God called Israel to become a nation of teachers, and gave them statutes and judgments which, when made the basis of the educational systems, tended to make of the nation a peculiar people, a nation of priests, a spiritual race, thereby constituting them the leading people of the world. From what did he call them?--"The Lord hath taken you, and brought you forth out of the iron furnace, out of Egypt." (Deut. 4:20) And again, "Out of Egypt have I called my Son." (Matt. 2:15) Egypt stands as a personification of the heathen world, and its very name means darkness. The dark mantle of paganism has ever obstructed the bright shining of the light of truth.
As Israel's power, physical, intellectual, and political, was derived from, and depended upon, her system of education, so it would be but natural to suppose that the opposing power of paganism would possess educational ideas, and be controlled by a system of instruction in harmony with its practices. Or, to state it more logically, we necessarily conclude that the pagan world rested upon a distinct system of education, and that the customs and practices of pagan nations were the result of the educational ideas which they advocated.
The God-given system, as found among the Hebrews, rested upon faith, and developed the spiritual side of man's nature, making it possible in the highest sense for divinity to unite with humanity. The result of this union of the human and the divine--the Immanuel--is the highest creation of the universe. It in itself was a power before which men and demons bowed.
Paganism Self-Worship
As to paganism and its system of education, what was the religion of the pagan world? and what were the ideas it strove to propagate? First, it placed above God the study and worship of self. Christ is the "true light that lighteth every man that cometh into the world." All men have, then, at some time in life, light enough to lead them to truth, for the gospel "reveals a divine anger from heaven upon all wickedness and iniquity of men who pervert the true into the false; because the knowledge of God is clear within themselves, God having revealed it to them; for from the creation of the world His invisible attributes might be discovered from the created facts,--that is, His unseen power and Godhead. Consequently, they are inexcusable." (Rom. 1:18-20, Fenton's translation.)
Men, therefore, who of necessity have light may reject that light, and they then become pagan. Paul, in the first chapter of his Roman letter, states a universal law in that when truth is rejected, error takes its place. The quotation is again taken from Fenton's translation, because the wording, by differing slightly from the authorized version, stimulates thought: "Because, knowing God, they did not honor Him as a God, or rejoice, but trifled in their augmentations, and darkened their senseless hearts; professing to be philosophers, they played the fool, and transformed the glory of the imperishable God into an image of perishable man, and birds! And beasts! And reptiles! And, therefore, God abandoned them in the lusts of their hearts to filthiness, to dishonor their own bodies to themselves; they having changed the truth of God into falsehood, by honoring and serving the creature contrary to the Creator, who is truly blessed in all ages." (Rom. 1:21-25, Fenton's translation.)
Having turned from the worship of Jehovah to the worship of man, then bird, and beast, and reptile, we find associated with worship the grossest forms of licentiousness. This is stated by Paul in the first chapter of Romans. The thought which must be borne in mind is that man turns from God and worships himself. He can conceive of no power higher than his own mind, no form more lofty than his own. His first idol is the human form, male or female. He endows this with human passions, for he knows no heart but his own. By beholding he becomes changed into the same passionate creature; a beast becomes the personification of his deity, and the sacred bull his god. Everything about the worship is gross, and birds, crocodiles, and all sorts of reptiles become objects of worship. This is Egypt. This, in fact, pictures the final worship in any country which turns from Christ and places faith in man.
There are a variety of forms in worship, as there are a variety of complexions in the men of different countries; but it is one and the same plan throughout, resting upon one system of education, producing the same results, whether traced in the proud Babylonish court, the loathsome filth of Egypt, Greece with its intellectual pride and culture, in Roman law, or in the more modern European countries. Paganism is the green-eyed monster, crouching on the southern shore of the Mediterranean, whose body follows the course of the Nile, whose paws reach both east and west, and whose breath has poisoned the atmosphere of all Europe. Into those eyes men have gazed expecting to find wisdom. It was but the glare of the demon, as the tiger's gaze at night.
Egyptian Religion and Education
For Egypt itself, it blotted out all individual rights, placing the masses as a common herd writhing in superstition under the hands of a tyrannical king and a scheming priesthood. It was indeed "an iron furnace," as God had called it, and as Israel had found by sad experience. It was tyranny in government; it was still more bitter tyranny in education and religion. As well might one strive to move the pyramids, or get words from the silent sphinx, as to hope to change the life in Egypt by means of anything presented in Egypt.
