Picture-Work — Themes and Context

That was a profound and true saying uttered by President G. Stanley Hall not long ago, that "of all the things that a teacher should know how to do the most important, without any exception, is to be able to tell a story." And a student pursuing a university course in education, after seeking to know what stories to choose, where to find them, how and to whom and wherefore to tell them, touched the same truth when he said, "It gradually dawned upon me that if I knew how to tell a story, I had mastered the main part of the art of teaching." For to know a good story is to have literary and pedagogic taste; to adapt or make a good story for children is both to know the secret of the mind of a child and to have creative power; to tell a good story is to be a master of a noble art.

The child's thirst for stories--has it no significance, and does it not lay a duty upon us? And yet the insatiableness of the child's thirst is often paralleled by the inadequacy of the teacher's power to satisfy it, and by the parent's despair at being so bankrupt of material.

In his admirable suggestions for making the Sunday-school able to appeal to the interest and the respect of boys and girls who are no longer children, and whom to treat as children is an offense against good taste and Christian charity, Bishop Vincent recommends, among other things, "lectures and outlines, and independent statements by individual pupils and teachers." Story-telling, both by teachers and pupils, is here suggested as a means of further enrichment.

The "wholes" of Scripture narrative, whole books, whole lives, whole stories _told as wholes_ by the teacher or by a single pupil, and not picked out piecemeal by the teacher from halting individuals--these are the things that in the class give interest and that in the mind live and grow and bear fruit. "Moral power is the effect of large unbroken masses of thought; in these alone can a strong interest be developed," and from these alone can a steady will spring.

He who has never read or heard as a whole, at one, or at most, two sittings, the story of an entire book of the Bible, as Jonah, Daniel, Job, or one of the Gospels, has missed one of the chief sources of interest and power.

Our course through the Bible--incident by incident, verse by verse, here a little, there a little, years of "lessons," but no idea even of the life of Christ as a whole--is not unlike the toilsome road traversed by the boy "reading" Cæsar as his first Latin author: so many separate, mutually repellant parts, but no wholes, no idea of what it is all about; or it may be compared to the route of the milk-man--a stop at every other house, and never a good run.

Not one of these plodders, the Sunday-school pupil, the young Latin student, the milk-man's hack, can be looked upon as a model of spiritedness or of continuity.

A teacher of English in the old days, when literature was used chiefly as a clothes-line on which to air grammatical linen, was once guilty of giving out a lesson in Washington Irving--so many constructions, figures, analyses, so many pages, and no more. The end came in the _middle_ of the ride of the headless horseman. But by the time the next class studied Irving the teacher had met with a change. The limit of the first lesson was set according to the structure of the story. The pupils were told to read the story.

"Only read it!" said they. "Aren't we to do anything with it?"

"No," said the teacher, "you are to read it _for fun_."

Should one be in danger of being misunderstood in saying that we do not have enough of reading the Bible for fun, for the pure enjoyment of its stories and of its matchless pictures? The rest will come in due course. It will come just so surely as the story is _realized_.

But important as reading is, telling is incomparably better. The eye of the teacher is then fixed on the class, not on the book; the tone is conversational, the hand is free to gesture and to draw. One can grasp the whole of the story and the whole of the situation. One can bring out dramatic power. For there are few stories that do not have some dramatic quality, both in the making and in the telling. The following points kept in mind will aid the teacher:

1. The story must have a beginning, concrete, interest-compelling, curiosity-piquing. "All things have two handles; beware of the wrong one."

2. It must have a climax, properly led up to, easily led down from; and that never missed.

3. Many good stories have rhythm, recurrence, repetition of the _leit motiv_. "The Three Bears" is a favorite for this reason, among others. The commands of the Lord to Moses were regularly repeated thrice in the Bible story; in the book of Daniel the sonorous catalogue of flute, harp, sackbut, and the rest, comes in none too often for the purposes of the story-teller.

4. All good stories have unity; parts well subordinated; the main lesson unmistakably clear; the point, whether tactfully hidden or brought out by skilful questions, never missed.

This use of stories by exactly reproducing them is naturally the teacher's first method. There follow naturally the _adaptation_ of stories and the making of _original_ stories. The latter way must be dismissed with a single word of caution. Beware of a certain fatal facility in reeling off "made-up" stories. Have you not heard such teachers and such stories? The latter at least are not true, or healthy, or wholesome. They are about unreal people who do unnatural things. They are a poor, ragged device for covering the nakedness of barefaced moralizing.

No one who has tried to tell Bible stories to children, whether young or old, can fail to appreciate the need of adaptation: of enrichment and expansion on the one hand, of condensation on the other. Suppose the story to be told is the parable of the Good Samaritan. There must first be preliminary work. The minds of the children must be made ready, not merely for the lesson, as, for example, by a talk on the meaning of "neighbor," but also for the story. This latter kind of preparation for three reasons:

1. To give your hearers something of the same knowledge about the road from Jerusalem to Jericho, the relations of Jews and Samaritans, the standing and dignity of high priests and Levites possessed by those who heard the parable from the lips of Jesus.

