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An
Educational Problem for
Protestants
“My people have committed two evils; they
have forsaken Me the fountain of living waters, and
hewed them out cisterns, broken cisterns, that
can hold no water.” Jer. 2:13.
By E. A. SUTHERLAND
President of Battle Creek College
REVIEW AND HERALD PUBLISHING CO.
BATTLE CREEK, MICHIGAN
1900
Copyright, 1900,
By E. A. Sutherland
There are few books which treat of the historyof education, and fewer which attempt to show thepart that the educational work has ever borne inthe upbuilding of nations. That religion is inseparablyconnected with, and upheld by, the systemof education maintained by its advocates, has beenrecognized by many historians in a casual way;but, to the author’s knowledge, no one hashitherto made this thought the subject of avolume.
In teaching the history of education and thegrowth of Protestantism, the close relationshipever existing between the latter and true methodsof education led to a careful study of the educationalsystem of the nations of the earth, especiallyof those nations which have exerted alasting influence upon the world’s history. Thepresent volume is the result of that study.
D’Aubigné says that in the Reformation “theschool was early placed beside the church; and[4]these two great institutions, so powerful to regeneratethe nations, were equally reanimated by it.It was by a close alliance with learning that theReformation entered into the world.”
True education, Protestantism, and republicanismform a threefold union which defies thepowers of earth to overthrow; but to-day theProtestant churches are growing weak, and theboasted freedom of America’s democracy is beingexchanged for monarchical principles of government.
This weakness is rightly attributed by some tothe want of proper education. The same causeof degeneracy would doubtless be assigned bymany others, were effects traced to their source.
The author has attempted, by a generous useof historical quotations, to so arrange facts thatthe reader will see that the hope of Protestantismand the hope of republicanism lies inthe proper education of the youth; and that thistrue education is found in the principles deliveredby Jehovah to his chosen people, the Jews;that it was afterwar