PART FIVE

MODERN SUBSTITUTES---SOCIAL CONDITIONS

"Any society can put down offenses if it chooses. I hold the whole school responsible for this offense. I don't know who the offenders are, and I don't want to know. They would not have done it, if the rest of you disliked it enough."

---Edward Thring.

 

A THIRD factor that has always played a prominent part in its influence on youth is found in the social conditions, be they local or not, with which youth is surrounded. The influence here again is hard to define, but it has always contributed its generous share to the shaping of the habits and the developing of the characters of our boys and girls.

The loss of the ordinary conventions of life, now so conspicuous, has its place here and its effect on the social conditions of the present day in which our young people move so freely and so strangely. It is hard to recognize in these conditions elements that are stimulating and helpful either physically, intellectually, or morally.

Some little has been gained, no doubt; too much has been lost. The lack of the old and tested moral standards; the increasing disrespect of law; the undermining of the home; the flippancy with which many of the most sacred things of life are discussed and treated; all-night dances for children still in their early teens; automobile "joy rides," unchaperoned and unrestrained---these things contribute nothing to the stability of youth, while they strain it, on its weakest side, to the breaking point.

Not many months ago I had the privilege of addressing a group of ex-service men at their annual banquet. At the close of the speaking a young fellow asked me if he could have a quiet chat with me. I consented and we withdrew to a corner of the room. There I listened to a strange and heart-rending story.

The boy, for he was still that in appearance, told me that he had enlisted at a very early age for the ambulance service in France. He had been badly gassed and was sent to Paris to recuperate and perhaps to be sent back to America. After examination the doctors assured him that he had only a fighting chance for life, and advised him to return home as soon as he could. Passage could not easily be secured at that time, and he was forced to remain for some weeks in the French capital. Here a fit of discouragement seized him, and for the time he lost his grip on himself. The loose conditions which prevailed in Paris exerted their subtle influence on his weakened will, and he plunged into the excesses of the life which surrounded him on all sides. As the time approached for him to sail for the homeland he was overwhelmed with remorse as he realized how far he had departed from the earlier and finer standards which had formerly governed his conduct. In this state of mind his one and great ambition was to get back to America, where, freed from the temptations which had beset him in that foreign city, and stimulated by the conditions he had formerly known in his own country, he felt confident he would be able to get his bearings once more and make a new and honorable start.

At this point in his story a look of pain came over his boyish face. He paused for a moment, and then, leaning forward and with dramatic intensity he said, "But, Mr. Stearns, I came back to a Sodom!"

I asked him to tell me just what he meant by that.

"Why, you see," he replied with feeling, " I had always moved among the best people at home and in neighboring places." He mentioned several well-known cities. "I had entered fully into the social life with my friends, both girls and boys; and I did not for a moment dream that the old conditions and standards of conduct I had known so well did not still exist. But I found that they had all gone. I found things as bad, and, in a sense, worse than they had been in Paris where every loose element was in evidence, for here I was dealing again with people who were supposed to be respectable."

He went on to tell me of some of his recent experiences in this supposedly respectable social life to which he had returned with such high hopes. He told of the complete absence of the old and restraining conventions, of the freedom with which old and young, boys and girls alike, openly indulged in liquor, and the effect of this indulgence on their actions. He mentioned specific cases, almost unbelievable had they been related by one of less sincere earnestness. And then, in distress so manifest as to be pathetic, he said, "And under the excitement of it all my ambitions and resolves all broke down and I went the limit again. But, Mr. Stearns, what could a fellow do under such conditions?"

The self-righteous Pharisee will doubtless answer that the boy was unforgivably weak, and that he alone was responsible for his undermined will and unworthy impulse. In a sense he will perhaps be right; but the schoolmaster, whose continued dealings with unstable youth add constantly to his stock of charity, knows only too well that in this case a lad, at the most critical moment in his life, was subjected to conditions so needless and so grossly unfair as to arouse our just pity for their victim and our hot resentment against those who were responsible for or tolerated them.

I could give innumerable incidents of the same distressing kind, stories that have been told me by remorse-stricken boys, and frequently by distressed parents. But such stories, all too common nowadays, are not needed to drive home to any who will listen and think the indisputable truth that we cannot subject plastic youth to the lax and deplorable conditions that characterize our modern social life without paying the inevitable penalty in the dimming of spiritual ideals and the weakening of moral fibre.

The public attitude towards these striking changes that have come over our social life forms an interesting, if a somewhat disheartening, study. How the plain influence of these things, so clearly taught by the history of the human race in its long struggle from savagery to the vantage point of the present day, can be ignored by those of supposed intelligence is impossible to explain. That the public is not altogether comfortable in the assumption of this attitude of heedless indifference is clear from its own testimony. Struggling to conceal unpleasant truths, it has invented terms misleading and unfair. For that which is attractive and alluring it makes use of soft and smooth-sounding names. For that which it would escape it chooses words the very harshness of which inspires repulsion. Like the ostrich, it strives to hide its head in the sands of its own complacency and force itself to believe that all is well.

