its consciousness, it is certainly difficult for the rural church to
consider without prejudice the possibility of its needing to change its
manner of functioning. It is, however, possible that life has been so
changed, so fundamentally changed, that the Church to meet its present
duties and to use its present resources must make profound changes in
its method of service. When the situation advances to the point where
such changes receive serious consideration, some of us believe that the
following questions will be asked and finally answered on the basis of
experiment and experience:
1. Must not the rural church give less attention to preaching? The
theological student is still taught by many of our Protestant
seminaries, just as he was a decade ago, that the minister's chief
function is preaching. There can be no doubt concerning the supreme
importance of preaching in the past. Is not, however, its effectiveness
decreasing? If the Church were starting its work at the present time, in
the light of the methods of other organizations, would we expect it to
put the stress upon preaching that it does at present? There are two
reasons why preaching ought not to have the emphasis it has had in the
past. Much of its former importance was due to influences that are now
exerted by the newspaper, the magazine, the library, the public lecture,
and even by the theater. The sermon no longer has the monopoly it once
had in the bringing of moral truth to the attention of the people. Many
people are more deeply impressed by the methods of presenting truth
exercised by some of the Church's rivals for popular attention. It is
also true that, since religion has tried to function more in social life
and the Church has not so much tried to build up an experience of dogma
within the life of the individual, the sermon has, as a means of public
influence, suffered some handicap. It is largely because of this that
the Church has undertaken so much new work in addition to the preaching.
There is, of course, a limit in the process of taking on new forms of
service and eliminating nothing. The minister is human and he simply can
not do so much as is asked of him. Charles M. Sheldon, in a very
interesting essay in regard to the work of the minister,[2] says that
the man does not live who can produce two good, new sermons each week.
In the long run the rural church must decrease the emphasis upon
preaching, if it is successfully to carry on the new work that from time
to time it is adding. And the new activities come with all the momentum
that belongs to service that seems to fulfil real needs.
When the Church devotes less attention to preaching, it will certainly
give more consideration to its function as a leader of worship.
Protestantism has never exaggerated this part of the Church's activity;
it usually still undervalues the importance of the esthetic element in
religion. Worship tends to emphasize the common elements; preaching
necessarily brings out the differences between religious people. When
there is less importance given to preaching and more to worship, there
will be a decrease in sectarianism.
Of course there are orators who preach and who enjoy the influence and
popularity that oratory always will have. These men, however, are
outstanding and their success illustrates the continuing power of
oratory, but it gives no argument for the effectiveness of preaching in
general. As a person having an instinctive bias for the spoken word, I
have slowly been driven to the opinion that a great multitude of people
feel differently and are more sincerely and more easily influenced by
other means of bringing truth home to the hearts of men and women.
Less attention to preaching will permit the rural minister to undertake
the other work given in the following parts of the program here
presented.
2. There is a second question that we may expect the rural church some
time to consider--must not the Church make more of modern science as a
means of developing social and individual character? This question is
likely to reveal different ideas as to what religion is. One who thinks
of the spiritual as the flower of complete living, who wishes every
possible wholesome condition provided for character-formation, will
naturally regard science as the friend of religion and the basis for
moral progress. There is no one who does not wish the Church in some
degree to take advantage of the means for its wider service provided by
discovery and invention. Must not the rural church undertake to
distribute to the community life the helpful information science has,
unless it is willing to give to some other institution a great moral
service that at present it can best perform? Until it assumes in a
greater degree and in a more conscious manner the distribution of
science in the small community life, can we expect any amount of
exhortation to make the community life what it should be? The people
need, to meet their problems, concrete information that furnishes
specific answers to their difficulties.
At present the average minister realizes that his training has been
philosophic rather than scientific. His outlook upon life is from a
different viewpoint than that from which most men face experience. He
often builds his service for men upon a basis which no other
professional man except the lawyer--and he in a smaller and decreasing
degree--is attempting to use in practical effort. If the minister had
been given more science in his preparation for life, there is little
doubt that the Church would have accepted, especially in small towns and
villages, its opportunity to popularize science by bringing men and
women skilful in presenting useful information into the community and by
this time would have been regarded as socially the most valuable
instrument for the distribution of science.
