Lord to feed 
 the lambs of the flock. The apostles were 
 teachers as well as preachers. Note how often 
 it is said that they taught as well as preached 
 the Word of God. As Christianity spread 
 
44 Secrets of Sunday-School Teaching 
 
 children were gathered together in every com- 
 munity for catechetical instruction in the ele- 
 ments of faith, while in the great circles of 
 population larger schools were established for 
 more advanced instruction. After the days of 
 the apostles Christianity was spread largely by 
 means of the work done in the Bible schools. 
 "It is a remarkable fact," says Dr. Schaff, 
 " that after the days of the apostles no names 
 of great missionaries are mentioned till the 
 opening of the Middle Ages. There were no 
 missionary societies, no missionary institutions, 
 no organized efforts in the Ante-Nicene age, 
 and yet in less than three hundred years from 
 the death of St. John the whole population of 
 the Koman Empire, which then represented 
 the civilized world, was nominally Christian- 
 ized." In the fourth century when Julian the 
 Apostate raised his hand against the Church he 
 saw that the very life of Christianity pivoted 
 upon the religious training of the young, and 
 his fiercest blow was aimed at the Christian 
 teachers in the schools of the empire. One 
 trembles to think what would have happened if 
 Julian had lived long enough to close the Chris- 
 tian schools and rid all other schools of the 
 empire of Christian teachers. 
 
 " Thus," says Trumbull,' " it is clear that the 
 
 ^ " Yale Lectures on the Sunday-school " (Chas. Scribner's 
 Sons, N. Y.), 
 
How to Stir Up Your Enthusiasm 45 
 
 early Christian Church was not unfaithful to 
 its trust or unmindful of the duty imposed upon 
 it by the Great Commission. It organized 
 Bible schools far and near as a means of in- 
 structing its converts and of training its mem- 
 bership. And so it continued to do so long as 
 it wisely followed the injunctions of its Divine 
 Founder. But as it grew in worldly prominence 
 and lost in spiritual life changes came in the 
 methods of its training work. Its ritual serv- 
 ices were expanded and its teaching exercises 
 were diminished." Profit says that " when the 
 ecclesiastical spirit overcame the evangelical 
 the Church grew worldly in her instructions, 
 making more of a splendid ritual than of a pure 
 faith, and magnifying church orthodoxy above 
 vital piety, catechetical instruction, of course, 
 declined." And Lea, in his history of the In- 
 quisition, shows conclusively that the decline of 
 the spiritual life of the Church was attributed 
 to the neglect of the Church of its educational 
 function. 
 
 In the light of these facts what a responsibil- 
 ity rests upon the Sunday-school teacher ! 
 
IX 
 
 A SETTLED MIND 
 
 THEEE are few greater obstacles in the 
 way of a teacher's success than an un- 
 settled mind. I do not mean an open 
 mind— a true student always keeps his mind 
 open, — but a mind that is always in a state of 
 uncertainty and unrest. If you never know 
 what to believe, — if your mind is like a reed 
 that bends before every wind, — if you cannot 
 hear an argument against your faith without 
 trembling at the knees, — if you feel yourself 
 growing dizzy whenever you hear that another 
 famous professor has just abolished life after 
 death, — you may be able to do some things 
 worth while, but you are in no condition to 
 teach a class. I do not hesitate to say that a 
 teacher should go to his class feeling the 
 ground beneath his feet or he should not go at 
 all. We must get rid of the things which dis- 
 turb our peace. This cannot be done by trying 
 to avoid them but by bravely facing them. 
 Take for illustration the presumptions of a cer- 
 tain class of scientists that have unsettled the 
 minds of so many teachers. One can never get 
 rid of the nervousness caused by the vapourings 
 46 
 
A Settled Mind 47 
 
 of these men by simply shutting one's eyes. 
 The only way is to face the matter squarely 
 and think it through once for all. If you will 
 do this you are not likely to receive any serious 
 shocks from this source again and you will 
 probably be able to keep your eyes open to all 
 the future discoveries of Science without dis- 
 comfort. 
 
 I have found that when a teacher succeeds 
 in getting the right attitude towards Science 
 he is not easily unsettled by disturbers of any 
 sort, and for this reason I am going to call 
 attention to two or three things which many 
 teachers have found worth remembering in 
 dealing with this subject. 
 
 Let me say at the outset that I have nothing 
 against Science — no more than I have against 
 the sun. The sun deserves my admiration and 
 respect, and it receives both. But I am not a 
 sun-worshiper, and I do not regard it with un- 
 reasonable awe. Nor have I great respect for 
 any of its imitations. I do not admire painted 
 suns or suns cut out of yellow paper. So 
 Science deserves my respect and admiration, 
 and it receives both. But not being a wor- 
 shiper of Science, I do not fall down before it, 
 nor do I stand in awe of the monstrous image 
 which certain so-called scientists have set up in 
 the world and labelled Science, and commanded 
 all men, under pain of scorn, to fall on their 
 
48 Secrets of Sunday-School Teaching 
 
 faces before it. There is Science and science, 
 and there are scientists and scientists. 
 
 Your true scientist is the humblest of men. 
 He walks softly all his days. He feels like Isaac 
 Newton felt — that he is only a little child pick- 
 ing up a few pebbles here and there on the sea- 
 shore of knowledge. He realizes that he knows 
 little, and therefore he speaks little. He makes 
 no loud claims for himself or for Science. He 
 vaunteth not himself. He is not puffed up. 
 He doth not behave himself unseemly. He 
 does not speak with the assurance of those who 
 know that they are the people, and that wisdom 
 will die with them. He excels in modesty. 
 He remembers that much of what men thought 
 was true yesterday is no longer true to-day. 
 And he is not certain but that much which 
 seems true to-day will evaporate to-morrow. 
 He believes in Science, but he does not believe 
 in the infallibility of scientists. He expects 
 great things of Science, but he recognizes its 
 limitations. He does not believe that it is the 
 fountain of all truth. He does not expect 
 Science to shed light on God. He rather looks 
 to God to shed light on Science. IS'or can he 
 see the point in the argument that because 
 Science has not discovered God there is no God. 
 He remembers that Science has not yet dis- 
 covered his mother's love or any of the noble 
 sentiments that abide in his own great heart. 
 
A Settled Mind 40 
 
 Let this man tell you what Science is, and you 
 will see in it nothing to doubt or scorn ; as an 
 intelligent being you must accept it, and as a 
 true man you must respect it. 
 
 But unfortunately the world does not get its 
 knowledge of Science from your humble seeker 
 after truth. During the last fifty years the 
 field of Science has been invaded by a vast 
 army of young men in search not of truth, but 
 of fame. And men whose foremost ambition is 
 fame are never humble. And they are never 
 quiet. And so it has come to pass that this 
 motley crowd of noisy fame-seekers has almost 
 drowned the quiet voices of true scientists, and 
 nearly all that many of us have heard about 
 Science in recent years has come from fakirs 
 or amateurs. And what a scene we have 
 been having all through this half century of 
 pseudo-scientific exploitation ! Bent on fame, 
 old JSTebuchadnezzar erected a great image of 
 gold and commanded all men at the sound of 
 the cornet, flute, harp, sackbut, psaltery and 
 dulcimer to fall on their faces and worship be- 
 fore it. Bent on fame, our modern self-ap- 
 pointed priests of Science have set up a mon- 
 strous image of their god and have commanded 
 all men everywhere to fall down and worship 
 before it. And the trick has worked marvel- 
 lously. This image is no more like Science 
 than an elephant is like a cow, but let the 
 
50 Secrets of Sunday-School Teaching 
 
 cornet sound and all the world falls on its face 
 before it. Great is Nebuchadnezzar! Great 
 is Diana of the Ephesians ! Great is Science ! 
 People sit down and talk about the great and 
 terrible image in awed whispers. If a little 
 man fresh from Germany takes snuff in the 
 name of Science, the whole world sneezes. 
 If anybody anywhere, with or without testi- 
 monials, with or without insignia of authority, 
 boldly expresses an opinion in the name of 
 Science, the whole world bows before him 
 in silent submission, and the thing is settled. 
 Science says so, and Science is infallible, not- 
 withstanding the fact that our scientific books 
 must be written over once every ^ve or ten 
 years to set Science right before the world. 
 The other day a whole city was stirred from 
 centre to circumference because a certain doctor 
 of Science decided on a public platform that 
 there was no evidence of immortality or of God. 
 Nobody had ever taken the learned doctor 
 seriously on any practical question of life. No- 
 body would accept his opinion about a beefsteak 
 or a flower garden or a new coat. In all things 
 he was a mere joke, but when he rendered his 
 decision in the name of Science, people fell on 
 their faces and wept, and would not be com- 
 forted. 
 
 Every age has its bugaboo. We have had our 
 hobgoblins, our ogres, our witches, our ghosts, 
 
A Settled Mind 51 
 
 our myriad superstitions. To-day we have 
 this monster hnage which so-called scientists 
 have set up to overawe the " common herd." 
 We use the name of Science to conjure with and 
 to cast spells. If people will not do their 
 thinking to suit us, we condemn them to per- 
 dition in the name of Science — though we in- 
 sert by way of parenthesis that Science does 
 not believe in perdition. If we do not like to 
 see a man going around with simple faith, 
 serving God and his fellow men, and putting 
 our poor lives to shame, we proceed to frighten 
 him out of his faith and out of his wits by call- 
 ing over him the name of Science. We tell 
 him that Science knows nothing of God, and 
 nothing of religion, and that what Science 
 doesn't know doesn't exist. We can hardly 
 sleep of nights for thinking of Science. I won- 
 der we have any nerves. 
 
 No, I have nothing against Science. Science 
 has never said that there is no God. Science 
 has never uttered a word against our holy re- 
 ligion. Science has never thrown any doubt 
 upon revealed truth. It has never denied the 
 existence of the spiritual world. The fact that 
 some scientists have denied everything that is 
 precious to God's people proves nothing, except 
 that men will sometimes talk of things they 
 know nothing about. Science is the friend of 
 humanity, and we are overwhelmingly in its 
 
52 Secrets of Sunday-School Teaching 
 
 debt. But while I have nothing against Sci- 
 ence, I have somewhat against certain scientists 
 whose heads have been turned by their achieve- 
 ments, and who boast great things. And I 
 have more against this vast army of swollen 
 fame-seekers who have no achievements to 
 boast of, and who, realizing that they cannot 
 get a hearing on their own account, have set 
 up this monster image and appointed them- 
 selves its priests, in order to secure the ear and 
 respect and worship of mankind. I am sick 
 and tired of the absurd pretensions of mere 
 novices who presume to parade in the garb of 
 Science, but who are unworthy to hold a light 
 for a true scientist to work by. 
 
 It is such a simple trick. Mrs. Innocence 
 Sublime, who is newly married, and has just 
 found her way to the kitchen for the first time 
 in her life, is informed with authority by her 
 cook that all good cooks do thus and so. The 
 cook does not know what good cooks do, but 
 she knows perfectly well that Mrs. Innocence 
 Sublime does not know either ; and so she can 
 utter herself with safety. The Rev. Jonathan 
 Theologue, just from the factory, informs his 
 verdant congregation that all modern scholar- 
 ship worthy of the name is in hearty accord 
 with his opinions. The Eev. Jonathan Theo- 
 logue doesn't know what all modern scholar- 
 ship is in accord with, but he is perfectly 
 
A Settled Mind ^3 
 
 certain that his congregation doesn't know- 
 either, and, being sadly in need of something 
 to baclc up his statements, he chooses "modern 
 scholarship " as an awe-compelhng sound. So 
 m the iield of Science there are bright young 
 seekers after fame, who have hardly learned 
 enough to be accounted apprentices, but who 
 know that they cannot get a hearing on their 
 own account, and, having an itching for world- 
 worship, they clothe 'themselves in the robes 
 of Science, and deepening their voices, go forth 
 to speak in the name of the monster image. 
 Nobody but Mrs. Innocence Sublime takes the 
 cook seriously. Nobody but the most verdant 
 of congregations takes the Eev. Jonathan Theo- 
 logue seriously. Why should we take Pro- 
 fessor Pseudo-Scientist seriously ? 
 
HOW TO STUDY THE LESSON 
 
 WHERE one is taught two must learn 
 — the teacher as well as the pupil. 
 A mere hearer of lessons does not 
 need to know anything. One can impart only 
 that which he has learned himself, and if you 
 are going to impart anything to your pupils you 
 must study as faithfully as you want your 
 pupils to study. 
 
 What is the one thing needful in the study 
 of the lesson ? On the divine side, the Holy 
 Spirit ; on the human side, a willing spirit. 
 The simple condition upon which the Book 
 opens its treasures is a willingness to do what 
 we may find commanded therein. As a rule 
 the Book shuts up like an oyster when it is ap- 
 proached by a cold heart, a critic, a curiosity 
 hunter or a croaker. 
 
 The best time to begin the preparation of 
 next Sunday's lesson is the first moment you 
 can find after teaching this Sunday's lesson. 
 The reason is that which prompts the fireman 
 to keep his fire going through the night rather 
 than start with a cold boiler when the morning 
 comes. It is an easy matter to get up steam 
 54 
 
How to Study the Lesson 55 
 
 when the water is already hot in the boiler. 
 It is easier — far easier — to get interested in 
 next Sunday's lesson while the heart is yet 
 warm over the lesson you have just taught 
 than it is to take it up after the mind and 
 heart have had time to grow cold again. So 
 you want to use the very first opportunity to 
 make your start on the next lesson. You need 
 not go very far, but you want to make a start. 
 You want at least to go far enough to save the 
 trouble of working your heart and mind up 
 from a dead level later on in the week. 
 
 First, find the next lesson and mark it.' 
 Then turn back to the last lesson, read it over, 
 recall its principal points and read on up to the 
 beginning of the next lesson. Then read the 
 next lesson rapidly simply to catch the general 
 drift. If now you can read it in the original, 
 that is well, though the benefit to be derived 
 from reading it in the original is usually much 
 exaggerated. The next best thing — and to the 
 great majority of people a much better thing — 
 is to read all the different versions you can lay 
 your hands on. There are many of these and 
 they are all helpful, if for no other reason than 
 that they keep you on the alert to note the 
 changes from the authorized version. They 
 keep you wide awake and that is the first es- 
 
 * This method is offered only for its suggestive value as 
 the intelligent student will want to mark out his own path. 
 
56 Secrets of Sunday-School Teaching 
 
 sential in Bible study. It is a delightful sensa- 
 tion when one comes across such renderings as 
 this which I happened upon just now in an old 
 Scotch translation : " Abandon us not to 
 temptation, but preserve us from evil " ; or 
 this : *' Which of you can by his anxiety pro- 
 long his life one hour ? " or this : " Having 
 looked up he said, ' I see men whom I distin- 
 guish from trees only by their walking.' " 
 
 After reading the text in all the versions you 
 have at hand, take up the lesson helps and 
 notice the subject given to the lesson and read 
 the Golden Text. I know most authorities 
 will tell you to use helps very sparingly, and 
 not to use them at all until you have gotten 
 everything out of the lesson that you can get 
 for yourself ; but I also happen to know that 
 most authorities use all the helps they can get 
 hold of, and that they are not always careful 
 to wait until they have exhausted the subject 
 for themselves. You do not want to let other 
 people do any more thinking for you than you 
 can help, but you will probably need to use a 
 good deal of their thinking nevertheless. 
 
 Now return to the text, and read it over very 
 slowly with pencil in hand, and underscore 
 every word or phrase that is in the least degree 
 obscure. When you have done this, go back to 
 the beginning and take up these obscure words 
 and phrases one at a time and see what you 
 
How to Study the Lesson 57 
 
 can do with them. Sometimes nothing more 
 is needed than a steady gaze at the obscure 
 word until the mind is concentrated wholly 
 upon it ; frequently, however, you will need to 
 go to your lesson helps. If you have library 
 helps, such as a good Bible dictionary or ency- 
 clopedia, you will often want to go to them for 
 further light. 
 
 When you have cleared up the obscure points 
 you will be ready to test your knowledge of 
 the text. It is of the highest importance that 
 you should do this at this point, for you are 
 not prepared to go further until you are abso- 
 lutely sure of your ground. There is one sure 
 way of testing your knowledge of the text 
 and fixing its meaning indelibly in your mind, 
 and that is by writing it out in your own lan- 
 guage. Close your Bible, and with pencil and 
 paper in hand write down in your own words 
 the substance of the text just as fully as possi- 
 ble. If you have never done this you will be 
 surprised to see how quickly it will enable you 
 to master the text. 
 
 ISTow that you have the facts of the lesson 
 clearly before you, the next step is to analyze 
 the story and learn its teachings. Ask yourself 
 such questions as. What is all this about ? Who 
 is it of whom the lesson is speaking ? What do 
 we know about his life ? What of his char- 
 acter? What particular incidents concerning 
 
58 Secrets of Sunday-School Teaching 
 
 him are here recorded ? What prompted him 
 to do as he did ? Continue questioning your- 
 self until you have brought out in an orderly 
 way all the facts of the lesson. ISTow ask, 
 What does all this teach ? What is it to me ? 
 How can I apply it to my own heart and my 
 life ? What good can I get out of it ? What 
 suggestions do I find that may be helpful in my 
 own daily walk ? What is the one thing of the 
 lesson that is preeminent ? What is the very 
 kernel of the lesson — the very heart of the les- 
 son ? Do not ask, How am I to teach this ? or, 
 What can I get out of this for my pupils? 
 The time for this is not yet. You are now 
 studying the lesson not as a teacher, but as a 
 pupil. Thus far you should have forgotten that 
 you are a teacher. You should study the les- 
 son for your own soul's sake. When you have 
 done this you will be ready to study the lesson 
 for the sake of your pupils. 
 
 Here are three points worth remember- 
 ing: 
 
 1. My old teacher of mathematics used to 
 say to us at the beginning of a written examina- 
 tion, " Young gentlemen, work out all the 
 problems you can, first, and then work out the 
 problems you can't." It is a good rule to ob- 
 serve in studying one's lesson. Don't dwell too 
 long on an obscure passage ; mark it and when 
 you have studied its easier surroundings you 
 
How to Study the Lesson 59 
 
 may come back to it better prepared to get at 
 the kernel of the matter. 
 
 2. You are not prepared to teach the lesson 
 until you are able to reproduce the lesson text 
 in your own language. Test your preparation : 
 can you rewrite the text in the terms of every- 
 day life ? 
 
 3. When a thought in the lesson is confused 
 or obscure sit down and try to write it out. 
 It is wonderful how the act of writing clears 
 up obscurity and brings order out of chaos. 
 
XI 
 HOW TO PLAN THE LESSON 
 
 W HEIST the teacher has studied the les- 
 son for his own profit — when he has 
 eaten of its bread and drunk of its 
 water, and put forth his hand and taken of its 
 honey; when his own eyes have been en- 
 lightened — he is ready to prepare the lesson for 
 his class, and not until then. 
 
 This special preparation is a serious task and 
 it calls for an uninterrupted hour, an hour that 
 should be as full of hallowing quiet as a Sab- 
 bath eventide. I am fond of saying that Satur- 
 day night, that border-land between the week 
 of cares and the Sabbath of calm which our 
 fathers set apart as the outer court of the 
 sanctuary, but which we in our greed have 
 plowed over and sown down in left-overs, is 
 the teacher's golden opportunity. Certainly 
 no other hour can be so easily fitted up and 
 kept sacred for this special task. Let us sup- 
 pose that this quiet hour has come and that you 
 have found a quiet place where you can spend 
 it without interruption. You have opened your 
 Bible at the lesson which has now come to be a 
 living, burning truth. Look at this lesson for a 
 60 
 
How to Plan the Lesson 61 
 
 moment and then look away and try to realize 
 the presence of your pupils. Look at your 
 pupils. It is hardly worth while to attempt 
 any preparation at all if you do not vividly 
 realize your class on the one hand and your 
 lesson on the other. Put them side by side and 
 look at them. Look at the lesson. What are 
 its practical teachings ? What is its great cen- 
 tral truth— the truth you want to burn into the 
 hearts of your pupils ? Write it down on paper 
 and look at it. What are some of its practical 
 teachings? Write them down and look at 
 them, l^ow look at your class. That is to 
 say, look at Charles and Sarah and Henry and 
 Alice— not your class in the abstract but 
 each pupil in the concrete. I have frequently 
 said that the teacher who habitually thinks 
 of his class as a whole rather than its individ- 
 ual members is as badly out of place as the 
 parent who never prays for his children except 
 in a lump. Look at these pupils with the prac- 
 tical teachings of the lesson in mind. What 
 are the special needs of each pupil ? Don't be 
 in a hurry ; take time to think this matter 
 through to some purpose. When you have done 
 this recall again the practical teachings of the 
 lesson, and with the needs of your pupils in 
 view try to decide what truths shall be pressed 
 home in the class. Then decide what truth 
 shall be placed foremost, emphasizing it above 
 
62 Secrets of Sunday-School Teaching 
 
 all others. The others may be placed in the 
 background, only one should be placed in the 
 foreground. When the lesson is ended there 
 should be burning in the hearts of the children 
 one great truth — burning as clearly and as 
 sharply defined as the flame of a lamp. 
 
 The next thing is to take up the lesson story 
 and settle upon your plan of unfolding it. 
 There are half a dozen points which you will 
 need to decide with care. 
 
 First, you want to ask what you shall say to 
 secure attention. Not what you shall say to 
 force attention but what you shall say to win 
 attention. Perhaps an incident will come into 
 your mind which you are confident will get the 
 attention of your pupils. But are you sure that 
 the telling of this incident will help you to get 
 your hand on the pupils' minds? Will it 
 draw your pupils around you ready to follow 
 wherever you may lead, or will it only start 
 their minds off on an excursion through endless 
 fields of fancy where there are daisies and but- 
 terflies enough to last through the lesson hour ? 
 Children are very much like ponies ; it is one 
 thing to catch the ear of a capering pony and 
 cause him to stop suddenly and gaze at you, but 
 it is quite another thing to induce him to stand 
 and allow you to go to him and place a bit in 
 his mouth. 
 
 Second, you want to decide how to make the 
 
How to Plan the Lesson 63 
 
 connecting link between this lesson and the last. 
 Omitting the connecting link is the besetting sin 
 of the average teacher. Children do not re- 
 member disconnected lessons any better than 
 the rest of us. A chain always helps the mem- 
 ory. 
 
 Third, what questions shall be asked on the 
 lesson itself? Write them down. Don't for- 
 get that the act of writing not only clarifies the 
 mind, but it photographs the question in your 
 mind so that it will come up readily at the 
 moment you want it. Questions in the lesson 
 helps are not designed to save you the trouble 
 of making questions of your own, but rather to 
 help you in making such questions. 
 
 Fourth, decide what points should be illustra- 
 ted and select your illustrations. Do not select 
 an illustration from any printed thing until 
 you have searched your memory through and 
 through for an illustration that has come into 
 your own every-day life. Home-made illus- 
 trations are best, be they ever so homely. In 
 teaching young children use incidents, not fig- 
 ures of speech. Figurative language which 
 shines for mature minds only casts a shadow 
 for little children to stumble in. 
 
 Fifth, are there any simple objects which may 
 be used to illustrate the lesson ? Take care that 
 you select objects that will illustrate, and that 
 will not divert. A pair of scissors will illustrate, 
 
64 Secrets of Sunday-School Teaching 
 
 but a mellow red apple, full of teaching as it 
 may be to mature minds, will only make a 
 child's mouth water. 
 
 Sixth, decide how the lesson shall be brought 
 to a close. There are teachers who carefully 
 plan the first part of the lesson and leave the 
 latter part to providence, or to the inspiration 
 of the moment, which they usually assume to 
 be the inspiration of the Holy Spirit. A good 
 end may make amends for a bad beginning, 
 but a good beginning never counterbalances a 
 bad end. 
 
 The lesson plan is now ready. But are you 
 ready ? No : not until you have brought your- 
 self face to face with your own soul. ISTot 
 until you have examined your commission and 
 gazed long upon the model after which you 
 are trying to mold the lump of clay heaven has 
 put into your hands. Not until you have pre- 
 sented your pupils, one by one, at the throne 
 of grace, and poured out your own soul unto 
 God. 
 