"Tolerance," says Coleridge, "is only possible when indifference has made it so." But how are we to account for the callous if not criminal indifference of the present day?

Everywhere we find the tendency to use the soft pedal when dealing with unpleasant facts. We speak of "petting parties" and "joy rides" as if these were only innocuous and wholesome pleasures. We decline to acknowledge the perfectly evident dangers which they involve. They fit in nicely with our pleasure-loving tendencies, so why worry? We talk indignantly and sneeringly of "blue laws," of "Puritanic traditions," of "out-of-date" and "old-fashioned" standards, and, if one is courageous enough to face plain facts and define them, he will promptly be dubbed a "Grundy"or a "Grouch." We would like to believe that human nature has undergone some inexplicable change in recent years and can face serenely temptations which, in all ages, have undermined or wrecked human character unless successfully overcome, and can absorb with immunity moral poison which has always worked with deadly effect in humankind. Careless and indifferent parents will smilingly tell us that our boys and girls to-day are different, that they are wiser than were their parents at their age, and that they can safely be trusted to deal with life and conditions as they find them, whatever those conditions may be.

But human nature does not change. To-day the laws which govern its development, like the laws in the natural world, are stable and operative. Those who deal constantly and intimately with youth cannot be deceived here. Daily incidents confront them which ever refute this claim, and the significance of which is plain. One incident alone of my recent experience will be sufficient, I think, to prove my point.

On a beautiful spring afternoon I had returned from a journey which had kept me away from the school for several days. It happened to be a half-holiday. The regular ball game scheduled for the afternoon had been unexpectedly, canceled. The boys were free for a few hours to do about as they pleased. Ordinarily one would have expected to see scores, if not hundreds, of these fellows scattered over the various school playing-fields, indulging with the enthusiasm of youth in what are regarded as its most attractive pastimes, but the baseball fields, the tennis courts, and the track were as deserted as if some dire calamity had suddenly wrapped the place in gloom.

"Where are all the boys this afternoon?" I asked one of my teachers.

"I don't know," he said, "but I imagine that you will find them at the movies."

"The movies on a day like this," I exclaimed; "that's impossible."

"Well," he answered, "I saw a line of them heading that way soon after the lunch hour, and I think you will find them there."

Still a. doubter, I set about my routine work.

Late in the afternoon I watched from my study window these youngsters streaming up from the village. My friend had evidently been right. Pondering over the matter, I made up my mind that there must have been some unusual attraction at the theatre that afternoon to draw several hundred boys from the sunny and alluring playing-fields into the dark and dingy precincts of a movie house. I decided to investigate, and, during the evening, strolled down to the village. The posters conspicuously displayed in front of the building told the story. It was not necessary to investigate further. The film shown that afternoon was "Theda Bara in Cleopatra." It is hardly necessary to add that it was not an enthusiasm for classical history that drew those boys from ball grounds and tennis field into the murky atmosphere of that dingy playhouse on that beautiful spring day.

No, human nature has not changed; and we only make fools of ourselves if we try to believe that it has. Youth will respond, as it has always done, to the baser appeal when that appeal is strong and alluring.

Robert Service, in a poem written shortly before the war, has touched on this theme and has told the truth. I sometimes wonder how much stronger he might have made his poem, or how much more boldly he would have spoken, had he written several years later. He describes the plight of an angel in heaven, a red-blooded and somewhat restless individual, who, tiring of golden crowns, of golden harps and golden streets, requests his good Lord for permission to visit the earth for a time and mingle with mortals. The permission is granted and he starts on his journey. His arrival is depicted, and we are told of the surprise with which the devils in the lower regions watched his advent. Then Mr. Service goes on to tell us what happened. Here is what he says:

Never was seen such an angel-eyes of a heavenly blue,
Features that shamed Apollo, hair of a golden hue;
The women simply adored him; his lips were like Cupid's bow;
But he never ventured to use them-and so they voted him slow.

Till at last there came One Woman, a marvel of loveliness,
And she whispered to him: "Do you love me?" And he answered that woman, "Yes."
And she said: "Put your arms around me, and kiss me, and hold me-so
But fiercely he drew back, saying: "This thing is wrong, and I know."

Then sweetly she mocked his scruples, and softly she him beguiled:
"You, who are verily man among men, speak with the tongue of a child.
We have outlived the old standards; we have burst, like an over-tight thong,
The ancient, outworn, Puritanic traditions of Right and Wrong."