3. Another question the rural church must soon face. Must there not be
less emphasis given to individualism and more to social control? This is
a question the schools are already facing. A philosophic outlook
naturally tends toward an emphasis upon individual responsibility in a
way science does not justify. Science (medicine, abnormal psychology,
and the social sciences especially) is showing more and more why men act
as they do. One's very personality is social in origin. The pressure of
early influences and of later public opinion is very great. Moral
results follow influences that belong to diseases, abnormal experiences,
unfortunate suggestions, defective inheritance, and a multitude of
causes understood by science. If religion is the supreme experience of a
wholesome, normal individual, there can be no doubt that increasingly we
must regard our moral problems as social more deeply than individual.
This will force the rural church to give up its present unreasonable
emphasis upon individual conduct and lead it to assume a much larger
social responsibility.
4. Finally, do not the currents of modern thought and feeling appear to
lead to a greater emphasis upon Christianity as a service rather than as
a system of thought? Will not the rural church consider whether it must
not put more emphasis upon itself as a function and less upon itself as
an interpreter of doctrine? This is the big question. At present the
Church wishes to increase its service, but it has only slight
inclination to reduce the attention it gives to doctrine. The essential
element in Christianity, service--largely as a result of the work of the
churches--has now widespread acceptance, but many are not captivated by
the doctrinal side of church activity. Such men must understand the
meaning of faith to Paul by the meaning of religion to Jesus. They
respond to the appeal of service; they do not take interest in matters
of doctrine. To such the Church is a function, not an interpreter of
dogma. What represents religious sanity in such a movement it is for
time to reveal, but the current now flows toward service and away from a
system of doctrine.
Service brings religious people together; doctrine separates them. It is
therefore natural that with the present tendency toward making religion
an activity, there should go a profound movement toward religious
consolidation. The reaction from narrower and narrower division, smaller
and smaller groups, within Protestantism is very determined. What a
blessing this is proving for the rural people! The burden of
sectarianism is hardest for them to endure. Someone has said that every
argument for the consolidated school is equally strong for the
consolidated church. If activity proves a working basis for the
fellowship of Christian people, we may in time have the community church
attempting to serve all the people in every possible way, and in
association with other churches assuming the same function. At present
this appears very distant and we are satisfied when we find churches
federating, while still assuming the seriousness of doctrinal
differences.
Our entire social life seems in a state of flux. It is commonplace
thought that changes are taking place. We are too closely related to the
movement to know just what is to be the outcome. A more stable condition
must some time come. It now appears that rural life is entering upon the
period of flux which heretofore has been more characteristic of the
cities. It is folly to suppose that church life will not at all change
during such a social experience as that upon which we have entered. The
rural worker must in every way possible help the Church in the work it
is now doing. He has no right, however, to be content with merely doing
this. He also should seriously think over and over the problems of
possible changes in church activity, that new social demands may not be
ignored. Since he knows the work of many churches, he has a basis for
wide-minded thought. This will prepare him to serve those churches that
attempt new service. In other words, the best type of rural worker will
not merely assist the Church that now is; he will also have sympathy and
understanding for the Church that is coming to be. This second task is
more difficult than the first. It will require critical thought, vision,
patience, courage, and good judgment.
Perhaps a sufficient criticism of this program is contained in the
question, "Why doesn't the author try to put his program in practice?"
The force of this challenge has been felt, even by one who is imbedded
in a different occupation and who has peculiar obligations that would
seem to forbid entering a new field of service. This much is certain,
were I a minister in any degree successful, I would be unlikely to feel
the need of any radical change in the program of the rural church; were
I a failure, I would have no courage to suggest the change. As an
outsider I have come to think that some change of program is sure to
come, but not quickly. Meanwhile it is wisdom for us all to remember
that the mission of the Church is a larger matter than its methods.
FOOTNOTE:
[2] "Man or Superman," _Atlantic Monthly_, January, 1917.
MENTAL HYGIENE IN RURAL DISTRICTS
V
MENTAL HYGIENE IN RURAL DISTRICTS
Nervous diseases, insanity, and feeble-mindedness are a grievous burden
for modern society. Every form of social ill roots itself in these mind
disorders. Since this great burden seems to be increasing as a result of
the conditions of present-day living, it is not strange that those most
familiar with the situation are seriously alarmed. This concern is
expressing itself in movements that attempt to educate the public to the
need of conserving the mind in every possible way. Interest is being
aroused in mental hygiene and this fact promises great social relief. It
is indeed fortunate that philanthropic effort has thus become welded
with science and is eager to get at one of the most serious sources of
poverty, alcoholism, prostitution, crime, and physical suffering. The
student of any of these great social problems knows that the roots of
the difficulty usually run down into human weaknesses such as the mental
hygiene movement is attempting to correct and prevent.