XII 
 
 THE TEACHER'S PEESONAL PEEP- 
 AEATION 
 
 PREPARING to teach a lesson is like 
 winding np a toy : the moment you let it 
 go the thing begins to run down. Pre- 
 paring is one problem j staying prepared is 
 another. I have been ready to teach a lesson 
 at ten o'clock on Saturday night, and I have 
 found myself utterly unprepared to teach it at 
 ten o 'clock the next morning. This leads me 
 to speak of some little things which are usually 
 overlooked because they are small, but which 
 usually prove to be the little foxes that spoil the 
 vines. 
 
 Many a good lesson is spoiled by a bad 
 digestion. To illustrate, here is my friend 
 Jones. Jones is as bright a fellow as one will 
 meet between Sundays. He knows how to 
 study his lesson, and he studies it. And he 
 knows how to plan it for his class. When Sun- 
 day comes everything is ready. All the facts 
 are at hand. The teaching points are drawn 
 up in battle array. The illustrations are com- 
 ing up in the rear. Everything is in shape. 
 Everything except Jones himself. Jones has 
 65 
 
66 Secrets of Sunday-School Teaching 
 
 a weakness for good suppers. He has a special 
 weakness for good suppers that are late. And 
 on Saturday nights, when the work of the 
 week is over and everything is ready for Sun- 
 day, he likes to indulge a bit. Last night he 
 ate too much, and this morning he woke up 
 with that dark brown taste. You know the 
 taste. And you know how brown it gets to 
 be. When a man starts down-town to his office 
 on Monday with that taste he knows what it 
 means. His brain is dull, his heart is cold, his 
 knees are shaky, and he carries a cotton string 
 where his backbone used to be. He can't think, 
 he can't plan, he can't give orders, he can't face 
 his creditors, he can't make good in anything. 
 The day is an utter loss — unless he can get 
 something to overcome that dark brown taste. 
 And a wise business man is not going down- 
 town with that taste in his mouth if he can help 
 it. But Jones, who knows all this as well as 
 you or I, somehow imagines that when it comes 
 to " religious " work it is different. He has pre- 
 pared his lesson faithfully, and he is going to 
 Sunday-school to attend to the Lord's business, 
 and he does not see why he cannot look to the 
 Lord to help him through without regard to 
 such trifling hindrances as a late supper may 
 have put in his way. But the Lord does not 
 undertake to master the man who is willingly 
 mastered by his own stomach, and poor Jones 
 
The Teacher's Personal Preparation 67 
 
 goes down in ignoble defeat. When a teacher's 
 stomach IS against him, everything is against 
 him His facts will not muster. His teaching 
 truths refuse to come forward at his command 
 His illustrations loiter indifferently in the rear 
 And his scholars-if you had followed the boys 
 after the lesson was over you would have heard 
 Jim saying to Bob : "I don't see what they can 
 expect of a fellow with that old stupid ox for a 
 teacher." 
 
 But poor Jones is not alone. At the very 
 moment that he was struggling to make the 
 lesson move, if you had looked over towards 
 the northeast corner you would have seen Miss 
 Sapphira Smith stretching her beautiful little 
 mouth into a most unbeautiful yawning chasm 
 And if you had looked towards the south you 
 would have seen three other teachers of assorted 
 sizes and sexes likewise engaged in the manu- 
 facture of yawns. And just back of them one 
 teacher was looking at his watch, and another 
 —a great big benevolent-looking hulk— had his 
 chair tilted back, and his eyes closed, and was 
 drumming with his fingers on his song-book. 
 
 Dullness is produced by emptiness. It is the 
 only thing that emptiness produces. Empti- 
 ness of the head is caused either by putting 
 nothing in the head or by putting too much in 
 the stomach. Some of us suffer from one cause 
 some from the other. Some, alas ! from both' 
 
68 Secrets of Sunday-School Teaching 
 
 What we need is all-round preparation for the 
 class. One teacher prepares his head and neg- 
 lects his heart. Another prepares his heart and 
 neglects his head. The wise teacher prepares 
 both heart and head and does not neglect his 
 stomach. 
 
 When you lay down the lesson Saturday 
 night remember that He who giveth His be- 
 loved sleep is also ready to keep your mind in 
 perfect peace when you are awake. Look to 
 Him for a composed mind when you awake on 
 the morrow. I take it for granted, of course, 
 that you will not make such a prayer if you 
 have already done those things during the day 
 which in the natural course of events will blos- 
 som into a dull headache and depressed spirits 
 to-morrow. 
 
 When you wake in the morning direct your 
 first thoughts straight to the throne of God. 
 Don't aim an inch lower. Whatever you do 
 through the day be sure that you steel your 
 mind at the beginning against those things 
 which fret and distract. Don't have any un- 
 settled problems about dress to solve. Attend 
 to such matters on Saturday. That is what the 
 latter half of Saturday is for. You may noi-^ 
 think it a serious matter but if you allow any- 
 thing to distract you at the beginning of the 
 day you are not going to be ready to teach 
 that lesson when the time comes. Take hold 
 
The Teacher's Personal Preparation 69 
 
 of yourself and refuse to allow yourself to 
 hurry. Keep yourself composed the first hour 
 of the day and you will be thrice armed against 
 the distractions of the remainder of the day. 
 
 Get into communication with God with your 
 first waking thoughts and then while you are 
 preparing your toilet get en rapport with the 
 day. Take a peep through the blinds, and if 
 the sun shines open your heart to its gladness. 
 If it does not shine that is the moment to steel 
 your heart against the depression of a gloomy 
 day. Don't let the weather master you ; master 
 the weather. Watch against everything of a 
 disturbing character. Watch against the sur- 
 prises that bring the nerves to the surface. 
 Resolve to see and hear the things which make 
 for peace. At the breakfast table look into the 
 sunny faces and look beyond the morose one. If 
 there is a single bit of toast that isn't burnt don't 
 know that there is anything the matter with 
 the rest. Be an optimist— at least on Sunday 
 morning at the breakfast table. Keep sweet. 
 Keep happy. Eemember you have prepared 
 your lesson and you have a great opportunity 
 before you, and it would be a pity to allow 
 anything to spoil it. At the same time don't 
 allow yourself to be weighed down with a sense 
 of the responsibility before you. Don't think 
 of your teaching as a responsibility but as an 
 opportunity. When you put on your hat and 
 
70 Secrets of Sunday-School Teaching 
 
 start to Sunday-school, start as one going forth 
 to seize an opportunity, not as one going to take 
 up a burden. But don^t be impatient to seize 
 it. Don't allow yourself to hurry. Many a 
 teacher is nervous and useless throughout the 
 Sunday-school hour simply because the nerves 
 all came to the surface while on a run to get to 
 Sunday-school on time. Promptness is a cardi- 
 nal virtue in a teacher, but nervousness is a 
 cardinal sin. Better be late than be nervous. 
 Better not come at all than be nervous. 
 
 Now you have your nerves en rwpport with 
 the day and with your opportunity. The next 
 thing is to get en rapport with your class — 
 rather, with each member of your class. Re- 
 member, the first impressions are the lasting 
 ones. Johnny was all out of sorts last Sunday 
 because when you came in you glanced at him 
 and spoke in an absent-minded sort of way. 
 You cannot afford to speak to any of your 
 pupils in an absent-minded sort of way. The 
 moment a pupil sees you are not thinking of 
 him that moment he ceases to care for you. 
 He expects the teacher to think of him what- 
 ever else and whoever else he may have to think 
 of. He expects the teacher to see him if it re- 
 quires a dozen eyes to see him. He expects a 
 warm, friendly hand- shake with all five fingers, 
 and not two icy tips, though it may take a dozen 
 hands to do it. But right here take care. If a 
 
The Teacher's Personal Preparation 71 
 
 boy is four or five years old or under you may 
 pet him as you will, but if he is beyond five 
 try to think of him, not as a baby, but as 
 a little man. Treat him respectfully. Don't 
 "O dear" him. Don't put the emphasis on 
 " little." If he is more than eight years of age 
 don't pat him on the head — for your life, don't. 
 If he is more than ten years of age don't put 
 your arm around him. You may put your 
 hand on his shoulder provided you don't do 
 it patronizingly. Kemember, he feels himself 
 a man — every inch a man — and it is not your 
 business to undeceive him. If you have a class 
 of girls it will not make a great deal of differ- 
 ence. Girls will take a great deal of petting — 
 most of them. Even the biggest girls do not 
 mind sometimes being called little. But it is a 
 matter of the most vital importance that you 
 do not rub a boy the wrong way by petting 
 him when he has reached the age when he no 
 longer regards himself as a little boy. 
 
 Now that you have settled yourself among 
 your pupils and have made yourself in a measure 
 one of them — though I do not say that a teacher 
 should make himself a child in the class because 
 he is with children — ^you want to turn your 
 heart upward for a moment and get a new hold 
 on the Throne. Are you ready ? Last night 
 you decided upon a little incident that you 
 would tell to win the interest of the pupils and 
 
72 Secrets of Sunday-School Teaching 
 
 open the way to the lesson. Kun over it a 
 moment in your mind to be sure you recall it 
 distinctly. When you have it clearly before 
 you tell it. It is important not to stumble at 
 the beginning. And it is important that while 
 these first words are being spoken you should 
 look straight into the eyes of each pupil. If 
 you want to talk over a 'phone you first get the 
 connection. This is what you must try to do 
 in these opening words — connect your mind 
 and soul with the mind and soul of each pupil. 
 
XIII 
 GETTING THE POI^ifT OF CONTACT 
 
 THE difference between a trained teacher 
 and a novice is never more apparent 
 than in the first five minutes of the 
 lesson hour. The novice looks first at the 
 lesson. The trained teacher looks first at the 
 pupils. The novice thinks of the lesson as a 
 little pile of chunks — chunks of knowledge — 
 which he is commissioned to throw into the 
 minds of his pupils. And he proceeds to throw 
 them. Whether the minds of his pupils are 
 open to his chunks or not does not give him any 
 concern. He feels that it is his business to 
 throw them and he trusts to the Lord for the 
 rest. The trained teacher knows that his lesson 
 is not a pile of chunks but a single link in the 
 chain of knowledge ; and he first looks into the 
 minds of his pupils to see if he can find another 
 link to which it can be attached. He knows 
 that a pupil cannot be taught by throwing 
 knowledge into his mind in chunks. Knowl- 
 edge grows as a chain grows — a link at a time ; 
 and the last link must be linked with the pre- 
 ceding link. And so, as I have said, the trained 
 teacher first looks into the minds of his pupils 
 73 
 
74 Secrets of Sunday-School Teaching 
 
 to find something to which he can attach the 
 link of knowledge which the lesson contains. 
 To do this he must bring his mind to a level 
 with the minds of his pupils. It is what Du 
 Bois calls getting the point of contact/ You 
 cannot stand off at a distance and throw knowl- 
 edge at a pupil. You must come close to him 
 and take hold of a link that is in his mind and 
 proceed to link into it the new link of knowl- 
 edge which you wish him to possess. 
 
 Should the teacher begin by talking about 
 what is uppermost in the minds of the pupils ? 
 ISTo ; not always. I am aware that some of our 
 authorities tell us that if the boys are thinking 
 about baseball the teacher should talk ball, and 
 if the girls are thinking about new hats he should 
 talk hats. But it is one thing to interest your 
 pupils and it is another thing to hold them after 
 they are interested. The theory is that one 
 should talk ball and hats until the pupils are 
 interested and then deftly lead them from 
 ball or hats to the lesson. But can you deftly 
 lead them? That is the question. Having 
 persuaded your balking pony to start off in a 
 run will you be able to hold him in the road 
 and make him go where you want him to go ? 
 It is easy enough to start a boy's mind off on 
 the subject of ball, but are you strong enough 
 
 * "The Point of Contact in Teaching," by Patterson Du 
 Bois, 
 
Getting the Point of Contact 75 
 
 to turn his mind from ball to something else ? 
 Is the average teacher who starts his pupils' 
 minds off on the subject of hats just before 
 Easter able to turn their minds away from hats 
 long enough to get the lesson into their heads ? 
 I am afraid not. A skillful teacher may use 
 almost anything to awaken interest but the un- 
 skillful must be careful. When you want your 
 boy to go up-town on an errand do you start 
 him by sending him to the pantry where the 
 goodies are ? 
 
 But while it is not always safe to begin with 
 what is in the pupil's mind it is necessary to 
 begin with something that he already knows, 
 something in which he is interested. If you 
 have a well trained class, getting your point of 
 contact will not be a difficult matter. As a 
 rule you will have nothing to do but to have 
 your pupils recall the most interesting facts 
 about the last lesson. When you have done 
 this it will be an easy matter for you to lead 
 them up to the present lesson by simply naming 
 the principal intervening events. But I shall 
 assume that you have not a well-trained class, 
 and that your pupils have little or no recollec- 
 tion of the lessons that have gone before. With 
 such a class it will not be sufficient to recall last 
 Sunday's lesson because you will not reach the 
 level of their minds. Kemember the funda- 
 mental rule in all teaching, that you must begin 
 
76 Secrets of Sunday- School Teaching 
 
 with that which is known and then proceed to 
 that which is unknown, connecting the unknown 
 with the known. If your children know noth- 
 ing about the last lesson you must find some- 
 thing else that they know to which you can 
 attach the lesson of the hour. Suppose the 
 lesson is about one of Christ's miracles. What 
 is the character of the miracle? Have your 
 pupils ever learned anything about a miracle of 
 like character ? Kecall that miracle. If you 
 find that they have a particle of interest in it, 
 you can begin with that and lead them on up to 
 the present miracle by telling them that here 
 we have another story like the one that in- 
 terested them before. Suppose you have for 
 your lesson the miracle of the wedding in Cana, 
 and your children know nothing of the miracles 
 of Jesus at all. In this case it is useless to 
 begin with miracles. But you can begin with 
 weddings, for there is not a child in your class 
 who has never heard of a wedding. But here 
 is a great danger. You can begin by talking 
 about weddings in such a way as to lead the 
 minds of your pupils off on an endless excursion 
 through fields of fancy, and they will spend the 
 rest of the lesson hour thinking of weddings 
 that have been or of weddings that are to be. 
 You want to interest them just enough to secure 
 their attention, and then you want to lead their 
 minds away from modern weddings back to 
 
Getting the Point of Contact 77 
 
 ancient Oriental weddings where they will not 
 be tempted to wander off out of your reach. 
 Describe an Oriental wedding and then when 
 you have made it real to them bring Jesus to 
 the wedding feast. Then their minds will be 
 prepared for the story of the miracle at the 
 wedding in Cana. 
 
 I know of nothing in the teacher's work that 
 calls for so much skill as this matter of getting 
 one's point of contact. It is easy enough to be- 
 gin on a level with the pupil's knowledge, but 
 you need to take care not to call anything to 
 their minds that will absorb their attention so 
 that they will lose sight of you. And you 
 need to be careful not to begin with trifles. 
 You cannot get your point of contact to any 
 good purpose by talking to your pupils about 
 the latest fashions, or about a forthcoming en- 
 tertainment. You cannot link the lesson to 
 things of this sort. Of course if you have a 
 class of pick-ups, hoodlums, nondescripts fished 
 out of sundry alleys, you may find it necessary 
 to talk to them about almost anything that will 
 secure their attention ; but the moment you see 
 any sign of interest you must lead them to 
 something else of interest that will serve as a 
 natural step towards the lesson itself. 
 
XIV 
 HOW TO TEACH THE LESSON 
 
 WHEN you have succeeded in getting 
 your point of contact — when you 
 find that what you are saying is on 
 a level with your pupils' minds and is arousing 
 their interest — you are ready to lead them into 
 the lesson itself. The important thing at this 
 point is to lead them without delay. If you 
 give them a single moment the minds which 
 you have aroused will start on excursions of 
 their own choosing, and you will have a hard 
 time coaxing them back and getting them to 
 take the road through the lesson which you 
 have selected for them. Did you ever see an 
 old man tr3ring to catch a frisky colt on a frosty 
 morning ? That's the picture of many a slug- 
 gish teacher in his efforts to catch the minds of 
 his pupils after he has allowed them to wander 
 away. 
 
 You have now recalled the last lesson and 
 have mentioned the intervening events. " This 
 brings us " — I should say here — " to our lesson 
 for to-day. And an exceedingly interesting 
 lesson it is." Here I would open my Bible. 
 " Let us turn to it. It is in the — what chap- 
 78 
 
How to Teach the Lesson 79 
 
 ter ? " If no one knows just where it is don't 
 waste any time over it. Call out the book and 
 chapter yourself and ask Charlie to read the 
 first verse. Are there any obscure words that 
 need to be cleared up ? Bring out the mean- 
 ing in the fewest possible words and then ask 
 the least attentive pupil in the class to read the 
 second verse. The whole class might read the 
 third, another inattentive boy the fourth, and so 
 on. Keep your eyes open for inattentive pupils 
 and give them something to do. I would vary 
 the order of calling for the verses, and I would 
 never let the pupils know the order. If Charlie 
 knows that Kobert will read the next verse he 
 will not even look at it. Keejp all the class on 
 duty all the time. You cannot do this if you 
 read the lesson yourself. The moment you be- 
 gin every pupil will feel that he is off duty and 
 nearly every one of them will slip away from 
 you in spirit, though not in body, before you 
 get through, unless the lesson happens to be a 
 narrative of unusual interest. 
 
 When the reading is ended I would say some- 
 thing like, "JSTow let us see what we have 
 here ; " and without talking about it I would 
 begin a rapid fire of questions designed to draw 
 out from the pupils the principal facts of the 
 lesson. I would not point out these facts ; I 
 would draw them out. Do not tell a pupil 
 anything that you can get him to tell you. 
 
8o Secrets of Sunday-School Teaching 
 
 You are not to throw facts at him with the 
 hope that they will somehow find lodgment in 
 his mind : you are to lead him up to the facts so 
 that he can discover them for himself. And 
 you should do this by questions. The younger 
 a child the more important it is to put every- 
 thing you can in the form of a question. You 
 may lecture to grown people because they can 
 concentrate their minds upon what you are say- 
 ing. In other words, they can hold on to their 
 own minds. A child does not have this power 
 of concentration and you must get hold of his 
 mind and hold it for him. The question is the 
 hook with which you get hold of his mind and 
 keep it from running away. 
 
 At first you may have difficulty in getting 
 the children to answer at all. You will always 
 find it hard to draw them out if you have been 
 doing all the talking for some time. Have you 
 not noticed how hard it is to say anything after 
 somebody else has been monopolizing the con- 
 versation? From sheer stupidity, you say. 
 Certainly ; and you don't want to make your 
 pupils stupid. Asking questions that are too 
 hard has quite as bad an effect as too much 
 talking. It forces the pupils to be silent, and 
 if you keep them silent long they will not even 
 feel like answering the easy questions which 
 may come by and by. Ask your easy ques- 
 tions at the beginning. Indeed it is a good 
 
How to Teach the Lesson 81 
 
 plan sometimes to ask half a dozen questions 
 which can be answered without any effort, just 
 to get the pupils in the habit of answering. 
 "When the answers come back briskly make 
 your questions a little harder. If the class 
 grows dull make your questions easy again. 
 
 There are a great many points about the art 
 of questioning which you will need to think 
 over later. Just now it will be sufficient to at- 
 tend to the few simple suggestions I have given 
 and to watch carefully your manner in asking 
 questions. Try to recall how you did it last 
 Sunday. Did you throw your questions at 
 your pupils in a careless, haphazard sort of 
 way? Did you fire them at them out of a 
 popgun ? Did the tone of your voice say that 
 you didn't believe they could answer, or you 
 didn't care whether they did or not, or you 
 were going to force them to answer whether or 
 no? Did your questions demcmd answers or 
 invite them ? Did you imagine that you were 
 a lawyer and that your pupils were on the 
 witness stand? Did you act as some unwise 
 parents I know who always question their 
 children as if they were trying to catch them 
 in something? Did you question them with 
 all the ardour and tenderness of a lover trying 
 to secure an answer to the one question ? 
 
XV 
 HOW TO ASK QUESTIONS 
 
 0UESTI0:N^ING is an art— one of the 
 fine arts, if you will. Anybody can 
 ask questions — anybody can ask a 
 great many questions ; but to ask questions 
 that will open up the pupil's mind to the light 
 and reveal to you what he knows, and then 
 lead him on to the goal which you desire he 
 shall reach — this is the test, the supreme test of 
 the master teacher. 
 
 First of all, you want to ask questions that 
 will reveal to you just what the pupil knows. 
 These questions should draw out his knowledge 
 of the last lesson. You do not need to ask 
 many — three or four, as a rule, will serve your 
 purpose. When you have found something 
 that he knows you are ready to build upon it 
 the things you want him to learn. 
 
 Then you should ask a few questions to find 
 out whether the pupil has read the lesson text 
 correctly. Does he know what it says ? A 
 great many people habitually misread things. 
 Grown-up people do it as well as little children. 
 Said Smith, " I see by the morning's paper that 
 Willie Jones got hurt on his automobile." 
 82 
 
How to Ask Questions 83 
 
 " Sure ? " said I. " Sure." " But Willie Jones 
 does not own an automobile." " I don't know 
 about that ; it is what the paper said. I read 
 it myself." Then I took up the paper and read 
 how Willie Jones had been hurt by a passing 
 automobile. Half the children in your class 
 have very likely misread at least one or two 
 verses in the lesson. You want to get the les- 
 son text clearly before their vision. 
 
 The next thing is to ask questions that will 
 clear up the meaning of the text. There are 
 several obscure words and phrases which you 
 do not want to explain yourself if you can get 
 your pupils to explain them for you. Fre- 
 quently if a child does not know what a word 
 means you may ask several questions that will 
 lead up to the meaning and will reveal it to 
 him. It is always better to ask questions that 
 will help the child to see the thing for himself 
 than to point out the thing to him. In asking 
 questions of this sort care must be taken not to 
 consume too much time. Don't ask questions 
 about things of little or no importance. 
 
 When you have gotten at the meaning of the 
 text — that is to say when you have cleared up 
 these difficult words and phrases so that your 
 pupils will be able to repeat the lesson text in 
 their own words and phrases, you will be ready 
 to ask questions that will bring out the teach- 
 ing of the lesson. This is the most difficult 
 
84 Secrets of Sunday-School Teaching 
 
 task of all. A great many teachers, when they 
 get to this point, don't know what to say next 
 except to ask, "Now, what does the lesson 
 teach us ? " As a rule, when one has gotten to 
 this point, no pupil is ready to tell what the 
 lesson teaches. Besides, the lesson may teach 
 a great many things and not merely one truth. 
 You do not want to bring out everything the 
 lesson teaches. You want to select some one 
 important truth — the most important truth — 
 the central truth of the lesson, and you want 
 to ask a series of questions that will bring the 
 pupil to that central truth. Don't ask what is 
 the heart of the lesson. Lead him up to the 
 heart of the lesson. The only way to do work 
 of this sort effectively is to prepare for it 
 beforehand. In the quiet of your own room 
 you want to ask yourself. What is the gist of 
 this lesson ? What is it about ? What can I 
 get out of it for myself ? The thing that you 
 get out of it for yourself is very likely the 
 thing you will want to teach your pupils. 
 With this great central truth in view, make an 
 outline of the lesson that will lead up to it. I 
 would make this outline in the form of ques- 
 tions — just as few questions as will be necessary 
 to lead from the beginning of the lesson on up 
 to the central truth. These questions I would 
 write down on a slip of paper, not for the pur- 
 pose of taking them to the class on paper, but 
 
How to Ask Questions 85 
 
 for the purpose of taking them to the class in my 
 mind. As a rule the questions which you write 
 down on paper in their natural order will come 
 to your mind in the same order while you are 
 teaching. That is, if you make your questions 
 clear, direct and to the point. You want to use 
 very few words and you want those words to 
 be of the simplest sort. A rambling, indefinite 
 sort of a question will not &x itself in your 
 mind, and if it should by any means turn up in 
 your class, it will not be worth asking. These 
 questions which you write down on paper be- 
 fore going to the class ought to be read over 
 and studied and revised until you are sure that 
 they have been put in the simplest, strongest 
 and most direct language you can command. 
 If you do this you will have no difficulty what- 
 ever in recalling them when in the act of teach- 
 ing. Moreover, they will be impressed so 
 deeply upon your mind that they will furnish 
 an outline leading directly to the goal which 
 will keep your own mind from wandering, 
 and will save you from rambling, indefinite 
 teaching. 
 