Then the Master feared for His angel, and called him again to His side,
For oh, the woman was wondrous, and oh, the angel was tried!
And deep in his hell sang the Devil, and this was the strain of his song:
The ancient, outworn, Puritanic traditions of Right and Wrong."

We may call things by all the pleasant or repulsive names we will, but we shall not alter by one jot the established laws of the moral world which govern the development of the human race. Whatever advance mankind has made through the ages has been due to the observance of these unchanging laws. Individuals and nations alike have progressed when they have obeyed them. They have collapsed when they have broken them. The laws are still there whatever we may call them; their effects are inevitable, however we may seek to blink the truth. The discovery of and our readiness to obey natural law in the physical world have brought the wonderful advances that recent years have witnessed in every realm of applied science. Every scientist and most of the rest of us realize that we cannot trifle with these laws without inviting danger or actual destruction. Equally is this true in the moral realm. It is time that we recognized and admitted this truth. To ignore it is to invite ultimate disaster for the individual and the civilization we now enjoy.

A close observer of youth cannot refrain from the belief that the softening influences of modern social life have already exercised a benumbing effect on youth. Those who deal at close range with the boys of our schools and colleges are agreed that the boy of to-day has far less inclination than had his predecessors to indulge in the "rough stuff" of undergraduate days. In one sense this is a real and desirable gain. The disappearance of much of the old-time lawlessness and meanness is an unquestioned gain; though the more modern and gentle "students' strike" lacks at least something of virility and romance. But much of the old-fashioned "horse play" of student days was altogether innocuous, while at times it indicated the presence in its perpetrators of a degree of initiative and originality not wholly uncommendable. I realize, however, that a difference of opinion prevails on this point, and I have listened to many arguments pro and con. But if these modern influences are tending to undermine the vigor and enthusiasm with which youth throws itself into the normal and wholesome activities that properly belong to these younger days, argument is out of place. There are evidences, I think, that this has actually happened.

I chanced recently to be passing a Sunday at one of our well-known universities. It was in the early spring, the last Sunday before the close the winter term. The previous day, a half-holiday for the students, had been one of those rare spring days in which a still distant summer suddenly injects itself into the midst of the bleakness of the passing winter and gives warning of its approach. The sun beat down hot and clear, and the students swung their coats over their arms and rolled up their shirt-sleeves as they strolled about the campus and the streets of the city.

At the breakfast-table that Sunday morning I chanced to meet an old acquaintance of college days, a famous baseball player of his time, and a graduate of this university. He drew me aside excitedly to tell me a unique and almost unbelievable story. On that alluring Saturday he had closed his desk and given up his business in order to get back to his college and help coach the varsity nine which was to start on its annual southern trip at the beginning of the spring vacation early in the following week.

"There's something radically wrong with the boys of to-day," he exclaimed heatedly. "Let me tell you what happened." It was clear that he found it difficult to control his feelings as he spoke. "You know what a wonderful day it was yesterday for baseball? Well, I went out to the field and donned my togs and waited for the team to show up. But they didn't come. After about an hour a lone individual appeared. I asked him what had become of the squad. He replied that he understood that practice had been called off. 'Practice called off on a day like this,' I exclaimed; 'the first decent day you fellows have had out of doors this year, and the spring trip only a day or two ahead. That's impossible.' 'It is queer,' the youngster admitted, 'but I was told that a notice to that effect had been posted on the bulletin board.'

"That settled it for me," went on my irate friend. "I hastily dressed and went back to the campus. I found the bulletin board, and there, sure enough, signed by the captain himself, was the notice. After some difficulty I found the captain and demanded to know the reason for his unheard-of act. He looked a bit sheepish, and by way of explanation told me that one of the fraternities had given a dance the night before, that it had lasted till late into the morning hours, and that he knew the members of the team would be in no shape for practice."

My friend paused to wipe the sweat from his brow, and then, raising his hands excitedly, fairly shouted: " I tell you it's a different brood! It's a different brood!"

That afternoon, at a fraternity tea, I received full confirmation of all that my friend had told me. And the interesting part of it, to me, was that the student body seemed to accept the thing as a perfectly natural and normal incident of college life.

Such an incident simply could not have happened only a few years back. The thing would never have been attempted in the first place. But had a varsity squad, or even individuals from that squad, dared to try it, the student body would have promptly seen to it that they were never again permitted to wear the uniform of the college, if indeed they would have been allowed to retain their places in the college community itself. Without doubt this may be regarded as a somewhat extreme and unusual illustration. But it clearly denotes a tendency, at least, which can not be avoided if youth is to continue to react in perfectly natural and normal ways to the softening influences of the social conditions with which it is surrounded.

For all this we cannot fairly blame youth. The reactions of youth are still normal, as they have ever been; the conditions which prompt these reactions to-day are not; and for these conditions not youth but the older generation is responsible.