The mental hygiene propaganda has been up to the present time largely
confined to the urban centers, but it is very important that our rural
districts receive the benefits that come from attention to the problems
of mental health. Not that rural people have greater need of mental
hygiene than have those who live in the cities. Many alienists, on the
contrary, believe the city more in need of mind-conserving activities,
and, although there is no satisfactory basis for comparison, it would
seem as a result of the data gathered by the last census[3] that their
conclusion is reasonable in light of the evidence we have at present
regarding conditions in this country. The country needs emphasis
because it can be more easily neglected than the city.
People in the country are less likely to realize the needs of mental
hygiene. As a rule, rural conditions that should challenge the attention
of the leaders of the communities are not spectacular and appear in
isolation. In urban life, on the other hand, thoughtful social workers
are bound to see many individual cases that belong to the defective
group as a mass, and thereby to realize the seriousness of the problem.
If the rural leaders could put together the cases of social
maladjustment present in many different communities, there is no doubt
that the great need of mental hygiene in the country would be easily
recognized.
It is also true that mental hygiene propaganda is somewhat more
difficult in the country, partly because of the temper of mind of rural
leadership and partly because of the lack of means for the reaching of
popular attention. People are not likely to be spontaneously interested
in the mental hygiene movement. They require the instruction and
inspiration that come through the personality of the alienist.
Fortunately our daily and weekly papers realize the seriousness of the
mental hygiene propaganda and they circulate both in the country and in
the city. This fact is making many of the leading people in the country
nearly as familiar with the problem of mental hygiene as are city
leaders.
Even though we know less than we should like concerning the amount and
the significance of mental deficiency in the country, we already have
information that reveals the need of mental hygiene effort among rural
folk. The report of the New Hampshire Children's Commission made in 1915
contains a significant conclusion in regard to the feeble-mindedness in
the rural section of that state. "One of the most significant studies
that can be made in the survey of these counties is the geographic
distribution of the feeble-minded and the proportion of the entire
state population that falls within this defective class. Since there has
been a report from every town in the state, either by questionnaire or
personal canvass, this proportion may be considered fairly correct, even
though many cases have not been reported. One of the most significant
revelations of this table is the range of feeble-mindedness gradually
ascending from the smallest percentage, in the most populous county of
the state, to the largest percentages, in the two most remote and thinly
populated counties. It speaks volumes for the need of improving rural
conditions, of bringing the people in the remote farm and hill districts
into closer touch with the currents of healthy, active life in the great
centers. It shows that a campaign should begin at once--this very
month--for the improvement of rural living conditions, and especially
for the improvement of the rural schools, so that the children now
growing up may receive the education that is their birthright." We also
have two recent government reports that disclose the need of mental
hygiene among rural people.[4]
The first report, based upon a survey made in Newcastle County,
Delaware, contains among the conclusions these that are of special
interest to the student of rural life:
"Five-tenths of 1 per cent of 3,793 rural school children examined in
New Castle County are definitely feeble-minded and in need of
institutional treatment.
An additional 1.3 per cent of the total number were so retarded mentally
as to be considered probable mental defectives and in need of
institutional care.
A number of mentally defective children were encountered who exhibited
symptoms similar to those which are observed in the adult insane.
It is believed, as a result of this survey, that epilepsy is a more
prevalent disease than it has heretofore been thought to be."
The other report gives the following information:
"Of the 1,087 girls and 1,098 boys examined in the rural schools, 93 of
the former and 100 of the latter were below the average mentally, or 8.7
per cent of the whole number.
Of the total school population, 0.9 per cent were mental defectives.
The undue number of one-room rural schools in the county which were of
faulty construction, with poor equipment, and with imperfect teaching
facilities, were largely responsible for the retardation found in the
county.
The average loss of grade by 193 children, as recorded by teachers, was
1.28 years for girls and 1.5 years for boys, a total of 269 school
years.
No special classes for the instruction of retarded children were found
in any of the rural schools of the county.
In addition to the 214 children who were retarded and exceptionally
retarded, three epileptics and two constitutionally inferior children
were found among the school children of the county."
