We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life,Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.

We the people of the United States, in order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquillity, provide for the common defense, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America.

. . .

Ed.  In the above two examples the assumption of spiritual references represented by the capitalization's of Spiritual Words ( emboldened for emphasis) are references to God: the Author and Creator of "Union" (unity); the Author and Creator of "Justice"; the Author and Creator of "Tranquillity"; the Author and Creator of "Welfare" (eternal); the Author and Creator of "Blessings" and of "Liberty"; and of "our Posterity", etc..

Another excellent example of capitalization's of Spiritual Words that refer to God: the Author and Creator etc., can be found in a true representation of George Washington's FAREWELL ADDRESS.

Article the Third.   Religion, morality and knowledge, being necessary to good government and the happiness of mankind, schools and the means of education shall forever be encouraged.   The utmost good faith shall always be observed . . .

b.1745- 1813.   He earned his BA in Chemistry in 1760 (15 y.o.), then his MD in 1769.   He was one of the signer's of the Declaration of Independence, & US Treasurer from 1797-1813.   This personal letter, written in the late 1700's, was circulated for many years perhaps as a guide to the "means of education" for the new territories schools, or any new school, as stated in the Northwest Ordinance of 1787:

" Article the Third.   Religion, morality and knowledge, being necessary to good government and the happiness of mankind, schools and the means of education shall forever be encouraged. ..."

This letter was later used as a religious tract when it was reprinted by The American Tract Society in 1830 as tract No. 231.

This is a word for word reprint with the exception of some deletions (" . . . ").   All edits, comments and additions are Italicized; emphases are Bold. - Ed.

`

Dear Sir:

It is now several months since I promised to give you my reasons for preferring the Bible as a schoolbook to all other compositions.  Before I state my arguments, I shall assume the five following propositions:

1. That Christianity is the only true and perfect religion; and that in proportion as mankind adopt its principles and obey its precepts they will be wise and happy.

2. That a better knowledge of this religion is to be acquired by reading the Bible than in any other way.

3. That the Bible contains more knowledge necessary to man in his present state than any other book in the world.

4. That knowledge is most durable, and religious instruction most useful, when imparted in early life.

5. That the Bible, when not read in schools, is seldom read in any subsequent period of life.

  I.   In the constitution of the human mind.

1.   The memory is the first faculty which opens in the minds of children.  Of how much consequence, then, must it be to impress it with the great truths of Christianity, before it is preoccupied with less interesting subjects.

2.   There is a peculiar aptitude in the minds of children for religious knowledge.  I have constantly found them, in the first six or seven years of their lives, more inquisitive upon religious subjects than upon any others.  And an ingenious instructor of youth has informed me that he has found young children more capable of receiving just ideas upon the most difficult tenets of religion than upon the most simple branches of human knowledge.  It would be strange if it were otherwise, for God creates all His means to suit His ends.   There must, of course, be a fitness between the human mind and the truths which are essential to its happiness.

3.   The influence of early impressions is very great upon subsequent life; and in a world where false prejudices do so much mischief, it would discover great weakness not to oppose them by such as are true.   I grant that many men have rejected the impressions derived from the Bible; but how much soever these impressions may have been despised, I believe no man was ever early instructed in the truths of the Bible without having been made wiser or better by the early operation of these impressions upon his mind.   Every just principle that is to be found in the writings of Voltaire is borrowed from the Bible; and the morality of Deists, which has been so much admired and praised where it has existed, has been, I believe, in most cases, the effect of habits produced by early instruction in the principles of Christianity.

4.   We are subject, by a general law of our natures, to what is called habit.  Now, if the study of the Scriptures be necessary to our happiness at any time of our life, the sooner we begin to read them, the more we shall probably be attached to them; for it is peculiar to all the acts of habit, to become easy, strong, and agreeable by repetition.

5.   It is a law in our natures that we remember longest the knowledge we acquire by the greatest number of our senses. Now, a knowledge of the contents of the Bible is acquired in school by the aid of the eye and the ear, for children, after getting their lessons, read or repeat them to their instructors in an audible voice; of course, there is a presumption that this knowledge will be retained much longer than if it had been acquired in any other way.

6.   The interesting events and characters recorded and described in the Old and New Testaments are calculated, above all others, to seize upon all the faculties of the mind of children. The understanding, the memory, the imagination, the passions, and the moral powers are all occasionally addressed by the various incidents which are contained on those divine books, insomuch that not to be delighted with them is to be devoid of every principle of pleasure that exists in a sound mind.