 

PART SIX

DISCIPLINE VERSUS SELFISHNESS

"This truth comes to us more and more the longer we live, that on what field or in what uniform or with what aims we do our duty matters very little, or even what our duty is, great or small, splendid or obscure. Only to find our duty certainly, and somewhere, some way, to do it faithfully, makes us good, strong, happy and useful men, and tunes our lives into some feeble echo of the life of God."

---Phillips Brooks.

THE loss of discipline in home, and school, and society has been so steady and, in recent years, so appalling that to-day its influences are everywhere felt. One is unpopular who speaks of discipline in these days. It is not good form. This is an age, we are given to understand, when youth should develop in its own way, unhampered and unrestrained.

This pernicious doctrine has spread its roots in all directions, and these roots have gone in deep. It is hard to tell where this theory first started, but, wherever that may have been, its spread is everywhere in evidence. It runs counter to all the experiences of individual life and of the human race, to the plain teachings of history, to the testimony of all those who have achieved real greatness and positions of true leadership. And yet it has its vociferous advocates everywhere. "To him that overcorneth" used to be the inspiring slogan for a man's life. The reverse would appear to be true to-day.

We have already noted its effects within the home. Examine for a moment the teachings of modern pedagogy and the theories so rampant in modern school life. Note the catchwords that are so common and so gratifying to a generation immersed in pleasure, seeking material gain, and averse to all things irksome and restraining,"self-expression," "self-realization," "self-determination." Where can we escape them? What their advocates persistently refuse to tell us is that in the last analysis these all spell Selfishness, and with a large "S."

That there is something good in this theory no one will dispute. That the emphasis is wrong should be evident to all. And yet our public schools have become almost experiment stations for testing these absurd nostrums, and there are a growing number of private schools that thrive lustily upon them. If many of our self-appointed pedagogical experts could have their way, all schools, public and private alike, would be forced to enthrone this new and absolutely pernicious doctrine of education.

I have read the catalogues of some of these schools, and, when I have finished, I have been tempted to question my own sanity. The monstrous absurdities that are there set forth would be only absurd if they were not so readily accepted by gullible parents, and did not involve the character and future of the youth subjected to their influence. Easily satisfied and duty-shirking parents are captivated by assurances that their promising boys and girls are unfolding under such influences into wonderfully beautiful human flowers. They have been led to believe that through these newly discovered methods of education the old Adam has been completely eliminated from the human child, and that nothing less than an angel may be counted on for the days ahead.

I received a letter recently from one of these schools in which a picture of this kind of product is given me, and, apparently, in good faith. This is what the headmaster writes:

"As I wrote you before, the boy is very sound morally and very superior intellectually. His father once asked me what I could find to correct in him, and I could suggest only a slight hesitancy in speech and a tendency to cock his head on one side when speaking close to a person."

If this is the description of a normal boy, I fail to recognize it. Fortunately I have not been called on to deal with that kind. I hope I never may be. I wouldn't know what to do with him. My first impulse, I think, would be to teach him to steal or commit murder or do something desperate that would at least give me reason to believe that he was human. Kipling must have had some such boy in mind when he wrote:

"Angels may come for you, Willie, my son,
But you'll never be wanted on earth, dear."

Frankly, I don't believe that the boy in question was ever exactly as painted by his admiring principal. If the principal's statement is true, it is certainly fair to ask whether there may not have been something radically wrong with the environment of a school to which the reactions of a perfectly wholesome, normal boy would exhibit only inconsequential and silly mannerisms. Surely the prospects of a virile, rugged, and manly character in maturer years for a boy of that type would be dark indeed.

This tendency to extreme individualism and glorification of self, which has developed in conjunction with the loss of discipline, is not limited to the home and school. It is rampant to-day in all phases of our social, civic, and economic life. Individuals and groups alike are more and more concerned about themselves and their fancied privileges and grievances and with steadily lessened thought of their obligations to society as a whole. The classic expression of an old-time railroad magnate, "The public be damned," represents an all-too-common attitude of mind in these later days. Woman shouts for her "rights "; labor joins the chorus and clamors for the same somewhat indefinable thing; and the sterner sex, not to be outdone, screams for its "personal liberties." Seldom, in all this noisy turmoil, do we hear the inspiring words "duty," "service," "sacrifice,"---words which were ever in the minds and constantly on the tongues of those who laid the foundations and builded so well the lower structure of our national life. And yet happiness, the pursuit of which we acknowledge as an inalienable right, and the avowed aim of all those who raise this boisterous turmoil, has never yet been found where these words are lacking in the thoughts of men.

