Scanned, proofed and corrected from the original hardcover edition for enjoyable reading. A excerpt from the first chapter: As a pastor, the writer had ample opportunity to note the results of earnest effort put forth to bring the child early to Christ. For three years he has been travelling over the state of New York, investigating the work of the Sunday-schools with the result that the impression has deepened, that greater efforts should be put forth to bring young children to Jesus Christ. The following narration of facts will help others to understand why this little book is given to Christian workers. One morning the writer came to the office of the New York State Sunday-school Association and was requested by the chairman of the state executive committee to visit a gentleman who had on his soul a burden, which was as follows: The burdened one had figured out that the Sunday-school life of the average pupil is ten years, that in the State of New York for a series of years prior to 1900, about twenty per cent, of the members of our Sunday-schools confessed Christ while members of the school, and that about another twenty per cent, confess Christ after they leave the Sunday-school. This leaves sixty per cent, of the great army which constantly passes through our Sunday-schools who never, so far as can be learned, confess Jesus Christ. In other words, three-fifths of those who are members of the Sunday-schools of the State of New York seem to go down to Christless graves. This does not take into account the 500,000 nominal Protestants of school age in New York State who are not enrolled as members of Sunday-schools. The question that was placed on the heart of him who made this calculation was this: What can be done to arouse pastors, Bible-teachers and parents to such efforts for the conversion of children, that these figures shall be changed? I left this gentleman with a part of his burden on my own soul, and the next morning started on a trip, which ended in the First Presbyterian Church of Binghampton, where the New York State Sunday-school Association was to begin its annual convention on the following day. Strung above the platform in large, red letters was the motto: "the Children For Christ." Inquiry disclosed the fact that the local committee had not been in communication with the gentleman in New York above referred to, but that they had selected this motto as the most appropriate one for the gathering. During the three days of that convention nearly every speaker referred to these words, so that they became the keynote of the meeting, and were burned into the very being of nearly every person present.
