Religion and war are the two great central facts of history. Around these two points cluster pretty much all that is worth knowing of the past. Religion gave birth to education; war led the way to civilization. The ritual of the ancient pagan worship necessitated an educated priesthood, and the temples of worship were monuments to the genius and skill of the times. During many ages man's highest faculties were developed in doing homage to that Being whose presence was everywhere felt, whose wisdom and justice in ordering the affairs of this world were everywhere acknowledged. The fragments of those masterpieces of pure taste and unrivaled architectural skill which still remain to us are eloquent tributes to the piety of the warlike races that reared them. All that is beautiful and chaste in music and painting, in poetry and the drama, we owe primarily to religion.
Next in importance to the priesthood of the ancient civilization came the military caste. War was the great school wherein men of intellect could cultivate their genius, or gratify their ambition. The training of the young was mainly directed towards preparing them for the field. With this training there was inculcated such a pious regard for the gods of their fathers as to develop the highest virtues in the sons; hence a deference to the guardian powers of their country, and an open, fearless profession of their belief, are found to be characteristics common to all the great military leaders of antiquity.
The hardest fighters, whose deeds are recorded in the Iliad, are those who are most fervent in their appeals to the gods. Achilles, in an earnest prayer, invokes the aid of Jove in behalf of his friend Patroclus, and the great Hector, all stained and spent "with long laborious fight," rejecting the proffered cup because it "dulls the noble mind," bids Hecuba repair to the virgin's fane, and with prayers and oblations avert the city's doom. These were the typical heroes of the time.
The Persians taught their children virtue, says Montaigne, as other nations taught letters. After young Cyrus, subsequently the greatest captain of his time, had completed his military education under the ablest masters, Cambyses instructed him in military ethics. In a short time, Xenophon tells us, he taught him more, and what was of more importance to him as a military commander, than all his celebrated teachers had done. He concludes by saying, "Above all he, (a military commander,) must have recourse to the protection of the gods, from whom alone we receive all our wisdom and all our success." Cyrus put in practice the excellent lessons he had received, never failing to invoke the gods to be favorable to his enterprises, and beginning and ending all his battles with prayer. "For it is observable," says the historian, "that on such occasions those that fear the Deity most are the least afraid of men."
The Greeks were the first to develop the science of secular education, in which mental and physical culture had an equal share. To these Socrates added logic, moral science, and the cultivation of the heart.
It was with religious ceremonies that the Athenian youth, on entering his nineteenth year, was admitted to the civic list. Armed with a shield and a spear he was escorted to a temple devoted to worship, and there took a solemn oath of loyal service to his country and the gods. "I will do battle," he vowed, "for the common weal and for the religion of my fathers." For the Athenian government laid special stress upon religious influences in education. It insisted that the young men should be trained to reverence the guardian powers of the State, in the hope that they would grow up to orderly and pious manhood. Hence, we find that no Greek army marched to battle without first offering prayers to the Deity; no Greek fleet undertook a military movement without supplications for success..
Xenophon, whose remarkable retreat with the "Ten Thousand" through an enemy's country is still regarded as one of the most brilliant and instructive passages in military history, said it was only "reasonable to believe that the Divinity would guide and protect those who adored him with the purest affection, who invoked him with the greatest constancy, and consulted him with the most sincerity." By way of enforcing his arguments he gives an illustration of the insufficiency of a purely military school by proving that a graduate of one of them had acquired nothing but self-conceit. He then proceeds, in the person of Socrates, to give some lessons in military ethics, "without which no man, however skilled in war, can become truly great." Xenophon regarded religion from a strictly military and practical point of view. "If any one wonders," says he, "that I insist so much here upon the necessity of not forming any enterprise without first endeavoring to render the Divinity favorable, let him reflect that there are in war a thousand unforeseen and hazardous conjunctures wherein generals, vigilant to take advantages and lay ambuscades for each other, from the uncertainty of the enemy's motions, can take no other counsel than that of the gods. Nothing is doubtful or obscure with them. They unfold the future to whomsoever they please. Now we may presume that the gods are more inclined to those who not only invoke their aid on urgent occasions, but who at all times, and when no dangers threaten, render them all the homage and adoration of which they are capable."