 Do not forget that the ultimate aim of all 
 questioning is to lead the pupils up to and help 
 them to grasp the great central truth of the 
 lesson. It is not worth while to ask ques 
 tions to win their attention unless you intend 
 to win their attention to the lesson. 
 
86 Secrets of Sunday-School Teaching 
 
 Teachers ask why they have so much dif- 
 ficulty in getting their pupils to answer ques- 
 tions. There are several reasons. Some teach- 
 ers do not put their questions clearly. They 
 are too indirect and too long. A question to be 
 clear must be short and as straight as an 
 arrow. Some questions go beyond the range 
 of the pupil's knowledge. The wisest man in 
 the world cannot answer that sort of a ques- 
 tion. If your pupils are timid and need to be 
 encouraged, ask them easy questions, but do 
 not ask questions that are so absurdly simple as 
 to make them feel that you are reflecting upon 
 their intelligence. Make your questions con- 
 crete. Avoid abstractions. Don't talk about 
 heroism and goodness but about heroes and 
 good men. Don't talk about people and places 
 in general but about people and places in partic- 
 ular. Occasionally I would ask a question of 
 the whole class, but as a rule I would ask it of 
 a particular pupil. And as a rule ask your 
 question first and then call the name of the 
 pupils you want to answer it. If you call the 
 name of the pupil first the rest will feel that 
 they are off duty for the moment and will 
 cease to pay attention. For the same reason I 
 would never ask questions of pupils in rotation. 
 You are not going to get your pupils to answer 
 well until you get them to listen well. The 
 secret of prompt answers is to so teach the 
 
How to Ask Questions 87 
 
 lesson as to have the attention of all your 
 pupils all of the time. 
 
 I would not do anything to make children 
 answer questions. Probably one reason why 
 your pupils don't answer your questions is 
 because their teacher has been trying to force 
 answers out of them. Children don't like to be 
 approached with a crowbar. Stop trying to 
 make them answer questions and try to learn 
 the art of asking them so that they will want 
 to answer. I know a teacher who can hardly 
 finish a question before every child in the class 
 is trying to answer. 
 
 In teaching very timid children I would 
 begin by asking a few easy questions of the 
 whole class and having the pupils answer in 
 concert. Usually the most timid child can be 
 induced to answer simple questions along with 
 the rest. Of course answering in concert is 
 not much of a mental exercise and it should be 
 abandoned as soon as the more timid pupils 
 have been drawn out by it. But care should 
 be taken not to frighten these timid ones back 
 into their shells by asking them diificult ques- 
 tions. Simple questions for the timid so long 
 as they are timid. 
 
 I have known the diffidence of grown-up 
 people in a class to be overcome by a simple 
 expedient. The teacher would say : " Before 
 beginning the lesson let us spend a few minutes 
 
88 Secrets of Sunday-School Teaching 
 
 in a simple Bible drill. I am going to ask a 
 few questions — ^you'll laugh at them because 
 they are so simple perhaps— and I want you to 
 answer them all together just as if you were 
 children. The simplest things need to be often 
 repeated to keep them clear in one's mind. 
 Now, ready " — and then he would fire a dozen 
 questions at them on, say, the names and order 
 of the books of the Bible, and the class would 
 answer in concert. Frequently the whole class 
 would get into a glow of interest, the diffidence 
 would all disappear, and the teacher would glide 
 into the lesson before they were conscious of it. 
 Perhaps after all the most important thing 
 in asking a question is the manner in which you 
 ask it. I don't care what your question is, if 
 you do not ask it in a way to invite an answer 
 you are not likely to get the answer you want. 
 Some teachers throw questions at their pupils 
 as if they were stoning them, and then wonder 
 why nobody seems disposed to answer. Culti- 
 vate a pleasing, spirited, cordial manner. 
 
XVI 
 HOW TO ILLUSTEATE THE LESSON 
 
 IT goes without saying that the teacher 
 must use illustrations, for illustrating is a 
 large part of the teacher's work. For 
 teaching is the art of making one see and grasp 
 things, and the chief business of the teacher in 
 many a lesson is simply to shed light upon 
 things so that they will be clearly photographed 
 upon the pupils' minds, and warmly welcomed 
 into the pupils' hearts. 
 
 And to illustrate is to shed light. It is just 
 that— nothing more, nothing less. Some teach- 
 ers have an idea that an illustration is an 
 anecdote, and they seem to think that the 
 longer the story the better it will illustrate. If 
 you can tell a story so that it will shed light- 
 so that it will bring out more clearly and at- 
 tractively the truth you are trying to teach- 
 that story will be an illustration ; but the fact 
 that it is a story does not make it an illustration. 
 There are teachers who spend half the time in 
 class telling stories which have been suggested 
 to them by the lesson, and imagine that they are 
 illustrating the lesson, when they are only mak- 
 ing their pupils forget it. A long story draws 
 89 
 
go Secrets of Sunday-School Teaching 
 
 the mind of the pupil so far away from the 
 lesson that when it is through he has lost all 
 idea of what the teacher set out to illustrate. 
 And sometimes the teacher forgets, too. I 
 would avoid all long stories for this reason if 
 for no other, and I would avoid exciting stories 
 for the same reason. Then, too, it is of the 
 utmost importance to avoid all stories which 
 open up a tempting field of fancy for young 
 minds to roam in. 1 would never tell a Christ- 
 mas story just before Christmas — not if I wanted 
 my pupils to think of anything the rest of the 
 lesson hour. Nor would I tell a picnic story at 
 the picnic season. 
 
 I do not believe in the free use of stories — 
 especially second-hand stories gotten out of 
 books and papers. Now and then they may 
 be used effectively, but more often they are 
 used harmfully. I do not believe that it is 
 worth while to amuse pupils just to interest 
 them. If we would think of the pupils them- 
 selves as much as we think of plans to interest 
 them we would not find it necessary to tell 
 many stories in order to secure their attention. 
 The best way in the world to interest boys is to 
 take an interest in the boys themselves, and to 
 show it by talking with them about what they 
 are doing. Don't talk to them, talk with them. 
 Drop into an easy conversation about some 
 things that have interested them during the 
 
How to Illustrate the Lesson 91 
 
 past week and then watch your chance to lead 
 up to the lesson. As a rule the chance is sure 
 to come sooner or later — usually sooner than 
 you will expect. Somebody will say something 
 that will suggest something that is in the lesson, 
 and before they know it you will have them in 
 the very middle of it. Some teachers will tell 
 you that it is dangerous to introduce such 
 foreign matters into a class, and then they will 
 go off and get a story out of a book a thousand 
 miles further off. Story telling is a talent, 
 but it is not a necessary talent, if you will sit 
 down in the midst of your pupils, on their level, 
 and begin where you find them. Boys are more 
 interested in things they are doing and want 
 to do than in all the stories in the world. 
 Besides, when you talk with them about what 
 they are doing the conviction grows upon them 
 that you are interested in them, and you might 
 tell a thousand stories without making them 
 feel that you care a fig for them. 
 
 I would never tell more than one story in the 
 course of a lesson, and frequently I would not 
 tell any at all. There are easier and safer ways 
 to illustrate. For example, you can often shed 
 light on a truth you are trying to teach by call- 
 ing attention to certain facts or events which 
 come within the range of a child's every-day 
 life. Sometimes a simple design on a black- 
 board or a writing pad (I would always carry a 
 
92 Secrets of Sunday- School Teaching 
 
 writing pad to Sunday-school if I did not have 
 a blackboard) will bring out a truth with sur- 
 prising clearness. Occasionally I would use 
 familiar objects as object lessons. Here, how- 
 ever, as in telling stories, one must be careful. 
 An object lesson must not be too novel. It 
 must not create a sensation. Chemical experi- 
 ments before a class are interesting, but in a 
 primary department they create such a sensa- 
 tion that the._children never get back to the 
 l^ssonagain. The more familiar the object the 
 better. Again it must not be something that 
 the pupils will covet, or something that will 
 awaken appetite. A prettily dressed doll may 
 make what you will regard as a perfect love of 
 an object lesson but to the little tots before you 
 it will be a perfect love of a doll which they 
 would dearly love to have for their very own. 
 A glass of water is a very effective object lesson, 
 but I would never use it on a warm day if I 
 wanted to awaken anything in my pupils besides 
 thirst. 
 
 Nevertheless there is nothing more helpful 
 when used at the right time than an object les- 
 son of the right sort. If you wanted to go to 
 'Frisco and you had your choice between a 
 Pullman and an ox-cart, would you choose an 
 ox-cart ? If you wanted to reach the mind of 
 a child, and you could reach it in one-half the 
 time and with one-half the trouble through the 
 
How to Illustrate the Lesson 93 
 
 Eye-gate that it would take to reach it through 
 the Ear-gate, should you choose the Ear-gate ? 
 We take to short routes and to time-saving in- 
 ventions as a duck takes to water, and yet how 
 slow we are to grasp the possibilities of the 
 shortest route to the mind. I say " we " ; I 
 mean we Protestants ; our Catholic friends 
 learned the route long ago and they go by no 
 other if they can help it. If the Catholic is 
 more devoted to his church than the Protestant 
 it is largely because of what the Catholic is 
 made to see and handle while the Protestant is 
 left to work it out with his imagination. And 
 so many of us are lacking in imagination ! 
 One may say that Kome has overdone it, and 
 perhaps she has, but any one who knows any- 
 thing of the fundamental principles of teaching 
 will tell us that we Protestants have neglected 
 a great opportunity. We indulge in so many 
 abstractions when we might give to our pupils 
 something they can see with their own eyes. 
 We talk of principles in general when we ought 
 to show them things in the concrete. Many a 
 teacher spends half an hour trying to explain a 
 thing by word of mouth when a pencil and a 
 slip of paper and two or three crooked marks 
 would make it as clear as daylight in two 
 minutes. 
 
 There are so many ways in which we might 
 make use of the Eye-gate to our profit. We 
 
94 Secrets of Sunday-School Teaching 
 
 use it a good deal in the primary depart- 
 ment, when we might use it in all the depart- 
 ments. 
 
 We overestimate the strength of the average 
 mind of the big boy and girl and even of the 
 grown up. We think pictures and blocks are 
 for little children, but we never outgrow the 
 picture-and-block age. The prof oundest thinker 
 will listen to your talk as you walk with a 
 yawn, and open his eyes wide with new inter- 
 est the moment you stop to illustrate your prop- 
 osition with a stick in the sand. There are 
 few methods to reach the mind through the 
 eye that are in use in the primary department 
 which might not be adapted to our most ad- 
 vanced classes. 
 
 I would always choose my illustrations before 
 going to the class. If you leave it to the in- 
 spiration of the moment you may not think of 
 any illustrations at all, or those you think of 
 may fail to illustrate. But do not forget to go 
 first in your search for illustrations to your own 
 every-day life. Cultivate the habit of asking 
 about everything you see and hear, and read in 
 the newspapers. What will this illustrate? 
 There are no illustrations like home-made ones 
 be they ever so homely. There is as much dif- 
 ference between telling something that you 
 have seen with your own eyes and something 
 you have read in a book, as there is between 
 
How to Illustrate the Lesson 95 
 
 the discourse of a preacher whose words come 
 hot from his heart and a discourse read from 
 the pulpit from a volume of South's Sermons. 
 The printed sermon may be far better than the 
 spoken, but, in the language of the street, it 
 somehow fails to reach the spot. Next to 
 something that has happened in your experi- 
 ence is something that you have read in the 
 daily newspapers, because the daily paper is a 
 record of the every-day life of our own day. 
 Last of all you may go to a book ; but don't if 
 you can help it. And never — never at the peril 
 of your life— go to an encyclopedia of illustra- 
 tions. An encyclopedia of illustrations is a 
 pretty good museum but a mighty poor tool 
 chest. 
 
 There are hidden stores of illustrations locked 
 up in your memory and visible stores of illustra- 
 tions within the bounds of your vision — enough 
 to last a lifetime. A book of illustrations on 
 22ur study_table_.is_the, greatest obstacle you 
 can put in the. way of learning theart of illus- 
 trating. 
 
XYII 
 
 HOW TO MAKE THE MOST OP A BIBLE 
 STOEY 
 
 TO make the most of a Bible story, it 
 must be used not as a picture to please 
 but as an illustration to instruct. 
 Whether drawn artistically with coloured chalks 
 or roughly sketched with a quick, bold hand, it 
 is given us not to criticize, but to teach us what 
 we need to know. 
 
 In a certain school the lesson on Daniel and 
 his temptation was presented by an intelligent 
 teacher as a very beautiful but very old paint- 
 ing to be admired by the class. When the 
 children went home of course they left the paint- 
 ing behind them. It was a magnificent oppor- 
 tunity shamefully wasted. 
 
 Suppose the teacher had said: "Now, chil- 
 dren, here is a young man severely tempted. 
 Let us watch him and see how he overcomes 
 his temptation so that we may know what to 
 do when we are tempted." That would have 
 been better than placing on exhibition an old 
 painting. See how practical it could be made. 
 First, they have a look at the youth. What sort 
 of a youth must Daniel have been, to overcome 
 96 
 
How to Make the Most of a Bible Story 97 
 
 such a temptation ? Then they would look at 
 the temptation. "What made the king's meat 
 so hard to resist ? In the first place Daniel was 
 very young — at the very age when such a 
 temptation is strongest. In the second place, 
 he was away from home. Temptations are 
 always strongest when away from home — out 
 of sight of mother and playmates and the 
 people that know you. In the third place, he 
 might have said : " I am in Babylon ; why 
 not do as Babylon does ? Why be peculiar ? " 
 No boy wants to be peculiar. "What's the 
 use of being the only one in the crowd who 
 refuses to drink ? " " What's the use of making 
 a scene ? " Then he might have said, " I'll get 
 my new friends in trouble." The young man 
 at his first dinner party says something like 
 that. "Why offend my hostess by refusing 
 this wine when she has been so kind to me ? " 
 Then he might have said, " What harm is there 
 in the meat and wine in itself ? " And, finally, 
 it was a matter of life and death with him — 
 just as it is a matter of life and death with 
 every boy when he is about to decide about 
 that first drink. 
 
 Now the interesting question would come 
 up : How did he overcome ? In the first 
 place, he started at the beginning. He stopped 
 before he began. He did not indulge a few 
 days with the intention of stopping as soon as 
 
98 Secrets of Sunday-School Teaching 
 
 it could be done without a scene. In the 
 second place, he purposed in his heart. He 
 said, Sink or swim, live or die, survive or perish, 
 I will not touch it. Not many boys start out 
 that way. " I expect to be a temperance man, 
 of course ; but as to never taking a glass of 
 wine, I don't care to make any rash promises." 
 Such a boy's purpose to be a temperance man is 
 not of the sink or swim variety. In the third 
 place, he went to work to carry his purpose 
 into effect. He made arrangements to keep 
 the temptation out of his way. And last, but 
 not least, God helped him — as God helps every 
 young man who starts in life with the right 
 purpose in his heart. 
 
 Then the teacher would talk about the re- 
 wards; the benefit of abstinence to the body 
 and the mind and the social standing : and 
 above all the soul's standing ; and how that 
 benefit, unlike propping up on beer, is perma- 
 nent. 
 
 And finally the teacher would lead his pupils 
 up to the conclusion of the whole matter : 
 
 " Dare to be a Daniel ! " 
 
XYIII 
 PRESSING HOME THE CENTRAL TRUTH 
 
 IT is not worth while to ask questions to 
 awaken the minds of your pupils unless 
 you are going to use their awakened minds 
 to grasp the central truth of the lesson. Now 
 and then you will have a lesson in which the 
 central truth is not apparent. It may teach 
 several truths and no one of them may appear 
 more prominent than the rest. In such a case 
 you should choose the truth that has made the 
 deepest impression upon your own heart. You 
 may sometimes miss the mark but you are not 
 likely to go far wrong. The important thing 
 is to have one great truth to press home and to 
 have one only. 
 
 This is a matter you can never afford to for- 
 get. A great many teachers fail to teach any- 
 thing because they try to teach too many 
 things. It is worth while to remember that 
 the brain of a child is of limited capacity. 
 Most of our brains are, for that matter. You 
 can put so much into one's head at a time, and 
 no more. This is as true of the heart as of the 
 head. Teachers have found out by experience 
 that if you would put anything into the head 
 99 
 
100 Secrets of Sunday-School Teaching 
 
 of a child in order that it may find its way into 
 his heart you must insert only one truth at a 
 time. Teach only one truth and it may find its 
 way into his heart. Crowd his brain with 
 several truths and the probability is that 
 nothing will find its way down into his heart. 
 
 A lesson makes an impression very much like 
 a picture. If a picture has no central figure 
 or central theme it is not likely to make a 
 lasting impression of any sort. You have seen 
 Munkacsy's " Christ before Pilate." You have 
 never forgotten it. You will never forget it 
 because you cannot forget its central figure. If 
 Christ had not been brought out so prominently 
 — if He had been placed in the picture along 
 with the crowd — the picture as a whole would 
 probably have left no impression upon you at 
 all. You would not see it in your mind's eye 
 as you see it to-day. Yet it is the whole 
 picture that you see and not Christ only. 
 
 I would handle this whole matter in this 
 way : Here is a lesson — to illustrate — on the 
 healing of the nobleman's son at Cana. In the 
 preparation of this lesson I would ask, " What 
 is it in this lesson that impresses me most ? " 
 Clearly it is the fact that this man who knew 
 so little about Jesus was willing to take Him 
 at His word. This interests me, for probably 
 the hardest thing I ever tried to do was to take 
 Jesus at His word, when I knew as little about 
 
Pressing Home the Central Truth loi 
 
 Him as this Eoman officer did. And this will 
 interest my pupils, for they have had the same 
 experience. And some of them are thinking 
 very hard of God to-day for requiring them to 
 take Him at His word. 
 
 I would think over this matter a while. I 
 would make it very personal. Do I take Jesus 
 at His word ? Am I not continually longing 
 for something to happen that will demonstrate 
 to me the truth of what He has told me ? Do 
 I not sometimes feel inclined to murmur against 
 God who gave the early disciples so many mira- 
 cles to help their faith and who has denied 
 these miracles to me ? Am 1 willing to take 
 Him at His word ? 
 
 Until I can answer this question as it ought 
 to be answered I should not go a step further. 
 The very moment I have answered it, how- 
 ever, I will be filled with a desire to lead my 
 pupils up to the point where they will be will- 
 ing to take Jesus at His word. Then I will say 
 to myself, " JSTow I am going to teach this les- 
 son for the sole purpose of bringing my pupils 
 to the point of taking Jesus at His word. I 
 am going to picture Jesus in such a light that 
 it will be easy for them to take Him at His 
 word. I shall have no other purpose, no other 
 thought. Every question that I may ask, every 
 incident that I may relate, every verse that I 
 may quote, every word or look or deed, shall 
 
102 Secrets of Sunday-School Teaching 
 
 be to this single end. If I can go to my class 
 in this frame of mind I will be in no danger of 
 rambling, of teaching a little of this and a little 
 of that, of clipping up the lesson and serving it 
 as so much Scripture hash, of losing a moment's 
 time trying to decide what point to bring out 
 next. My aim shall shine out before me as clear 
 as a star in the heavens, and I shall follow that 
 star as straight as an arrow." 
 
XIX 
 HOW TO CLOSE THE LESSON 
 
 WHEN you have gotten at the mean- 
 ing of the lesson, what do you do 
 with it? I know some very fine 
 folk who do nothing with it. They tell us that 
 it is unscholarly to study a thing for any other 
 purpose than to know, and they like to be 
 scholarly. It sounds well to be scholarly. 
 Professor Up-to-date Sophocles spends an hour 
 in his Sunday-school class discussing the meas- 
 urements of Noah's ark. !N"ext Sunday he will 
 run his yardstick up the Tower of Babel. The 
 pupils wonder what there is in it for them, but 
 Professor Sophocles does not tell them. " We 
 study the truth for truth's sake," says the pro- 
 fessor, and he repels with scorn the base sug- 
 gestion that the truth can be put to practical 
 uses. But ordinary folk don't mind putting 
 the little they learn to practical uses, and if I 
 find anything in the lesson I am going to ask 
 what there is in it for me. If a man studies 
 the Bible simply for the sake of knowing, he 
 may become the greatest scholar in the world, 
 but he will not necessarily become a better 
 man. If you want to know simply in order to 
 103 
 
104 Secrets of Sunday- School Teaching 
 
 know, there is no special reason why you should 
 study the Bible — you might try Plato. But if 
 you want to know in order to do^ you will find 
 nothing to equal the Bible, for therein is all 
 the wealth of knowledge that sheds light on 
 the path of duty. " JS'oah built the ark ; let us 
 see how he built it," says the professor. "Well 
 enough, but before he is through with his meas- 
 urements the lesson hour is over. Of course it 
 is interesting, and much of it is necessary, but 
 you and I want something more. We are not 
 going to learn how Noah was saved unless we 
 learn about his ark, but we must not stop with 
 his ark. We want something that will help us 
 in building our own ark. I want to be saved 
 — like Noah. And so when I learn that Noah 
 built the ark, I ask. What is there in it for me ? 
 And when I look into the matter, I find that 
 Noah built the ark in obedience to God's com- 
 mand and according to God's instructions. 
 This is the kernel of the matter. This is 
 the thing that makes the story worth while. 
 Noah w^as saved because he did what God 
 told him to do, and did it in the way God 
 told him to do it. Now I will go and do like- 
 wise. To-day, to-morrow, through all the days 
 to come, by God's help I am going to do what 
 He tells me to do, and I am not going to insist 
 on having my own way. I am going to do it 
 according to His instructions. This may sound 
 
How to Close the Lesson 1 05 
 
 old-fashioned, but I'd rather get at the kernel 
 of the matter, even at the risk of being out of 
 fashion. 
 
 A lesson should be brought to a close by 
 pressing home to the hearts of the pupils the 
 heart of the lesson. How this should be done 
 depends upon the pupils, the lesson and the 
 hour. A mere exhortation will not do; fre- 
 quently it is the worst thing you can do. 
 When the pupils have the truth clearly in their 
 minds you want to press it down into their 
 hearts. Don't think of driving it home ; think 
 of pressing it home. Some teachers would do 
 better work if they could rid their minds of 
 the image of driving nails home, and put in its 
 place the thought of the gentle pressure of a 
 loving hand. Often the best thing to do after 
 the truth has been made clear is to pause until 
 every one is perfectly quiet and attentive and 
 then tell as impressively as you can a simple 
 heart-story illustrating the truths you are teach- 
 ing. Tell it slowly and allow no one to inter- 
 rupt you, and when you have spoken the last 
 word remain silent a moment to give time for 
 the story to do its work. And remember, you 
 want a story that appeals to the heart, or none 
 at all. Sometimes it is well to ask the pupils 
 to write down on paper the message which 
 they think the lesson has for them. What does 
 it teach them that they ought to be, or do ? 
 
io6 Secrets of Sunday-School Teaching 
 
 Or what do they find in the lesson that they 
 think will be of the most help to them? Often 
 a good way to press home a lesson is to show 
 the pupils a picture relating to it or illustrating 
 its central truth. Of course the picture should 
 be kept out of sight and no mention made of it 
 until the moment you are to show it. You can 
 do this in a way that will create a deep im- 
 pression and you can do it in a way that will 
 create no impression at all. If you have an ap- 
 propriate poem — something short and tender — 
 you might repeat it at the close of the lesson 
 slowly and in a low voice. At another time if 
 you have a beautiful text or quotation contain- 
 ing the very cream of the lesson, or its most 
 important truth, repeat it and then have all the 
 pupils repeat it in concert. 
 
 Whatever may be chosen to close with, let it 
 be warm, tender, inspiring. All difiiculties, all 
 those points which suggest unprofitable discus- 
 sion, all seeming harshness should be gotten out 
 of the way early in the lesson. If Sinai thun- 
 ders, give the echo time to die out. If you 
 must utter a word of rebuke, utter it and get it 
 out of the way. If you find yourself bursting 
 with that little joke, tell it early in the lesson 
 (it is better to tell it than burst), and get rid of 
 it. Everything should be gotten out of the way 
 that there may be room for the still small voice. 
 And you should plan your lesson so that these 
 
How to Close the Lesson 107 
 
 last w6rds shall be spoken during the last min- 
 utes of the lesson hour. They may as well re- 
 main unspoken if the lesson is hurried through 
 with in order to have Ryo minutes at the end 
 to " talk about something else." 
 
