DEPARTMENT XXIV - RELIGION 



(Hall 4, September 20. 4.15 p. m.) 



CHAIRMAN: BISHOP JOHN H. VINCENT, Chautauqua, N. Y. 

 SPEAKERS: PRESIDENT HENRY C. KING, Oberlin College. 



PROFESSOR FRANCIS G. PEABODY, Harvard University. 



THE FUNDAMENTAL NATURE OF RELIGION 



BY HENRY CHURCHILL KING 



[Henry Churchill King, President of Oberlin College, Professor of Theology and 

 Philosophy, b. Hillsdale, Michigan, September 18, 1858. A.B. Oberlin 

 College, 1879; D.B. Oberlin Seminary, 1882; A.M. Harvard University, 1883; 

 D.D. Oberlin College, 1897; Western Reserve University, 1901; Yale Univer- 

 sity, 1904. Associate Professor of Mathematics, Oberlin College, 1884-90; 

 Associate Professor of Philosophy, Oberlin College, 1890-91; Dean of Oberlin 

 College, 1901-02. Member of Council of Seventy of American Institute of 

 Sacred Literature; Chairman of Executive Board and Council of Religious 

 Education Association ; member of Western Philosophical Association. Author 

 of Reconstruction in Theology ; Theology and the Social Consciousness ; Rational 

 Living ; The Appeal of the Child; Personal and Ideal Elements in Education. 



Is religion of really fundamental importance, or can we easily 

 dispense with it? Is the real trend of the scientific and educational 

 and ethical life of the world away from religion, or toward a deeper 

 recognition of it? Is religion something external, to be merely 

 tacked or pasted on to life, or is it absolutely fundamental to life, 

 touching every part of it? No questions can be more important than 

 these questions; the answer to none concerns us more deeply. 



But a satisfactory answer here must be thoroughgoing. No shal- 

 low investigation can suffice. And we can hardly expect to come 

 to any profound conviction of the fundamental nature of religion 

 without careful consideration of its relation to education, to ethics, 

 and to life. If religion is of fundamental importance, such a con- 

 sideration ought to make that clear. 



I. Religion and Education 



And if we ask first as to the relation of religion and education (so 

 far as education is not merely technical or professional), we seem 

 bound to say that the relation is here so intimate that we cannot separate 

 either at its best from the essential spirit of the other. The modern 

 world believes in education as it believes in almost nothing else. 

 Let us see, then, the inevitable outcome of a comparison of religion 

 and education as to aim, as to means and spirit, as to method, and 

 to results. 



