RELIGIOUS EDUCATION. The phrase greligious education' began to take on a definite and technical meaning only in the 20tth century. Up to that time there is' scarcely any trace of its use; to-day it has a recognized place in current educational coinage. Its pri mary significance is not so much that of instruc tion in a category of subjects or lessons on religion, but in general it describes that type of education which gives full recognition to the religious nature of the persons being educated, religious and moral forces opera tive in their development and the religious, or spiritual, aim of all education. It is the dis tinctive phrase of the movement which seeks to complete the aims of general education by .the inclusion of the elements commonly called religious;' these 'intrinde racial and world heri tages of ideals, concepts, interpretations and values of life in terms of the spiritual, train ing in habits and conduct and the development of motives and purpose in life. It includes and emphasizes instruction in the history and literature of religion as the means of securing the heritage of ideals, but it 'insists still more on the wider aim of developing the person who will live a life essentially religious, governed by developing spiritual ideals. The concept of religious education has helped to give a deeper meaning 'to education by calling attention to the spiritual needs of the person. It has given new ranee to religious activities by suggesting their educational character and responsibilities. It has made men think of education in terms of the religions ideal and of the religions aim and ideal as realized by educational processes.
The movement for religious education owes its modern inception and its present Impetus to the vision of educational idealists such as Her batt, Froebel, Spencer and Dewey who con ceived of education in terms of life and as em bracing all life, to leaders in the spiritual like Gladden Coe, King and others, who taught us to think of religion in terms that lift it far above its own records, analyses, philosophy and literature, and to' practical educators, like W. R
Harper, who could see the problem of securing each person his full heritage of the world's spiritual idealism and opportunity. The move Meat for religious education instead of forcing ecclesiastical formularies upon the schools and colleges has widened the' meaning and field of education, and has given it a deep, spiritual Meaning. Whether in the agencies of the Church or in 'those of the State, religion and education are seen as inseparable processes of life development.
''• The notion of religious' education expresses the idealism of the modern revolt against formalized education. General education passed from 'the restraints of a class privilege to be come little more than a system of mass, mechanical, intellectual discipline, a formal and largely perfunctory initiation to the rights of citizenship. Its technique was that of mental Processes. Its aim was the acquisition of bodies of information arranged in a series of fixed steps which led up and out of schooling. Its tests were almost exclusively intellectual. Its Professional interests were largely confined to Methods of formal disciplines. But modern psy chology 'revealed the person as a complex of powers; it insisted both on the breadth of the life as embracing much more than the so-called mental povrers and on its unity so that every power of the life entered into the making of the person. •'Moreover modern social studies indicated that the formal, intellectual disciplines of education were failing to train persons com petent in vision, motive and habits for the strain and opportunities of present-day living. It be came evident that if education would really develop persons it must deal with them as lives and not alone as memories. It must in elude, by some means, the range of motives, ideals, emotions. die habits and the will and all that determines character and conduct. A new Conscience for personality arose in education.