General Robert Lee, in those immortal words which have become an American classic, voiced for all true and patriotic Americans the spirit of the founders and builders of this great republic when he said, "Duty is the sublimest word in the English language." The modern invitation, so freely extended to the youth of to-day, to seek its satisfactions in selfish indulgence is in marked and painful contrast to the sterling advice given by this same great American to his son. He writes:

"I know that wherever you may be placed, you will do your duty. That is all the pleasure, all the comfort, all the glory we can enjoy in this world."

Duty involves service for others and not for self. Self-expression and self-determination, on this sound basis, are realized only and always by the investment of one's self and one's talents in the welfare of the community. And this cannot be done without facing constantly the exacting demands of discipline.

It is this unwillingness of the present generation to face discipline, to deny itself anything that for the moment pleases, even when that denial ministers to the welfare of society,---that is responsible for much of the present-day unrest. The passing whim, the personal interest, the selfish ambition,---these must have the right of way. If the needs of the community and the welfare of society as a whole can later find a place, well and good. If not, let them pass.

Unfortunately this purely selfish and unpatriotic attitude of mind is not limited to those who lack vision and opportunity. Nowhere is it more strikingly in evidence than among those who, through birth and privilege, have been permitted to fill positions of leadership and responsibility. From these high sources widespread and demoralizing influences are flowing which offer an open and alluring invitation to those of weaker minds and wills to realize their distorted visions and unworthy ambitions. Prompted by the same selfish motives the robber collects his loot and the gunman murders his helpless victim. And plastic youth, bewildered and perplexed, is the greatest sufferer of all.

I chanced to be sitting, at a banquet just after the close of the war, beside that peerless American, Major-General Leonard Wood. As the tables were cleared and the speaking was about to begin the appearance of liquor was everywhere noted about the hall. Turning to me, in very evident distress of mind, the general said, "Is this a sample of the college dinners of the present day?"

"I am sure I don't know," was my reply. "College dinners were not held during the war, and before that time liquor had become unpopular and had practically disappeared on such occasions."

For a few moments the general watched the increasing flow of the law-forbidden beverage. Then he turned to me again, and, with intense feeling, said: "Don't these men know that they are defying the constitution of their country? Don't they realize that they are trampling its flag under their feet? Why, these are educated men, those to whom we look for ideals and leadership, those on whom we must lean to ward off anarchy and chaos! Can't they see that by their actions they are breeding more Bolsheviks and anarchists than all the 'reds' and radicals in the slums and on the streets can possibly create? I can't understand it," he went on, "and I would not have believed it possible if I had not witnessed it with my own eyes."

General Wood's statements are altogether true. The censure was deserved. But that which, in those early days of prohibition, was something of a novelty has become a commonplace to-day. No sane person believes that this government of ours can stand unless supported by a law-abiding citizenship. But no sane person can honestly expect that the manhood of tomorrow, surrounded as it is to-day in its plastic youth by such influences as these, will entertain even a passing respect for the law and the constitution of the land.

In all the multifarious phases of our modern life, where the effects of this self-centered attitude and unwillingness to recognize proper responsibilities to others are so painfully apparent, nowhere, I think, has there been a greater loss to our boys than in that phase which belongs to woman. As my contacts have been chiefly with boys may I offer a special plea in their behalf at this point.

The changes which have taken place of late in woman's realm, and by which her horizon has been so greatly enlarged and her activities so widely increased, have changed significantly the character of society. Woman has gained much by these changes, much that is deserved, much that was long overdue. That much all of us must frankly admit. But with the gains there have come losses, unnecessary perhaps, but in the realm of boyhood, at least, very real and very greatly to be deplored.

Throughout the passing years the sanctity attaching to the name of woman has been a priceless possession of the youth of the sterner sex. Its influence has proved always a restraint on ignoble action, a check on unworthy impulse and desire, and a stimulus to chivalry and idealism,those choicest qualities of youth in the history of the world's civilization. Again, the influence is hard to define. But to those who can, for the moment, put themselves back into the days of their own boyhood my meaning will be clear. Whether rightly or wrongly we looked on woman as an ideal, as an inspiration, as a. challenge; something set apart from the ordinary dirt and dust of the world to guide and inspire us; something that steadied and strengthened us in our hardest fights in those days when we were struggling for self-control and manhood. Sometimes it was womankind as a whole, sometimes an individual over whose head we had set our boyish halo; but always the influence was there; wholesome, strong, uplifting, it stood between us and the unworthy deed we were tempted to do. It drove from our minds the base thoughts that so frequently showed their ugly heads. It urged us to place in complete control the best that was in us. It stood as an ever-present challenge to all that was noble but so often concealed.

