"Sometimes it is hard for me to tell whether Brother Sewell is joking or in earnest. I have known him so long and so well that I can hardly conceive of him joking about so sacred a thing as the Word of God and yet it seems equally hard to believe that he is so ignorant as to bring the school of Tyrannus into this discussion as an apology for the Sunday School. The lesser lights among their debaters have worn this threadbare long ago and everyone who is at all informed knows that any attempt to show a similarity between it and the thing Brother Sewell is defending is unadulterated and sublimated nonsense. The primary meaning of the Greek scholee is a period of rest, leisure, relaxation-a vacation. In the New Testament, lexicographers define it as "a place of learned leisure, where a teacher and his disciples came together and held discussions and disputations." There is nowhere, that I know of, where there is the least hint or intimation that those assemblies resembled, in any way, the Sunday School with its classes, literature and multiplicity of teachers.

It was the custom of the apostles to preach the gospel wherever crowds assembled and they could find opportunity. I emphatically deny that Paul was one among a number of teachers, teaching an unknown number of classes in a school in any way resembling a Sunday School and Brother Sewell would never dare to make himself ridiculous by affirming such a thing, yet he seems willing to trade upon the presumed ignorance of others by implying that very thing. Why did he bring it in if he did not intend his readers to think that Paul actually taught in a similar institution to the one he is lamely trying to defend? As we have no mention of Paul having any assistants in his teaching in the school of Tyrannus, we know there was no division into classes of his hearers. If Paul simply preached to an assembly of people (undivided) who had come together "to hold discussions and disputations" (which the record shows he did) what comfort or support can the advocates of the Sunday School find in this case?

He says again, "In our teaching service, the class is the unit." Just so; but who formed that unit and by whose authority? The only unit that Christ ever formed was the church and if he ever authorized anyone to institute any other units let us have the evidence or let these innovators be silent. I have preached in schools and I presume Brother Sewell has, but when I did there was no division into classes, but all came together to hear what I had to say and I fear no disclaimer when I assume that Brother Sewell did the same. But suppose some apostle had preached in a theatre, would Brother Sewell argue that the church may organize theatrical troupes? If his reasoning is sound there could be no other logical conclusion. The best way to show the absurdity of such sophistry is to carry it on to its final conclusion.

But our deluded brother forgets that Paul also preached among a collection of idols, so what objection could he raise if we were to insist on having a few idols in his classes? Pardon me if all this seems ridiculous, but I am merely showing the results of Brother Sewell's own logic (?). But our brother just jumps from the mire of one absurdity into the mud puddle of another in his desperate effort to find some ground that will keep him from sinking without trace, so we pass on to his next effort.

Hear Him: Christ and His apostles made it binding on the church as well as individual Christians to teach the word of God, but they did not reveal any specific method of teaching that excludes all others. The church in the days of the apostles could not teach in the way we are compelled to teach today. We cannot teach as they taught, therefore if we teach at all we must, of necessity, use some method they did not use. Therefore, we are at liberty, not only at liberty, but necessarily compelled to use methods in teaching that differ from theirs. Now let me prove this assertion...."

It certainly needs proving and he shall be given the opportunity, but first let us examine this preamble a little, and then we will present his proofs (?). When Paul speaks of the church all coming together in one place are we "necessarily compelled" to divide that assembly into classes? Anything Brother Sewell or anyone else shows that we are "necessarily compelled" to do I agree to do without a murmur, but I wish to make sure of the compulsion! When the apostle tells us to speak one at a time that all may learn, are we "necessarily compelled" to have several teachers instructing separate classes at the same time, so that all cannot possibly learn all that is being taught? When Paul says, "I suffer not a woman to teach," are we "necessarily compelled" to have some women teachers? And when he commands the women to be silent while the teaching is being done and forbids them even to ask questions at that time are they "necessarily compelled" to speak and ask questions? If these questions are answered affirmatively, I wish to know whence comes necessary compulsion, but if answered in the negative then I wish to know what they are worth as proof as Brother Sewell's contention. Unless he can show that the necessary compulsion exists, which he so insistently emphasizes, they are not worth a counterfeit penny to him. But if, on the other hand, his argument is sound, what a boon he has conferred upon innovators of his sort and description. When Jesus needed money, he took it supernaturally from the mouth of a fish. The church now is unable to do the same as he did. Are they then "necessarily compelled" to have an ice cream supper or some other kind of entertainment?

Paul and Silas sang with their feet in the stocks, but stocks having gone out of fashion, we can no longer do that. So, are we "necessarily compelled" to organize a choir? The Holy Spirit sent Paul and Barnabas on a missionary journey, but as missionaries can no longer be sent that way, are we "necessarily compelled" to have a missionary society? (and so forth and so on) That necessary compulsion is certainly a fine idea-What?

But now let us examine some of his so-called proofs. "First: the churches in the days of the apostles could not teach as we do because they had no New Testament." I hope our readers will not fail to note, and keep in mind, that Brother Sewell in all of his arguments admits that the teaching in the Sunday School is different to that in the apostolic churches and his whole effort is not to insist on following their example, but to offer excuses for not doing so. But this first attempt at proof has no bearing whatever upon methods and can be of no help to him, because the fact that the apostles received their knowledge by direct inspiration of the Holy Spirit, while we receive ours from the written records of the same, does not give any warrant for using different methods for imparting that information to others. The source of knowledge is one thing and the method of imparting it is another.

"Second: We cannot teach as they taught for we are not inspired." Again our brother is guilty of the same sort of perversion as he displayed in his first attempt and essays the absurd task of trying to justify a difference in methods by a difference in the source of knowledge; it is about as logical as trying to measure milk with a yard stick. Following this method of unreason we might as well say that if the apostles made apple dumplings, we would be "necessarily compelled" to cook our apples some other way because we cannot get them from the same tree.

"Third: compelled to use methods different from theirs, and it is meet that we use the best method we can." But not a word has this our great teacher written as proof from the Word of

God. Instead, he has fooled away his time telling us about the source from which we receive things taught. I am getting old and have read many foolish things, but this futile effort of Brother Sewell's certainly caps them all. In my next I will show, from Brother Sewell's own statement, just why he is so insistent in his efforts to "pervert the right ways of the Lord." (Acts 13:10)--G.A. Trott