Chapter 60—The Bible in Our Schools
It is not wise to send our youth to universities where they devote
their time to gaining a knowledge of Greek and Latin, while their
heads and hearts are being filled with the sentiments of the infidel
authors whom they study in order to master these languages. They
gain a knowledge that is not at all necessary, or in harmony with the
lessons of the great Teacher. Generally those educated in this way
have much self-esteem. They think they have reached the height of
higher education, and carry themselves proudly, as though they were
no longer learners. They are spoiled for the service of God. The time,
means, and study that many have expended in gaining a comparatively
useless education should have been used in gaining an education that
would make them all-round men and women, fitted for practical life.
Such an education would be of the highest value to them.
What do students carry with them when they leave our schools?
Where are they going? What are they going to do? Have they the
knowledge that will enable them to teach others? Have they been
educated to be wise fathers and mothers? Can they stand at the head
of a family as wise instructors? In their home life can they so instruct
their children that theirs will be a family that God can behold with
pleasure, because it is a symbol of the family in heaven? Have they
received the only education that can truly be called “higher education”?
What is higher education? No education can be called higher
education unless it bears the similitude of heaven, unless it leads
young men and young women to be Christlike, and fits them to stand
at the head of their families in the place of God. If, during his school
life, a young man has failed to gain a knowledge of Greek and Latin
and the sentiments contained in the works of infidel authors, he has
not sustained much loss. If Jesus Christ had deemed this kind of
[468]
education essential, would He not have given it to His disciples, whom
He was educating to do the greatest work ever committed to mortals,
to represent Him in the world? But, instead, He placed sacred truth in
their hands, to be given to the world in its simplicity.
385