It is hard to believe that our boys to-day can find in their friends of the other sex the old-time inspiration and appeal. If in her change of social status woman has lost those qualities and characteristics that in all ages have been an inspiration to chivalry and high manhood, the loss is irreparable. Once let our boys believe that woman is not worthy of their confidence, their respect, and their reverence, we shall search in vain for anything that can make good the loss. That something has been lost already, is clear. How far any gains will offset this loss will not perhaps be apparent until those who are boys and girls to-day shall have become the men and women of to-morrow.

To what extent that influence is appreciated by the representatives of the other sex I am not prepared to say. But that its existence was resented by any had never occurred to me until very recently. I had supposed that women gloried in it. Their actions seemed to lend color to this belief. But as one of the older generation I fear that I am no longer competent to form opinions about the modern representatives of the other sex.

A city newspaper was once rash enough to print something I had said on this subject before a local college club. Several days later I received a unique and somewhat remarkable letter from a very modern lady, who took me sharply to task for my remarks, and told me in plain and emphatic language how thoroughly incompetent she considered me to discuss the subject. Parts of this interesting letter deserve wider publicity, and I venture, therefore, to give them to my readers.

"It is impossible a man of your age," she writes, "should be unaware that the gorgeous bloom of social immorality you deplore, and which the returning young soldier beholds with astonishment, is the blossom and fruit of a plant of age-long growth. Why did you not point out, my dear Doctor, that the trouble is not so much a lack of religion, but rather the dawning of that inevitable day of which warning was given many centuries ago: 'Whatsoever a man soweth that also shall he reap.' Remember the promise: 'Give and it shall be given unto you; good measure, pressed down, and shaken together, and running over.' Bear in mind that a great writer once uttered the truth when he wrote: 'The whirligig of time brings in its revenges.' You and your audience faced the fulfilling of those promises.

"Why did you not tell those boys that the root of the troubles lay in the fact that their fathers ate sour grapes throughout the ages and for that reason their teeth are now on edge? Why did you not address them after this fashion: 'The men built up, for their own pleasure and profit, laws unjust to women,---standards and habits and customs unjust to women. This has been a man-made world, and run for the benefit of the men. They sowed the wind; you, my young friends, and I stand by, and experience the force of the inevitable whirlwind.' I cannot see that men to-day, on the whole, are inwardly much better, or much worse, than were their forebears. There is ever a fashion in morals, as in hats or coats. This present spell you deplore is a woman's revolution. Unless you care to emulate Canute of old, the best advice I have to offer is to await the passing of this righteous hurricane, and trust that the promise, 'At eventide it shall be light,' may be fulfilled.

"A great deal goes to make up the girl of the period, and to explain her raison d'être, besides her short skirt, cigarette case, painted face, and lack of restraint. The evolution of the face-mask our great-grandmothers wore, so that their faces might not be deprived of their marketable value, is the short skirt and the rolled stocking.

"If the girls unduly seek pleasure and diversion, remember the dull, deadly monotonous, dreary drabness of the lives of generations of women from whom they descended. Had the centuries held for them less jam-making and fewer children, and more fox-hunting, cock-fighting, rat-baiting, and gambling, the movies, dancing, and hundreds of enticing pleasures would not to-day prove so alluring to their descendants. If those St. Paul terms 'the weaker vessels ' had partaken of the fine Burgundy, rum, and Madeira imported for the sole consumption of paterfamilias, and at times joined him beneath the dining-room table, possibly your young soldier . . . might not now be deploring the number of girls under its influence to-day.' . . . You say of influence: 'I mean parents who are ready to make sacrifices.' Throughout the ages the mother has been an eternal sacrifice to her husband, her children, and her home. If she is so no longer, she is in a state of rebellion. Something age-long has occasioned it. Metaphorically speaking, she puts on her hat evenings and goes out 'to the lodge.' You speak of parents "----I think she meant to say "men "---" who have a belief in the modesty and purity of womankind as a whole, and say: 'Those are the things we anchor to, and you know that we cannot anchor to those things to-day as we used to.' Possibly not, and I think I can tell why. The women are tired of having the men anchor to their purity, and place their hope of heaven in woman's skirts. . . The root of the evil called 'divorce' Adam planted in the Garden of Eden. Divorce is a symptom not a disease. In the good old days of the religious home . . . laws and customs favored immorality; the Church winked at it, and preached the subjection of woman. I might remark in passing that the woman of to-day and St. Paul are slightly out of harmony. Mary to-day places her erring spouse on the curbstone and shuts the matrimonial door. She thereby adjusts her own score, and incidentally that of generations of her female forebears. Do you blame her if she seeks a steadier anchor, indulging in what Dr. Johnson calls 'the triumph of hope over experience.'

"The Bible, my dear Dr. Stearns, must be revised and reinterpreted, if you expect response from the girl of to-day. The mosaic ox and ass, as compabuibs, make scant appeal. St. Paul's theories concerning woman, her relation to man and the Church, are out of date. Woman is the keynote of the situation. Had I addressed thatClub, those boys would have heard a number of wholesome truths and without any sugar coating."