XX 
 OTHEE TEACHING POINTS 
 
 NOTHIJSTG interests us like folks. 
 You can awaken interest in the 
 dullest lesson if you will only put 
 people in it. Everybody is attracted by the hu- 
 man element. Everybody likes to hear about 
 people. Everybody devours the personal col- 
 umn in the newspapers, and women, at least, 
 read the marriages and deaths, which are in- 
 teresting personals. This inborn interest in our 
 fellows is a mighty force in the development of 
 character. Is that boy in your class without am- 
 bition ? Give him a story of a flesh-and-blood 
 hero. If it does not stir him it will be because 
 there is nothing in him to stir. 
 
 2. You never know what you are really 
 teaching until you hear from your pupils. A 
 wise teacher seeks expression from his pupils at 
 every step. To try to teach a silent class is like 
 trying to do a very delicate piece of work in 
 the dark: you never know when you hit or 
 when you miss, though you may be sure that 
 as a rule you miss. Getting a pupil to speak 
 his mind not only clarifies a matter and fixes it 
 in his mind, but it sheds light for you to work 
 jo8 
 
Other Teaching Points 109 
 
 by as well. You know what you are doing and 
 what to do next. 
 
 3. Don't try to teach the meaning of a verse 
 without regard to its surroundings. Texts of 
 Scripture are not nuggets of gold scattered along 
 the road to heaven to toll us upward, but rather 
 they are inseparable links of a golden chain 
 stretched along the way for our guidance. It 
 is a silly habit we have of chopping off a link 
 as the notion takes us to try to make it do the 
 duty of the whole chain. 
 
 4. It may be true that the sole business of 
 the teacher of mathematics is to make the lesson 
 clear, but it is not true of the teacher of the 
 Bible. In the Sunday-school we do not teach 
 our pupils simply in order that they may know ; 
 we teach them in order that they may do, and 
 we have learned that merely making a lesson 
 clear seldom moves one to do anything. When 
 the lesson is made clear so that the mind will 
 take it in, it must then be presented so that the 
 heart will take it in. It must be laid on the 
 conscience. 
 
 5. Should a teacher attempt to answer a 
 question the discussion of which is likely to 
 awaken doubt ? As a rule I would not attempt 
 to answer a question of this sort in class unless 
 I saw that other pupils besides the questioner 
 were interested. In this event evading the 
 question might do more harm than even an 
 
no Secrets of Sunday-School Teaching 
 
 awkward attempt to answer it. If one or two 
 pupils only are interested I would promise to 
 talk over the matter with them privately. In 
 that event, however, I would be careful not to 
 suggest more doubts than are already in the 
 pupils' minds. One may do that by one's man- 
 ner as easily as by what one may say. Better 
 not attempt to answer at all than to hesitate or 
 betray anxiety or act as though you felt that 
 you were in a tight place. 
 
 6. Keep your Bible closed so that you may 
 look at your pupils. The teacher who does not 
 use his eyes in teaching keeps his best talent 
 hidden in a napkin. A good pair of eyes 
 properly used will do more to hold attention 
 and to keep up the current of sympathy be- 
 tween your teacher and pupil than anything 
 else you possess. Look straight into the eyes of 
 your pupils all of the time. 
 
 7. One reason why some children take no 
 interest in Bible stories is because they have not 
 the slightest idea where the incidents related 
 occurred. To make a story interesting it must 
 be given a local habitation as well as a name. 
 A child must see the place and the people. 
 The cure for a great deal of the prevailing in- 
 difference to Bible history is a faithful study of 
 Bible geography. Get the children thoroughly 
 interested in the land of the Book and you will 
 have little difficulty in getting them interested 
 
Other Teaching Points 1 1 1 
 
 in the Book. The most pressing need of many 
 a class is a map and a teacher who knows how 
 to use it. Never mind about a bought map. 
 A simple outline on a blackboard or on a sheet 
 of paper is better. What you want is not 
 merely to own a map, but to use the map you 
 own. 
 
 8. Partiality is a great evil, but it is worth 
 while to remember that children are apt to 
 think you are partial at times whatever you 
 do, and that it is better to show kindness at 
 the risk of appearing partial than not to show 
 kindness at all. 
 
 9. The average teacher's greatest mistake is 
 in taking it for granted that our pupils un- 
 derstand what we are saying, when as a matter 
 of fact our sentences are about as liable to get 
 twisted on the way into their little heads as 
 they are to keep straight. A little child 
 especially is apt to turn the sentence to suit 
 that which is already uppermost in his mind. 
 
 10. The average young girl usually shields 
 herself from her teacher's efforts to lead her to 
 Christ by insisting that she never does any 
 harm and therefore does not need to repent like 
 other people. Set before her a picture that will 
 show her the absurdity of her position. For 
 example, you hire a man to work on your farm. 
 At the end of the year he comes to you with a 
 statement of what he has done, expecting a 
 
112 Secrets of Sunday-School Teaching 
 
 settlement. " I have been a very inoffensive 
 labourer," he says ; and he begins to tell you 
 how he has never done you any harm ; how he 
 did not sow tares in your wheat while you 
 slept ; how he did not pull up all your corn, and 
 tear down your fences, and cut down the best 
 trees in your orchard. You soon grow very 
 tired of that. What a dunce he is to think 
 you will pay him for what he hasn't done ! 
 JSTow this world is a great plantation, and God 
 is the landlord of every one of us tenants. No 
 other view of life will explain anything we see 
 about us. There cometh a harvest and a time 
 of reckoning. Empty-handed you go up to the 
 judgment. Before you and behind you walk 
 men burdened with many sheaves. The eyes 
 of the Master are turned inquiringly upon you, 
 and a burning flush mantles your conscious 
 cheek. Where are your sheaves ? " Lord, 1 
 have done no harm ! " 
 
 11. " Is it best to try to teach after I become 
 weary ? " No. But pray, why should a teacher 
 grow weary in the midst of his teaching ? You 
 may feel as limp as a dish-rag when the lesson 
 is over, but if you are thoroughly interested in 
 your work you will not be conscious of a par- 
 ticle of weariness while the lesson is being 
 taught. When a teacher is weary in the lesson 
 you may be sure he is weary of the lesson. 
 
 12. " Is it best to try to teach after the 
 
Other Teaching Points 11^ 
 
 children have become weary?" ISTo. This 
 does not mean, however, that no further effort 
 should be made to teach during the lesson hour. 
 Some teachers stop the moment they see signs 
 of weariness, and spend the rest of the hour in 
 idle gossip. I would suspend the lesson long 
 enough to rest the pupils and then begin again. 
 
 13. You want life in your class of course, 
 but do not imagine that you can get it by work- 
 ing up your pupils to a high pitch of excite- 
 ment. " We had a glorious time last Sunday : 
 you should have seen how I kept those children 
 excited all the time." Poor teacher ! it did not 
 occur to him that while animation makes one's 
 head as clear as a bell, when one is excited one 
 has no head at all. 
 
 14. The best way to deal with doubt is to 
 love the doubter enough to be patient with him, 
 and to resist the temptation to ridicule him. A 
 doubter was never cured by calling him a fool. 
 I think this after all is our greatest mistake in 
 dealing with young men who are afflicted with 
 doubt. It does not make so much difference 
 whether we can clarify their minds or not if we 
 will only be forbearing, and if our sympathy 
 will be without any admixture of pity. The 
 spell will be over in the course of time, and 
 the young man's mind will clear up of itself, if 
 only those around him will make no mistake. 
 
 15. A teacher may and should make an ap- 
 
1 14 Secrets of Sunday-School Teaching 
 
 peal to his pupils as a whole to accept Christ, 
 but he should not single out a pupil and 
 appeal to him in the presence of his companions. 
 It is always a perilous experiment to approach 
 a man about a sacredly private matter in the 
 presence of others. And it is even more 
 perilous to approach a child. A man resents 
 your efforts to uncover his heart in public ; he 
 does not even want you to point to it. If he 
 should become wrought up sufficiently to expose 
 it himself that is another matter. A child 
 guards his feelings even more jealously, partly 
 because of greater timidity and partly because 
 he is conscious that he lives in an unsympathetic 
 atmosphere. A man may be persuaded that 
 he is surrounded by friends who can enter 
 into his feelings and who are longing to help 
 him carry his heart's burden ; but a child knows 
 too well that Jimmy who has just turned his 
 head is in a broad grin, and that the snicker 
 which he distinctly heard a moment ago in the 
 direction of the big boy in the class foretells 
 innumerable woes that will befall him when he 
 is on the street again. But should not a child 
 be taught that he should confess Christ in spite 
 of persecution ? Certainly ; but it is not a 
 matter of confession ; it is a matter of decision 
 — the decision that precedes confession. When 
 he has once decided for Christ the big boy's 
 snicker will be shorn of at least half its terrors. 
 
Other Teaching Points nc 
 
 You have learned that if you want to get two 
 people to love each other you need to be as wise 
 as a serpent and as harmless as a dove. What- 
 ever you do you will not do in public. Would 
 you— unless you were a foolish, tormenting 
 tease — talk to a boy in the presence of his com- 
 panions about his love, or his lack of love, for 
 his mother, or his sister, or even somebody else's 
 sister ? I know that children as well as men 
 have been singled out in the great congregation 
 and won for Christ while a hundred pairs of 
 eyes were looking curiously on ; but I also know 
 that when others have been thus approached 
 their hearts have shut up like oysters and they 
 have experienced a revulsion of feeling towards 
 religion that has remained with them until this 
 day. It may sometimes be necessary to run 
 this risk in the case of a man who vf ill be out 
 of your reach the moment he passes out of the 
 church door, but it is not necessary in the case 
 of a Sunday-school pupil. The teacher who 
 appeals to his pupils personally before the class 
 on the ground that he has no other time in 
 which to win souls is evidently too busy to be 
 a Sunday-school teacher. I would not run the 
 risk of spoiling all my work that way. I would 
 watch my pupils and whenever I saw, by look- 
 ing into the eyes of a child, that the way to his 
 heart was open, I would find the time to talk 
 to him alone. And I would find it quickly. I 
 
Ii6 Secrets of Sunday-School Teaching 
 
 would take a long walk with him in the fields 
 that very afternoon, and in the hallowed Sab- 
 bath quiet I would help him, God helping us 
 both, to settle that question forever. 
 
 16. It is the teacher's business to translate 
 the Bible into the terms of our twentieth century 
 life ; to get down beneath its Oriental covering 
 and find its very soul — its essential teaching — 
 and to present it to the pupil in such language 
 as he can understand, applying it not to the 
 Israelites or the Ammonites of old, but to the 
 pupil's own heart and life. 
 
 17. It is well enough for a teacher to call a 
 spade a spade, but it is never necessary for him 
 to call a simpleton a simpleton. It is one thing 
 to be frank ; it is another thing to be brutally 
 blunt. 
 
 18. One Sunday-school teacher is all sun- 
 shine and wins ; another, having no sunshine in 
 his soul, undertakes to keep his class merry 
 with stale jokes, and wonders why he does not 
 succeed. It is the difference between being 
 whitewashed and washed white. 
 
 19. It is the teacher's business to adapt his 
 teaching to the needs of his pupils, but he ought 
 not to say anything in class that would cause 
 a pupil to feel that he was "hitting at him." 
 That sort of thing never does any good and often 
 does a great deal of harm. 
 
XXI 
 
 HOW TO KEEP THE PUPILS INTEEESTED 
 
 IT is not an easy problem but I am persuaded 
 that it would not be as hard as many of us 
 have found it if we were not always trying 
 to solve it backwards. It is strange that we 
 should be continually asking what will keep our 
 pupils interested, and never think to ask what 
 will keep the teacher interesting. For here, 
 after all, is the secret of permanent interest in 
 a class. The thing that is needed to interest 
 pupils is not an interesting occasion, or an 
 interesting lesson, or an interesting story, or an 
 interesting picture, but simply and solely an 
 interesting teacher. An interesting teacher will 
 make an occasion, a lesson, a story, a picture or 
 anything else under the sun interesting. An 
 uninteresting teacher dulls the interest that may 
 already exist in whatever he takes in hand. 
 
 Nearly all the methods ever invented to 
 awaken the interest of pupils are worthless be- 
 cause they are the result of taking hold of this 
 problem at the wrong end. They are purely 
 artificial, like our much advertised methods for 
 aiding the memory, and they are not one whit 
 more successful. We may work up a mo- 
 117 
 
1 18 Secrets of Sunday- School Teaching 
 
 mentary interest by an artifice, but the per- 
 manent interest of the pupils cannot be secured 
 in this way. Only a permanently interesting 
 teacher can permanently interest his pupils. 
 
 What can a teacher do to make himself in- 
 teresting to his pupils? Did you ever notice 
 how some young girls try to make themselves 
 interesting on entering society ? One goes 
 to work to gather together a fund of interest- 
 ing stories. Another searches an encyclopedia 
 of wit and humour for bright sayings. Another, 
 too indolent for either of these efforts, depends 
 upon gush — artificial gush. Another walks out 
 upon the carpet with a year's supply of imported 
 smiles. You know how well, or how ill, these 
 things work. But here is another girl who 
 has somehow learned that it is not that which 
 we gather from without but that which we de- 
 velop within that makes us interesting, and she 
 goes to work to develop herself — her mind and 
 her heart. She seeks the broadest culture, 
 without which it is impossible to have perfect 
 sympathy with all men ; without which she can- 
 not get en rapport with all men. She finds a 
 little sweetness of disposition in her nature and 
 she goes to work to develop that. She forms 
 the habit of interesting herself in people, of 
 sympathizing with people. She keeps her eyes 
 wide open watching for opportunities to lend a 
 helping hand, by which her humanity — her 
 
How to Keep the Pupils Interested 1 19 
 
 humanness — is daily broadened. She studiously 
 cultivates the art of thinking about people until 
 people become the most interesting things in the 
 world to her ; and when they become the most 
 interesting things in the world to her she is 
 pretty apt to become the most interesting girl 
 in the world to at least some people. 
 
 It is by the same method that a teacher 
 must become interesting to his pupils. Have 
 you a class of girls ? Go to work to learn girls. 
 Cultivate the habit of thinking about girls. 
 Look for them on the street — everywhere. 
 Live as far as you can in the girl world. Learn 
 not only the ways of girls — their ways do not 
 mean a great deal — but learn what they think 
 and feel ; learn not so much what they do as 
 what they intend to do or would like to do. 
 You cannot judge a girl by her actions. It is 
 not often that she does what she intends to 
 do — not often that she knows why she does a 
 thing at all. Cultivate the habit of thinking of 
 girls until a girl becomes the most interesting 
 thing in the world, just because she is a girl — 
 interesting whether she is pretty or ugly, good 
 mannered or bad mannered, neat or slovenly. 
 You may be sure that when a girl has come to 
 be the most interesting thing in the world to 
 you it will not be long before you will become 
 the most interesting teacher in the world to 
 your girls. 
 
120 Secrets of Sunday-School Teaching 
 
 Have you a class of boys ? Learn boys. 
 Katber, learn as much of them as you can. Go 
 every day to Boy ville. Form the habit of look- 
 ing straight into the eyes, not critically but 
 sympathetically, of every boy you meet. If 
 you find nothing good in those eyes don't try 
 any longer. Turn your class over to the 
 superintendent and try a class of girls. You 
 have no business with boys if you see nothing 
 good in them. Get acquainted with boys — 
 not only your boys but other people's boys. 
 Form the habit of interesting yourself in 
 every boy you meet regardless of the sort of 
 boy. Interest yourself in him simply because 
 he is a boy. When the time comes that a boy 
 shall be the most interesting thing in the world 
 to you there will be some boys at least in your 
 class who will regard you as the most interest- 
 ing teacher in the world. 
 
 I do not mean that when you find yourself 
 in sympathy with your pupils you will have 
 nothing to do to keep them interested. You 
 should be in such sympathy with them that you 
 will always be doing something to interest 
 them. You will study them so thoroughly and 
 you will study your lesson so thoroughly that 
 it will be almost impossible for you to bore 
 them. 
 
 You have noticed that there are some teach- 
 ers who are very dry and uninteresting because 
 
How to Keep the Pupils Interested 1 2 1 
 
 they have grown up with very narrow or 
 partial views of the truth given them to teach. 
 It is surprising how many teachers there are 
 whose narrow views of the Christian life utterly 
 disqualify them for their work. No teacher 
 can be interesting and be narrow. That is 
 why I have said that a teacher to be interest- 
 ing must go to work to develop himself. He 
 must acquire breadth of view. Here is a man 
 who has a reputation for business integrity. 
 He is very proud of his good name in the 
 community. Talk with him and you will find 
 that in his mind religion is summed up in one 
 word — honesty. To him the most highly de- 
 veloped Christian is the man who has the 
 highest sense of business honour. JSTothing 
 else appeals to him. This man neglects most 
 of the means of grace and does scores of things 
 a Christian ought not to do and yet he is per- 
 fectly satisfied with his attainments in grace 
 because of his unquestioned business integrity. 
 This man is as dry a teacher as you will come 
 across in a dry season. There is never any- 
 thing to talk about in the lesson unless there is 
 something to suggest a discussion about busi- 
 ness integrity. And it is the same old sermon 
 year in and year out. It is enough to make a 
 healthy boy hate honesty. Here is a good 
 woman who has summed up religion in another 
 word. It is temperance. Temperance is her 
 
122 Secrets of Sunday-School Teaching 
 
 hobby. Temperance is the thing on which she 
 gets intoxicated. She is always in a state of 
 intoxication. To this good woman every lesson 
 is a temperance lesson. It matters not where 
 it begins it always ends in temperance. And 
 it is the same old thing Sunday after Sunday. 
 I wonder that her boys do not grow up drunk- 
 ards for very spite. Any one-sided or partial 
 view of truth continually presented becomes 
 tiresome. The teacher who seeks to be inter- 
 esting will shun narrow and partial views. He 
 will go to work to get at the whole truth. He 
 will seek that larger view of religion which 
 will fairly burden him with its richness and 
 breadth so that when he goes to his class his 
 great difficulty will be not to keep from teach- 
 ing the same thing, but to keep from trying to 
 teach too many things. 
 
XXII 
 THE SECEET OF GOOD OEDER 
 
 WHAT is good order ? Perhaps some 
 of us would have less difficulty in 
 keeping order in our classes if we 
 had a clearer idea of what good order means. 
 Did you ever walk through a great mill at the 
 close of the day after the operatives had all 
 gone? Look at those long rows of spindles. 
 How regular they are ! How orderly ! How 
 quiet ! You can hear a pin drop. Here is 
 perfect order, you say. Well, yes : the order 
 of death. But that is not the kind of order 
 you want in your Sunday-school class. I have 
 seen classes of that sort — classes in which the 
 teacher had spent all of his time in quieting 
 his pupils into silent rows of spindles — silent 
 spindles which receive nothing, produce noth- 
 ing. Did you ever walk through that same 
 mill in the early morning after the wheels had 
 started ? There are the endless rows of spin- 
 dles in the same regular order that they were 
 before. But in every spindle there is life. 
 And there is the sound of life ; not the jarring 
 sound of something out of order, but a healthy 
 hum — the hum that is music to the ear of the 
 123 
 
1 24 Secrets of Sunday-School Teaching 
 
 master machinist who knows that all is well. 
 This is the kind of order you want in your 
 Sunday-school : you want every pupil in his 
 place and about his business. You do not want 
 a row of silent pupils like idle machines, nor do 
 you want to hear a noise as of something out 
 of order; but you want a row of pupils in 
 each of whom there is life — enough life to send 
 forth a healthy hum. Don't aim at absolute 
 silence in your class. Don't aim at death ; aim 
 at life. 
 
 The wise teacher has learned that there are 
 two great secrets of good order. The first is 
 good order in the teacher himself. ]S"ow don't 
 turn red in the face. I am not going to be too 
 personal. But as a matter of fact there are 
 thousands of teachers who have never learned 
 how to keep order themselves. There are 
 thousands of teachers who create such a dis- 
 turbance in trying to maintain order that their 
 pupils are tempted to answer back, "Why 
 don't you be still yourself ? " To be orderly 
 one must have one's self well in hand. And it 
 is not every teacher who has himself well in 
 hand. Disorder breeds disorder, but disorder 
 in a teacher breeds ten times as much disorder 
 as disorder in a pupil. There are teachers 
 whose very attitude when they meet the class 
 is an invitation to disorder. All noise is not 
 disorder and all disorder is not noise. We have 
 
The Secret of Good Order 125 
 
 good order in a class when things are done in 
 an orderly way ; when the right thing is done 
 at the right time ; when each pupil is attending 
 to the duty of the moment and not to some- 
 thing else. Disorder is the result of attending 
 to something else, and it is a painful fact that 
 the average teacher is just as apt to wander 
 from the matter at hand and attend to some- 
 thing else as the average pupil. I have seen 
 teachers who were so anxious to keep order that 
 they would never give their attention to the 
 lesson more than half a minute at a time. They 
 would turn to the lesson, and before the atten- 
 tion of the pupils could be gained they would 
 allow their own attention to be drawn off by 
 any "passing trifle. " Now, children, let us see 
 what the lesson is about. John, put your feet 
 down. What is the lesson about, Mary ? By 
 the way, Mary, were you here last Sunday ? 
 What is the golden text ? Did I ask you the 
 last question, Sallie ? What was the last les- 
 son about ? Oh ! didn't I ask that question be- 
 fore? I wonder why the library isn't open 
 this morning. Don't you know what the 
 lesson is about? Mary, what are you and 
 Sallie so deeply interested in?" And so it 
 goes on and on, until the signal bell rings, and 
 the poor teacher cannot for the life of her un- 
 derstand why there is so much disorder in her 
 class. I visited a Sunday-school in which the 
 
1 26 Secrets of Sunday-School Teaching 
 
 disorder during the singing fairly drowned the 
 singing, and I noticed that two-thirds of the 
 teachers were engaged in conversation with 
 their pupils. Kemember, a teacher is disor- 
 derly whenever he turns the attention from the 
 matter in hand. 
 
 The other great secret of order is in securing 
 and holding the attention of the pupils. Did 
 you ever know a pupil to be disorderly while 
 he was intent upon what you were saying? 
 He may not sit up straight ; his feet may not 
 be placed at proper angles on the floor ; but he 
 is not disorderly. If you could get all the 
 pupils in your class to be intent upon what you 
 were saying would you not have perfect order? 
 Children are like ponies. If you will hold a 
 pony firmly by the bridle he will stand per- 
 fectly still — as a rule. It is the firm hold, not 
 the uncertain hold, that keeps him still. If 
 you tug at the bridle one moment and let it 
 fall lax the next, if the bridle slips from your 
 hand, he is not likely to be still. And if you 
 pull the bridle off his head he will be gone in a 
 flash. If you will keep a child interested every 
 moment you will hold him as safely as if you 
 had a bridle on him ; but if you make an effort 
 at attention now and then, if you relax your 
 hold now and then, if you let him go altogether 
 with the intention of securing his attention 
 again after a while, he will be off in a flash. 
 
The Secret of Good Order 127 
 
 And the moment he is off he will be out of 
 order ; he will be a creator of disorder. The 
 great secret is to gain the attention of your 
 pupils at the beginning and to require yourself 
 to hold their attention to the end. I do not 
 mean at the beginning of the lesson but from 
 the moment you take your seat in the class. 
 One reason why it is difficult to secure order 
 during the lesson is because we so often allow 
 disorder up to the moment the lesson begins. 
 The only safe rule is to require order from the 
 beginning, and to do this the teacher should be, 
 if possible, the first to reach the class room. 
 
 ^* How can I hold the attention of my pupils 
 during the time when there is nothing to do ? " 
 There is no time in which there is nothing to 
 do. If you have not found something to 
 occupy every moment of the Sunday-school 
 hour go and find it, and if you have any spare 
 moments left ask your superintendent to help 
 you fill them. One of the greatest problems of 
 the progressive teacher is to find enough min- 
 utes in the Sunday-school hour to do all the 
 work he has planned to do. 
 
