y. It has popularized education and developed a new social
consciousness and new efficiency in rural institutions, amounting often to
a total redirection of the community life. But fundamentally the new
civilization is naturally religious. It is revealing the strong religious
sentiment in country folks, even when they are not associated with
churches. It is calling upon the church to gird itself for new tasks and
under a new, virile type of leadership undertake real community building
with the modern church as the center of activity and source of inspiration
and guidance. The church should be, and with adequate leadership is, the
local power house of the country life movement.

_Rural Progress and the Providence of God_

Every man of faith must see in this new rural civilization the purpose of
God to redeem the country from the dangers of a rural peasantry and moral
decadence. Progress is the will of God. Christ's vision of a Kingdom of
Heaven involved a redeemed world. That Kingdom of Heaven is coming
ultimately in the country as well as in the city. Every sign of rural
progress indicates it and should be hailed with joy by men of faith. The
triumph over isolation and the gradual emancipation from drudgery, the
development of good roads, trolleys, telephones, rural mail service,
automobiles, and the wonderful evolution of farm machinery are all
way-marks in the providence of God indicating the ultimate coming of his
Kingdom. The increased intelligence among farming people, the many new
agencies for popular education, the new social consciousness and growing
spirit of cooperation, the new efficiency of rural institutions, a better
school, a community-serving church, a character-building home, as well as
a scientifically conducted farm, every one of these makes for better rural
morals and better religion, and should delight the heart of every earnest
man who "desires a _better country_, that is a heavenly."

[Illustration: Plan of Macdonald Consolidated School grounds and gardens,
Bowesville, Ontario, Canada.]

TEST QUESTIONS ON CHAPTER III

1.--Why are the terms "countryman" and "farmer" ceasing to be used as
terms of ridicule?

2.--What effect, in past years, has _isolation_ had upon people living in
the country?

3.--What modern means of intercommunication have largely overcome the
evils of rural isolation?

4.--What are the social possibilities of the telephone for people living
in the open country?