This is indeed the exaltation of reason. There is, in such a system, no room whatever for faith. W. T. Harris, United States Commissioner of Education, writing of Sunday-schools, attributes their decline to the adoption, by Sunday-school teachers, of the methods employed in the secular schools. A few words from him will suffice. He says: “With the spectacle of the systematic organization of the secular schools and the improvement of methods of teaching before them, the leaders in the church have endeavored to perfect the methods of the religious instruction of youth. They have met the following dangers which lay in their path; namely, first, the danger of adopting methods of instruction in religion which were fit and proper only for secular instruction; second, the selection of religious matter for the course of study which did not lead in a most direct manner toward vital religion, although it would readily take on a pedagogic form.”[178] In order to show the reason why methods which are perfectly proper in giving secular education are not adapted to religious instruction, Mr. Harris explains: “The secular school gives positive instruction. It teaches mathematics, natural science, history, and language. Knowledge of the facts can be precise and accurate, and a similar knowledge of the principles can be arrived at. The self-activity of the pupil is ... demanded by the teacher of the secular school. The pupil must not take things on authority, but must test and verify.... He must trace out the mathematical demonstrations.... He must learn the method of investigating facts.... The spirit of the secular school therefore comes to be an enlightening one, although not of the highest order.” The whole tendency of secular education, according to Mr. Harris, is to develop a spirit of investigation and proof. This, he says, is a means of enlightening, but not of the highest order. The highest means of enlightening the mind is by faith. That is God’s method. Christian schools must avoid the secular methods of instruction, adopting in their stead that highest form of enlightening,—faith. That separates Christian schools from secular schools in methods as well as in the subject matter taught. [Sidenote: Secular methods require material proof]