The education of the Spartan youth was calculated, in a preeminent degree, to produce the highest type of soldier. While the physical training was thorough, those higher qualities, a lofty sense of honor, an exalted patriotism, dauntless courage, perfect self-control, and a sincere reverence for the gods, were carefully cultivated. Plutarch tells us that the Spartans marched to battle as if God were present and fought for them; and this practical piety, and the true courage it imparted, were attributed by Cicero less to their natural disposition than to their excellent education. Of all the people of their times, the Spartans best understood military ethics, or the practice of the military virtues. There is a striking similarity between the training of Spartan youths and those of Japan.
Alexander the Great adopted the godlike Achilles as his model. The theology of Homer was his religion; the Iliad his Bible. He had been carefully educated by Aristotle, who was a pupil of Plato, who was a pupil of Socrates himself. Aristotle's scheme of education embraced the development of the moral, intellectual, and physical natures with a view to the rounding out of the humanly perfect man. Such, according to Arrian, was Alexander. "In body he was most handsome, most indefatigable, most active; in mind most manly . . . and most religious; in sensual pleasures most temperate."
In the warlike republic of Carthage devotion to the Deity was agreeable to the genius of the people. Its generals regarded it as a solemn duty to begin and end all military expeditions with the worship of the gods. On the eve of setting out on his great campaign Hannibal repaired to Cadiz, and there, in, the temple of the supreme god of Tyre, offered up his prayers for the success of his enterprise. He regarded himself as the chosen instrument of his country's gods to destroy their enemies. With an undivided heart, as we are told, and with an entire resignation of all personal and domestic enjoyments forever, he went forth at the early age of twenty-seven to fulfil his high mission.
Have you not observed says Socrates, in his dialogue with the irreverent Aristodemus, that the wisest nations and the most stable governments are those which are the most religious? And, according to Cicero, it was the universal acquiescence in the wisdom and justice of the Almighty that raised the Romans above all other nations. In the Roman, indeed, the warlike avid religious elements were singularly blended. In her early days of purer faith the simple Roman husbandman lived and died like his Sabine ancestors in the fear of the gods. He believed there was something in the universe higher and better than himself; that to these powers good deeds and an honest life were pleasing, evil deeds and bad faith hateful. "There can be little doubt," says Liddell with emphasis, "that the simple morality of the times, maintained by habitual deference to authority, was confirmed by the higher sanction of religion." The attachment of the Roman troops to their standards, says Gibbon, was inspired by the united influence of religion and honor. "It was this that rendered the legions of the republic invincible." Carlyle has particularly noticed this trait of the Roman character. Ferguson, he observes, "points out the profoundly religious character of the Roman people, notwithstanding the wildness and ferocity of their nature. They believed that Jupiter was lord of the universe, and that he had appointed the Romans to become the chief of men, provided they followed his commands to brave all difficulties, to stand up with an invincible front, to be ready to do and to die, and also to have the same sacred regard to veracity, to promise, to integrity, and all the virtues that surround that noblest quality of man,—Courage,—to which they gave the name of virtue,—manhood, as the one thing ennobling for a man." All history goes to show that the Romans of the republic were more pure in morals, more honest, more self-denying than their neighbors; and a clear-sighted Greek, says Liddell, accounts for the difference by their stronger sense of the obligations of religion. It was the very first act of Fabius, on being elected dictator, just after the great disaster to the Roman arms at Thrasymenus, to attend at the celebration of the most sacred rites known to his religion. Having completed these, he turned his attention to the state of war. A strong religious bias was a notable characteristic of Scipio (Africanus), who finally delivered his country from the fear of her enemies. Caesar's final summons came not in disease, nor old age, nor in the excitement of battle; but in the prime of life, and in the enjoyment of health and domestic happiness. Nothing in the history of this great captain so clearly demonstrates the firm support he derived from his religious belief as his bearing during the last hours of his eventful life. He was not disturbed by the admonition of the gods, conveyed, as he believed, through Calphurnia's dream. "Be it so," said he. "If I am to die to-morrow, that is what I am to do tomorrow; it will not be then because I am willing it should be then, nor shall I escape it because I am unwilling; it is in the gods when, but in myself how I shall die. If Calphurnia's dreams are from the gods, their admonition is not to prepare me to escape from their decree, but to meet it. I have lived to a fullness of days and of glory. Cesar is prepared to die." From the simplicity and purity of primitive belief, and from virtuous industry, Rome pursued her successful career to power and wealth, thence to luxury and indolence, which brought political corruption and impatience of discipline on the part of the people. With loss of virtue came the loss of liberty and everything worth having, till finally the people relapsed into their original barbarism. Such is the law governing the rise and fall of nations.