I have read this interesting letter many times. It contains a wealth of food for serious thought. The writer has convictions, and the commendable courage to defend them. I am told that she enjoys the reputation of being something of a leader in the feminist movement of the present day. Whether this is so or not, she undoubtedly gives voice to the feelings and beliefs of those who to-day are vigorously championing that cause. For that reason, if for no other, her contentions should be studied. She signs herself "Mrs." She is a wife then; perhaps, a mother.

My first reaction on reading this unusual document was one of unfeigned amusement. But while the smile still lingered there flashed across my mind in arresting contrast the picture of a mother I had known of the older, and now somewhat discredited, generation.

She was born on a New Hampshire farm, this old-fashioned girl, where she grew up close to nature and in daily contact with the "dull, deadly monotonous, dreary drabness" of the life of the mother who bore her, and of that of her women friends. It was an old-fashioned home, with many children. "Cock-fighting, rat-baiting, and gambling," for some reason, had not yet become a part of the family régime to broaden the vision of woman and free her from age-long shackles; and the "weaker vessels" seemingly had no opportunity or desire to "join paterfamilias beneath the dining-room table" after partaking of "fine Burgundy, rum, and Madeira." A careful perusal of the family records brings to light no evidence that the mother in this old-time home was accustomed to "put on her hat evenings and go out to the lodge," either for her own amusement or for the sake of "adjusting her own score" or "that of generations of her female forebears." Nor is there in the record any suggestion that this sadly unenlightened mother found in her "eternal sacrifice to her husband, her children, and her home" anything more than a God-given privilege and joy.

Yet in spite of these frightful handicaps the young girl grew up, and seemingly into a young womanhood of beauty and charm. At least so thought a young and adventurous-spirited fellow from a neighboring city who sought and won her hand, and who, a year or two later, carried her away to the home he had prepared for her in faraway and Sunny India.

Wealth and success came rapidly to this happy couple, and, with them, that which they counted their greatest joy of all, an old-fashioned family of seven children. The home, presided over and graced by the presence of a hostess to whom had been denied the privilege of living at "the dawning of that inevitable day of which warning was given many centuries ago," became the center of the social and intellectual life of the Far Eastern city on the outskirts of which it was located. British viceroys, army and navy officers from many lands, distinguished travelers, native rajahs and princes,---all found in that home a friendly welcome and passed many happy hours within its walls. David Livingstone, the great explorer, made it his headquarters before his memorable departure into the African wilderness.

The mistress of this home cherished warmly a belief, translated into daily thought and action, in old-fashioned religion. For her the "Bible" had neither been "revised" nor "reinterpreted." In it she found all that she desired to guide in daily life, to comfort in time of sorrow, and to strengthen in moments of adversity. In spite of the many interests of her active life her thoughts were always and chiefly of those children which she counted her greatest blessing. And in those days of material prosperity, while yet no cloud dimmed the financial skies, daily on her knees she prayed to her heavenly Father that if the wealth with which she had been so signally blessed might work some later harm on the characters of her children it should be taken away.

How strangely must such a prayer fall on the ears of our modern world!

And at length the clouds did gather. Higher and blacker they piled than even this brave and unselfish mother could have dreamed. Within the brief space of a few weeks fortune, and the husband and father too, had gone from her life. But faith and courage were equal to the great test. With superb heroism the stricken mother turned her back on the old life and scenes, and, with unshaken trust in the wisdom of Almighty God, faced the new and unknown future.

A brief experience as a teacher in earlier days prompted her to open a private school for girls.

To give her children, the youngest still a baby, the education which, in the days of prosperity, had been planned for them, was her absorbing ambition. Year after year she labored for the accomplishment of this unselfish aim. Sacrifice was her daily lot, and the stern discipline of an exacting world faced her at every turn. One after another four of the children for whom she struggled were taken from her, and in the prime of their lives. But she never wavered, this old-fashioned mother, nor lost her faith that all was well. To the world she held her head as high as ever; and to her friends and family she was still the same inexhaustible source of strength and comfort and cheer. And after twenty-five years of ceaseless effort she had completed her seemingly impossible task.

The "state of rebellion" in which the modern woman would have us believe true happiness can alone be found, was never dreamed of by this mother of whom I write; yet she fairly radiated happiness wherever she went. Her children, knowing well where and when the springs of her deep humor could best be uncovered, would sometimes twit her good-naturedly over her unpardonable offence in failing to consult them personally before asking the Almighty to take away the inheritance that would have been theirs. Then merriment would dance from those eyes, and the lips would twitch with uncontrollable mirth. The worthless scion of some wealthy home would be pictured in language that left nothing to the imagination, and the protesting children would be assured that this would doubtless have been their fate had not a far-seeing Providence interfered in their behalf. As life's sunset drew near, the faith that had never deserted her seemed to burn with an ever-brightening flame, the courage that had sustained when life's road was roughest increased in strength, the humor still flashed from dimming eyes, and the happiness, which had always been so radiantly hers, catching now the rich coloring of the evening skies, reflected the unseen but brighter glories of another world.