2. To give the setting of the story--time, place, people, customs, atmosphere.

3. To make the language, the steps, the moral, as intelligible to your hearers as they were to the young lawyer to whom the story was first told.

The need of the first way of filling in the picture is brought out by Mrs. Gaskoin in the "Children's Treasury of Bible Stories," Part III.:

"Pages might be written about this parable, for every line is full of teaching, wrapped in beautiful words. But my object just now is only to draw your attention to the circumstance that the third person who passed the wounded man--and the only one who cared about his sufferings and took pains to relieve them--was a Samaritan. On this the point of the story turns. First a priest, and then a Levite, whose very offices alone should have made them ready helpers, had shunned their poor countryman, and had passed on without even a word of sympathy. But the person who did pity him, and, indeed, showered kindnesses upon him, was, not only neither priest nor Levite, not only a mere stranger--but a Samaritan. Now to say this was the same thing to the "lawyer" who was listening to the tale as to say that he was an enemy. The Lord could have chosen no stronger expression; in using it he spoke quite as plainly as when, once before, his words had been these: 'I say unto you which hear: Love your enemies, do good to them which hate you, bless them that curse you!' Clearly, then, it is only by understanding how the Jews felt toward the Samaritans, that we can grasp what the blessed Savior meant when he said that every disciple of his must love his 'neighbor' as himself."

A striking example of the mode of using a full knowledge of customs and people to enrich the story is given by the same author in the following vivid word-picture of the thrilling experience of Zacharias. After describing the method of choosing by lot the priests to take charge of the temple services, the narrative continues:

"To Zacharias, however, one autumn, the coveted lot did fall, and leaving his quiet home, he went up to Jerusalem, and there entered at once upon his sacred duties. They lasted for eight days, including two Sabbaths.... Every morning at nine o'clock, and every afternoon at three, a priest entered the Holy Place to sprinkle the incense-offering on the golden altar. He was accompanied by an assistant priest, who withdrew as soon as he had made the necessary preparations. The privilege of sprinkling the incense-offering, like the other priestly functions, was bestowed by lot. One day, during his week of attendance in the Temple, the lot fell upon Zacharias. So, in his white robes, with bare feet and covered head, he went slowly up, through court after court, to the entrance of the Holy Place. Then a bell rang, all the other ministrants on duty in the Temple took their places, and the people assembled in the various courts composed themselves for prayer. Zacharias disappeared within the sacred enclosure, and in due course his attendant left him alone there, separated from the Holy of Holies itself only by the splendid Veil-of-Partition. Silvery clouds of fragrant smoke presently arose from the kindled incense--then, kneeling before the altar, he paused, in prayer and adoration. Suddenly he became aware that he was not alone. Lifting his eyes he saw, to the right of the altar, a glorious angel, who thus addressed him, dispelling his gathering fear: 'Fear not, Zacharias, for thy prayer is heard, and thy wife Elizabeth shall bear thee a son, and thou shalt call his name John.' ... 'Whereby shall I know this?' he asked, hesitatingly. And the angel, answering, said unto him, 'I am Gabriel, that stand in the presence of God, and am sent to speak unto thee, and to show thee these glad tidings. And behold thou shalt be dumb and not able to speak, until the day that these things shall be performed, because thou believest not my words, which shall be fulfilled in their season.'

"Meanwhile the people were anxiously waiting for Zacharias to return. His reappearance would be the signal for the laying of the sacrifice upon the altar, accompanied by a joyous outburst of the beautiful Temple music. Great, then, was their uneasy wonder at the unusual delay. But at last he did appear."

An illustration of what is meant by re-telling the old story in a modern way for modern hearers is found in the following characteristic extract from a sermon of Dr. Parkhurst's on the text, "And he arose and came to his father":

"The prodigal had not enjoyed nearly as much as he expected--what he had arranged to enjoy. His scheme had collapsed; his experiment broken down. Going away from home and living as though he had no home had not worked as he expected that it was going to. Lonely, ragged, hungry, he thought the thing all over and said to himself: 'I think I had better go home.' He had let go of home, but home had declined to let go of him. He had been his father's boy for twenty years or more, and his experience in the far country had not been quite able to cure him of it. Home still had a pull upon him."

While many of the stories both of the Old and of the New Testament need expansion rather than contraction--think of trying to bring the masterly story of Jonah or the wonderfully simple tale of the Shunemite's son into any smaller compass!--yet the need of condensing the long stories, of Abraham, Joseph, David, Daniel, for instance, is obvious, for we must give the children a picture of the whole life and character of these great and simple figures. To this end selection and suppression are necessary.

The various books mentioned in a later chapter are all more or less successful in the attempt to recast the old original story. So perfect is the original form, however, that the task is one of extreme difficulty. Yet it must be attempted by every teacher, and it is certainly worth a trial. The following suggestions may prove helpful in both modes of adaptation:

1. Use direct discourse. It will require an effort to keep yourself (in your embarrassment) from taking refuge behind the indirect form, saying, for example, "And when he came to himself he said _that he would_ arise and go to _his_ father and tell him _that he had_ sinned."

