were unsettled. Gradually religious leaders began to give attention to the Sunday school as an agency that could be operated by neighbors and friends. Efforts with the best of motives were made by great societies in the North to advance the work of organizing Sunday schools, but these efforts had little success, save in remote districts. Immediately after the war there began that great movement of the blacks to form churches of their own. In these churches the spirit of imitation led to the organization of Sunday schools, and Northern missionary effort helped this on. In many states denominational and interdenominational societies conducted more or less systematic campaigns for Sunday school extension. But in the country districts this was difficult. Danger, distance, and bad roads made the work spasmodic and imperfect. Yet, as always, the Sunday school was the most effective of pioneer agencies, and in the remote regions it went ahead of the churches and did the work of the day schools as well. Leaders were interested during this period, the Sunday school was urged, literature was provided, but the results were not remarkable.

International Uniform Lesson System Adopted.

The great advance in the Sunday school movement in America came with the adoption of the International Uniform Lesson System in 1872. No Southern man had place on the first lesson committee, but the uniform lessons were soon adopted by all denominations in the South. The second lesson committee was appointed at a great session of the International Sunday School Convention which met in Atlanta in 1878. This was the first of the great national bodies to meet in the South after the war. It was counted a great event by its projectors, and one who participated says of it "that

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nothing since the war has done so much to promote good feeling between the sections as this convention." Its influence was no doubt great. Three Southern men, Dr. B. M. Palmer, Presbyterian, Dr. John A. Broadus, Baptist, and Dr. W. G. E. Cunnyngham, Methodist, were made members of the committee. The very names of these men gave an impetus to the new cause in the South, for they are the names of three wise and gracious leaders of real power. No doubt the convention helped the Sunday school cause as much by appointing these men as by any direct influence, for it is difficult to find any direct results from the great meeting.

Denominational Work.

The International Sunday School Association, working through local interdenominational organizations in the states, has never gained the hold in the South that it has in the West, and to some extent in the East. Denominational feeling is more vital and intense, while the strange and mysterious, but beautiful solidarity in the South which makes it a section in spirit and fellowship even more positively than do geographical lines, has always made organized religious work more effective when conducted by Southern organizations. The most potent influences also in religion in the South are still denominational. So the great progress in Sunday school work has come, and still comes, through denominational effort working in the South as a section, rather than from interdenominational, local, or Northern organizations. The Methodists began their systematic work in 1870, the Baptists in 1890, and the Presbyterians about 1901, although the two latter bodies had for many years issued periodicals under the care of missionary organizations. Each of these denominations now carries on an extensive

field work which has great force because in the life of the South the influence of these Southern organizations is vital among the people. The progress of Sunday school work in the South is to be looked for along denominational lines rather than through interdenominational, and this progress is manifest all along the line. As has been true everywhere else the Sunday school work and the publishing of books have been combined, and great and growing publishing houses are maintained by the Southern Baptists, Methodists, and Presbyterians, the first two at Nashville, and the latter at Richmond.

Sunday Schools Among Negroes.

It remains but to say a word or two as to the Sunday school among the negroes. At the present this has not brought about any great results, save that the Sunday school has become general among them. To use the Sunday school to the best advantage of the race is now the problem. It is a source of gratification that the uniform lesson gives them a common touch with their white brethren and this is a bond not to be lightly esteemed. Practically all negro Sunday schools now patronize negro publishing houses and have Sunday school periodicals prepared by negroes. This is as it should be. It results in a more direct application of the Bible to the needs of the race and enables their leaders to direct their people in common movements. Another result has been to develop publishing houses of their own, which in turn become agencies for Sunday school development. To most men familiar with existing conditions the way upward for the negro is to be found under the leadership of his own race, and this is true in the Sunday school as in other things. Certain it is that it can be done by no one else. Most of the work so far attempted for the negro by the Inter

national Sunday School Association has been futile, largely because it has overlooked the existing negro agencies and the dominant denominationalism of the negro. Recent efforts to interest the negro schools and to gain the support of the denominational leaders, in a campaign to impress upon the race the need of using to the full the Sunday school, gives much greater promise of success. The Sunday school promises to be a factor second to none in the religious development of the negro. And as an agency the Sunday school will nowhere be of greater service than to the negro race at the present time. It is, and must be, largely the hope of securing a generation of negroes with intelligent conceptions of religion among the average members of the race.

BIBLIOGRAPHY.-Few, if any, books can be recommended. Brown's Sunday School Movement in America gives surface facts and dates; the minutes of the Southern Baptist Convention (1845-1908); minutes of General Conference, M. E. Church, South (Quadrennial since 1846); reports of Sunday School Union, Philadelphia; proceedings of International Sunday School Association (Triennial since 1842) are useful.

ISAAC J. VAN NESS,

Editorial Secretary Sunday School Board of the
Southern Baptist Convention.

CHAPTER VII.

THE LAYMEN'S MISSIONARY MOVEMENT IN THE SOUTH.

History of the Movement.

MONG the various organizations of the Christian young people of North America formed during the closing years of the Nine

teenth century, possibly none has been more productive of permanent good than the Student Volunteer Movement, organized in 1888. The watchword adopted by this organization-"The evangeli

zation of the world in this generation"-has always been its controlling motive. In February, 1906, the International Convention of this Movement was held in Nashville, Tennessee, with an attendance of over 3,000 students, representing 700 colleges and universities in the United States and Canada. There were also present a number of returned missionaries, editors of the religious papers of the country, and secretaries of the various foreign mission boards. It was a meeting of great spiritual power, in which added emphasis was given to the underlying principle of the Movement-the carrying of the gospel the world round in this generation. As the secretaries of the boards impressed upon the large student body the necessity of quadrupling the number of volunteers in the colleges of the country for the foreign fields, and as the response thereto was quite general, there came to a Christian layman present a conviction that a forward step must be taken by the Church at large that would parallel this advanced movement on the part of the student volunteers.

In the carrying out of his conviction, this Christian man had interviews with Mr. John R. Mott and other leaders of Christian thought and activity, and found them to be in full sympathy with the suggestion, and ready to coöperate in the inauguration of such a movement. After several conferences on the subject, it was resolved to invite a number of laymen to meet together to further consider the matter, and to take such action as their judgment might dictate. This meeting was held in the Fifth Avenue Presbyterian church, New York City, Nov. 15, 1906, following the day appointed for the celebration of the centennial of the Haystack Prayer Meeting, and somewhat as a sequence to that meeting. It was attended by a large number of men from New York