For most boys it is a loss not to be confirmed at school, which for
the time is the centre of their energies, their hopes, their
disappointments and their temptations; but the loss to the masters who
share their preparation would be irreparable. They may sometimes
blunder from want of knowledge and experience, but their will to help
is strong, and perhaps not least persuasive when chastened by
diffidence.

But all these scripture lessons, chapel services and confirmation
preparation will be powerless to produce a Christian education, if
they be not held together by every lesson and by the whole life of the
school. Industry and obedience, truthfulness and fidelity to duty,
unselfishness and thoroughness, must form the soil without which no
religious plant can grow; and these are taught and learnt in the
struggle with Latin prose, or mathematics, or French grammar, or
scientific formula; as well as in the cricket field, on the football
ground, in the give and take, the pains and the pleasures of daily
life.

It is hard for us in England to imagine a purely secular education,
the very buildings of many of our schools would protest against it;
perhaps it is equally difficult for us to realise how far we fall
short of what we might accomplish did the spirit of Christianity
really inform our lives.

To-day is our opportunity. The claims of education are being listened
to as they never have been in England. Money in millions is being
promised, the value of this subject or that is being canvassed, the
most venerable traditions are being shaken. It is a time of hope, but
a time of danger too. All sorts of plans are being formed for breaking