A knowledge of Bible history and of religious dogmas cannot make anyone more moral. There are many countries in which we find that the extent of immorality is directly proportional to the extent to which, in the various areas, a religious spirit prevails. Our general conclusion, therefore, is that the public elementary school should not be founded upon a religious basis, and that it should not undertake to give religious instruction. The standpoint of France, formerly so religious a country, is thoroughly sound. The principle of religious liberty allows everyone to profess whatever religion he pleases. It is a logical corollary of this principle that the public elementary school, which is open to all, should be neither religious nor anti-religious; that is to say, that it should be a secular, lay, neutral school, and that religious instruction should be left to the parents. But, in view of these considerations, it is all the more necessary to provide for special moral instruction in the public elementary school. It is not a valid objection to say that ethics are too difficult for children; in this matter everything depends upon how they are taught. Evidently moral teaching will be effective only if the right educational methods are employed, and it cannot be said that this has hitherto been the case to any considerable extent. Moral instruction must not consist in mere repetition of ethical principles, but must be a lesson of a very practical order; it must not be a dry enumeration of duties, but an introduction to the realities of social life, the aim of moral instruction being to teach the pupil sound views of life, and to lead him to regulate all his thoughts and all his activities with reference to their “social reaction.” The introduction of ethical problems and moral outlooks into the instruction given in other branches of study is also necessary, and may indeed begin at once, for this offers no difficulties. But it is also absolutely essential that moral questions should receive a comprehensive and connected consideration in a special course of lessons. For more than a quarter of a century moral instruction has been given in the elementary schools of the United States and of France. In France this course of lessons is used, not merely as an instrument in the campaign against clericalism and monarchism, but also, quite wrongly, as a means for the cultivation of jingoism.