 " But there are some duties which the teacher 
 must attend to which do not directly concern 
 his pupils. How, for instance, can I keep my 
 class quiet while I am making out my reports ? " 
 Why, bless you, have your pupils help you 
 make them out. I would do it somewhat in 
 
128 Secrets of Sunday-School Teaching 
 
 this way : " Kow, children, we are going to put 
 ourselves on record in this book. Let us see. 
 Were we all present on time this morning ? " 
 And while their minds are occupied with your 
 question iill in your attendance column and 
 your tardy column. "Did we all know our 
 lesson this morning?" And while they are 
 thinking over this matter set down the lesson 
 percentages. And so on. Make it a rule never 
 to have anything to do during the Sunday- 
 school hour apart from your pupils. Do not 
 allow yourself to separate yourself from them 
 either bodily or mentally for a moment. Be 
 one with them. Stay with them in person, in 
 thought, in heart, in interest ; and in all likeli- 
 hood they will stay with you. 
 
XXIII 
 COMMON SENSE IN TEACHING 
 
 IT is not the knowledge one acquires but the 
 knowledge that one uses that is worth 
 while. To make use of what you learn, 
 one thing is absolutely necessary. That one 
 thing is common sense. I know that most of 
 us feel that we are not lacking in this particular, 
 but I also know that most of us are too well 
 satisfied to believe we have common sense 
 while neglecting to put it into practice. As a 
 matter of fact, if we have it in any marked de- 
 gree we will put it into practice. We must put 
 it into practice if our knowledge of any sort is 
 ever to be worth anything to us. And no- 
 where in the world, it seems to me, does one 
 need to bring one's common sense into practice 
 oftener than in the Sunday-school class. 
 
 Let me illustrate : If there is too much in a 
 lesson to be taught in the lesson half hour, I 
 would not try to crowd it in ; I would select a 
 part of it for comprehensive treatment and 
 devote the time to that. And I would spend 
 the time in teaching the things that we under- 
 stand, not in discussing to no profit the things 
 129 
 
130 Secrets of Sunday-School Teaching 
 
 which have been discussed to no profit for a 
 thousand years. Again, if I were teaching a 
 temperance lesson, I would not spend, or mis- 
 spend, the precious moments telling tear-com- 
 pelling stories of homes ruined and hearts 
 broken and hungry children in rags as a result 
 of intemperance. One may force from little 
 children a bucketful of tears without getting 
 into their minds a single helpful thought. It 
 is better to leave our own stock of stories at 
 home and give the whole hour to the picture 
 which the lesson furnishes. We may rest as- 
 sured that no picture of our own making will be 
 more lifelike or more convincing. 
 
 Yet, again, I would not try to explain that 
 which no child can understand. For instance, 
 when you have a lesson on the deluge, a pupil, 
 who has seen in so-called Bible story books 
 blood-curdling pictures of mothers with babes 
 in their arms drowning in the flood, will want 
 to know how God could have done such a thing. 
 Now one might give a satisfactory answer on 
 this point to a mature mind, but one cannot ex- 
 plain it to a child, and one had better not at- 
 tempt it. I would rather say to the pupil : 
 " Well, that is the way it looks at a distance, 
 but don't you suppose if we had been there and 
 understood it all we would not have thought of 
 charging God with wrong in the matter ? " 
 And then I would recall some things which the 
 
Common Sense in Teaching 131 
 
 Scriptures tell us which show the goodness of 
 God and His love for little children. 
 
 When the lesson is an account of an event I 
 would picture the scene, and I would make it 
 my chief business to keep the picture before my 
 pupils. I would avoid introducing any unneces- 
 sary outside material. I would not indulge in 
 excursions. For instance, if the story is about 
 blind Bartimeus, I w^ould not dwell at length 
 on other cases of blindness in the Bible, nor 
 upon the prevalence of blindness in the East. 
 I would not introduce any incidents by way of 
 illustration. The lesson is the best illustration 
 we can find to teach the lesson it is intended to 
 teach. I would first make the pupils see Bar- 
 timeus. They should not only realize his help- 
 lessness, but the state of his mind. While 
 others see in Jesus a prophet of Nazareth, he 
 sees the Messiah. When I had succeeded in 
 getting Bartimeus before them I would try to 
 make them see Jesus. I would open up His 
 heart to them, and I would try to make them 
 see Him as Bartimeus stands before Him. It 
 will hardly be necessary to moralize upon the 
 lesson at all if one can get his pupils to see the 
 picture. 
 
 Common sense as well as God's law requires 
 us to be perfectly honest with our pupils. A 
 great many teachers are not honest in their 
 teaching. They don't mean to be dishonest, 
 
132 Secrets of Sunday-School Teaching 
 
 yet they do not hesitate to take advantage of 
 the ignorance of their pupils. For instance, as 
 I have said before, many an intelligent teacher 
 has used the account of the beheading of John 
 the Baptist as a lesson against the evils of the 
 modern dance, when every intelligent teacher 
 knows that it can be fairly quoted only as a 
 warning against witnessing lewd performances. 
 We never gain anything by trying to teach a 
 practical lesson from a text that does not teach 
 it, although it may be taught in other parts of 
 the Bible. The smallest boy in the class will 
 be quick to recognize the difference between the 
 solitary dance of the indecent Salome and the 
 modern dances in which the sexes mingle, and 
 we cannot safely point to the one as a warning 
 against the other. The lesson is a warning 
 against witnessing indecent performances of 
 every sort, and if the teacher would speak of 
 the evils of the ballroom he should make it 
 plain that he does not draw his lesson from 
 Herod's banquet. 
 
XXIY 
 HONESTY IN TEACHING 
 
 WHAT are we trying to teach ? Are 
 we teaching what we really believe 
 to be true or only what we are sup- 
 posed to believe is true ? Are we sure of our 
 ground? Do we teach things to-day which 
 may have to be untaught to-morrow ? Take 
 for instance the matter of prayer. When we 
 teach our pupils about prayer do we teach only 
 that which will stand the test ? Or do we tell 
 them things which they will find out when they 
 are older are not true ? Here is John Jones in 
 the senior class turning up his nose. What is the 
 matter with John ? Why, John's teacher, when 
 he was a little fellow, taught him that all he had 
 to do when he wanted anything was to ask God 
 for it, believing that he would receive it, and he 
 would surely get it. Johnny tried it and it 
 didn't work. To-day you can't get him to listen 
 to anything about prayer : he is too busy turn- 
 ing up his nose. A dishonest teacher — a teacher 
 who taught what she knew was not true — has 
 done the work and she has turned out a horrible 
 job. It is an awful thing to make promises for 
 God which He never authorized us to make. 
 133 
 
134 Secrets of Sunday-School Teaching 
 
 God has nowhere told us that all we need to do 
 when we want anything is to go to Him in faith 
 and we shall have it. He has promised to 
 answer prayer in His own way and in His own 
 time under certain conditions, and you and I 
 who speak for Him have no right to teach a 
 pupil that God answers prayer without clearly 
 stating the conditions and explaining what is 
 meant by answering prayer. I do not know 
 anything about which we do so much loose 
 thinking and about which we say so many 
 senseless things that we don't believe as this 
 matter of prayer. And our loose thinking and 
 pious twaddle are doing untold damage. When 
 you shake a man's faith in a prayer-answering 
 God you shake him to the foundations, and his 
 faith will inevitably be shaken if you give him 
 a false picture of God at the beginning — a 
 picture that will not stand the test in after life. 
 God answers prayer, but He may not choose to 
 answer it in the way we think He ought to 
 answer it, or at the time our little wildly tick- 
 ing watches call for an answer, and He certainly 
 will not answer at all if we do not fulfill the 
 conditions which He has laid down. 
 
 A poor woman comes to me for bread. I go 
 down town and secure a position for her as a 
 seamstress. The next day she comes to me 
 again. "Did I not do what you wanted me 
 to do?" I ask. "But I didn't want work," 
 
Honesty in Teaching 135 
 
 whines the poor thing ; " I wanted bread." 
 Do you think I will go to the baker and 
 send her a ready-made loaf ? And yet have 
 I not answered her prayer ? " Give me this day 
 my daily bread," cries lazy Jake. God has 
 given lazy Jake a little piece of land out in the 
 mountains — given it to him through his father 
 — and He has given him all the health and 
 muscle and mind he needs, and as much sun- 
 shine and rain as He has given anybody else, 
 and the little farm is all grown up in weeds and 
 lazy Jake is still wearing holes in his trousers 
 at the knees asking God for his daily bread. 
 Will God send him a loaf from the bakery to 
 convince him that He answers prayer ? " The 
 Lord has been feeding me these thirty years," 
 said old Tom Twaddle at the prayer-meeting, 
 " and I never have to worry a minute about my 
 daily bread. I just trust Him and praise His 
 name and somehow the bread always comes." 
 But everybody knew that the Lord had been 
 caring for old Tom all along through a faithful 
 wife who for thirty years had kept a boarding- 
 house to keep the lazy rascal from starving. 
 
 If God in answer to my prayer for bread 
 gives me the ability to make bread, and I 
 refuse to use the ability given me, and continue 
 to cry for bread, I may cry till the crack of 
 doom and there will be no answer. When in 
 un ugly mood my child cast away the piece of 
 
136 Secrets of Sunday-School Teaching 
 
 bread his mother gave him and demanded cake 
 did he get it ? God is infinite in mercy but He 
 does not humour our childishness. 
 
 But suppose I do my best with the means 
 God has given me, or suppose I have become 
 helpless and can no longer make my bread? 
 Then, if I recognize God as my Father — if I 
 love Him as a Father, and treat Him as a Father 
 — I can go to Him with perfect confidence that 
 He will give me not everything that I may ask 
 for, but everything that I ought to have. In 
 other words, I can go to Him with the assur- 
 ance that He will treat me as His child. If I 
 am God's child He is not going to give me 
 everything I ask for, but He is going to answer 
 my prayer according to His will and it is not 
 His will to ruin His children by giving them 
 things they ought not to have. 
 
XXV 
 
 IF YOUE PUPILS ARE TO BE LIKE 
 CHEIST 
 
 IT is a lifetime study — a lifetime apprentice- 
 ship—this art of helping one's pupils to 
 attain unto the image of Christ. The sculp- 
 tor who ceases to learn his art ceases to live ; the 
 teacher who ceases to learn his art ceases to live. 
 Yet I do not mean to say that the art of molding 
 clay or chiselling marble is wholly like the art 
 of molding character.^ The order of develop- 
 ment is not altogether the same. For instance, 
 the artist must first fall in love with his art, 
 while the teacher must first fall in love with his 
 pattern. The artist may have many patterns 
 in a lifetime ; the teacher will have but one. 
 
 Your first business then is with the pattern 
 that has been given you — Jesus Christ. If you 
 are to mold your pupils into the image of Christ 
 you must first become thoroughly acquainted 
 with that image. You must know Christ. In 
 other words, you must have a clear, strong, defi- 
 nite vision of the image which you are expected 
 to copy. If an artist tries to mold an image 
 that is yet but imperfectly formed in his mind 
 
 See page 14. 
 137 
 
138 Secrets of Sunday-School Teaching 
 
 he will fail. The success of his work depends 
 largely upon the distinctness of his vision. First, 
 then, you want a clearly defined vision of 
 Christ. You want to see Him not only as the 
 Divine One, but as the perfect man. You want 
 to know Him not only as a personal Saviour, 
 but as a personal friend. 
 
 Let me be perfectly frank about this matter. 
 If you do not know Christ you are not going to 
 do anything worth while. I am not exagger- 
 ating. The idea that a man or woman can 
 teach a Sunday-school class as it is intended to 
 be taught, simply because he or she is intelligent, 
 or talented, or has had a course in pedagogy, is 
 sheer nonsense. I do not care how intelligent 
 or talented an artist may be; he may know 
 everything that is knowable ; he may be a 
 veritable wizard with his fingers ; but as a rule 
 if he tries to mold or carve an image that has 
 not become clearly defined before him — if he 
 tries to mold something which is as yet con- 
 fused in his mind's eye — he will fail. I am 
 aware that this illustration is very imperfect, 
 for the teacher is not limited in this matter as 
 narrowly as the artist, but generally speaking 
 it is true that nothing else will avail if there is 
 no clearness of vision. The only thing for an 
 artist to do when his vision is indistinct is to 
 drop his chisel or brush and look after the im- 
 age that is forming in his mind. And as a rule 
 
If Your Pupils Are to be Like Christ 139 
 
 the only thing for a teacher to do, who has at- 
 tempted to teach his pupils while the image of 
 Christ is as yet indistinct before him, is to drop 
 everything and look after the image that has 
 been set before him. 
 
 Take your Bible and look yourself in your 
 room. Forget that you are a teacher. Forget 
 that there are pupils waiting to be taught. 
 Open your Bible at Matthew. Kead Matthew 
 to-day — not a chapter, but the whole book; 
 read Mark to-morrow and Luke the third day 
 and John the day after. Go back to Matthew 
 again and read these Gospels over and over 
 again until you have been thoroughly saturated 
 with them. Don't study them ; don't analyze 
 them ; read them. Absorb them. Drink them 
 in. You don't want to get at the meaning of this 
 or that point ; you want to take in the whole 
 picture. By and by you will have the vision of 
 Christ in these Gospels like that of the yet im- 
 perfectly restored blind man who could see 
 men only as trees walking. But read on, and 
 while you read let your heart cry out to God : 
 " Lord, show me Thy Son." 
 
 Open your heart to God about this matter. 
 Tell Him that you want to know Christ — not 
 that you may teach your pupils about Him but 
 that you may receive Him ; that you may be 
 one with Him; that you may breathe His 
 spirit ; that you may be like Him. Keep your 
 
140 Secrets of Sunday-School Teaching 
 
 heart wide open before Christ — ^ready to re- 
 ceive every word He speaks ; ready to do what- 
 ever He may require. Read and pray and read 
 again. Then sit still before Him. Sit still 
 until you can hear your heart beat, and then 
 quiet your heart. Be still before God and wait. 
 Wait before Him in an attitude of perfect sur- 
 render to Him. Wait until every thought of 
 your own passes out of your mind, and every 
 disturbing sound is lost in the distance, and you 
 sit with open and empty heart and mind before 
 Him. One of these days, while you are thus 
 waiting, there will come into your imnost being 
 such a sense of the reality and presence of the 
 personal Christ — such a vision of Him who is 
 fairest among ten thousand, that your heart 
 will hardly be able to contain itself, and you 
 will turn to your pupils thrilled with that fine 
 frenzy which the artist feels when, all on fire 
 with the vision before him, he seizes his lump 
 of clay and begins to mold. 
 
XXVI 
 SEEDS TO SOW 
 
 THEEE are two ways to get rid of 
 grass. One is to let it alone until it 
 grows up, and then pull it up by the 
 roots. It is an ancient method that is still held 
 in much favour where laziness is king. The 
 other is to get ahead of it — to get there first 
 with something better. The soil is no respecter 
 of persons. It's first come, first serve. If the 
 grass gets there first, it will have the right of 
 way. If your wheat gets there first, it will 
 have the right of way. He was a wise warrior 
 who said that the way to win a battle is to get 
 there first with the most men. There is every 
 advantage to the man who occupies the ground 
 first in every battle of life, whether he is fight- 
 ing grass, or soldiers, or sin. 
 
 Are you getting there first ? Are you on 
 the ground with plenty of good seed ahead of 
 the enemy ? Are you waiting for evil to sprout 
 up and grow, intending to pull it up by the roots 
 by and by, or are you hastening to get rid of it 
 before it comes? What about the hearts of 
 your pupils ? Are you trying to get there first ? 
 141 
 
142 Secrets of Sunday-School Teaching 
 
 Are you already on the ground with a good 
 crop planted, or are you simply watching and 
 waiting for little sprouts of evil to spring up, 
 that you may pull them up by the roots ? Are 
 you a good, live farmer in the Lord's service ? 
 Are you a hearty hater of grass ? 
 
 Take, for example, the seeds of doubt which 
 the world, the flesh and the devil combine to 
 sow in the heart of every young man the mo- 
 ment he begins to sprout a mustache. You 
 know that in the course of human events that 
 boy in your class is going to sprout a mustache, 
 and you know that to-day the ground of his 
 heart is practically unoccupied. You know 
 that the world, the flesh and the devil have 
 their eyes on it, and that as sure as the sun 
 shines they will be on hand when the time 
 comes to take possession. They are standing 
 ready now with bushels and bushels of seeds of 
 doubt and skepticism and unbelief — call them 
 what you will — ready to scatter them broad- 
 cast the moment the word is given. And to- 
 day you have that boy in charge. He is not 
 disposed to doubt now, and you have the first 
 chance. What are you doing about it ? Are 
 you waiting quietly to see the sprouts of doubt 
 shoot up so that you can pull them up by the 
 roots, or are you on the ground busily sowing 
 down the soil with seeds that will forever keep 
 doubt from getting a hold ? If you are going 
 
Seeds to Sow 140 
 
 to win this battle, should you not be on the 
 ground with the most seed first ? 
 
 It is sheer nonsense, this idea that a young man 
 must become an unbeliever before he can ever 
 become an intelligent believer. It may be safe 
 to say of a young man that he is likely to pass 
 through certain stages of development, in which 
 he will find it easy to doubt and hard to be- 
 lieve; but God did not so plan this world that 
 any man in his making should be compelled at 
 any time to doubt his Maker. A young man 
 may be preserved from the experience of unbe- 
 lief just as he may be saved from sowing his 
 wild oats. 
 
 What kind of seed do we need to sow in 
 order to occupy the heart ahead of unbelief ? 
 I answer, first, the fundamental truths of our 
 religion; second, certain practical, every-day 
 truths or facts which effectually answer all the 
 arguments that can be brought against our 
 religion. Let me mention two of these every- 
 day facts which we need to sow in the heart of 
 every boy— and every girl, for that matter— 
 with whom we come in contact : 
 
 The first is that the proof of the pudding is 
 in the eating. It makes no difference what the 
 cook or the critic may say about the pudding, 
 the proof of it is in the eating. That is final. 
 The cook may bring a car-load of facts to prove 
 that the pudding was properly made, and the 
 
144 Secrets of Sunday-School Teaching 
 
 critic may offer a car-load of theories to prove 
 that it was not, but the proof of it is still in the 
 eating. So it makes no difference what men 
 may say about our religion : the proof of it is in 
 the eating. What does it do for the man who 
 receives it, devours it, appropriates it, absorbs it ? 
 The logic is irresistible : if our religion makes 
 a man more godlike, it is of God, and all the 
 theories and all the alleged facts that men may 
 pile up against it are not worth a sou. The 
 question is, does it make men more godly ? 
 What has it done for the world ? What has it 
 done for intelligent men and women ? What 
 has it done even for men who do not accept it, 
 but whose lives have notwithstanding come 
 under its influence? What has it done for 
 your best friend? What has it done for 
 your mother? Said a man, "I don't know 
 much about religion — I am no theologian — but 
 I know my mother, and I know that the relig- 
 ion that can make such a mother is good 
 enough for me." 
 
 Another seed to sow in the mind of a grow- 
 ing boy or a girl is the truth that the ability to 
 speak with authority about one thing is no 
 evidence of a man's ability to speak with 
 authority about another. A young man is not 
 at college a month before some young fellow 
 comes to him and whispers, " Why is it that 
 so many of our great scholars don't believe in 
 
Seeds to Sow 14^ 
 
 the Christian religion ? " And instantly the 
 young man falls down in a heap. He does not 
 stop to inquire whether it is true or whether, if 
 true, it has any significance ; he simply falls in 
 a heap. If a man with as big a brain as 
 Professor Sophocles cannot see anything in relig- 
 ion, then surely there can be nothing in it. 
 But the fact that a man has a big brain proves 
 nothing except that he has a big brain. He 
 may be very wise or he may be otherwise. He 
 may know everything worth knowing in one 
 sphere of life and he may know nothing worth 
 knowing in any other sphere of life. A back- 
 woodsman from the mountains walks into a 
 chemical laboratory. The moment he shuts the 
 door behind him he is in a new world, but he 
 does not see it. He has nothing with which to 
 grasp it. So far as he is concerned, the world 
 of chemistry does not exist. Nothing exists 
 but a lot of vile-smelling crucibles. That man 
 can speak with authority on mountain corn and 
 mountain bears, but not about chemistry. An 
 old bachelor, who has lived fifty years by him- 
 self, spends a day in a home illumined with love. 
 His mother died when he was a baby, and he 
 grew up in an orphanage. He learned to spell 
 love when a little child, and he has never spelled 
 it since. He can no more comprehend the 
 world of love than a backwoodsman can com- 
 prehend the world of chemistry. A young man 
 
146 Secrets of Sunday-School Teaching 
 
 just out of college consecrates himself for life 
 on the altar of material science. He gives his 
 days and nights to the study of matter. He 
 has no thought for anything else. As time runs 
 on he loses all taste for everything else, all 
 capacity for enjoying everything else. At fifty 
 he has not read a poem in thirty years, and he 
 tells you it is all bosh. He has not heard an 
 opera or an oratorio in thirty years, and music 
 is all bosh. He has never had time to fall in 
 love, and love is all bosh. He is a stranger to 
 the world of art, the world of the affections, 
 the world of sentiment. In his blind study of 
 matter he has given no thought to spirit or that 
 which is spiritual. He has never tried to reach 
 out after God in prayer. He has remained a 
 stranger to all the higher impulses that come to 
 a man in the stillness of the twilight. That 
 man can speak with authority about anything 
 in the world of science, but who will take him 
 seriously in the world of art, or the world of 
 love ? It was such a man who said to a man 
 friend who had been crushed by the loss of his 
 wife : " Pshaw, man, what are you crying about? 
 The world is full of women just as good as she 
 was." Put this thought in the mind of your 
 boy. If we do not take what this man says 
 seriously about the world of art, or the world 
 of love, because we know that he knows noth- 
 ing about it, why should we take him seriously 
 
Seeds to Sow 147 
 
 when he presumes to speak with authority 
 about the spiritual world, of which he is equally 
 ignorant ? I hardly know anything more 
 pitiful than Darwin's confession, made after he 
 had passed the prime of life. He tells us that 
 he had lost all taste for music, all taste for 
 poetry, all taste for the plastic arts, all taste for 
 everything beautiful except natural scenery. 
 He had devoted himself so earnestly and exclu- 
 sively to the one sphere in which he had chosen 
 to live that all other spheres had become foreign 
 to him. He had retained his taste for natural 
 scenery only because his investigations of nature 
 had kept him in touch with natural scenery. 
 The pitiful thing about it is that Darwin could 
 see that he had lost his ability to grasp these 
 things simply because he had spent his life 
 apart from them, and yet it never occurred to 
 him that his refusal to believe in the spiritual 
 world was due to his inability to grasp it, and 
 his inability to grasp it was due to the fact that 
 he had spent his life entirely apart from it. 
 The fact that a man who has devoted his life to 
 the material world cannot see anything in the 
 spiritual world does not prove that there is no 
 spiritual world any more than the fact that an 
 old bachelor cannot see the world of love proves 
 that there is no world of love. 
 
XXVII 
 SOME CLASS PEOBLEMS 
 
 SOME teachers attempt to bring a back- 
 ward pupil forward by pushing him to 
 the front. This is rarely successful and 
 is sometimes fatal. Doubtless there are many 
 backward pupils who are backward through 
 timidity and no doubt they ought to be helped 
 over their tunidity; but it is not wise to 
 help a child over his timidity by jerking him 
 over it. Let the backward pupil stay in the 
 background — for a while, anyway. Ask him 
 very few questions at first and let them be 
 simple and easy. Do not call attention to him 
 in any way and do not ask him a question that 
 is likely to excite the interest of others. Do 
 not require him to say or do anything that will 
 rivet all eyes upon him. In a word, don't try 
 to jerk him forward. Draw him forward gently 
 and be content if he does not pull back from 
 you. If he is backward from stupidity talk 
 with him privately about some little thing you 
 would like to have him do. Select an aim for 
 him — a goal you would like to have him reach. 
 When he lags behind point to it and when he 
 reaches it, as in the course of time he will if 
 148 
 
Some Class Problems 149 
 
 you are faithful, do not forget to rejoice with 
 him. 
 