The early history of that race which first threatened and finally overcame Rome is not less instructive. Speaking of the countries of Northern Europe, we are told that the education of the Teutonic nations, their laws, morality, and religion, all concurred to make war their ruling passion. Their laws knew only the military virtues; no crime but cowardice. Religion, by annexing eternal happiness to the former, gave the highest .degree of activity to their ardor for war. Their indomitable courage was stimulated by the promised joys of Valhalla for those who fell in battle. Nor was their passion for a wild, adventurous life abated by their conversion to Christianity. As pagans, they had been most zealous sectaries of Thor, the god of battles. As Christians, they became the enthusiastic devotees of Michael, the archangel, whom they were taught to believe was equally as renowned in demoniacal warfare as the Scandinavian deity. As the Norsemen were incited to deeds of heroism by visions of the Valkyries, so the Mohammedans saw, in fancy, the darkeyed Houris ready to welcome to an eternity of bliss those who died fighting for Allah and his prophet.
So firm was the belief among certain nations that the Deity assisted those who were enlisted in a good cause, that in the Hebrew, Arabic, Sync, and Chaldeac languages words which originally signified justice, innocence, or uprightness, came to express likewise the idea of victory; and words whose usual meaning was injustice or wickedness also meant defeat or overthrow. The same may be said in respect to words which signify help or aid, inasmuch as the nation which conquered received aid from God, and God was its helper.
In the early history of the Jews we find many instances of the direct influence of religion upon the issue of battles and the results of campaigns. They fought in the name of the Lord of Hosts. Their battle-cry was, "The sword of the Lord and of Gideon." "Thou comest to me with a sword, with a spear and with a shield," cried the stripling warrior of Israel to the giant Philistine; "but I come to thee in the name of the Lord of Hosts, the God of the armies of Israel, whom thou hast defied." Though not a military race, their sacred books contained, besides accounts of battles, many allusions to military affairs. Ensigns raised on high, and signal-fires at night, are frequently mentioned as the signs of war, while opposing hosts are marshaled by the sound of the trumpet. These warlike practices were so common that they finally came to be used as figures of speech; and, by a natural association of ideas, the sphere of operations was transferred from the physical to the moral world. Here the contest was carried on between the spirit of good and the spirit of evil.
When all that was good and pure in the ancient faiths became crystallized under the Christian dispensation, the metaphor was kept up, Christian writers representing man's sojourn on earth as the Battle of Life, where the conflict rages in his own heart. To gain this battle and to win his inheritance to a life of eternal peace is the object of the Christian soldier. The battle begins in early youth, and the same discipline which enables the young warrior to subdue his own evil nature and obtain command over himself, enables him, in maturer years, to command others, and to overcome the enemies of his country. Such, in the main, is the Christian and modern theory of virtue. It does not differ materially from that which obtained in the meridian of the ancient civilization. For religion is not based on outward forms and ceremonials. The practices of divination, the consulting of oracles, or reading the future by the entrails of beasts or the fight of birds, were never made essential points of religious belief. Far less have the fundamental truths of religion to do with the hideous crimes and gross immoralities that have, in almost every age been perpetrated in religion's sacred name.
The various systems of ancient faiths had their rise, development, and decay according to natural laws, each system being suited to the times and the genius of the people, and all founded on the two great fundamental truths,—the existence of a Deity and of a future life. It is these two truths, indeed, which underlie all systems of religious beliefs: not only those of to-day, but even those of the tribes of the remote East, whence history and civilization had its genesis, as well as those of the peoples of the Western Hemisphere, which, like meteors of unknown origin, have appeared for a time only to fade away, the sole repositories of their own mysterious history. Even the denizens of the North American forest believe in a Great Spirit, and that it is in the Happy Hunting-Grounds of a better world that they will still pursue the chase.
Such universal concurrence of belief in the great truths of what may be called natural religion can proceed only from a necessity of Man's nature, an unerring instinct which prompts him in his needs to look for help from something higher and better than himself, and whose beneficent care will extend beyond this life. It can readily be imagined how princes and great generals and admirals having vast armies or numerous fleets, perhaps the liberties of their country, or the destiny of nations in their keeping, would, when impressed with a sense of their responsibilities, turn instinctively for help to a source of power above and beyond this world. The great Atrides termed that power,
"The resistless Lord of all,
At whose command whole empires rise and fall.
He shakes the feeble props of human trust,
And towns and armies humbles to the dust."
