EDITOR'S TABLE. 



559 



be said on both sides, and we have 

 no doubt the soundest arg'uments 

 will prevail in the end. 



THE DEVIL IN TEE PUBLIC SCHOOLS. 



A FEW weeks ago a most extraor- 

 dinary story appeared in the daily 

 papers of this city — a story of a panic 

 that had occurred in one of our pub- 

 lic schools in consequence of a state- 

 ment made by a little girl that she 

 had seen the devil coming into the 

 building. It was at the hour of the 

 noon recess, and the boys and girls 

 were in their respective playrooms. 

 No sooner had the words been ut- 

 tered than all the girls in the room 

 were seized with abject terror and 

 began to scream in a frenzied man- 

 ner, begging and praying to be saved 

 from the fiend. The boys, whose 

 room adjoined that of the girls, heard 

 the shrieks and became almost equal- 

 ly terror-stricken. When the teach- 

 ers appeared on the scene they could 

 not for some time learn what the 

 cause of the excitement was, so hys- 

 terical had the ■ whole mass of the 

 children become. Shortly a crowd 

 gathered round the building, largely 

 composed of women who had chil- 

 dren in the school, and who, when 

 they heai'd that the devil had ap- 

 peared on the premises, became per- 

 fectly frantic themselves. The police 

 having been sent for took possession 

 of the building, and with consider- 

 able difficulty peace was finally re- 

 stored. 



It would appear from this that 

 the devil superstition is not quite so 

 extinct in the community as most of 

 us perhaps have been in the habit of 

 believing. It seems the children had 

 been frightening one another for 

 some time previously with stories of 

 the devil, ghosts, etc., so that there 

 had been a certain preparation for 

 the panic that finally broke out. 



This is a matter, we think, in which 

 teachers might very properly inter- 

 est themselves a little. It does no 

 small child good to believe in a 

 devil capable of donning the con- 

 ventional horns and tail and start- 

 ing out on errands of destruction; 

 and it is not probable that any im- 

 portant theological doctrine could be 

 upset if children were told that such 

 a devil was really a negligible quan- 

 tity. There ought to be some way 

 of talking even to very young chil- 

 dren which would tend to take their 

 thoughts ofi' ghostly mysteries of all 

 kinds, and concentrate them on 

 what is beautiful and interesting and 

 healthful in the world around them. 

 The true corrective to devil worship 

 — and all fear of the devil is a kind of 

 worship— is the study of Nature and 

 of the powers inherent in Nature. 

 It should not be difficult to make 

 children feel that there is really no 

 scope left for the devil in the world 

 as we know it to-day. Of course, if 

 their parents or Sunday-school teach- 

 ers, on the other hand, tell them that 

 the devil goes about like a roaring 

 lion seeking whom he may devour, 

 the more wholesome teaching which 

 we are advocating may be so far an- 

 tagonized. No effort should, how- 

 ever, be spared in the public schools 

 to put all the thoughts of the chil- 

 dren on a natural and rational basis, 

 and thus as far as possible to secure 

 for them immunity against hurtful 

 and degrading superstitions. This 

 incident should be taken to heart 

 by teachers generally, as showing 

 the importance of knowing what 

 thoughts are really engaging the 

 minds of their pupils. The devil has 

 had his day — he had a good thou- 

 sand years of human history pretty 

 much to himself — and there is really 

 no impropriety in trying to keep him 

 out of the schools of modern New 

 York. 