 2. What would I do to draw out a timid 
 pupil ? There are several things I would not 
 do. I would not do anything to call the atten- 
 tion of the class to him. I would not let him 
 know that I was conscious of his timidity, nor 
 would I allow the pupils to show that they 
 were conscious of it. I would never ask him 
 a question at the very beginning of the lesson. 
 I would never ask him a difficult question. 
 Finally, I would not be too anxious to draw 
 him out. About the best thing one can do to 
 draw out a timid pupil is to be patient and wait. 
 Ask him a simple question now and then in a 
 very casual way and pass on. Give him some 
 little thing to do. It is easier for a timid child 
 to do a dozen things than to say one thing. 
 
 3. " What would you do with a smart pupil 
 who insists upon answering all the questions ? " 
 Chloroform him. Tell him privately that 
 you are more anxious to get answers from 
 those who do not know the lesson well than 
 from those who do. If he persists in answer- 
 ing ask him in quick succession several ques- 
 tions which you know he cannot answer. Bear 
 in mind, however, that the smart pupil would 
 not have a chance to display his smartness 
 overmuch if you would avoid asking questions 
 of the class as a whole. This may be done oc- 
 
150 Secrets of Sunday-School Teaching 
 
 casionally but as a rule pupils should be ques- 
 tioned individually. This of course does not 
 apply to adult classes. 
 
 4. Why are my pupils disposed to antago- 
 nize me ? Why do they always take the op- 
 posite side ? Is it simply because they dearly 
 love an argument, or is there something in 
 what I say or in my manner or tone of voice 
 that always rubs them the wrong way ? Have 
 I a way of stoutly maintaining my side of a 
 question so that my pupils are tempted to 
 argue with me ? If I find that the trouble is 
 with myself — in my speech or spirit or general 
 make-up— I will of course take myself in hand 
 instead of my class. If on the other hand I 
 find that it is due to an inordinate fondness of 
 my pupils for argument I will still take myself 
 in hand. I will guard against saying things 
 that will tempt them into a discussion, and 
 when I find my pupils about to take sides 
 against me I will quietly switch off on some- 
 thing else. 
 
 5. " What would you do with a child who has 
 a way of turning up her nose at every sign of 
 poverty that appears in the clothing of her 
 classmates ? " I don't know. The trouble is it 
 comes from either a lack of sense which you can- 
 not help, or a lack of home training which most 
 of us don't know how to help. I should say, 
 seek an opportunity outside of the class to teach 
 
Some Class Problems 151 
 
 her those things which her mother ought to have 
 taught. If jou cannot do this you can only- 
 pity and pray and be patient, while seeking to 
 overcome the effect of her sneers upon her 
 classmates by teaching them (without any ref- 
 erence to the sneering pupil) that greatness and 
 goodness are matters of character, not of clothes. 
 
 6. I do not believe in offering prizes of any 
 sort. I believe in offering rewards, and these 
 rewards should be of the same character as 
 those which one is apt to win in later life if one 
 is faithful. In other words, our rewards should 
 be of the nature of honours and promotions. 
 The greatest rewards we get in this life are 
 
 (1) recognition for diligence and faithfulness and 
 
 (2) opportunities to be more faithful and more 
 diligent. Give a pupil a certificate of honour 
 for faithfulness and when he has accomplished 
 a certain amount of work promote him. These 
 are rewards that mean something, that teach 
 something, and that abide. Your cheap jew- 
 elry and other flimsy gewgaws given as prizes 
 mean nothing, teach nothing and do not abide. 
 
 7. It is easy to fall into the habit of doing 
 too much for one's pupils. Some pupils get too 
 much teaching ; some too much preaching ; 
 some too much coaxing ; some too much moth- 
 ering. There are teachers who are so fussy 
 and fidgety that they worry their children into 
 a fever. It is never safe to neglect one's pupils, 
 
152 Secrets of Sunday-School Teaching 
 
 but it is well sometimes to exercise a little 
 wholesome letting alone. 
 
 8. " What would you do with a stranger 
 who drops into your class and takes a seat with- 
 out an invitation ? " I would give him a most 
 cordial greeting, ask his name, give him mine, 
 introduce him to each member of the class, hand 
 him a Bible, tell him what point we have reached 
 in the lesson, and for the rest of the hour treat 
 him as far as possible as one of the class. You 
 may say that this will break into your lesson, 
 and perhaps it will ; but it will give you an ex- 
 cellent opportunity to teach your pupils a lesson 
 in Christian courtesy, and you cannot afford to 
 let such an opportunity slip by you. 
 
 9. You have found that you can make no 
 progress in teaching without an aim and you 
 have therefore set up a goal before you as a 
 magnet to draw you forward. You have 
 learned the power of this magnet and you 
 would not be without it for the world. The 
 moment you reach your goal you propose to 
 set up another. Now why not provide for 
 your pupils as you have provided for yourself ? 
 They can make no progress without an aim any 
 more than you can, and they are not likely to 
 decide what to aim at without your help. 
 Why not set up a definite goal for them as a 
 magnet to draw them forward? Plan your 
 work with this end in view, and tell them your 
 
Some Class Problems 153 
 
 plan. Let them know what you want them to 
 reach by a given time. See that their eyes are 
 fixed on the goal at which they are to aim and 
 then see that they do not lose sight of it. 
 
 10. Ignore the impertinent fussy sort of a 
 boy who is always interrupting you in the 
 lesson. You will no more break him of his 
 ugly habit by noticing him than you can break 
 a child of the habit of calling you from another 
 part of the house by answering him. 
 
 11. As for the boy who is always playing 
 " tricks " in the class, I should pay little attention 
 to his conduct during the lesson hour, but I 
 would make an opportunity to see him alone 
 during the week and have a frank talk with 
 him. I would try to show him that while he 
 did not intend to do wrong he was doing a 
 great deal of harm — so much harm that I had 
 found it necessary to come to him about it. 
 If I could get an expression of regret from 
 him and a promise to do so no more, I would 
 make him feel that I had confidence in his 
 word. I would then see his mother and try to 
 secure her cooperation. If the boy continued 
 to offend in spite of my remonstrances I would 
 tell him plainly that he could no longer remain 
 in my class, and I would then turn him over 
 to the superintendent. 
 
 12. Of course it is difficult to keep up the 
 interest of the class in summer, but you will 
 
154 Secrets of Sunday-School Teaching 
 
 find it a great deal more difficult if you grumble 
 over it. The wise teacher treats the listlessness 
 of summer just as he does its heat. The best 
 way to get through a hot summer is to accept 
 the fact that summers are hot and to refuse to 
 think of the heat. And so the best way for a 
 teacher to get through a summer is to accept 
 the fact that everybody is more or less listless 
 in summer and then absolutely refuse to think 
 about it. !N"o wise teacher ever watches his 
 pupils to see how indifferent they are ; he knows 
 they will appear more indifferent than ever. 
 And he never dares to talk of their indifference, 
 much less complain about it. I never knew 
 the interest of a pupil to be awakened by being 
 lectured about his indifference. 
 
 13. " Don't you think it unwise to promote 
 a class to a higher grade and leave the teacher 
 behind when the pupils insist on staying with 
 him ? " I have never found this so serious a 
 matter as it is usually assumed to be. I have 
 known pupils to be up in arms about giving up 
 their teacher when as a matter of fact they did 
 not care a ^g. And I have known a superin- 
 tendent to be in mortal fear that a class would 
 go to pieces if he took the teacher away when the 
 pupils were secretly delighted at the thought of 
 a change. As a rule these matters adjust them- 
 selves easily after a week or two. Of course 
 there are exceptions. 
 
Some Class Problems 
 
 155 
 
 14. Fully four-fifths of all the work that is 
 done to win the hearts of the pupils in the 
 Sunday-school is done in the primary depart- 
 ment. Possibly the primary department is 
 overdoing it. Certainly it is if the rest of the 
 school proposes to do nothing. The contrast 
 between the two is too great. The primary de- 
 partment is a warm, cozy nest ; the main school, 
 to the child coming out of this nest, is a frozen 
 world. In the primary department he has all 
 sorts of attentions paid him — perhaps too 
 many— now he must shift for himself. His pri- 
 mary teacher knew all about him— knew his 
 mamma and his papa, and his sisters and how 
 many kittens he had, and his birthday— and 
 always came to see him or sent him a card 
 when his birthday came. The new teacher 
 speaks very kindly to him, asks him a few 
 questions out of the quarterly, and the thing is 
 done. And she never knows anything about 
 his mamma, and his papa ; she never knows 
 anything about his kittens ; she never so much 
 as heard that he has a birthday. It is time 
 we were taking hold of this problem. We 
 must learn to take the children where the pri- 
 mary department leaves them. The ten-year- 
 old child is just as much in need of attention as 
 the six-year-old child, and the fifteen-year-old 
 child is just as much in need of attention as the 
 ten-year-old child. We never grow too old to 
 
156 Secrets of Sunday- School Teaching 
 
 need the affectionate interest of those who are 
 teaching us. We want our teachers to know 
 about us ; we want them to remember our birth- 
 days. There is no more reason why a forty- 
 year-old pupil in the Sunday-school should not 
 be remembered on his birthday than the four- 
 year-old pupil. 
 
 15. Children expect something on Christmas 
 from those who love them. If a pupil gets 
 something from you when he expected nothing 
 he concludes that you love him more than he 
 thought you did. If he gets nothing, when be 
 expected something, he is apt to conclude that 
 you do not love him at all. Moreover, if you 
 try to remember all who are dear to you, and 
 fail to send anything to your pupils you will 
 find it difficult to think of them as belonging 
 to the inner circle of loved ones. It is not wise 
 to send pupils expensive presents, but I would 
 send them something — a little card, or, if you 
 can, a large art card to hang on the wall, which 
 will cause them to think of you and of the 
 Sunday-school many times through the year. 
 
 16. I would keep the absent pupil's name on 
 my list just so long as there remained the slight- 
 est chance of getting him back again. The mo- 
 ment you drop him from your list you give him 
 up, and a pupil should never be given up until 
 he is dead, or has left the community, or gone 
 to some other school. 
 
Some Class Problems 157 
 
 17. If you are not strong enough to man- 
 age your class do not confess it to your pupils 
 by fretting over them. The smallest child un- 
 derstands that people fret only because they 
 can't. The wise teacher shows his strong 
 points and keeps his weak ones to himself. 
 
 18. As a rule a teacher should not have a 
 heart-to-heart talk with a pupil in the presence 
 of others, but he ought to seek opportunities to 
 have such talks in private. 
 
XXYIII 
 
 BEACHING THE PUPILS DUEING THE 
 WEEK 
 
 I DO not believe that it is the business of 
 the teacher to ring door-bells any more than 
 I believe it is the business of the pastor. 
 " Pop " calls may do some good, but as a rule 
 they consume more time than they are worth. 
 Pastors are finding out that they can accom- 
 plish more in one visit of half an hour or an 
 hour than in half a dozen ten-minute calls. 
 The teacher should devote what time he can 
 spare to a few visits that will be remembered 
 rather than fritter it away in many calls that 
 will be forgotten. Most of us feel that we 
 have little time to spare but there are at least 
 two occasions when the teacher 7niist visit a 
 pupil, whether he can spare the time or not — 
 once when he is sick and the other when death 
 enters his home. 
 
 Why not have a committee to visit the sick ? 
 I answer : A Sunday-school rarely makes a big- 
 ger blunder than when it appoints a committee 
 to visit the sick. Yisiting a sick teacher is the 
 superintendent's business, and visiting a sick 
 pupil is the teacher's business, and a committee 
 can no more take the place of either than it can 
 158 
 
Reaching the Pupils During the Week 159 
 
 take the place of a mother whose business it is 
 to visit her sick son. What would you think 
 of your mother if she should stay away from 
 you when you were sick and satisfy her con- 
 science with the reflection that a committee 
 had been appointed to visit you ? When a sick 
 committee visits a child in the place of his 
 teacher one thing is sure to happen. It is 
 bound to happen. "Miss Jones came to see 
 me when I was sick but my teacher she never 
 comes. I want Miss Jones for my teacher." 
 The right of a teacher to look after his sick 
 pupils is a divine right, and let no school ever 
 interfere with it. If a teacher fails to visit a 
 sick pupil that is another matter. He should 
 be interfered with. He should be interfered 
 with long enough to get his resignation. If a 
 teacher is sick himself let him send his sick 
 pupil a message by a friend. But don't let the 
 friend go as a committee. 
 
 " Is it always necessary to visit the home of 
 a pupil in the case of a death in the family ?" 
 Yes. " Suppose one doesn't know the family ? " 
 I am sorry for the teacher who has never 
 visited the homes of the pupils. JSTo wonder 
 he feels awkward at such a time and does not 
 know what to do. But whether I knew the 
 family or not I would call at once, and if it 
 was not convenient to see my pupil I would 
 leave my card for him as well as the family. 
 
l6o Secrets of Sunday-School Teaching 
 
 And a day or two afterwards I would write 
 him a letter or, if I found this too diiRcult, I 
 would send him a bereavement card containing 
 a comforting sentiment, and with a word of 
 sympathy and my name written on the back. 
 
 " How often should one write letters to one's 
 pupils ? " 
 
 You don't want to write often enough to 
 make your letters commonplace to your pupils. 
 Ordinarily three or four times a year will do. 
 Of course much depends upon the opportunities 
 that will arise. If nothing unusual occurs in 
 the life of a pupil you may content yourself 
 with a letter accompanying a card at Christ- 
 mas, at Easter, and before Children's Day or 
 Eally Day, or both. But special opportunities 
 are going to arise. Your pupil is going to have 
 a birthday which you must not ignore under 
 any circumstances. You can at least send an 
 appropriate card with your best wishes on the 
 back. And one day death will enter his home 
 and of course you will use this opportunity for 
 a tender missive. And perhaps the first Sun- 
 day in next month will be the anniversary of 
 his joining the church. That will give you an 
 excellent opportunity, especially if he has need 
 to be reminded as he is likely to be now and 
 then that he is really a member of the church. 
 
 " Is there any special advantage in writing 
 letters to pupils ? " 
 
Reaching the Pupils During the Week l6i 
 
 Do you remember what a letter meant to you 
 when you were a child — a letter that bore your 
 name and a stamp and actually came through 
 the mail ? Did it not make you happy for a 
 whole day ? And did you not prize it as if it 
 were worth far more than its weight in gold ? 
 And did you not read it over and over again 
 and remember every word of it ? And when 
 your teacher who hated letter-writing stopped 
 you just after Sunday-school to say something 
 to you which she might have written in a letter 
 did it make a great impression upon you ? Did 
 you repeat it over and over on your way home 
 and hug her words to your heart as a precious 
 treasure? Did it make any impression upon 
 you at all? Didn't you forget it before you 
 reached home ? 
 
 One thing more. Don't use a postal in writ- 
 ing to a child. 'Not if you can get together 
 enough money to buy a two-cent stamp. And 
 the reason is simple. One thing that makes a 
 letter so precious to a child is its privacy. 
 Children dearly love to have secrets. To have 
 a letter from one's own teacher that no eyes 
 have looked upon except the teacher's and the 
 child's — that is bliss supreme. Let your pupils 
 taste this bliss. Don't spoil it all by putting it 
 on a postal that everybody can read — and will 
 read before the pupil gets it. 
 
XXIX 
 
 HELPING THE PUPILS WITH EVEEY-DAY 
 PEOBLEMS 
 
 OUR lessons in the course of a year or 
 two shed light on almost every prob- 
 lem of life. Are we making the most 
 of this light ? Take, for example, the money 
 question. What are we teaching our children 
 about money ? Half the pupils in the Sunday- 
 school have never been taught anything about 
 money except the duty of putting a penny in 
 the plate when it is handed around. And they 
 hear this every Sunday. Has the Bible no 
 light on the great moral questions relating to 
 money ? Shall we let our pupils go out into 
 the world utterly ignorant of the great princi- 
 ples which govern honourable men in the 
 handling of money ? Thousands of young men 
 and women are going out into life with no 
 higher thought than to make money. Nobody 
 has ever suggested to them a higher thought. 
 Shall we not at least tell them that no true man 
 was ever content to work for money alone ? — 
 that there is something in the heart of every 
 true man that revolts against making money 
 for its own sake ? — that the only way in which 
 162 
 
Helping Pupils with Problems 163 
 
 a manly man can be content to make money 
 is to do some good while he is making it, and 
 to do good with it when he has made it ? 
 
 Then there is the problem of suffering. A 
 child sees no good in suffering and therefore 
 few children suffer heroically. That is not so 
 bad, but it is pitiful when children grow up to 
 manhood without having learned how to suffer 
 and bring their childish whining with them. 
 Perhaps half of the failures of life come from 
 faHing to get a right attitude towards pain on 
 the threshold of life. We start out running 
 from suffering. There is but one thing we can 
 run from without becoming cowardly and that 
 IS sin. If we get in the habit of running from 
 everything that is painful, hard, bitter, trying, 
 unpleasant, we will lose what courage we 
 started with and we will lose all the strength 
 and development that come from endurance. 
 In other words, we will never become real 
 men : we will be soft-fleshed, muscleless cry- 
 babies all our days, ^thing is easier than to 
 teach a child the mission of suffering in life 
 Show him a baby. What is sweeter than a 
 baby ? But suppose Baby never stretched its 
 little arms and legs, never made an effort to 
 walk, never felt cold or heat but just stayed in 
 Its warm cradle and cooed the days away. 
 What would you think of Baby ten years from 
 to-day— a great, big, gross lump of muscleless 
 
164 Secrets of Sunday-School Teaching 
 
 flesh with no strength for anything ? Look at 
 those roses ! Last year they made a poor 
 show, but this spring mother cut the bush 
 mercilessly almost to the ground. It seemed 
 such a cruel thing to do, but look at those 
 roses! And those big chrysanthemums you 
 had last fall — big as your two hands — came 
 from a bush that a year or two ago grew little 
 ugly flowers no bigger than buttons. And 
 mother did it by pinching off nearly all the 
 buds on the bush I 
 
XXX 
 
 HOW TO INCEEASE THE ATTENDANCE 
 
 IT makes little difference what method a 
 housewife uses to get the family to dimier 
 — or whether she uses any method at all — 
 if it is known that she always provides a good 
 dinner. So it makes little difference what 
 methods are used to get children to attend 
 Sunday-school if it is known that those who do 
 go get something worth going for. Some of 
 us are too much concerned about getting the 
 children to come, and too little concerned about 
 what we should do for them when they do 
 come. 
 
 I believe in offering rewards for faithfulness, 
 but I do not believe in games of chance, or in 
 encouraging a child to hope to get something 
 for nothing in this life. If you can make an 
 offer for attendance that will be a reward for 
 faithfulness pure and simple, well and good ; 
 but I doubt if you can do it. Most of our 
 contests for prizes are mere games of chance. 
 Here is a little child who would have been 
 present every Sunday but for hindrances over 
 which he had no control. To him it is a game 
 of chance. Here is another child who was 
 ^6S 
 
l66 Secrets of Sunday-School Teaching 
 
 present every Sunday because his mother saw 
 to it that he was present. This child gets 
 something for nothing. Moreover he gets a 
 reward which does not belong to him at all but 
 to his mother. One child misses the prize 
 because of sickness. Another gets it because 
 of his health. If this sort of thing is repeated 
 often both are likely to grow up with the idea 
 that accidental success is the rule rather than 
 the exception of life. 
 
 Membership contests are like all other races 
 — exhausting and sometimes perilous. I have 
 known Sunday-schools to come out of them so 
 far spent that they were never able to recuper- 
 ate. About the only good thing to be said of a 
 contest is that what it does it does quickly. If you 
 absolutely must double your attendance within 
 the next month or two I would have a member- 
 ship contest. But if you want to increase your 
 membership permanently you must use other 
 methods. A membership contest is a big 
 spasm, and the life of a spasm is short. If 
 after doubling your attendance by a member- 
 ship contest you will promptly introduce other 
 methods you may be able to keep it up to high- 
 water mark. Otherwise it is likely to decline 
 to the point from where it was at the beginning. 
 The best method of securing a large permanent 
 increase is a method that lasts the year round. 
 Have an associate superintendent whose busi- 
 
How to Increase the Attendance 167 
 
 ness it shall be to look after the attendance. 
 Give him a standing committee with a secre- 
 tary. The committee should be very large and 
 should be composed only of agreeable persons 
 who know how to make a pleasant impression 
 when visiting strangers. Divide the committee 
 into twos. They should always go on their 
 mission as did the seventy whom Jesus ap- 
 pointed — two by two. Let the associate super- 
 intendent district the town or community, and 
 appoint in each neighbourhood a child (not an 
 adult) whose business it shall be to look out for 
 all newcomers in his neighbourhood and if 
 they have no fixed Sunday-school homes re- 
 port the fact at once by 'phone or postal or in 
 person to the associate superintendent or secre- 
 tary. The children thus appointed should be 
 known as the " lookout committee." I would 
 not appoint an adult on this committee for the 
 simple reason that a child will learn more about 
 a new neighbour in three hours than an adult 
 will learn in three weeks. Moreover, he will 
 enjoy the honour and take an interest in the 
 work. The secretary should keep an account 
 of all names thus reported and of the commit- 
 tees appointed to look after each person. Sup- 
 pose the name of a young man is reported. 
 Two young men notified by the secretary or 
 associate superintendent should call to see this 
 young man early in the week. Another couple 
 
i68 Secrets of Sunday-School Teaching 
 
 should call and repeat the invitation towards 
 the end of the week. If he does not appear at 
 Sunday-school the following Sunday two young 
 men should see him on Monday, two more on 
 Wednesday and two more on Saturday. The 
 young man who does not surrender at the end 
 of the second week should be visited every day 
 of the following week — each time, if possible, 
 by a different committee. If he still holds out 
 do not set him down as a hopeless apostate. 
 He may surrender the next week. Little tots 
 should be visited by ladies, boys by boys and 
 young men, girls by girls and young ladies. 
 This method not only increases the attendance 
 but it gives more than half of the teachers and 
 pupils something to do, and wonderfully quick- 
 ens the zeal and interest of the whole school. 
 Other methods may bring quicker results but 
 no other method ever devised has brought better 
 results. 
 
XXXI 
 
 HOW TO OEGANIZE A BIBLE CLASS 
 
 NEXT to a good teacher the most im- 
 portant thing, it seems to me, for a 
 Bible class is a thorough organiza- 
 tion. You are not going to produce the class 
 spirit — you are not going to cultivate the tie 
 that binds — without organization. You should 
 elect at the beginning a president, a vice-presi- 
 dent, a secretary, a treasurer, an executive 
 committee and a teacher. I would have the ex- 
 ecutive committee provide, among other things, 
 for social meetings of the class, which should 
 be held very often. It is important for the 
 class to choose some missionary or benevolent 
 object to look after. A class badge, also, is a 
 good thing. One of the best features that can 
 be introduced, however, is the life membership 
 plan. The great Vaughn Bible Class, of Wash- 
 ington City, adopted this plan many years ago 
 and its members are now scattered all over the 
 world. A young man joins the class for life. 
 If he goes to the other side of the globe he is 
 still a member and he is never lost sight of. 
 