So sang the blind poet of Chios over twenty-five centuries ago.
To confound the religious belief of any age with superstition is to misapprehend the very highest attribute of human nature. "The kingdom of God is within you," said our Lord, and we do but repeat the words of the pagan Socrates in saying it is the highest duty of the educator to develop and bring it out.
Under the Christian dispensation a purer and better system of ethics—far better and purer than any that had preceded it—was founded on that doctrine whose central idea was Love: love not only for that Deity man's own deeper nature had ever yearned for, but it included also the Divine law of love for one another.
With the introduction of Christian ethics came a modification of ideas in regard to the virtues. The word Duty assumed a wider and deeper signification, and Honor, one of the cardinal virtues in military ethics, once synonymous with courage, now associated itself with the highest and noblest aspirations of man;
"Honor," as well expressed by an eminent English divine, "will discover itself by a mind superior to fear, to selfish interest, and corruption, by an ardent love to the Supreme Being and by a principle of uniform rectitude. It will make us neither afraid nor ashamed to discharge our duty as it relates both to God and to man. It will influence us to be magnanimous without being proud, humble without being mean, just without being harsh, simple in our manners, but manly in our feelings. Honor thus formed by religion, or the love of God, is more dependent and more complete than what can be acquired by any other means." It is wonderful to observe how the characters of many of the military and naval leaders of Greece and Rome in their palmy days illustrate even this definition of honor. The moral courage of Socrates in defending from the popular wrath of the Athenians the six admirals who had fought at Arginusx ; Alexander's chivalric deportment towards the beautiful consort of the unfortunate Darius; Regulus leaving Rome to redeem his pledge to Carthage, are all in their several aspects, fine examples of a high sense of honor. In pagan Rome the temple erected by Marcellus to Honor could be reached only by passing through the temple he had dedicated to Virtue.
If the fusion of the religious with the military element produced the highest type of pagan soldier, the result of the combination was even more marked with the Christian. The spirit of Chivalry was born of the tyranny and corruption, the terrorism and confusion of the Dark Ages. It was nurtured by the church for the maintenance of religion and good order. As the Athenian youth was admitted to the civic list, and assumed his arms with religious ceremony, and the delivery of the virile robe to the young Roman was made an occasion of public solemnity, so the young novice was admitted to the order of knighthood under the auspices of the Holy Catholic Church. He solemnly vowed, his hands on the missal, "to undertake nothing without having first performed his religious obligations; to spare neither blood nor life in defense of his religion; to give aid to all widows and orphans; to undertake no war without just cause; to favor no injustice, but to protect the innocent and oppressed; to be humble in all things; to seek the welfare of those placed under him; never to violate the rights of his sovereign; and to live irreprehensibly before God and man." Self-denial was his boast, honor his sole reward. He was simple in attire, austere in morals, humble after victory, steadfast under misfortune. Chivalry more than any other institution, save the mother-church alone, aided in the civilization of Europe, and having fulfilled its high mission passed away, leaving as a heritage, common to all aspirants of military fame, the names of Du Guesclin, of Bayard, and of Sidney. To possess these virtues is to be a gentleman.
The exaltation of the military spirit by the fervor of religion reached its climax in England under the Commonwealth. The stern morality and religious zeal which pervaded all ranks distinguished the armies of Cromwell from all others. In his camp no oath was heard, no drunkenness or gambling seen. The property of a citizen and the honor of woman were held sacred. The "praying Puritan" was invincible. However surrounded by difficulties or outnumbered in force, they were invariably victorious. They routed the most renowned battalions of Europe, and carried positions deemed impregnable by the most skilful engineers of France. "They fought so well," it was said, "because they prayed so well." It was this spirit that made the armies and fleets of Cromwell the terror of the world.
It would be an easy task to illustrate, by the examples of many Christian soldiers and sailors, the truth of Xenophon's proposition, that ethics is essential to a thorough course of military instruction. But the argument would be strengthened by illustrations drawn from those masters of the art of war who have not been distinguished for their moral qualities. Turenne, for example, had, from his youth up, says Cardinal de Retz, all the good qualities, and very early he had acquired all the great ones. It is but natural in such a character to find only what is truly good and noble. But with his distinguished rival, the great Conde, it was not so. Though he died in the faith, yet during the greater part of his life Conde was an unbeliever. But he had been carefully educated under his father's eye, and early trained in those habits of self-command which fitted him for the command of others. He possessed certain military virtues in an eminent degree, though they were not founded in Christian ethics.