7.   There is in man a native preference of truth to fiction.  Lord Shaftesbury says that "truth is so congenial to our mind that we love even the shadow of it"; and Horace, in his rules for composing an epic poem, established the same law in our natures by advising that "fictions in poetry should resemble truth.".  Now, the Bible contains more truth than any other book in the world; so true is the testimony that it bears of God in His Works of creation, providence, and redemption that it is called truth itself, by way of preeminence above other things that are acknowledged to be true.   How forcibly are we struck with the evidence of truth in the history of the Jews, above what we discover in the history of other nations.  Where do we find a hero or an historian record his own faults or vices except in the Old Testament?   Indeed, my friend, from some accounts which I have read of the American Revolution, I begin to grow skeptical to all history except that which is contained in the Bible. Now, if this book be known to contain nothing but what is materially true, the mind will naturally acquire a love for it from this circumstance; and from this affection for the truths of the Bible, it will acquire a discernment of truth in other books, and a preference of it in all the transactions of life.

8.   There is wonderful property in the memory which enables it in old age to recover the knowledge acquired in early life after it had been apparently forgotten for forty or fifty years.  Of how much consequence, then, must it be to fill the mind with that species of knowledge in childhood and youth which, when recalled in the decline of life, will support the soul under the infirmities of age and smooth the avenues of approaching death.   The Bible is the only book which is capable of affording this support to old age; and it is for this reason that we find it resorted to with so much diligence and pleasure by such old people as have read it in early life.  I can recollect many instances of this kind in persons who discovered no special attachment to the Bible in the meridian of their days, who have, notwithstanding, spent the evening of life in reading no other book.  The late Sir John Pringle, physician to the queen of Great Britain, after passing a long life in camps and at court, closed it by studying the Scriptures.   So anxious was he to increase his knowledge in them that he wrote to Dr. Michaelis, a learned professor of divinity in Germany, for an explanation of a difficult text of Scripture a short time before his death.

  II. My second argument in favor of the use of the Bible in schools is founded upon an implied command of God and upon the practice of several of the wisest nations of the world.

In the sixth chapter of Deuteronomy, we find the following words, which are directly to my purpose: "And thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thine heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy might. And these words, which I command thee this day, shall be in thine heart: And thou shalt teach them diligently unto thy children, and shalt talk of them when thou sittest in thine house, and when thou walkest by the way, and when thou liest down, and when thou risest up."

It appears, moreover, from the history of the Jews, that they flourished as a nation in proportion as they honored and read the books of Moses, which contained the only revelation that God had made to the world. The law was not only neglected, but lost, during the general profligacy of manner which accompanied the long and wicked reign of Manesseh. But the discovery of it amid the rubbish of the temple by Josiah and its subsequent general use were followed by a return of national virtue and prosperity.  We read further of the wonderful effects which the reading of the law by Ezra, after his return from his captivity in Babylon, had upon the Jews.  They hung upon his lips with tears, and showed the sincerity of their repentance by their general reformation.

The learning of the Jews, for many years, consisted in a knowledge of the Scriptures.   These were the textbooks of all the instruction that was given in the schools of their Prophets.   It was by means of this general knowledge of their law that those Jews who wandered from Judea into other countries carried with them and propagated certain ideas of the true God among all the civilized nations upon the face of the earth.   And it was from the attachment they retained to the Old Testament that they procured a translation of it into the Greek language, after they had lost the Hebrew tongue by their long absence from their native country.  The utility of this translation, commonly called the Septuagint, in facilitating the progress of the Gospel is well known to all who are acquainted with the history of the first age of the Christian church.

But the benefits of an early and general acquaintance with the Bible were not confined to the Jewish nation; they have appeared in many countries in Europe since the Reformation.  The industry and habits of order which distinguish many of the German nations are derived from their early instruction in the principles of Christianity by means of the Bible.   In Scotland and in parts of New England, where the Bible has been long used as a schoolbook, the inhabitants are among the most enlightened in religions and science, the most strict in morals, and the most intelligent in human affairs of any people whose history has come to my knowledge upon the surface of the globe.

I wish to be excused from repeating here that if the Bible did not convey a single direction for the attainment of future happiness, it should be read in our schools in preference to all other books from its containing the greatest portion of that kind of knowledge which is calculated to produce private and public temporal happiness.

We err, not only in human affairs but in religion likewise, only because we do not "know the Scriptures" and obey their instructions. Immense truths, I believe, are concealed in them.  The time, I have no doubt, will come when posterity will view and pity our ignorance of these truths as much as we do the ignorance sometimes manifested by the disciples of our Saviour, who knew nothing of the meaning of those plain passages in the Old Testament which were daily fulfilling before their eyes.