 But a big Bible class is in danger of being 
 wrecked unless you have an organization that 
 
 l6q 
 
lyo Secrets of Sunday-School^Teaching 
 
 reaches every man in it. Let me give you a 
 plan. Divide the community into several dis- 
 tricts, so that each district will contain from 
 eight to twelve members of your class. Elect 
 a chairman and a vice-chairman in each district. 
 Let each chairman call his members in his dis- 
 trict together and organize them into a division. 
 The chairman in the first district will organize 
 Division No. 1 ; the chairman in the second 
 Division l^o. 2, and so on. It is not necessary 
 to have any officers except the chairman and 
 vice-chairman ; the work is to be done mainly 
 by committees. The division itself should be a 
 committee on membership. There should be an 
 absentee committee, composed of two or three 
 members ; a newcomers' committee, to look 
 after the young men who have just moved into 
 the neighbourhood ; a committee to look after 
 the sick and unfortunate ; a committee to aid 
 members out of employment in securing posi- 
 tions ; and perhaps one or two other committees. 
 Arrange the committees so that every member 
 of a division will be a member of one other 
 committee besides the membership committee. 
 The chairman should call up his members over 
 the 'phone or see them in person or write to 
 them once a week, and have them give him the 
 names of all the men in the district who are not 
 connected with any Bible class, the names of 
 all newcomers and the names of any who are 
 
How to Organize a Bible Class 171 
 
 sick or out of employment or in trouble of any 
 sort. The chairman will turn over these names 
 to the proper committees and will call up the 
 chairmen of these committees occasionally to 
 see that they are doing their work. As chair- 
 man of the membership committee, he will, of 
 course, divide up the names of all prospective 
 members among the members of the division. 
 In sending an invitation to a man to join the 
 class, it is best to send by a committee of two. 
 If they do not succeed in getting him, send 
 another committee, and another, and another. 
 He should not be allowed to go in peace until 
 he either joins or leaves the neighbourhood. 
 When a division grows to a membership of 
 fifteen the district should be divided and two 
 divisions organized in the place of the old one. 
 The chairman of the several divisions, together 
 with the general officers of the class, should 
 compose the general executive committee. The 
 executive committee should be divided into 
 several sub-committees corresponding to the 
 division committees, and when the division 
 committees are unable for any reason to attend 
 to any duty that may be assigned to them, the 
 matter should be turned over to the general 
 sub-committees. For instance, if the employ- 
 ment committee should be unable to secure a 
 position for a member who is out of employ- 
 ment, the fact should be reported to the general 
 
172 Secrets of Sunday-School Teaching 
 
 employment sub-committee, which may enlist 
 the services of the entire class in behalf of the 
 unemployed member. In addition to the usual 
 general officers of the class, there should be an 
 absentee secretary. The absentee secretary 
 should forward to the chairman of each division 
 every Monday the names of the members of his 
 division who were absent on Sunday. The 
 division chairman will turn these names over to 
 the chairman of his absentee committee, and at 
 the end of the week call up the absentee chair- 
 man and find out if his committee has visited 
 or communicated with the absentees. Every 
 Sunday morning after the study of the lesson 
 the chairman of each division (or in his absence 
 the vice-chairman) should report the names of 
 all new members secured by his division, and 
 also the names of any sick members in his dis- 
 trict. Once a month the secretary should report 
 to the class the name of the division making the 
 best report in attendance, and the division 
 reporting the largest number of new members. 
 This plan has many apparent advantages. It 
 not only keeps account of the members, so that 
 no one can be lost sight of, but it gives every 
 member something to do, and also keeps ac- 
 count of all who ought to be members. 
 
XXXII 
 THE WAY OF A CHILD 
 
 I SUPPOSE that the hardest thing you will 
 ever have to do as a teacher will be to 
 keep from forgetting that you are teach- 
 ing children. Not grown people who know 
 what you know, nor cooing babies who know 
 nothing at all, nor marvels of wisdom, nor 
 drivelling idiots, but just plain unadulterated 
 children. 
 
 It is mainly because the average teacher has 
 such a poor memory at this point that he is only 
 an average teacher — that is, a very poor teacher. 
 It goes without saying that no one ever teaches 
 successfully who does not know his pupils, but 
 many of us do not realize just what this means. 
 We think it means that we must know that this 
 pupil is named John and that pupil Henry ; that 
 John has a father who is a drunkard, and that 
 Henry has a temper that must be crucified — 
 and so on. This is all very well and indeed it 
 is all very necessary. But these are not the 
 things we need to remember most of all. 
 The things that we need to remember most 
 of all are not the things that are peculiar to 
 173 
 
174 Secrets of Sunday-School Teaching 
 
 John or Henry, but the things that are common 
 to all children. 
 
 For instance, there is the child's way of look- 
 ing at things. The average teacher talks about 
 a thing as if his pupil was looking over his 
 shoulder and seeing things just as he sees them. 
 As a matter of fact the point of view of a child 
 is almost never the point of view of his teacher. 
 It is of the utmost importance that you should 
 know the point of view of your pupil and that 
 you should take his views into account. You 
 must respect his opinions. It is a serious thing 
 to ignore a child's way of looking at things. 
 It is often a fatal thing. It is better that a 
 millstone should be hanged about the teacher's 
 neck and that he should be drowned in the 
 depths of the sea than that he should offend 
 one of these little ones by running roughshod 
 over his views trying to force his own views 
 into their place. 
 
 The biggest thing about a healthy child is 
 his appetite. He is always wanting to be fed. 
 And he craves food for his mind and his heart 
 just as intensely as he craves it for his body. 
 Your five-year-old is as hungry for a good story 
 read out of a book as he is for the big red apple 
 he has just discovered in the pantry. And he 
 is as hungry for mother's loving attentions as he 
 is for the biggest slice of cake on the table. 
 Wherever he goes he wants to be fed, and if 
 
The Way of a Child 175 
 
 you send him where he gets nothing he will not 
 willingly go again. That is why some of the 
 children you know have to be pushed off to Sun- 
 day-school every Sunday morning. They have 
 been to Sunday-school and they have not been 
 fed, and the^^ don't want to go again. They 
 feel as if they have been cheated. It is a mis- 
 take to suppose that some children do not want 
 to learn. Some children may not want to learn 
 some things you may want to teach them, but 
 they want to learn all the same. And when 
 they come back from Sunday-school without 
 having had the cravings of then* minds satisfied 
 they are in great disgust. " What's the use of 
 going to that old Sunday-school ? They don't 
 teach a fellow anything." "But don't they 
 teach you the golden text ? " " Yes, but that's 
 all they do." There is no meat in the golden 
 text for the child mind. Of course, it must be 
 taught but you can starve a child to death feed- 
 ing him on golden texts. What his mind craves 
 is knowledge — not principles, or theories, or 
 rules. He wants facts, and while he likes them 
 put up in story form he will take them just so 
 if you give them to him that way. Almost any 
 bit of knowledge Tvall interest a child, and if 
 you give him a good many facts they will satisfy 
 his craving — for a while. Are you feeding the 
 children that come to your Sunday-school? 
 If your pupil should visit you at your home 
 
176 Secrets of Sunday-School Teaching 
 
 about the first thing you would do would be to 
 get something nice for him to eat. Will you 
 allow him to come to your class Sunday after 
 Sunday and never give him anything to satisfy 
 the cravings of his mind, or the deeper cravings 
 of his heart ? 
 
 We are often overwhelmed by the thought 
 that our children are imitating our ways. But 
 children do not stop with imitation ; they use 
 our ways as premises to reason out new ways 
 for themselves. That is, what we say or do not 
 only suggests to a child the saying or doing of 
 the same thing, but it frequently suggests to 
 him the saying or doing of something else also. 
 He not only draws on our ideas, but he is 
 continually reasoning out of them ideas of his 
 own. A neighbour of ours was speaking the 
 other day of a servant who had turned out 
 badly. " Why, papa," interrupted the youngest 
 hopeful of the house — " why, papa, she's as 
 dishonest as the moon." " Where did you get 
 that idea, my son ? " " Well, " said the young- 
 est, " I'd like to know if you didn't say one day 
 that that man what came here was as honest 
 as the sun." 
 
 Let me add some practical hints : 
 
 1. A child will do almost anything for you 
 with a good grace except wait. It is a hard 
 thing to keep his little body still ; it is almost 
 impossible to hold his little mind. When the 
 
The Way of a Child 177 
 
 superintendent fingers the leaves to find a song, 
 or the teacher spends two minutes looking up a 
 reference, one thing inevitably happens : all the 
 little minds go rushing off like frisky colts to 
 some fine field of fancy, and ten to one, half 
 of them will not be caught and brought back 
 before the school is over. Don't let loose the 
 little colts for a moment, not even to get out 
 your spectacles. Get your songs, your ref- 
 erences, your announcements ready beforehand, 
 and when you open your school or begin your 
 lesson start off in a lively trot and keep going. 
 It is the only way to keep little colts or little 
 Sunday-school scholars in line. 
 
 2. Figures of speech should never be used 
 in talking to little children, unless they are 
 explained, for the simple reason that the mind 
 of a little child cannot grasp the idea of figur- 
 ative language. A little child takes things 
 literally or not at all. Try this sentence on the 
 first child you meet : " That man's heart is all 
 right though his head may be wrong." That 
 is simple enough, to be sure, to you and me, but 
 you will not find one tot in a thousand who can 
 guess at its meaning. There are so many fig- 
 ures of speech in the Bible that it is impossible 
 for the teacher to carry his pupils very far 
 without using them; but they should be in- 
 troduced gradually, and carefully explained over 
 and over again. 
 
178 Secrets of Sunday-School Teaching 
 
 3. If three-fourths of the scholars were 
 grown people you would think it very absurd 
 to select such songs as " I washed my hands this 
 morning." Why should it not be just as absurd 
 when three-fourths of the scholars are children 
 to be always singing such dirges as "Peace, 
 Perfect Peace " ? It is not necessary that the 
 songs should be boisterous. 'Now and then the 
 children will like something sweet and low. 
 But a Sunday-school song should never be a 
 dirge. No healthy child ever enjoyed the music 
 at a funeral. 
 
 4. As a rule children do not handle the 
 Bible irreverently until the example is set for 
 them by older persons. Sometimes it is set by 
 their teacher. I was not surprised the other 
 day to see a boy in Sunday-school throw his 
 Bible across the class, when I found that the 
 teacher, who happened to have a low chair, was 
 sitting on her own copy of the Word of God. 
 
 5. I would not often teU a child that this or 
 that is his duty, and then proceed to exhort him 
 to do it. I would rather, if I could, tell him a 
 story of something that would lead him to dis- 
 cover the duty for himself and that would 
 inspire him with the desire to do it. A child 
 will often perform a duty which he has dis- 
 covered for himself, when it is almost impossible 
 to get him to do the duty which you have 
 pointed out to him. 
 
The Way of a Child 179 
 
 6. Some flowers bloom in a few months ; 
 some take a year ; one, they say, takes a century. 
 Some bloom in the light, some only in the night. 
 So with the boys and girls in om^ classes. Some 
 blossom out so quickly you look upon them wide- 
 eyed with wonder ; some are so slow you can 
 hardly see that they are developing at all ; and 
 there is one in the class you have worked with 
 and prayed over so long, it looks like it will 
 take a century. And some are not going to 
 blossom out, maybe, until a great darkness 
 comes down upon their lives and brings out the 
 stars. Let us be patient. 
 
XXXIII 
 ABOUT BOYS 
 
 YOU can read a little child like a book. 
 He is so candid, so artless, so perfectly 
 transparent. But you never make a 
 bigger mistake than when you imagine that 
 you can read a big child like a book. Most of 
 us cannot read him at all. It is about as hard 
 for some folks to tell what is inside of a four- 
 teen-year-old boy as it is to decipher the 
 hieroglyphics on Cleopatra's needle. A big 
 boy never advertises ; he hides. If he thinks of 
 doing an heroic thing it makes him blush — he 
 is so afraid somebody will find it out. If you 
 suspect the good that is in him he will throw 
 you off the track by blurting out something 
 unspeakably foolish or shocking. He has a 
 horror of the goody-goody. He'd rather be 
 knocked down and sat upon by a mere kid than 
 to have you pat him on the head and call him 
 a good boy. (In the name of all that's good, 
 kind reader, don't pat a fourteen-year-old boy 
 on the head.) And he'd rather lie down and 
 die this minute than have a body speak of him 
 as " a comfort to his mother." And yet if you 
 should one day by some strange fortune succeed 
 i8o 
 
About Boys 181 
 
 in finding your way deep down into the heart of 
 that boy you would very likely find that he 
 really wants to be a good boy and a comfort to 
 his mother. The only way to read a boy is to 
 get close to him. And the only way to get 
 close to him is to approach him as a companion. 
 And the only way to approach him as a com- 
 panion is to resurrect your own boyhood in 
 your own heart. No man can reach the heart 
 of a boy who cannot recall the feelings of his 
 own boyhood. But how about a woman ? I 
 don't know. It is only now and then that you 
 will find a woman who can get close to the 
 heart of a fourteen-year-old boy. And when 
 you find her you will probably find a mischiev- 
 ous-eyed mother who romped with fourteen- 
 year-old boys when she was twelve, and who 
 was known to her dismayed maiden aunts as a 
 horrid tomboy. 
 
 ]^o doubt there are bad boys just as there 
 are bad men ; and I suppose if a census 
 were taken we should find about as many of 
 one as of the other. The main difference seems 
 to be that the average boy conceals his good 
 points, while the average man conceals his bad 
 ones. When a small boy jumped into the river 
 the other day and rescued a drowning man, he 
 blushed at the applause of the spectators and 
 ran home as fast as his little legs could take 
 him. And when he got home he didn't mention 
 
l82 Secrets of Sunday-School Teaching 
 
 it. A man would have hastened to get his 
 photograph and family history ready for the 
 evening papers. Men turn the rough side in ; 
 boys turn the rough side out. Men are prac- 
 ticed in the art of concealing their infirmities 
 — infirmities of temper, speech, appetite. A 
 boy blurts out his worst feelings ; lets out his 
 ugliest words, whistling hot from the boiler ; 
 and if he has the appetite of a pig everybody 
 knows it. Nobody but a man's wife knows a 
 man's appetite. 
 
 A man is adjudged innocent until he is proved 
 guilty. That is his privilege. A boy is ad- 
 judged guilty until he is proved innocent. 
 That is his fate. Give the average boy a square 
 deal and a fair chance along with the average 
 man and I shouldn't wonder if he came out two 
 laps ahead any day. 
 
 Not that boys are especially good. No, no. 
 But men are not especially good either. I am 
 simply pleading for a square deal. We don't 
 play fair with our boys. 
 
 Give a dog a bad name and you might as 
 well kill him. We have learned that lesson, 
 and we have stopped giving our dog a bad 
 name. We give him the best place in the 
 house instead. We take him to ride in my 
 lady's lap. We cover him with ribbons and 
 caresses and all sorts of nonsense. A hundred 
 times a day we fall down and worship before 
 
About Boys 183 
 
 the idol with a dog face. And when we rise 
 from our knees we send the maid to find out 
 what that " bad boy " is doing and to drive him 
 out of the house. 
 
 We call men men. We call boys lad boys. 
 If we treated our men as badly most of them 
 would go to the bad. We have mercy on our 
 men. We say, "Yes, but he's such a clever 
 fellow ; " and, " You know all of us have our 
 weaknesses." But boys— boys are "unspeak- 
 able ; " " they drive me mad ; " " there's noth- 
 ing to be done with them but nail them up in a 
 barrel and feed them through a bung-hole." I 
 don't wonder that some boys go wrong ; I won- 
 der that any of them go right— with all these 
 things tingling in their ears. 
 
 Let us be fair with our boys. Some men go 
 to the other extreme. They say boys will be 
 boys, and they shut their eyes and wait quietly 
 for youth to sow its wild oats. That, too, is 
 unfair. My boy has a right to a fair chance. 
 I have no right to call him a bad boy, but 
 neither have 1 a right to deny him my daily 
 care, my instruction, my warnings, my com- 
 panionship. I cannot excuse my neglect of my 
 boy by affirming that a boy must sow his wild 
 oats. A boy does not have to sow his wild oats, 
 but he is likely to sow them if I do not go along 
 with him and show him how to sow good ones. 
 
 Look for the good in that boy. There's some- 
 
184 Secrets of Sunday-School Teaching 
 
 thing better in him, believe me, than " scissors 
 and snails and puppy dogs' tails." Your great- 
 est hero was once locked up inside of a boy. 
 
 But do not expect more than you have a 
 right to expect. I know a good man who has 
 always held up before his boy a view of the 
 Christ life such as only a mature saint could 
 appreciate. That boy has utterly rebelled 
 against religion and despises everything that is 
 good. I know another man who has held up 
 the same ideal before his children and insisted 
 that one who did not reach that ideal was no 
 Christian at all. It is hardly necessary to say 
 that the children have grown up to be infidels. 
 One or two of them in theory, all of them in 
 practice. One might exercise a little common 
 sense in these matters. Babes have a right to 
 all the milk they need, and it is a shame to turn 
 their little stomachs and imperil their lives 
 with the strong meat that belongs to men. 
 Whatever may be our own ideas or ideals we 
 ought to remember that about the most idiotic 
 thing one can do in teaching a child is to try to 
 force him to see things that are beyond his 
 range of vision. He should be encouraged to 
 hitch his wagon to a star, of course ; but pray 
 give him a star that is in sight. 
 
 I know another man who is an ardent be- 
 liever in the doctrine of non-resistance. He 
 insists upon a literal interpretation of Christ's 
 
About Boys 185 
 
 command to turn the other cheek. He believes 
 that there are no circumstances under which 
 one is ever justified in resisting another ; that 
 when a man undertakes to defend himself he 
 takes himself out of God's hands and shows 
 that he no longer trusts God's loving care. 
 This man also insists upon teaching this sort of 
 thing to his pupils. The result is his boys have 
 no more respect for religion than they have for 
 a cry-baby. If it is religion to let a boy run 
 over you — if it is religion to let all the boys in 
 the neighbourhood make a foot-mat of you — 
 then they don't want any — that's all. 
 
 Every boy believes in manhood, in courage, 
 in grit, in square dealing, in standing pat. If 
 you continually hold up before him the manli- 
 ness of Christ the probability is he will learn to 
 love Christ sooner or later ; but if you insist 
 upon picturing the Christian as a pale-faced 
 fellow with a cotton string for a backbone, he 
 will greatly prefer to be a pagan. I would not 
 teach a boy that there are times when he can 
 fight — he does not need to be told that, but I 
 would never tell him that if he wants to be a 
 Christian he must never fight under any cir- 
 cumstances. At thirty years of age, with the 
 wisdom that you have and with the grace that 
 God has given you, you do not find it difficult 
 to keep out of trouble with your fellow men, 
 and you know how to suifer rather than to 
 
l86 Secrets of Sunday-School Teaching 
 
 strike back. But just remember that you are 
 thirty years of age, and that you see things as 
 no boy ever saw them or can ever be made to 
 see them so long as he is a boy. 
 
 Let me conclude this chapter with several 
 important " don'ts." 
 
 1. Don't let those boys in your class get it 
 into their heads that Jesus was sentimental 
 rather than practical. For example, when you 
 quote what the Master said about labouring for 
 " the meat which perisheth " you want to remind 
 your pupils that Jesus did not mean to discour- 
 age labour. On the contrary. He was discour- 
 aging idleness. He would have these men 
 work for their bread, and not go roaming over 
 the country expecting Him to feed them. He 
 did not want a following of begging priests or 
 pious tramps, l^either did He mean to teach 
 that a busy life is incompatible with a spiritual 
 life. At no time did He ever intimate that to 
 be heavenly-minded we must have nothing to do 
 with the earth ; that a man should be too spir- 
 itual to handle money ; that piety is opposed 
 to perspiration ; that we should be more con- 
 cerned about paying attention to the preacher 
 than about paying the debt we owe him. 
 Bread is a good thing, but Jesus would have us 
 learn that man must not live by bread alone. 
 It is a means, not an end : it is not the princi- 
 pal thing. We need to know how to make it 
 
About Boys 187 
 
 without setting our hearts on it. Bread is for 
 to-day: man is for eternity. If we work for 
 to-day only, we are but worms ; if we work for 
 to-morrow, we are but bees ; not until we work 
 for eternity do we work as men. 
 
 2. Don't allow yourself to think too much 
 about the rudeness of your boys. Nearly every- 
 thing a boy does is rude in the eyes of a 
 grown-up, and if you undertake to repress 
 everything that appears rude in your class you 
 will not be able to keep your mind on the lesson 
 for a single moment. 
 
 3. Do not use a pretty girl teacher as a 
 magnet to draw big boys to Sunday-school. It 
 is like using a magnet to draw pins into a box. 
 The pins will go in the box if the magnet goes 
 in, but they will stick to the magnet, not to the 
 box, and you cannot do anything with them 
 while they are sticking. 
 
 4. In teaching boys be sweet but don't be 
 sentimental. Be loving but don't be " confec- 
 tionery," as the children say. Little girls can 
 stand a good deal of sentimental stuff, but 
 everything that is in a boy revolts from it. 
 
 5. Don't speak to a child as a child but as a 
 companion. Don't let a boy thuik that you 
 think of him as a little boy. What you want 
 is to develop a sense of companionship, and you 
 can't do this if the boy is made to feel that he 
 is of another sort from you. 
 
XXXIV 
 SOME BOY PEOBLEMS 
 
 WHAT is the first thing to do with a 
 bad boy? 
 The very first thing is to stop 
 calling him a bad boy. No teacher who uses 
 that phrase is likely ever to make any sort of a 
 boy good. Let him understand that you do 
 not think of him as other people do and that 
 you don't propose that anybody shall call him 
 a bad boy. Look for a single good point in 
 him — you will find it somewhere — and tell him 
 about it. Let him feel that you see something 
 good in him. This is the first thing. And 
 this is the most important thing. 
 
 What would you do with a boy who suddenly 
 concludes that he will not go to church any 
 more? 
 
 First, don't beg him to go. A boy likes not 
 to do a thing he is begged to do. Second, don't 
 tell him about what becomes of bad boys who 
 don't go to church. He has enough curiosity 
 to make the experiment. Third, ask the pastor 
 to give him something to do at church. He 
 can open the door ; he can watch the ther- 
 mometer ; he can distribute notices or envelopes 
 i88 
 
Some Boy Problems 189 
 
 or books in the pews ; he can keep note of the 
 absentees so that the pastor can look them up ; 
 he can locate strangers and tell the pastor about 
 them ; he can do a hundred and one things that 
 are usually left undone. The important thing 
 is to give him a specific object in going to 
 church. "What makes many a boy hate to go 
 to church is that he has been told nothing but 
 that it is his duty to go. A boy never likes to 
 do a thing for which you cannot give a reason 
 except to say that it is his duty. 
 
 " I find it impossible to get a hold on my class. 
 They are the most uncontrollable boys I ever 
 saw. What would you suggest ? " 
 
 The only way to get a hold upon one's class 
 is to get a hold upon the individual members of 
 the class, one at a time. Every class has its 
 leader, and the quickest way is to first get hold 
 of the boy who leads the rest in disorder. Seek 
 him out during the week and cultivate him, and 
 when you have reached a point where you can 
 safely claim him as a friend, have a little confi- 
 dential talk with him and ask him to assist you 
 in keeping order in the class. It is not such a 
 difficult matter if you know how to win the 
 heart of a boy. 
 
 " I want something for my boys to do during 
 the week. What shall it be ? " 
 
 If 3^ou would open your eyes you would not 
 ask what it shall be, but rather what it shall 
 
igo Secrets of Sunday-School Teaching 
 
 not be. For there is enough work around you 
 to keep a dozen classes of boys like yours busy. 
 If you cannot think of anything else take those 
 boys over to the poor widow's house in the lane 
 and let them cut her wood and clean up her 
 yard. Anything that looks like helping some- 
 body will do. Of course, cutting wood is un- 
 speakably vile to the boy alone at home, but at 
 the widow's house they will be ready to fight 
 for the possession of the axe. 
 
 " My boys are in their teens and are beginning 
 to feel a little ashamed of Sunday-school. What 
 can I do to hold them ? " 
 
 Treat them no longer as boys but as young 
 men. Instead of patting them on the head 
 give them a comrade's whack upon the shoulder 
 occasionally. Get your illustrations from the 
 every-day life of young men. Stress the manly 
 virtues. Show an interest in everything that 
 is manly. Don't look down upon them ; look 
 at them as if they were just as tall as you are — 
 no more, no less. And spend more time pray- 
 ing for them than you ever spent before. There 
 are other things you must do, but these are 
 enough for a beginning. 
 
 "What would you do with the unmanageable 
 boy? 
 
 Nothing, of course ; for how can I manage 
 him if he is unmanageable ? But I would be 
 very slow to decide that he is unmanageable. 
 
Some Boy Problems 191 
 
 If you are sure you can do nothing with a boy 
 you will do nothing with him. Better turn 
 him over to a teacher who is not sure. 
 
 " My pupils have reached a stage where they 
 seem to have little confidence in anything I say 
 to them. They are always expressing doubt. 
 What would you do ? " 
 
 I would not take them too seriously. Boys 
 in their teens are likely either to have doubts 
 or to affect them. In either case it is a mere 
 symptom, like the down on the upper lip. In 
 due time it will give place to something else. 
 Possibly if you will do all that you can to 
 strengthen their confidence in your knowledge 
 and judgment they will not find it so difficult 
 to believe what you say. 
 
 Should a teacher be chosen for a class of 
 boys who expresses an unwillingness to teach 
 boys? 
 
 ]^o. Nobody ever did anything with boys 
 who either feared them or disliked them. 
 