Cultivation of the Senses
Of Egyptian education, Jahn says: The "priests were a separate tribe, ... and they performed not only the services of religion but the duties of all civil offices to which learning was necessary. They therefore devoted themselves in a peculiar manner to the cultivation of the sciences. ...They studied natural philosophy, natural history, medicine, mathematics (particularly astronomy and geometry), history, civil polity, and jurisprudence." Place this course of study by the side of Jewish education, and you notice in the latter the Bible and such subjects as tended to develop spirituality, those things which faith alone could grasp; while the education of the Egyptian had an entirely intellectual basis, and dealt with those subjects which appeal to the senses and to human reason.
When this system as a system is traced in other countries, especially in Greece, this characteristic becomes startling in the extreme; and if reference is made to it often in contrast to the Jewish system, it is because herein lies the pivot upon which the history of nations revolves. It is either faith or reason to-day, as it has been faith opposed to reason throughout the ages. In place of reason use the word philosophy, for that was a favorite expression among the pagans.
Pagan Philosophy Folly
The gospel has stood opposed to the philosophy of the world since the beginning; hence we read, "For the reason of the Cross is certainly folly to the reprobate, but to us, the saved, it is a divine power; for it is written, 'I will destroy the philosophy of the philosophers, and upset the cleverness of the clever.' Where is the philosopher? Where is the scholar? Where is the investigator of this age? Has not God made the philosophy of this world folly? For when in the divine philosophy the world did not perceive God through the philosophy, it pleased God to save the faithful by means of the folly of preaching. As, however, Jews demand a sign, and Greeks seek after philosophy, we now proclaim a crucified Christ, a certain offense to the Jews, and joke to the heathen, but to the called, whether Jews or Greeks,--Christ a divine power and a divine philosophy. ... For observe your calling, brothers, that there are not many fashionable philosophers, nor many powerful men, nor many of high birth." (1 Cor. 1:18-26, Fentonfs translation.)
It is this divine philosophy which the spiritually minded grasp, and which is the sum and substance of their education. It is this human philosophy, or natural philosophy, which in the sight of God is folly that Egypt and her followers adopted. Minds delving into human philosophy never find God, nor do they approach the realms of divine philosophy. There is a divine philosophy, and it is grasped by faith; and there is a human philosophy, a creation of the human mind, a science formulated from deductions which appeal to natural senses. But the man, wisest in human learning alone, remains still a fool in the eyes of God, for the inner man has not been reached.
Egyptian Wisdom
Our study of pagan education is not, however, confined to the Nile Valley. Indeed, some of the most interesting phases, some of the strongest features of the system, were developed elsewhere. Egypt was the cradle, but Greece and Rome were fields in which these ideas gained strength. We read:
"The ancients looked upon Egypt as a school of wisdom. Greece sent thither illustrious philosophers and lawgivers--Pythagoras and Plato, Lycurgus and Solon--to complete their studies." "Hence, even the Greeks in ancient times were accustomed to borrow their politics and their learning from the Egyptians." [1]
Spartan Education and Egypt
Of the four men mentioned, we look upon Lycurgus as the founder of the Spartan government, noted for the physical training it gave and the utter subjection of the individual to the state. Every historian recognized this as due to the system of education introduced by Lycurgus, and followed out by his people. The newborn babe was adjudged worthy of life or death by a council of the state, the decision being based on the physical condition of the infant. At the age of seven the child became the property of the state, and so remained until sixty. It was more exclusively a physical or purely secular education than that offered elsewhere on earth.
Athens And Egypt
The prosperity of Athens, where was "wrought out the most perfect form of heathen civilization," dates from the time of Solon, who, as we have already learned, finished his education in Egypt. In these two men we see the leaning toward the physical side,made so prominent in pagan education. "The course of study in the school of Pythagoras embraced mathematics, physics, metaphysics, and medicine. Especial prominence was given mathematics, which Pythagoras regarded as the noblest science." Here is revealed the inclination of the pagan education toward the purely intellectual. Of Plato we shall read later.
Egyptian Education Universal
If Egypt offered ground for the germination of the seed of pagan education, Greece brought the plant to its seed-producing state; and Rome, acting as the wind with the thistle down, scattered pagan education broadcast. Of Rome we read:
"It gathered into its arms the elements of Grecian and Oriental culture, and as its end drew nigh, it scatters them freely over the rest of Europe. Rome has been the bearer of culture to the modern world." [2]
Plato in Education
In order to understand the fertility of the seeds of pagan education, it is necessary to regard with care the master mind of that system, and this we find in Plato. Emerson, in his "Representative Men," defines his position and the position of his philosophy in the pagan and in the so-called Christian world, making the teachings of this Greek, schooled in Egypt, crowd out the Word of God itself. He says:
"Out of Plato come all things that are still written and debated among men of thought... The Bible of the learned for twenty-two hundred years, every brisk young man, who says in succession fine things to each reluctant generation (Erasmus, Bruno, Locke, Rousseau, Coleridge) is some reader of Plato."