These interesting investigations do not, of course, disclose the full
amount of mental defectiveness in the localities studied, because they
are based on a survey of the children at school and because they
especially take up the matter of retardation and feeble-mindedness. It
is no uncommon thing in the small rural community to find the more
troublesome feeble-minded child withdrawn from the school. The reports
suggest that a wider investigation would increase the number of
defective children, for the method chosen could hardly be expected to
discern all the seriously neurotic children. The information gathered
indicates that epilepsy and the neurotic predisposition to insanity need
to be investigated as well as amentia,[5] and that the epileptics and
neurotics, even among rural children, are more numerous than is usually
supposed. Of course an investigation of the adults would still more
increase the amount of mental abnormality.
The sociologist is familiar with the social menace of the degenerate
family in the country. Most of the members of the families thus far
studied have lived in the country or small village. It is reasonable to
suppose that on the whole such families find it easier to survive in the
country than in the city. The country offers occupation for the high
grades during the busy season and yet does not require steady employment
all through the year. The social penalties of mental inferiority are not
likely to be so oppressive; certainly there is much less danger of
coming into collision with the law. Our institutions find from
experience that the feeble-minded take kindly to rough, out-door work
and from this it is natural to assume that a large number of the
feeble-minded, free to choose their environment, prefer the country to
the city. They are probably more often handicapped by the competition of
city life than by the conditions of life in the rural community.
It is probably true also that the feeble-minded family is more likely to
renew its vitality by the mixing in of new, normal blood in the country
than in the city. Illegitimacy holds in the problem of rural
feeble-mindedness the same position that prostitution occupies in urban
amentia. The attractive feeble-minded girl--and of course many of these
girls are physically attractive to many men--does not find it difficult
in the country to have sex relations with mentally normal men. Indeed it
is often not realized that the girl is mentally abnormal, and all too
frequently we have a marriage in the country between a woman of unsound
mind and a man who is mentally sound. Illegitimacy is, however, the
larger problem in rural amentia. The same type of girl that in the
country becomes the mother of several children, often by different men,
in the city, unless protected, enters prostitution. The city prostitute,
because of the sterilizing effects of venereal diseases, is less likely
to become the mother of children, but, on the other hand, she scatters
about syphilis, which has so much to do with causing mental
abnormalities. It may be a matter of opinion which of the two social
evils, illegitimacy in the country or prostitution in the city, has the
larger influence upon the spread of mental abnormalities, but there can
be no doubt that the rural difficulty deserves the attention of all
interested in mental hygiene.
It is unfortunate that rural people do not realize more often the
serious meaning of feeble-mindedness. The close contact between
neighbors and the familiarity of community life tend in the country to
develop an indifference to the variations from normal standard that the
high-grade ament expresses. People, as a rule, take the social failures
of the feeble-minded for granted and do not specially regard them as
evidences of mental inferiority. This condition makes the limited
segregation possible in the country very difficult indeed. The
thoughtful parent hardly knows how to keep his child from associating
with the deficient child of his neighbor when they live near together
and attend the same school.
At school also the feeble-minded child is likely to have advantages over
his city brother, which keep him from exhibiting to the full his
inherent mental weakness. A conversation with almost any rural teacher
will impress upon one the fact that the teacher is loath to declare
feeble-minded a child whose records give unmistakable evidence of
amentia and that she generally regards the child as merely dull.
Fortunately this is likely not to be so true in the future, as a result
of the recent instruction that candidates for teaching are now receiving
in our normal schools.
There is, however, the greatest need of clinic work being carried on in
our rural schools. The problem cannot safely be left with local
authority. The demand is for some state-wide method of mental
examination of school children. This service, which in most states could
be given over to the superintendent of public instruction, ought to be
given wider scope than merely the mental measurement of school children.
The problem requires the service of the alienist. Only by this more
fundamental treatment of the problem can we expect to obtain the full
social relief that the preventive side of mental hygiene promises. As a
matter of fact, however, it is likely that the problem will be
considered first from the viewpoint of retardation in our rural schools.
It will be unwise to force the mental hygiene movement into our rural
school administration more rapidly than the need of it can be made clear
to our rural leadership.
It is an unhappy fact that we are at present doing so little. The state
certainly must try in some way to provide, for the country children who
need it, the special class instruction now given backward children in
the cities. This will give relief by providing a basis for the
separation of the curable and the incurable defective children. At
present the defective child who requires treatment and improves in the
special class suffers a great handicap by being in the country rather
than in the city.