Rensselaer Republican, Volume 21, Number 37, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 16 May 1889 — LEARNING BIBLE VERSES. [ARTICLE]

LEARNING BIBLE VERSES.

■aaday Schools of To-dWy. and Those of tlm Past. Sunday schools have changed with the fifties. They now hold one short session every Sabbath day J and it is optioned with the pupils to attend cliuach or to remain away. liut fifty years ago two sessions were held every Sundav, and all file scholars were expected to be present at the church services morning and afternoon. In those days there were Sunday schools which proposed to make every child cornjolt to memory the Whole of the New Testament and most of the Old Testament. In the memoir of Dr. S. Wells Williams, the Chinese missionary and scholar, it is stated that while he was attending a Sunday school at Utica, N. Y., he received a book for having learned the New Testament through. Such was the emulation among the boys of the school that on a certain Sunday every scholar in one class repeated Whole chapters from the gospels, and one boy rehearsed 500 verses without an error. The forty girls of the school were so ambitions to excel the- boys in memorizJng Scripture, thaC-on ten Sundays-firey recited 44,000 verses—an average of 110 verses recited by each girl every Sunday. But the teachers saw that these feats of memory looked to mastering more the letter of tho Scriptures than their spirit, and limited the amount to be recited to fifteen verses. The fact is remarkable as showing the enthusiasm of the scholars, many of whom stole moments from their play during the week, that they might learn Bible verses to recite in Sunday school.