Marlborough, in his youth, was a profligate. Macaulay does not hesitate to stigmatize him as a villain and a traitor; and yet his tenacious adherence to the Anglican Church was the one point that would not yield to his sordid love of gold. On the night preceding the battle of Blenheim the arbiter of the destiny of Europe received the sacred rites of the Holy Communion at the hands of his chaplain; and after the battle he declared that he had prayed that day more than all the chaplains of his army.
With Frederick the Great it was far different. Religious feelings could hardly be predicated of one who claimed the friendship of Voltaire. But in the sad years of his early life his bad father had subjected him to a discipline which, in its Spartan rigor, prepared him for the exactions of a military life. A stern sense of duty became his religion. Duty was to him the Law and the Prophets, as Carlyle had expressed it.
In Wellington the Christian and military virtues were admirably adjusted; but there are no terms sufficiently strong, with some writers, for the reprobation of Napoleon. But when Paris, drunk with the blood of her own citizens, had formally declared there was no God, and had abolished the Christian religion, it was one of his first acts, on obtaining control of the city, to open the churches and restore religious worship as a political necessity. "Can you disbelieve in God?" he said to his physician during the last few and painful days of his life; "everything proclaims His existence, and the greatest minds have thought so." In a conversation with Montholon and a few others just before his death, on the subject of a future life, "As for me," he said, "I shall behold my brave companions in arms in the Elysian Fields. Yes, Kleber, Dessaix, Bessieres, Duroc, Ney, Murat, Massena, Berthier, all will come to greet me. . . . We will discourse of our wars with the Scipios, the Hannibals, the Cxsars, and the Fredericks." To the Abbe Vignali "I believe in God; I am of the religion of my fathers. . . . I was born in the Catholic religion; I wish to fulfil the duties which it imposes, and to receive the succor which it administers." And, finally, according to his own testament, he died in the apostolic Roman religion in which he was born.
It was only to be expected of the exalted character of Collingwood that his conduct should be exemplary in all the relations of life; but Nelson openly violated the most sacred of social obligations. And yet Nelson was a firm believer in the doctrines of Christianity. With singular inconsistency he wrote, just before his last battle, a prayer breathing the very spirit of true piety, and with the self-same pen placed on record the evidence of his own dark crime. And so we might continue to examine the lives of all the great masters of the art of war only to find that in nearly every case there has been either a solid foundation of character in deep religious convictions, or that the spirit has been chastened by early discipline, almost invariably in the stern school of war. Nor is this truth limited to any age or religion, as we have endeavored to show. The "Unknown God" ignorantly worshipped by a pagan world, was, in the fullness of time marvelously revealed to man. It is the same God throughout all time, and space.
The questions we have now to consider are how far the Government of the United States provides education for the young, and how much does the element of ethics enter into its school system? Before answering these questions let us first examine the popular fallacy that "there is no God in the Constitution."
The Constitution of the United States is based upon the Christian religion. Our English ancestors brought over with them to this country their dearest rights to life, liberty, and property, as recognized by the common law of England. But the common law embraced the Christian religion; hence the Constitution, in accepting the common law, accepted also the Christian religion. This is true not only of the Constitution of the United States, but of every State Constitution; and wherever the English common law is recognized by the people the Christian religion is recognized with it.'
The Fathers of the Republic were, many of them, eminently pious men. In one of the stormy discussions which finally led to the formation of the government, Franklin made use of the following language: "In this situation of the Assembly, groping as it were in the dark to find political truth, and scarce able to distinguish it when presented to us, how has it happened, sir, that we have not hitherto once thought of humbly applying to the Father of lights to illuminate our understandings? In the beginning of the contest with Great Britain, when we were sensible of our danger, we had daily prayer in this room for the Divine protection. Our prayers, sir, were heard and they were graciously answered. . . . Have we now forgotten that powerful friend? . . . I have lived, sir, a long time, and the longer I live the more convincing proofs I see of this truth, that God governs in the affairs of men. . . . I therefore beg leave to move that henceforth prayers imploring the assistance of Heaven, and its blessings on our deliberations, be held in this Assembly every morning before we proceed to business." The motion was not carried at that time, it is true, but for years past the deliberations of our National Legislature have been opened with prayer. Furthermore, the Chief Magistrate appoints, annually, a day of thanksgiving, when the people are invited to suspend their usual avocations and turn their hearts in grateful praise to the Giver of all good, for the manifold blessings showered upon this favored land. The Supreme Court of the United States, in its implicit faith in the sanctity of an oath taken in the name of God, recognizes the Christian religion. In short, the very spirit and genius of our institutions are rooted and grounded in Christianity.