That is saying that for twenty-two hundred years Plato and his educational system, known everywhere as Platonism, have taken the place of the Bible to the leading minds of the world.
"Plato is philosophy, and philosophy, Plato,--at once the glory and the shame of mankind, since neither Saxon nor Roman have availed to add any idea to his categories," continues Emerson." "No wife, no children had he, and the thinkers of all civilized nations are his posterity, and are tinged with his mind. How many great men nature is incessantly sending up out of night, to be his men,--Platonists!"
Plato's Influence
Then he gives a list of illustrious names who have stood for learning in the various ages of the world's history, and continues: "Calvinism is in his [Plato's] Phoedo: Christianity is in it." How little this writer knew of the power of the truth as given by Christ! Doubtless he formed his judgment from professedly Christian teachers. But he continues: "Mahometanism draws all its philosophy, in its handbook of morals
from him [Plato]. Mysticism finds in Plato all its texts. This citizen of a town in Greece is no villager nor patriot. An Englishman reads, and says, 'How English!' a German, 'How Teutonic!' an Italian, 'How Roman and how Greek!' "And to show that the recognition of Plato is not stopped by the Atlantic, our versatile New England writer says: "Plato seems, to a reader in New England, an American genius." Has the reader any suspicion that our American educational institutions may have recognized the universality of this master of philosophy, and adopted into their curricula his system of reasoning? One traces, without the aid of magnifiers, the thread of pagan philosophy throughout the American schools. "As our Jewish Bible has implanted itself in the table talk and household life of every man and woman in the European and American nations, so the writings of Plato have preoccupied every school of learning, every lover of thought, every church, every poet,--making it impossible to think, on certain levels, except through him. He stands between the truth and every man's mind, and has almost impressed language and the primary forms of thought with his name and seal. ... Here is the germ of that Europe we know so well, in its long history of arts and arms; here are all its traits, already discernible in the mind of Plato. ... How Plato came thus to be Europe, and philosophy, and almost literature, is the problem for us to solve." [3]
One ceases to wonder that, surrounded as was the Corinthian church by this philosophy and in daily touch with these ideas which have swayed the world, Paul wrote to it against accepting the philosophy of men in place of that divine philosophy which he and other apostles were preaching through the cross of Christ. "When I came to you, brethren," writes the apostle, "I came not proclaiming the testimony of God with grand reasoning or philosophies, for I decided to know nothing among you except Jesus Christ, and He was crucified. ... And my thought and my statement was not clothed in captivating philosophical reasons; but, in demonstrated spirit and power, so that your trust might not be in human philosophy, but in Divine power." (1 Cor. 2:1-5, Fenton's trans.) "Beware lest any man spoil you through philosophy and vain deceit, after the tradition of men, after the elements [margin] of the world, and not after Christ." (Col. 2:8)
Evolution the Basis of Platonism
Seeing, then, that the Platonic system of 'education has exerted, and is still exerting, such an influence over the minds of men, it behooves us to ascertain the basic principles of his system. What did the man believe, and what did he teach? Quotations have already been given showing that he is the father of modern philosophy. Emerson defines this philosophy. He says: "Philosophy is the account which the human mind gives to itself of the constitution of the world." All attempts, then, to account for the constitution of the world when a "thus saith the Lord," is refused, is philosophy. And philosophy is Plato.
"Through faith we understand that the worlds were framed by the word of God, so that things which are seen were not made of things which do appear." (Heb. 11: 13) But Platonism is the mind trying to account to itself for the constitution of the worlds. How, think you, did the author of this philosophy go about to account for things which can be grasped by faith alone?
"To Plato belongs the honor of first subjecting education to a scientific examination," says Painter. Here began the laboratory studies which have been continued by Huxley, Darwin, and others. And thus from Plato Europe and America have gained their ideas of evolution. Plato brought these ideas from Egypt and Babylon, and the schools of to-day follow this man-made philosophy. Our men of intellect write textbooks which they place in the hands of youth, teaching them to account for the constitution of the worlds according to the reasoning of men's minds.