2. Choose actions rather than descriptions, the dynamics rather than the statics of your subject. Those of us who have grown away from childhood tend to reverse the true order, to place the emphasis on the question, "What kind of a man was he," and not on, "What did he do." Let what he did tell what he was. Your story will thus have "go," as all Bible stories have.

3. Use concrete terms, not abstract; tell what was done, not how somebody felt or thought when something was being done; be objective, not subjective.

4. A story-teller should, in short, have taste. To form this taste it is indispensable that he should not read, but _drink in_ the great masters: Homer, Chaucer, Bunyan, Hawthorne ("The Wonder Book," for example), and above all the Bible itself. No one can absorb these without unconsciously forming a pure, simple style and getting a more childlike point of view and way of speech. Modern writers and modern ways of thinking are, in general, too reflective, self-conscious, subjective, and, where children are concerned, too direct, bare, "preachy."

5. But the secret of story-telling lies not in following rules, not in analyzing processes, not even in imitating good models, though these are all necessary, but first of all in being _full_--full of the story, the picture, the children; and then, in being morally and spiritually up to concert pitch, which is the true source of power in anything. From these comes spontaneity; what is within must come out; the story tells itself; and of your fulness the children all receive.

Finally, the points of practical story-telling may be thus outlined:

1. See it. If you are to make me see it you must see it yourself.

2. Feel it. If it is to touch your class it must first have touched you.

3. Shorten it. It is probably too long. Brevity is the soul of story-telling.

4. Expand it. It is probably meager in necessary background, in details.

5. Master it. Practice. Repetition is the mother of stories well told; readiness, the secret of classes well held.

6. Repeat it. Don't be afraid of re-telling a good story. The younger the children are, the better they like old friends. But every one loves a "twice-told tale."

SOME FIRST PRINCIPLES: UNITY, REALITY, ORDER.

One of the greatest of American preachers never goes beyond "firstly." He makes but one point in each sermon. But he makes that point, drives it home, burns it in, wears a crease in the brain that nothing can ever iron out. Every picture--and those sermons are full of pictures--bears upon that one point, and every argument and lesson, for which the pictures have been laying the foundation, is a part of the same unity. You never hear him say, "And we learn further," but always, "The same truth comes out in another way." One is never more than two bases away from the home plate. It is not a cross-country run, but a game of score and tally.

At the opposite pole from this intensive method is the typical Sunday-school lesson. The typical Sunday-school lesson is--is it not?--hodge-podge. Does the last lesson always bear upon the lesson of to-day? Is to-day's aim single? Do you hold before your mind the one point, the one picture, that your pupils shall carry away with them as an everlasting possession, or do you have in mind to display so many pictures, so many points, that some must needs take effect?

It is easier--at least it is lazier--to provide _many things_ than to prepare _much_. One can rake over an acre more easily than dig one post-hole. And the deeper you go the harder grows the digging. But it's the last six inches of hole that makes firm the top two feet of post.

Now pictures help toward unity of aim in a lesson in two ways: they help to elaborate the one main point--twenty illustrations of one point, not twenty points from one illustration; they help to teach us the law of unity, for a true picture has but one theme, is always simple.

"The great trouble with the stuff taught in our schools is that so much of it always remains _stuff_, and never gets worked up into _boy_." So said Dr. Parkhurst, in a sermon from the text, "Taste and see that the Lord is good." The only way to work up the raw materials of a boy into real boy is to bring him into touch with them, to have him taste, see, handle. But in order to be tasted these materials must be real. And to make them real is the first duty of the teacher. It is also his hardest task. For consider what it costs to make a thing so real to yourself that it can't help being real to some one else! Ah! there's the rub. It costs to do that--costs time, pains, life.

How long did the Lord make Ezekiel lie on his left side, and how long on his right side, without the relief of turning over from one side to the other, before he judged him ready to deliver his message with a due sense of the reality of its import? Three hundred and ninety days "for the iniquity of the house of Israel," forty days more "for the iniquity of the house of Judah"; each day for a year. After that there was no lack of a "realizing sense" in Ezekiel. He had "been there" himself. And was it by way of mere luxury or was it from pedagogical necessity that the Lord showed himself last of all to Paul also, and sent him into the desert, for a year or more, to think it over and get a real grip on the experience? It was a true instinct that made Thomas, the doubting one, want to reinforce a sight-picture by a touch-picture. A dose of the same "doubt" would be a tonic to much of the pale "faith" in the world.

When I was a boy I wrote, after the fashion of the day, an "essay" on a subject about which I had the slenderest knowledge. A tannery lay on my way to school, and the tanner would have been friendly and communicative, but the encyclopedia article, "Leather," was my sole authority. You may imagine the result: a cold, dead thing, not in the least savoring of real leather. On the other hand, when I became a man, I traveled a thousand miles merely to see, and hear the voice of, a master whom I admired and whose picture I wished to have hanging in my mind. Who has not, when freed from the dead atmosphere of the schools, done a like thing? And with what gain to the precious sense of reality!