In a similar if not exactly the same way, all the other principal topics of practical morality can be handled. The conscience can be enlightened, strengthened, guided, and all this can be done without once raising the question why it is wrong to do what is forbidden. That it is wrong should rather, as I have said, be assumed. The ultimate grounds of moral obligation need never be discussed in school. It is the business of religion and philosophy to propose theories, or to formulate articles of belief with respect to the ultimate sources and sanctions of duty. Religion says we ought to do right because it is the will of God, or for the love of Christ. Philosophy says we should do right for utilitarian or transcendental reasons, or in obedience to the law of evolution, etc. The moral teacher, fortunately, is not called upon to choose between these various metaphysical and theological asseverations. As an individual he may subscribe to any one of them, but as a teacher he is bound to remain within the safe limits of his own province. He is not to explain why we should do the right, but to make the young people who are intrusted to his charge see more clearly what is right, and to instill into them his own love of and respect for the right. There is a body of moral truth upon which all good men, of whatever sect or opinion, are agreed: _it is the business of the public schools to deliver to their pupils this common fund of moral truth_. But I must hasten to add, to deliver it not in the style of the preacher, but according to the methods of the pedagogue--i. e., in a systematic way, the moral lessons being graded to suit the varying ages and capacities of the pupils, and the illustrative material being sorted and arranged in like manner. Conceive the modern educational methods to have been applied to that stock of moral truths which all good men accept, and you will have the material for the moral lessons which are needed in a public school. FOOTNOTES: [1] Since the above was written, the draft of the _Volksschulgesetz_ submitted to the Prussian Legislature, and the excited debates to which it gave rise, have supplied a striking confirmation of the views expressed in the text. Nothing could be more mistaken than to propose for imitation elsewhere the German "solution" of the problem of moral teaching in schools, especially at a time when the Germans themselves are taking great pains to make it clear that they are as far as possible from having found a solution. [2] During the reactionary period which followed the Revolution of 1848, the school regulations of Kur-Hessen provided that twenty hours a week be devoted in the Volkschulen to religious teaching. II. THE EFFICIENT MOTIVES OF GOOD CONDUCT.