FOR many years, while serving as superintendent of Sunday schools, I saw hundreds of children grow up to young manhood and womanhood, and in a majority of cases go out from the school because they had reached such maturity. Every conceivable effort was made to retain them by securing the best teachers and offering such attractive social influences as could be introduced into a class. Occasionally some magnetic teacher with marked and strong personality would succeed for a time in holding a considerable number of young people in the school, but such teachers were hard to find. The The scholars never seemed willing subjects, but bound in some way to a service that was neither palatable nor in all cases profitable. Why is this so? was the question asked by troubled teacher and superintendent, and too often it was attributed to the perverseness of the young people, and they were given over to the world with the hope that early instruction might have left some seed in their hearts that would in future years bear fruit for their good and the glory of God. In the midst of these discouraging conditions, which seemed to be almost universal in the Sunday school (so much so that in every institute program was found this topic: "How can the young people be retained in the Sunday school," and when the paper was read and the discussion ended, the mystery was not solved), the writer began to search for the cause that produced these conditions, and asked the question of himself. Why did you leave the Sunday school at the age of sixteen, just as these people do you are so troubled about? Going back to those days and digging out of memory their thoughts, I found that there existed in my mind the thought which was confirmed by the conduct of all schools, that the Sunday school was for children, and not for young people, and that as I was no longer a child I was out of place. It was not that I did not like to be in the school, but that I had changed conditions and the school had not; therefore was not adapted to me or my wants. This was a revelation which led to the thought that the fault was not in the splendid young men and women who left us, but that of the organization and adaptation of the school to their needs. The conclusion was that if we would retain our young people in the school and church, we must adopt methods and instruction which would be in accord with their age and thought. The public schools at once gave a pattern to be followed. The graded system made some part of the school fit every scholar who came to it, and gave to each one in lower grade a laudable and helpful ambition to reach the higher. This idea, I conceived, might, in a modified form, be introduced into the Sunday school, and as soon as the plan was matured I proceeded to introduce it into the Central Methodist Episcopal Sunday School of Detroit. I will as briefly as possible outline it, trusting it may be helpful to others. GRADES.