A few more thoughts concerning Plato, and we shall see what evolution is, and where it is now found. Aristotle, the illustrious pupil of Plato, "created the science of logic," "the science of exact reasoning," as Webster puts it. Says Emerson: "The balanced soul came." "His daring imagination gives him the more solid grasp of facts. ... According to the old sentence, 'If Jove should descend to the earth, he would speak in the style of Plato.'" This last, the Christian can readily believe; but the Son of man used an entirely different speech, although Plato antedates his birth over four hundred years, and was, at the time of the advent of Christ, the ruler of the intellectual world.
"In reading logarithms, one is not more secure than following Plato in his flights." Plato himself is given credit for saying: "There is a science of sciences--I call it Dialectic--which is the intellect discriminating the false and the true." There is indeed a science of sciences--the science of salvation. There is verily a way of judging between the false and the true, for the Spirit of truth will guide you into all truth. But the human brain can never do this. It was this same logic, Plato's "science of sciences," which was given such prominence in the papal schools and all medieval education.
Platonism in Modern Schools
Here stand the two systems side by side, the one guided by human reason, the other by the Spirit of the living God. Remember that the world bows to Plato; and, raising its hands in an attitude of worship, lays at his feet its tribute, its dearest idol,--its educational system. Chambers' Encyclopedia, art. "Plato," shows conclusively that this Greek philosopher holds still his exalted position in literary circles and among educators. It says:
"Since the French Revolution particularly, the study of Plato has been pursued with renewed vigor in Germany, France, and England; and many of our distinguished authors, without expressly professing Platonism, -- as Coleridge, Wordsworth, Mrs. Browning, Ruskin, etc., -- have formed a strong and growing party of adherents, who could find no common banner under which they could at once so conveniently and so honorably muster as that of Plato."
Christians are to be gathered under the ensign of Christ; (Isa. 11:12) but many educators of to-day find "no common banner under which they could so conveniently and so honorably muster as that of Plato." Christianity or paganism, which shall it be in the education of Protestant children of today? How did it happen that the ideas of Plato were so generally accepted throughout Europe? The article in Chambers' Encyclopedia, from which the foregoing quotation is made, tells in the following words how the early Christian church became contaminated by the teachings of Plato: "The works of Plato were extensively studied by the Church Fathers, one of whom joyfully recognizes, in the great teacher of the academy, the schoolmaster who, in the fullness of time, was destined to educate the heathen for Christ, as Moses did the Jews." If the early church adopted the educational system of Plato, one does not wonder that by the Middle Ages Europe was ready for Greek philosophy.
Platonism in Europe and America
In the year 1453, the Turks captured Constantinople, and "many Greek scholars took refuge in Italy. The times were propitious for them." Let it be remembered that this was one of the mileposts in the history of the Dark Ages. The Latin tongue had been the universal language during the days of papal supremacy. There was an uprising against the tyranny of the papacy over thought, and the modern tongues began to appear. In order to stem the tide without losing ground, the papacy turned the attention of men's minds to Greek classics rather than to the Bible of Wyclif or Erasmus, and a little later to the writings of Luther. Indeed, for the papacy the "times were propitious."
"Noble and wealthy patronage was not lacking, and under its fostering care they (the Greeks) became for a time the teachers of Europe. They succeeded in kindling a remarkable enthusiasm for antiquity. Manuscripts were collected, translations were made, academies were established, and libraries were founded. Several of the popes became generous patrons of ancient learning. ...Eager scholars from England, France, and Germany sat at the feet of Italian masters, in order afterward to bear beyond the Alps the precious seed of the new culture." [4] Painter further gives the effects of this spread of Greek classics:
"In Italy it tended strongly to paganize its adherents. Ardor for antiquity became at last intoxication. Infidelity prevailed in the highest ranks of the church; Christianity was despised as a superstition; immorality abounded in the most shameful forms. The heathenism of Athens was revived in Christian Rome."
And scholars from England, France, and Germany sat at the feet of these heathen teachers, drinking in their philosophy, and then hastening across the Alps to propagate these ideas in the schools for the education of the young. This was the influence against which the Reformation had to fight. It is from Oxford, Cambridge, and the universities of Germany and France that American colleges and universities have imbibed these same pagan ideas.
Nature of the Classics
The classics form the backbone of paganism, as the Bible forms the basis of Christian education. The classics are enduring, because they are the highest product of the human mind. The recent move in educational circles, and on the part of some of our leading colleges against the study of the "humanities" (the Greek and Latin classics), and in favor of the study of "moderns" (that is, science, modern languages, and history), can never reach a point of stability until the Bible is put in its proper position as an educational factor, for to push out the classics without putting in their place that which is equally as strong, if not stronger, is useless. A reaction is inevitable, and the classics will be returned to their old-time place of honor. Christian education in its simplicity is the only alternative.