But further, we err, not only in religion but in philosophy likewise, because we "do not know or believe the Scriptures."   The sciences have been compared to a circle, of which religion composes a part. To understand any one of them perfectly, it is necessary to have some knowledge of them all. Bacon, Boyle, and Newton included the Scriptures in the inquiries to which their universal geniuses disposed them, and their philosophy was aided by their knowledge in them. A striking agreement has been lately discovered between the history of certain events recorded in the Bible and some of the operations and productions of nature, particularly those which are related in Whitehurst's observation on the deluge, in Smith's account of the origin of the variety of color in the human species, and in Bruce's travels.   It remains yet to be shown how many other events related in the Bible accord with some late important discoveries in the principles of medicine. The events and the principles alluded to mutually establish the truth of each other. . . .

. . . If moral precepts alone could have reformed mankind, the mission of the Son of God into our world would have been unnecessary. He came to promulgate a system of doctrines, as well as a system of morals. The perfect morality of the Gospel rests upon a doctrine which, though often controverted, has never been refuted; I mean the vicarious life and death of the Son of God.This sublime and ineffable doctrine delivers us from the absurd hypothesis of modern philosophers concerning the foundation of moral obligation, and fixes it upon the eternal and self-moving principle of LOVE. It concentrates a whole system of ethics in a single text of Scripture: "A new commandment I give unto you, that ye love one another, even as I have loved you."   By withholding the knowledge of this doctrine from children, we deprive ourselves of the best means of awakening moral sensibility in their minds. . . .

But passing by all other considerations, and contemplating merely the political institutions of the United States, I lament that we waste so much time and money in punishing crimes and take so little pains to prevent them. We profess to be republicans, and yet we neglect the only means of establishing and perpetuating our republican forms of government; that is, the universal education of our youth in the principles of Christianity by means of the Bible; for this divine book, above all others, favors that equality among mankind, that respect for just laws, and all those sober and frugal virtues which constitute the soul of republicanism. . . .

With great respect, I am, etc.

Benjamin Rush             [Pennsylvania]

________________________________

Religious Bible classes in the American Tradition were subsequently taught throughout the nation for over two centuries until the Supreme Court invented "separation of church and state".   Prior to this invention the Court understood that religion had several default "separation(s) of church and state"! 1. A student was not required to become a believer as a requirement to complete the class.  2. If the student willfully chose to become a believer, it was his responsibility, by his own initiative, to voluntarily perform the membership rituals of his chosen religion or church.  3. The teacher could not solicit membership into The Federal Church since the government has never established one!

In the 1st decade following the 1947 "separation of church and state" (Everson v Bd. of Ed. case and those of the same ilk.) our society began declining through the initiation and use of pornography.   A star named James Dean was in a movie prophetically entitled "REBEL WITHOUT A CAUSE".   The 2nd decade began the fall of the SAT scores, the sexual revolution and the use and abuse of drugs.   The 3rd & 4th decades brought us abortion, divorce, sex education ( belief in: prostitution, sodomy & pedophilia ! ) and gambling.   In the 5th decade we have police officers on elementary school campuses! !   And we've seen children massacring fellow classmates in schools like Paducah, KY and Jonesboro, AK.   These could well be called TERRORISTS WITHOUT A CAUSE!   I think we now know what the cause is and what to do about it.   We should not let the pain of our ignorance and the trauma of wrong choices and the disaster of bad experiences spanning five decades be wasted any further.  God's ways are wise and right and they lead to life, temporal happiness & eternal security; the benefits of which are free to all, but we must learn them and apply them.   Let's improve our children's life with Wisdom content.   Subsequent Supreme Court cases have allowed elective Bible classes and programs in or near schools under certain conditions which have largely been neglected and gone unexploited. But now parents, grand-parents, & citizens are working together to:

What you can do:     The space below is provided so that after prayer you might fill in your data, copy and distribute it as a local survey to see if there is anyone else interested in starting elective Bible classes and other programs in your school or district.

It would be more expedient if you were able to get a group of 3+ kindred spirits organized before proceeding with this flyer.

If it is already filled in, pray first, then make contact & offer your encouragement, your time and your talents.

  Name (printed) or Address Label: ____________________________________________

  Address: ________________________________________________________________

  City: ________________________________ St: _________ Zip: __________________

  Ph: _(_______)________-______________ Email: ______________________________

  School or District name: ____________________________________

IF my people, which are called by my name, shall humble themselves, and pray, and seek my face, and turn from their wicked ways; then will I hear from heaven, and forgive their sin, and heal their land.   2 Chronicles 7:14