ought not however to involve silence.

A wise teacher has said that it is not the miracles of Christ but his
standard that keeps men away from his Church, and therefore outside
the influence for which the Church stands. True though this may be of
men as life goes on, of the young it is not the whole truth. In those
critical years of a man's religion--between eighteen and
twenty-five--it is the sudden or the slow-growing doubt about the
miracles of the New Testament, as much as the lofty standard that the
"Follow me" of Christ requires, that makes the profession and even the
holding of a religious faith so hard. More and more are the schools
trying to prepare those in their charge for the perils that threaten
the physical health and the character of the young; but it is tragic
that they should be so unwilling to face frankly the perils that will
sap the man's faith, and so expose his soul to the assaults of the
world and the devil. It is very hard to put oneself in another's
place; perhaps harder for the schoolmaster than for any other man, but
when we are teaching such a subject as religion--a subject whose roots
must perish if they cannot draw moisture from the springs of
sincerity, we should try to imagine what must be the feelings of the
thoughtful boy when he first discovers that the lessons which he has
so often learnt and the Creeds that he has so often repeated were
taken by his teachers in a sense which they carefully concealed from
him. More harm is done by the economy of truth than by the suggestion
of doubt.

It may be extraordinarily difficult to treat these problems of the New
Testament with becoming reverence; but is it not true to say that the
day when it becomes easy to any man to do so will be the day when he
ought to stop dealing with them? The real irreverence, the only