Religion may be properly considered in relation to the ends of study, and to the spirit in which these ends are to be pursued.
I. Education ought to discipline and to strengthen the powers of the mind. This is the real object of all study. Men are to be prepared for their work. The best student is the man who is most, not the man who has learned most. No good student will neglect any side of his being. He must have fulness of nature, wideness of capacity; all that God has given him must receive its due regard.
II. It is here that the subject of religion comes to be considered by the student. The nature which he possesses is distinctly religious that is to say, he has capacities and powers which have relation to the Supreme Being, and which require training and discipline equally with all the others. Man is naturally formed for God, and if a man does not attend to that faculty whereby he regards God and can apprehend Him, he neglects that part of himself which is most important and most influential.
III. Consider the influences which religion exerts upon the student. (1) It renders him reverent. Nothing is so unsuitable to the man who desires a cultivated mind as arrogance and self-esteem. All wisdom is humble. Religion and its duties produce reverence. The religious man recognises the constant presence of God. The world to him becomes a temple, and every duty is a sacrifice. All objects of study with such a man ascend towards God, and shine in the light of the Divine throne. (2) Another element of the studious nature is the harmony which subsists between the different powers of the soul. Man cannot gain intellectual vigour when his whole being is torn asunder by conflicting forces. Outward physical quietness is the usually necessary condition of study. Inward spiritual peace is as needful. Religion will give this. Nothing in our nature so tends to preserve the balance and equipoise of the whole. And how is this religious life sustained, except by the knowledge of Him who is the express image of the Father, and the shining ray of the central light of God? To the student especially does Christ appeal. His religion is the religion of intelligence. He is the Word.We are to knowHim, and through Him to know God.
L. D. Bevan, Sermons to Students,p. 9 (see also Christian World Pulpit,vol. vi., p. 337).
References: Proverbs 2:10; Proverbs 2:11. Old Testament Outlines,p. 156. Proverbs 2:12-19. W. Arnot, Laws from Heaven,1st series, p. 97.