Another grave error is to suppose that in securing to every American citizen perfect freedom of religious belief, the Constitution intended to grant immunity from religious duties in general. On the contrary, it was intended especially to guarantee the enjoyment of some particular form of religion agreeably to the choice of the individual. A law framed under the Constitution provides for the appointment of chaplains. Another law declares that the commanding officer of a ship having a chaplain on board shall cause divine service to be performed on Sunday; and the law in its majesty "earnestly recommends to all officers, seamen, and others in the naval service diligently to attend at every performance of the worship of Almighty God." In the same spirit the Navy Regulations require that "Sunday shall be observed on board of all ships, and at all naval stations, in an orderly manner: all labor shall be reduced to the requirements of necessary duty; and the religious tendencies of officers and enlisted men shall be recognized and encouraged." In the Articles of War governing the army, "all officers and soldiers are recommended diligently to attend divine service," and in both the military and naval codes the law prescribes a penalty for any "irreverent or unbecoming behavior during divine service."
The views of Washington and of Lincoln on this subject are strikingly set forth in the following:
GENERAL ORDER RESPECTING THE OBSERVANCE OF THE SABBATH DAY IN THE ARMY AND NAVY.
EXECUTIVE MANSION,
WASHINGTON, November 15, 1862.
The President, Commander-in-Chief of the Army and Navy, desires and enjoins the orderly observance of the Sabbath by the officers and men in the military and naval service. The importance for man and beast of the prescribed weekly rest, the sacred rights of Christian soldiers and sailors, a becoming deference to the best sentiments of a Christian people, and a due regard for the Divine will, demand that Sunday labor in the Army and Navy be reduced to the measure of strict necessity.
The discipline and character of the national forces should not suffer, nor the cause they defend be imperiled, by the profanation of the day or name of the Most High. "At this time of public distress," adopting the words of Washington in 1776, "men may find enough to do in the service of God and their country, without abandoning themselves to vice and immorality." The first General Order issued by the Father of his Country after the Declaration of Independence indicates the spirit in which our institutions were founded and should ever be defended: "The General hopes and trusts that every officer and man will endeavor to live and act as becomes a Christian soldier defending the dearest rights and liberties of his country." ABRAHAM LINCOLN.
It is difficult to see how a liberal form of government could go further towards encouraging religious observances on the part of those in its own immediate service.
The Government of the United States has wisely left to each State the working out of its own system of popular education. From the proceeds arising from the sale of public lands, however, it has provided a fund to aid in the support of the common schools in the several States, and to found colleges for the promotion of scientific agriculture and the mechanic arts; it has endowed universities, and a Bureau of Education has been attached to one of the Executive Departments—the Interior—for the collection and dissemination of information relative to edu cational subjects. Beyond the encouragement thus given to the
cause of education in general throughout the country, the government
abstains from all interference with our public schools. But
while every State has its own common-school system, each varying
from the other more or less in matters of detail, there are
yet certain vital points which are common to all. Happily, the
very theory on which our entire educational system is based
admits the necessity of instructing the young in Christian ethics.
In a recent publication giving what may be regarded as an official
exposition of our theory of popular education, it is remarked
that "in America (meaning the United States) the peculiarities
of civil society and the political organization draw the
child out of the influence of family nurture earlier than is common
in other countries. The frequent separation of the younger
branches of the family from the old stock renders family influence less powerful in moulding the character. The consequence of this is an increased importance of the school in an ethical point of view. In order to compensate for lack of family nurture, the school is obliged to lay more stress upon discipline, and to make far more prominent the moral phase of education. It is obliged to train the pupil into habits of prompt obedience to his teachers, and the practice of self-control in its various forms, in order that he may be prepared for a life wherein there is little police-restraint on the part of the constituted authorities. . . . In the commercial cities the tendency is in the direction of punishment founded on a sense of honor."'
