| Show THE TIlE SMALL BOYS BOY'S I BELIEF It is common for the thoughtless man to say it is of no un consequence what one believes Ilis His ipse ipso dixit is belief belie is nothing doing is everything And yet the very basis of action is belief We e scarcely ever eyer move Inove a hand to do an anything thin but in iii obedience to a belief What hat folly is it then for Dr Di E. E Benjamin enjamin Andrews Andrewt president preside t of the University of Nebraska to advise ad as he lie did the University of Chicago summer summer sum sum- mer mer iner school after this fashion Dont teach your children to fear feat Go God Dont Don't teach them the doctrine of eternal damnation Dont Don't muddle their brains with the theory of or original sin Dont Don't scare them with the devil Dont Don't discuss with them whether they are arc to be lC justified b by faith and works Dont Don't puzzle them with the doctrine of predestination and free will A Above ho e all dont don't teach them that the they have Ilave m e any better chances of heaven than the little Baptist children or the little Methodist children or 01 orthe orthe the little Presbyterian children er whichever the case 4 m may y be be across across the wa way The Chicago papers very properly and very naturally expressed astonishment t t at nt such doctrine Tile The two for journalists r. r J. J sic of the rural press pronounce Dr Andrews a ar avery r I very wise man for these utterances Now whether one one be he a Catholic Jew Tew Presbyterian or Mohammedan dan if he be look at the matter mattel thoughtfully he must regard the professor for as reckless and seeking for cheap Dont teach your Jour children to fear feat God or the devil levil Just let them solve sol the problem of good and evil to suit themselves Let your Jour small ho boy lOy alone in in his belief belief he he i is sure to hold it that it-that that he lie he is the only small ho boy on earth that he is as big hig bigas as ns his father frillier and that he lie is not even een afraid of God Just lust let your yom small niall boy hoy alone alone lle he will come out all right And yet Jet somehow or oi other there are a avery averyt very t lar large e number of small mall boys in the reform schools y and mul a great leat many men who lio were once small boys now passing their lives behind prison hals bars Had those same fame boys feared God in the broad sense genSe of the word and hated the devil levil many of them would have had happy li lives s. s Had they been heen taught propel proper doctrines and imbibed with belief in iii the eternal fitness of good and the eternal mistake of evil they would not be he finishing hing their days in misery At least that is iF the testimony of many nany nan criminals and the they ought to know But we doubt douht not Dr Andrews Andrews An drews drew's means to advocate the of this so so- calIe called damnatory teaching and to present the Almighty Al AI mighty as a loving Father But he lie was reckless nevertheless ne and tind has brou brought ht upon himself the criticism criticism crit crit- wh which ch his itch for notoriety deserved |