 " What can I do to secure the respect of my 
 boys ? They don't seem to respect anybody or 
 anything." 
 
 Do you treat them with respect ? 
 
 "Do you believe it is possible to reform a 
 boy who is at heart dishonest ? " 
 
 I do not believe that he can be reformed, 
 but I believe he can be regenerated. Keform 
 has its possibilities, but it also has its limita- 
 
192 Secrets of Sunday-School Teaching 
 
 tions. Because men have reformed a bent 
 apple tree is no reason why we should hope to 
 reform a decayed apple. What a bad boy 
 needs is not reformation but regeneration. 
 
 Are not boys interested in stories of heroines 
 as well as heroes ? 
 
 Not until they are old enough to become in- 
 terested in the sex to which heroines belong. 
 A small boy is not interested in the things that 
 girls or women do. He is only interested in 
 the deeds of bigger boys and men. 
 
 Would you have a woman who is prejudiced 
 against boys teach a class of boys if you could 
 get nobody else ? 
 
 No ; I would break up the class and scatter 
 the boys among other classes. Could anybody 
 who is prejudiced against you teach you any- 
 thing ? 
 
 " How can I learn to love an unlovable boy ? " 
 
 First, stop thinking of him as an unlovable 
 boy. You will never learn to love him so long 
 as you think of him as unlovable. Think of 
 him as your boy, or, if you can, as God's boy 
 put into your hands to be molded into the 
 image of His Son. Second, get better ac- 
 quainted with him. You may call a boy un- 
 lovable if you know him only as he appears 
 on the surface, but the chances are that if you 
 will go down beneath the surface you will find 
 something in him worth loving. Third, do 
 
Some Boy Problems i^a 
 
 something for him. Do a great deal for him 
 feeek opportunities to help him in every way' 
 Tou know, we love most those we do most 
 tor, not those who do most for us. 
 
XXXV 
 ADDITIONAL POINTS 
 
 IN getting ready for Sunday-school see 
 that you have a good pencil, plenty of 
 patience, a sheet of paper, a heart full 
 of love, a handy Bible, and an abundant supply 
 of common sense. Pardon the mention of that 
 last item, but there are some very good people 
 who imagine that while common sense is a 
 very essential thing on Monday one has no 
 need for it on Sunday, seeing that in all relig- 
 ious work the Spirit helpeth our infirmities. I 
 wish every teacher could be persuaded to tie 
 his Bible and his common sense so tightly 
 together that he could never use the former 
 without the latter. I know a minister who 
 several years ago decided that ordinary com- 
 mon sense had no place in the study of so 
 spiritual a book as the Bible, and the other day 
 he announced that he would not conduct any 
 more funeral services because he had been re- 
 minded by the Spirit that Jesus had told His 
 disciples to let the dead bury their dead. 
 
 2. Disloyalty breeds disloyalty. If you are 
 not loyal to your superintendent you need not 
 194 
 
Additional Points 195 
 
 be surprised if at any moment your pupils 
 should prove disloyal to you. 
 
 3. I wonder if the great need of your 
 Sunday-school is not enthusiasm. I wonder if 
 it does not want a good electric shock or a suc- 
 cession of good electric shocks. I wonder if 
 the trouble is not with the teachers rather than 
 with the pupils. I wonder if you have not too 
 many men and women in your school whose 
 only excuse for being teachers is that they are 
 willing. And I wonder if you have not others 
 who have five talents for their work who are 
 using but one or none for the lack of enthusi- 
 asm to dig them up. 
 
 4. That teacher is doing the best work for 
 his pupil who has given him a place in his 
 heart next to his own children or brothers or 
 sisters. How many people are dearer to you 
 than your pupils ? 
 
 5. The habitually late or irregular teacher 
 in nine cases out of ten is late or irregular for 
 one reason only. It is purely a matter of lazi- 
 ness, and there is but one thing that will cure 
 laziness, and that is a motive. Laziness is 
 simply a symptom of emptiness — emptiness of 
 mind or of heart. Put an idea into the head 
 of a sluggard and he will soon be on his feet. 
 Fire his heart with a great ambition, and you 
 will perform a miracle like that which trans- 
 formed the dry bones of the valley into a 
 
196 Secrets of Sunday-School Teaching 
 
 living army. I would not underrate any of 
 the various methods and devices to secure 
 better attendance which have been used with 
 varying degrees of success, but we might as 
 well understand at the outset that if a method 
 or device is to be of any permanent value it 
 must aim at putting ideas into the heads and 
 motives into the hearts of the habitually ir- 
 regular. 
 
 6. We have not too much of the feminine, 
 but we have a great deal too much of the ef- 
 feminate in our Sunday-schools. "We want 
 more vigour, more virility, more masculinity 
 in our movements, our speech, om* discipline. 
 There are still too many superintendents and 
 teachers who imagine that the whole Sunday- 
 school is in pinafores and needs "mothering." 
 
 7. We might as well set up a tombstone at 
 the head of a class as to keep in it a teacher 
 whose pupils have discovered that his heart is 
 not in his work. 
 
 8. ISTothing has done more for the modern 
 Sunday-school than the convention idea. But 
 it is worth while to remind ourselves occasion- 
 ally that Sunday-school work does not consist 
 in going to conventions. The convention is for 
 preparation and inspiration ; the real work 
 comes after it is over. A great many good 
 people will sentence themselves to hard labour 
 at our conventions and institutes next summer 
 
Additional Points 197 
 
 and go home at the end with a satchel full of 
 note- books all used up and a heart full of con- 
 tentment over the thought that they have 
 proved themselves worthy Sunday-school work- 
 ers. And some of these good people will leave 
 all their ideas in their note-books and go back 
 to their Sunday-schools in the fall in the same 
 old listless way. I know a man who won a 
 great reputation as a Sunday-school worker by 
 attending all the conventions for miles around, 
 but he rarely attended his own Sunday-school. 
 Let us go to conventions — let us go wherever a 
 Sunday-school idea may be found— but let us 
 not deceive ourselves with the idea that this is 
 Sunday-school work. We go to conventions to 
 get ready to work. 
 
 9. The teacher who finds fault with the 
 superintendent is raising a lot of pupils to find 
 fault with the teacher. 
 
 10. Cultivate the habit of carrying your 
 lesson help in your pocket if you are a man, in 
 whatever you may carry in place of a pocket if 
 you are a woman. A prominent business man 
 whose knowledge of the lessons for a long time 
 excited my wonder told me that he had formed 
 the habit of glancing at his " help " whenever 
 he was waiting for a street-car, or was other- 
 wise unengaged, and that as a consequence 
 when Saturday night came he was always 
 saturated with the lesson. 
 
198 Secrets of Sunday-School Teaching 
 
 11. We waste so much precious time think- 
 ing about what we can do for our pupils in 
 general. If we would only spend a while think- 
 ing about what we can do for some one pupil 
 in particular ! 
 
 12. The fact that you do not agree with 
 your superintendent does not prove that he is 
 in the wrong. Nor is it any reason why you 
 should not give him your hearty support. You 
 are not going to agree with the wisest and best 
 people in the world in everything, but if you 
 are wise you are going to take your stand with 
 the wisest and best people regardless of your 
 own ideas or feelings. You will do it for your 
 own sake if for nothing more. Take your stand 
 by your superintendent and let him feel the 
 strength of your helping hand, not of yom' re- 
 sisting fist. It will help you as much as it will 
 help him. And it will help your class as much 
 as it will help the school as a whole. You can- 
 not weaken the authority of your superintendent 
 in the school without weakening your own 
 authority in your class. You cannot reflect 
 upon him without inviting upon yourself like 
 treatment from your own pupils. 
 
 13. Our pupils may step in our tracks with 
 safety only as our footprints fall in with the 
 footprints of Jesus. 
 
 14. Is your Sunday-school lesson story just 
 as real to you as the morning paper ? Do you 
 
Additional Points 199 
 
 think of it as an actual record of events that 
 actually occurred ? Are its people real flesh 
 and blood people ? Ask these questions of your 
 own heart before you go to the class and demand 
 an answer. And don't go until you can give 
 the right answer. 
 
 15. The teacher who is not assured of his 
 own integrity is not the teacher to teach a class 
 about matters of common honesty. 
 
 16. My friend Faintheart, who teaches a 
 girls' class in the corner, is still consoling him- 
 self with the thought that if he fails it will be 
 for lack of opportunity to succeed. Faintheart 
 sits with his chair tilted against the wall and 
 spends half of his time looking over the heads 
 of his pupils at the rest of the school, and envy- 
 ing the opportunities of his fellow teachers. 
 'No doubt he is going to fail, but it will not 
 be for lack of opportunity. It will be for 
 lack of get-at-it-iveness to seize and use the 
 opportunities that are flying around his class 
 like swallows about a chimney. 
 
 IT. The Sunday-school teacher should learn 
 how to smile and forget how to giggle. One 
 may smile at a very serious business — as did 
 many a martyr at the stake — but one cannot 
 giggle at it. 
 
 18. You will never do your best work in the 
 Sunday-school so long as you are not perfectly 
 sure that the Sunday-school work is worthy of 
 
200 Secrets of Sunday-School Teaching 
 
 your best. This is the chief trouble — we are not 
 perfectly sure about it. Some of us are not half 
 sure. Some of us are so uncertain about it that 
 we never go to Sunday-school without wishing 
 that we could go all the way by a back street. 
 We don't want to meet our distinguished friend, 
 the professor, and the adorable Miss High 
 Society, and have them discover that we are 
 pious Sunday-school workers ! 
 
 19. Is your piety of the type that makes 
 little children fidgety in your presence ? 
 
 20. The lesson is not going to mean more to 
 your pupils than it means to you. You are not 
 going to impart to them more than you get out 
 of it for yourself. You are not going to bind 
 the truth to their hearts if you do not first bind 
 it to your own heart. 
 
 21. If a Sunday-school teacher was paid a 
 salary would you employ a teacher for your 
 school who did not know anything more about 
 the art of teaching than some Sunday-school 
 teachers you know ? If not, why not ? 
 
 22. Do your pupils feel that you love them 
 during the week as well as on Sunday ? 
 
 23. It is a good thing to win the confidence 
 of those we would teach in our ability; it is 
 better to win their confidence in ourselves. It 
 is best to win both. 
 
 24. Teaching is a personal matter. If you 
 do not make the lesson a personal matter with 
 
Additional Points 201 
 
 yourself, you are not going to make it a personal 
 matter with your pupils. If you study the 
 lesson simply because you have to teach it, your 
 pupils will study the lesson — if they study it 
 at all — simply because they have to recite it. It 
 is vain to hope that you are benefiting your 
 pupils if you are not getting any benefit your- 
 self. 
 
 25. Yery small children can take a good 
 deal of genuine gush. When a boy is old 
 enough to know that it is gush he is utterly 
 repelled by it. A girl will detect it earlier, 
 perhaps, but for a while can stand it better. 
 Whatever you do don't gush over a boy who 
 has passed his tenth year. 
 
 26. Don't expect to set the hearts of your 
 pupils on fire if your own heart is not on fire. 
 And don't expect your own heart to be on fire 
 if you never furnish any fuel for the flame. If 
 you want to go to your class at white heat you 
 must find time to read. Thinking comes of 
 reading and fire comes of thinking. 
 
 Printed in the United States of America. 
 
SUNDAY SCHOOL WORK 
 
 WM. WALTER SMITH, A.B., A.N: 
 
 The Sunday School of To-day 
 
 A Compendium of Hints for Superintendents and 
 Pastors, with Suggestions and Plans for Sunday- 
 School Architecture by C. W. Stoughton, A.IA. 
 Graphically illustrated, i2mo, cloth, net $1.25. 
 
 "It is not too much to say that no pastor, superintendent, 
 oflficer, or teacher of the Sunday-school, who wants to do 
 the best possible work in the school of the church, can afford 
 to neglect this volume." — Standard. 
 
 EDWARD LEIGH PELL, DD- 
 
 Secrets of Sunday School Teaching 
 
 l2mo, cloth, net $1.00. 
 The key-note of this book is given by the author in his 
 Preface, where he says: "I have tried not to lay too much 
 stress on methods. _ The supreme need of the average Sun- 
 day-school teacher is not a method of work, but a motive 
 for work. The author himself is fired with enthusiasm for 
 teaching Bible truths and he has the ability to impart this 
 zeal. While he puts "motives" first, he does not ignore 
 "methods," but presents those which modern practice has 
 proved to be effective. 
 
 MARTHA TARBELL, Ph.D. 
 
 Tarbeirs Teachers' Guide, 
 
 i2mo, cloth, net $1.00 (postage 15c). 
 
 The secret of the striking success which has so quickly 
 made a place for "TarbElIv's" at the head of all Sunday 
 School lesson helps, is the adaptability to all grades^ of 
 Sunday School teaching. Primary, Junior, Intermediate, 
 Senior and Bible Class teachers find here full explanation of 
 Bible texts, light upon difficult passages by the best Biblical 
 scholars, and discussions of present-day problerns in teaching. 
 By its frequent missionary topics, and its missionary illus- 
 tration given with every lesson it helps the teacher strengthen 
 the missionary spirit of his pupils. 
 
 Arnold's Practical Commentary, 
 
 i2mo, cloth, net 50c (postage loc). 
 
 With its hints to teachers, illustrations, blackboard ex- 
 ercises, questions, maps, etc., this popular help has for many 
 years supplied the need for a good, all-round comrtientary 
 at a popular price. 
 
 "A perfect thesaurus of explanations, illustrations and 
 applications of the lesson." — Our Bible Teacher, 
 
 R. A. TORREY, D.D. 
 
 The Gi^ of the Lesson, 
 
 l6mo, leatherette, net 25c. 
 
 "I'o those who have possessed and used former issues 
 that for this year will need no commendation. It is not 
 only handy in form but wondrously complete." — Christian 
 Intelligencer. 
 
ILLUSTRATIVE HINTS 
 
 Studies in the Art of Illustration 
 
 By Amos R. Wells. 2d Edition^ - net 1.25. 
 
 "Incidents, expositions, exhortations, which the 
 author has used effectively in church and Sunday 
 school — bright, modern, pat. That it has been compiled 
 and culled by Mr. Wells, so experienced and effective a 
 speaker, is a guarantee of homiletic value."— /«/^r*V?r. 
 
 Object Lessons for Junior Work 
 
 By Ella N. Wood. 4th Edition, 16mo, Cloth, .50. 
 
 " It is just the book for which workers have been 
 asking. A child cannot remember a talk or a sermon, 
 but he will remember an object and the lessons that the 
 object taught." — Christian Endeavor Worlds 
 
 Object Sermons in Outline 
 
 By C. H. Tyndall, Ph. D. With an introduction 
 by Rev. A. F. Schauffler, D. D. 4th Edition. 
 Illustrated, 12mo, Cloth, - - - 1.00. 
 
 "The lessons are well conceived and worked out 
 with great ingenuity, and in good hands could not 
 fsul of being extremely effective."— 7)5^ Independent. 
 
 Windows 
 
 Gospel Lights for Gospel Subjects. By Sarah 
 Geraldina Stock. Illustrated, Cloth, - .60. 
 
 ••These windows let in a flood of light, whereby 
 much precious truth may be revealed to youthful 
 iDinds."--iV. F. Observer. 
 
 Attractive Truths in Lesson and Story 
 
 By Mrs. A. M. Scudder. Introduction by 
 F. E. Clark, D.D. 3d Edition, %^o. Cloth, 1.25. 
 
 *' This book occupies a new field, and occupies it 
 -well. No other book in the language, so far as we know» 
 has even attempted Just this task,"— C/4m/'ia» Et> 
 d«9vor World, 
 
THE 
 
 How to Conduct a Sunday School 
 
 By Marion Lawrance, General Secretary of th-e 
 
 International Sunday School Association. 
 
 6th Edition, 12mo, Cloth, - - net 1.25. 
 
 "Every superintendent, teacher, pastor, officer, 
 should own it. A perfect mine of hints ana plans from 
 the most experienced Sunday school leader of the day." 
 — Sunday School Times. 
 
 " Packed full of useful information. Filled with 
 details, specific and practical, for which a host of work- 
 ers have longed and prayed." — Examiner, 
 
 The Modem Sunday School in 
 Principle and Practice 
 
 By Henry F. Cope. 12mo, Cloth, - net 1.00. 
 
 By the General Secretary of the Religious Education 
 Association. It constitutes an invaluable guide for the 
 management of the Sunday School under modern con- 
 ditions. Presents the results of the newest experiments 
 both with primary, adolescent and adult grades. 
 
 Sunday School Success 
 
 By Amos R. Wells. 12mo, Cloth, Gilt Top, 1.26. 
 
 " The author writes from his rich fund of knowledge 
 and wisdom gained by personal experience in practical 
 Sunday school work. For Sunday school teachers and 
 superintendents it is the best hand-book on methods of 
 work and mastery of difficulties we have yet seen. It 
 is interesting. There is not a dull chapter in it."-— 
 Evangelical Messenger. 
 
 Pastoral Leadersli:p of Sunday 
 School Forces 
 
 By A. F. Schauffler, D.D. 12mo, Cloth, net .50. 
 
 The book is the outcome of the experience of he 
 who today is perhaps the leading exponent of practical 
 Sunday school work in its entirety and detail. 
 
 The Modern Superintendent 
 
 and his Work. By J. R. Pepper, 16mo,paper, .IB, 
 A wealth of suggestion in most compact form. , 
 
PRIMARY 
 
 Object Lessons for Children 
 
 Or, Hooks and Eyes, Truth Linked to Sight. 
 
 By C. H. Tyndall, Ph. D. Illustrated, 4th 
 
 Edition. 12mo, Cloth, - - . 1.26. 
 
 *' For busy Sunday school workers and others, we 
 know no better work of its Vind." — Cumi^r/and 
 JPresbyterian. 
 
 Talks to Children 
 
 By T. T. Eaton, D.D. 3d Edition. 12mo, 
 
 Cloth, Gilt Top, 1.00. 
 
 "It reproduces Scripture History in the terms of 
 modern life, and ^ves it both a vivid setting before the 
 youthful imagination and a firm grip on the youthful 
 conscience." — Independent, 
 
 The Shepherd Psalm for Children 
 
 By Josephine L. Baldwin. With half-tone 
 Frontispiece and 13 outline Illustrations, 16mo, 
 Cloth, - ■ - - . - - - .35. 
 •'Equally adapted to teach the teacher how to 
 teach, to teach the child how to learn, and to teach 
 what ought to be learned." — Christian Advocate. 
 
 The Lord'r* Prayer for Children 
 
 By Martha K. Lawson. Illustrated, 12mo, 
 
 Cloth, net .60. 
 
 " Miss Lawson is a specialist in the science of child 
 study. The book is invaluable to Primary teachers and 
 leaders of Junior classes." — N. Y. Observer. 
 
 Eighty Good Times Out of Doors 
 
 By Lilian M. Heath. 12mo, Cloth, Illus- 
 trated, net .76. 
 
 "Just the thing for workers among children, and 
 the question "What shall we play next ? " will find a 
 ready response in this helpful volume." — Christian 
 Intelligencer. 
 
 Seed for Spring-time Sowing 
 
 A Wall Roll for the use of Primary, Sabbath 
 School and Kindergarten Teachers. Comuiled 
 by Mrs. Robert Pratt. - . . . ' .75. 
 Favorite Psalms — The Lord's Prayer — Ten 
 Commandments — Beatitudes — Many other 
 choice Biblical selections, all in very clear type 
 for wall use. 
 
THE BLACKBOARD 
 
 Pencil Points for Preacher and Teacher 
 
 A Second Volume of Blackboard and Object 
 Teaching. 
 
 By Rev. R. F. Y. Pierce. 2d Edition, Illus- 
 trated, Cloth. net 1.26. 
 
 "A useful volume by the recognized exponent of the 
 art of conveying Scripture truth by means of blackboard 
 sketches and object lessons. Crowded with illustra- 
 tions of blackboard drawings and suggestions, and 
 forms a fitting companion to ais popular Dook 'Pictured 
 Truth.' ''—Westminister, 
 
 Pictured Truth 
 
 A Handbook of Blackboard and Object Teach- 
 ing. By R. F. Y. Pierce. With Illustrations 
 by the author. 3d Edition, Cloth, - 1.2B. 
 
 ^ " The blackboard in the Sunday School may be en- 
 nched readily in its diversified Sunday use by the study 
 of such a hoo\i,"—Congre£^ationalist, 
 
 Chalk 
 
 What We Can Do With It. Practical Work 
 with Chalk and Blackboard. By Mrs. Ella N. 
 Wood. 2d Edition. Illustrated, - net .T5. 
 
 " Mrs. Wood helps every one, in this book, who has 
 anything to do with the education of children, to make 
 an ally of the blackboard.. ..The book will help ministers 
 to hold their boys and girls ; it will be invaluable t<- 
 Junior Endeavor superintendents and Primary Suada* 
 school teachers."— C. E, World, 
 
 Children's Meetings 
 
 And How to Conduct Them. By Lucy J. Rider 
 and Nellie M. Carman. With Lessons, Out- 
 lines, Diagrams, Music, etc. Introduction by 
 Bishop Vincent. Cloth, . - net 1.00. 
 Paper, net .50. 
 
 •' With the aid of its blackboard sketches it aims to 
 teach the leader to talk with children, to encourage the 
 memorizing of Bible verses, and to make use of tht 
 lessons from nature."— C. £, World, 
 
THE SUNDAY SCHOOL and THE CHILDREN 
 
 A. H. McKINNEY, Ph.D. 
 
 Former Secretary N. Y. State S. S. Association. 
 
 Practical Pedagogy in the Sunday School 
 
 i6m,o, cloth, net soc. 
 
 "The principles which underlie successful teaching are 
 taken up under various heads, as 'Apperception,' 'Adap- 
 tation,' etc., and the art of illustrating, questioning, etc. 
 Many things which teachers instinctively find out for them- 
 selves are here supported with reasons, and every teacher 
 will find helpful suggestions which are new." — Watchman. 
 
 H. E. CARMACK 
 
 How to Teach a Sunday School Lesson 
 
 i2mo, cloth, net 75c. 
 
 New ways, new methods, new plans characterize this 
 new work which reflects the spirit of our progressive age. 
 It is decidedly fresh, and original in its treatment of the 
 subject of lesson teaching, 
 
 J^A V CLARKSOISr MARKER 
 
 The Work of the Sunday School 
 
 A Manual for Teachers. i2mo, cloth, net $1.00. 
 
 Fresh, original, stimulating, this book is the product 
 of research, study and thought. Because of its inspirational 
 character, it will impart a new impetus to Sunday Schoo? 
 workers. The book was inspired by lectures delivered by Mr. 
 Harker at Summer Assemblies and Chautauquas. 
 
 EA SIL MA THE WS, M. A. 
 
 The Fascinated ChM 
 
 A Quest for the Child Spirit and Talks with Boys 
 and Girls. i2mo, cloth, net $1.00. 
 
 A book for the parent, teacher and minister. Part I, 
 Wbnder and the Hero, or the Quest for the Child Spirit. 
 In Par'4 II, Talks With the Children. Part IIIp Primary 
 Talks. 
 
 ALBERT C. MACKINNON, M.A. 
 
 The Bible Zoo 
 
 Talks to Children about the Birds, Beasts and In- 
 sects of the Bible. i2mo, cloth, net $1.00. 
 
 The author says in his foreword, "Come with me, chil- 
 dren, for a stroll through the zoological gardens of the Scrip- 
 ture As we take our walk through these Bible grounds 
 
 I want you to listen to all the sermons preached to us by 
 the inhabitants of this zoo." "The "Zoo" contains "the Bird 
 House," "the Insect House," "the lyion House" and "the 
 Outside Paddock." 
 
Princeton Theological Seminary Libraries 
 
 1 1012 01237 6184 
 
 
 
 Date Due 
 
 
 
 
 
 ^27*38 
 
 
 
 
 Uv 13 '38 
 
 
 
 
 my -»■ •» 
 
 * 
 
 
 
 BSy 1 1 *Z 
 
 
 
 
 i> 
 
 ■■'S 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 » ■ . 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 UU ^ij 5' 
 
 
 
 
 l>f -l-H 
 
 
 
 
 ^?*«-- ■ - ■.'^. 
 
 
 
 
 Aii-igM****" 
 
 k- 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 1 
 
 
 
 ^