These views are fully supported by the testimony of President Porter of Yale. "Whatever can be done," he remarks, "to awaken and direct the kindling zeal of those youths who are ashamed to be called 'college boys,' to vary the burdens and relieve the tedium of their life, whatever can be done to confirm their health, to refine their manners, to awaken their self-respect, and to stimulate and guide their faith in Duty, in Immortality, and in God, not only comes fairly within the scope of the College, but becomes a duty which rests upon its guardians. Not a few experiments in college discipline and management are announced in various quarters which promise to relieve students, and especially younger students, from the sense of constraint and the necessity of constant accountability to monitors and teachers. The announcement of every new device would be hailed by all teachers who are tired of marks and monitors, were it not true that the longer and more various is the experience of the veteran teacher, the more tenacious does he become of the conviction that to have learned to meet a duty promptly, thoroughly, and without excuse or complaint, is one of the prime conditions of a successful student and public life, and that to the scholar and professional man above all, habits of this sort are of inestimable value. If such habits are to be formed they must in some way be effectively enforced. If they are self-enforced, so much the better; but in such a case the monitor awakens no reaction and needs no apologist. So long as bankers' and merchants' clerks and employes of every sort must keep their hours, and these hours are often prolonged into tedious confinement, it strikes us as altogether unreasonable that college youths should complain of any peculiar hardship, or that their guardians should second their sighs. On the other hand, it should not be forgotten that their teachers are equally bound to be mindful that their pupils are mercurial, fickle, and oftentimes forgetful of the most serious truths and obligations, and consequently demand the exercise of unwearied patience and good temper. The ease with which, in public schools and colleges, the plainest axioms of manners and morals are disregarded, and the accepted axioms of courtesy and truth are openly violated by specious casuistry, is one of the wonders of college life."
By many, these views will now be considered as somewhat antiquated. In the higher schools, both in England and in America, direct moral teaching has been, by common consent, discontinued, as a part of the ordinary class work. But practices which prevail at the great seats of learning do not necessarily apply to our national academies. The latter form a distinct class by themselves, and must be governed by rules specially adapted to their purely technical character.
Under the constitutional provisions imposing upon Congress the duty of providing for the "common defense of the United States," and "to raise and support armies and to provide and maintain a navy," a military and naval academy have been established. The pupils of these academies, being the nominees of members of Congress, may be said to be fair representatives of the several grades of society in the various parts of the country, and in that way to embrace a greater range of character and of social antecedents than can be found at our leading colleges. The remarks in regard to the students of Yale, already quoted, will therefore apply, it is not unreasonable to suppose, to the junior, classes of cadets at the national academies. We specify the junior classes, and hasten to add that the moral atmosphere and the strict discipline of these institutions is so wholesome that the tone of the classes rapidly improves as they advance, till the first-class man comes to be looked upon as a "man of honor," according to the generally accepted code of honor, and one who may be depended upon for the faithful performance of his duty. This we readily and gladly admit.' But, speaking in more general terms, there is no doubt that, while numbers of youths leave their homes for the national academies well equipped both mentally and morally for the battle of life, there are yet others who are not so fortunate. Some have not been blessed with a parent's care; the parents of others may have held uncertain views in regard to religion; the parents of some may have been materialists. There are, indeed, religious people who, with a curious obliquity of moral vision, prefer to let their children grow up totally free from religious bias in order that they may be at liberty, on attaining the years of discretion, to form their own opinions on the subject. Others, again, contend that their children are not Christians till they "get religion" through the exhortations of an evangelist. We find some important testimony on this very point in the annual report of the president of Harvard College for the college year of 1880-81.
From the evidence of "many leading educators" in the United States, we are led to the conclusion that of all the youths who annually find their way to our national academies, those of high moral culture are not in the majority. It becomes an interesting question, then, how far is any deficiency in this respect supplied by the Government? The Government of the United States having accepted the cares and responsibilities of guardianship over a given number of youths, how far does it fulfil its sacred obligations by providing for their moral and religious training? To state the case differently, how far does the Government sympathize with, and give encouragement to, those of its wards who bring with them from home strong moral and religious tendencies? And how far does it exercise a wise parental authority in bringing to a knowledge of moral science those who are ignorant of its principles? If the curriculum of an academy is any evidence, the Government schools furnish no instruction whatever in morals. To each academy a chaplain is attached, and a sort .of perfunctory service held in the chapel every Sunday forenoon, an enforced attendance not being regarded with favor by the majority of the cadets. The reading of the church service and a sermon by the chaplain constitutes the entire course of religious instruction seriously undertaken. There is, however, a volunteer Sunday evening service, attendance at which is wholly dependent upon the persuasive powers of the chaplain, and the attractions of a volunteer choir; and it sometimes happens that a few of the cadets associate together for religious exercises. We may go further, and say that there is something in the personal contact with a certain class of instructors which is in itself refining and elevating; and in the campus of every Anglo-Saxon school there is an unwritten code of ethics which every lad, who would stand well with his fellows, must conform to. But all of these, with the single exception of the Sunday morning church service, are adventitious circumstances and cannot be counted, valuable as they undoubtedly are in their way, as part of an organized plan of including ethics in a course of military education. It cannot be said, therefore, that any effort is made at either academy to lead the students along the lines which tend to the formation of character.