This does not mean the substitution of a class in Bible or sacred history for the former classics. As the classic literature has been the basis of all instruction in our schools since the Middle Ages, a reformation necessitates a decided breaking down of the old system, and the adoption of a new system built upon an entirely different foundation,--a system in which the Word of God shall be the basis of all education, and the textbook in every line of study.
Paganism and our Children
Parents, reading this, may say that but a small proportion of the people ever obtain a classical education. But if you send your child only to the modern kindergarten, he is there told the story of Pluto; or of Ceres, goddess of the golden grain; Mercury, the winged messenger god; the wood nymphs; OEolus, who rules the winds and brings the storms; or Apollo, who is driven across the heavens in a chariot of fire. Or, if the real Greek names are dropped, nature is personified in such a way as to give the childish mind a distorted idea of things which leads to anything but the pure and simple truth of God's Word. He thus drinks in the myths and fables of the Greeks from very infancy. One of his First Readers has the story of Proserpina, who was stolen, and hidden under the earth for a season. Nature-studies are often made attractive to youthful minds by being associated with the ancient Greek gods and goddesses. But even in a more subtle way the ideas of classic lore are taught in the evolutionary theories of science and philosophy, through primary, grammar, and high school grades.
Evolution
"Philosophy," as before quoted, is defined to be "the account which the human mind gives to itself of the constitution of the world." That philosophy is now termed evolution, for evolution is man's way of accounting for the constitution of the world, and the creatures which inhabit it. Take notice of these words from the pen of Henry Drummond. In a paper prepared for the Parliament of Religions, entitled "Evolution of Christianity," he says: "Working in its own field, science made the discovery of how God made the world." "Through faith we understand that the worlds were framed by the word of God," writes Paul to the Hebrews. (Heb. 11:3)
Mr.Drummond continues:
"To science itself this discovery was startling and as unexpected as it has ever been to theology. Exactly fifty years ago Mr. Darwin wrote in dismay to Mr. Hooker that the old theory of specific creation--that God made all species apart, and introduced them into the world one by one--was melting away before his eyes. He unburdened the thought, as he says in his letter, almost as if he were confessing a murder. But so entirely has the world bowed to the weight of facts before which even Darwin trembled, that one of the last books on Darwinism by so religious a mind as that of Mr. Alfred Russell Wallace, contains in its opening chapter these words: 'The whole scientific and literary world, even the whole educated public, accepts as a matter of common knowledge the origin of the species from the other allied species, by the ordinary process of natural birth. The idea of special creation, or any other exceptional mode of production, is absolutely extinct.'"
It would be well if each could read the Words of Drummond for himself; but in brief he says:
"It is needless at this time of day to point out the surpassing grandeur of the new conception [evolution].How it has filled the Christian imagination and kindled to enthusiasm the soberest scientific minds from Darwin downward is known to everyone. For that splendid hypothesis we can not be too grateful to science; and that theology can only enrich itself which gives it even temporary place in its doctrine of creation."
How strange that God failed to make known this stupendous truth ( ? ) through his Word, and left it for science in the hands of Plato's descendants to figure out! "What it needed," says Drummond, "was a credible presentation, in view especially of astronomy, geology, paleontology, and biology. These, as we have said, had made the former 'theory simply untenable. And science has supplied theology with a theory which the intellect can accept." Faith has been laid aside. The human intellect has been exalted. Paganism has cast out Christianity, and our boys and girls now study the nebular hypothesis, explanatory of the creation of the worlds, in their astronomy and geography; they dwell upon the eons of ages consumed in the formation of the geologic strata of the earth; they study the fossils of the ages past, and from them describe the evolution of man from a polyp.
Schools Have Greatest Influence
Of what use is the preaching of the gospel on one day of the week, while six days out of seven paganism guides the intellect? Why sit dreaming of heaven, or spend money to proselyte, while pagan education leads your own children by the hand, and weaves about their mind a network of theories which blinds their eyes to spiritual truths? There is weight in the words of President Harper, of Chicago University, who says: "It is difficult to prophesy what the result of our present method of educating the youth will be in fifty years. We are training the mind in our public schools, but the moral side of the child's nature is almost entirely neglected. The Roman Catholic Church insists on remedying this manifest evil, but our Protestant churches seem to ignore it completely. They expect the Sunday-school to make good what our public schools leave undone, and the consequence is that we overlook a danger as real and as great as any we have had to face."
Notes: