292 GENERAL RELIGIOUS EDUCATION 



individual, lonely will at the expense of moral environment. " The 

 mature man is molded into individuality not through deliberate 

 exercise of mind and will, undertaken for their effects, but through 

 the daily struggle to fulfill the duties that pertain to his position in 

 an organized community." 1 And if the mature man, still more the 

 immature child and youth. 



The way to acquire a moral character is, then, to become an effi- 

 cient and loyal member of the institutions of society - - the family, 

 the school, the church, the state, and an efficient and loyal member 

 of the smaller groups that these severally contain. 



The ways in which the teaching of religion may aid in the develop- 

 ment of the individual through institutional membership are well 

 known. I cannot enumerate them here. But there are certain 

 matters which deeply concern the efficiency of the institutions most 

 closely related to religion, of which I do wish to speak in conclusion. 



First, the institution must speak with authority. But that au- 

 thority must, as we have seen, be an inner authority. The institu- 

 tion makes for moral development only when it dimly, it may be, 

 but progressively, finds response in the heart of its members, only 

 when that which at first seemed an external thing is felt, by the 

 individual, to be his greater self. An institution which is a mere 

 external machine produces merely mechanical results. An institu- 

 tion that is powerless to require moral obedience is essentially 

 demoralizing and immoral. Sunday-school superintendents might 

 profitably ponder this. 



Second, the institution must make membership real through 

 participation in organized activities. 



A highly developed church service, one with some form of liturgy, 

 helps to satisfy the former requirement; such organization as is 

 found in the Young Men's Christian Association satisfies the latter. 

 Without division of labor or the fixing of responsibility, and without 

 pride in classes, in committee work, and the like, there will be lack- 

 ing much of the incentive and the loyalty that make up the motive 

 power of institutions. 



Third, institutions should adequately furnish what Theodore T. 

 Munger calls the " outward drill of religious observance and spiritual 

 habit." 2 " We can do nothing better for ourselves, for our families, 

 for the faith, than secure for each a full, ministering environment 

 of religious custom. A man should have for himself certain religious 

 habits and usage, something of an external nature that shall speak 

 back to him in confirmation of his belief; . . . it is a body holding 

 together the soul and playing into it from the external world." I 

 would if I could incorporate into this paper the whole of Dr. Hunger's 



1 Giddings, loc. tit. p. 396. 



2 The Freedom of Faith, p. 208. 