The Articles of War declare that all commanding officers are required to show in themselves a good example of Virtue, Honor, Patriotism, and Subordination. But where is the young officer, preparing for the responsibilities of command, to learn these things? We can find in the list of subjects taught at these academies no study which inculcates the practice of virtue, none in which a correct standard of honor is given; no instruction as to the nature and duties of patriotism, in the obligations of duty or the necessity of subordination.
The very first commission issued to the young officer states on its face that it has been given by the President of the United States, by and with the advice and consent of the Senate, in token of their "special confidence in his Patriotism, Valor, Fidelity, and Abilities." How is this confidence to be justified if the recipient has never been instructed as to what constitutes patriotism, or taught in what true valor consists? how his fidelity to his government is to be manifested, or how far he is bound to keep up the cultivation of his abilities? Has the government a right to place such confidence in the possession of virtues it takes no pains to inculcate? At this one point, unfortunately, the Government stops short. Obviously, it is the plain duty of every officer, save only in those rare cases of conscientious scruples, to attend divine service whenever held at any army post or on board ship. The obligation to do so is just as imperative as it is to take a tour of military duty, and the neglect on the part of the officer to conform to the solemn injunction of the government, as expressed by the law, is evidence of defective training. The confusion of ideas which betrays the officer into this disregard of the obligations imposed upon him will betray him into the neglect, or the imperfect performance, of any duty that may not be to his taste. In short, he is ignorant of the requirements of Duty.
If the undergraduate reasons on the subject of neglect of duty at all, he reasons incorrectly. And it is because there is so much incorrect reasoning on the subject of Duty and Honor, that with the study of Moral Philosophy a course of Logic is essential to a complete course of military instruction. "Logic," observes one of the most profound thinkers of modern days, "is the intellectual complement of mathematics and physics, and there is no part of the intellectual education which is of greater value, or whose place can so ill be supplied by anything else. Its function is not so much to teach us to go right, as to keep us from going wrong…It is the great disperser of hazy and confused thinking; it clears up the fogs which hide us from our own ignorance and make us believe that we understand a subject when we do not. It makes our opinions consistent with themselves and with one another, and forces. us to think clearly, even if it cannot make us think correctly."
Again: "If you take an average human mind before the objects it has chosen in life have given it a turn in any bad direction you will generally find it desiring what is good, right, and for the benefit of all; and if that season is properly used to impart the knowledge and give the training which shall render rectitude of judgment more habitual than sophistry, a serious barrier will have been erected against the inroads of selfishness and falsehood. It is a very imperfect education which trains the intelligence only but not the will. No one can dispense with an education directed expressly to the moral as well as to the intellectual part of his being. Such education, as far as it is direct, is either moral or religious; and these may either be treated as distinct or as different aspects of the same thing. Moral and religious education consists in training the feelings and the daily habits." The deduction, we repeat, is inevitable that the study of that science which includes a knowledge of ourselves and of our duties in this life, coupled with due instruction in the methods of correct reasoning, are essential parts of a military training. In 1886 a special course of instruction in physiology and hygiene was established at the Naval Academy, in accordance with an Act of Congress, approved May 20 of that year. Recent events at the Academy (1906), show that Moral Science and Logic should have been included.
President Porter, to quote that eminent authority once more, remarked of Yale, that "it will not be questioned that the guardians and instructors of an institution which is avowedly Christian should be held to an exacting responsibility for the influences they exert, or fail to exert, in forming and strengthening right moral and religious principles. . . . Our history in the past and our promises for the future all commit us to a characteristic and decided Christian culture."
If such is the loving care of this Alma Mater for the spiritual welfare of those who go out from her bosom never to return, how much more tenderly should the Great Republic nurture those whose lives are to be devoted to her service and to the defense of her honor!
"Beware of the men who contend for honor rather than for gold," said an Eastern noble to the Great King, when, twenty-three centuries ago, the Persian hosts were thundering at the gates of Greece. And this same honor was the subject of every Roman noble's story.