Perhaps an "old fogy" may be pardoned for suggesting that in such a contrast as this there is something still to be said for the old-fashioned woman of an earlier day. Such mothers there still are, God bless them! But they are not those who fill the air with noisy clamor about "rights" and "privileges"; not those who shun life's discipline and shrink from sacrifice; not those to whom "self-expression" means only the indulgence of selfish desires and the gratification of personal whims. If the modern woman, freed from what she regards as the shackles of the former days, can still give us mothers of the old heroic kind, we shall rejoice with her in her newfound freedom and still render her the homage that chivalry prompts. If she cannot or does not, whatever may be her personal gain, civilization will have lost something for which no other compensation will suffice. And youth will have lost its noblest inspiration and its strongest support.

In one of his well-known war stories Private Pete has put into gripping words the feelings of reverence and adoration which the youth of the sterner sex, in the deepest recesses of the heart, has always cherished towards women: "Out to France we go for Flag and Country. Over the top we go for Mother. And 'mother'----that one simple word---embraces the whole of womanhood."

 

PART SEVEN

CONCLUSION

"Who sleeps beneath yon bannered mounds,
The proudly sorrowing mourner seeks,
The garland-bearing crowd surrounds?
A light-haired boy with beardless cheeks!
'Tis time this fallen world should rise:
Let youth the sacred work begin!
What nobler task, what fairer prize
Than earth to save and Heaven to win?"

 

A DISTRACTED world calls loudly to-day for leadership. It has not prospered of late under the guidance of an older generation, and it looks to youth, with its undimmed visions and potential power, to set it right.

A friend of mine who returned not long ago from Italy has described in vivid language an experience which he had there soon after the close of the Great War. He was present at a great meeting in an opera house in a large Italian city. The distinguished educator and philosopher, Giovanni Gentile, was addressing the audience. He was pleading for higher moral standards for his nation. He spoke with feeling of the seeming breakdown of those moral standards that had governed in the past, and the dimming of those ethical and spiritual ideals in which alone stability was to be found. He asked for nobler living and clearer thinking, for the maintenance of finer honor and truer justice in the relations of individuals and in those of the nations of the world. As he spoke he apparently noticed on the faces of some of his audience expressions denoting cynicism and doubt. For a moment he paused and his face showed the intensity of his feelings. Raising his hands aloft and with dramatic earnestness, he cried: "I am not speaking to the older generation. The mind of the older generation has broken down. I make my appeal to youth, and youth will hear and answer me."

He was right. Youth will hear and answer, and gladly, as it has always done if the appeal is clear and strong and high.

The war gave us evidence enough of this truth. Here in America we had constant illustrations. It was youth that first saw the real issues at stake. It was youth that caught the first vision of a needy and distressed humanity calling loudly for help. It was youth that first sensed the truth---that justice and honor and righteousness were the stakes in that great contest. Youth did not stop to count the cost. Youth offered everything, even its life, that the great and necessary end might be attained for humanity. It was the older generation that quibbled and questioned. It was the older generation that sought security in the cowardly answer of Cain of old, "Am I my brother's keeper?" It was the older generation that tried to hide itself in the shadows of its own selfish complacency, and answered, like Adam in the Garden, "I was afraid and went and hid myself." It was the older generation that shrank from the thought of personal and material and national loss. The early call of duty awakened faint response in the hearts of those of maturer years. It found its prompt and courageous answer in the heart of youth.

Youth is still endowed with the heroic spirit it has always known, nor does it need the crisis of some great world war to awaken that spirit to action. It accepts the challenge in daily life, if only the challenge is vigorous and its real meaning clear. It will not hesitate and it will not shirk when once assured that the call to action is the divine call of duty. It will respond in a crisis as those brave Yale boys did at the New Haven fire, and it will respond, too, in the more obscure activities of common life. Though the service demanded may require the sacrifice of life itself, it will answer bravely and cheerfully in the words of Allen Keith, "I have no regrets."

Many incidents in my own experience come to my mind as I ponder on this theme, some commonplace, some unusual, but all testifying in unmistakable terms to the presence in youth of clear visions and the readiness to realize those visions if given a fair chance. Once the path has been chosen, youth will outstrip us in the race for the goal. It will shame us, too, in its readiness to invest its all.

Several years ago it seemed wise to the authorities of my school to abolish altogether dances under the school roof. The extravagances and eccentricities which had so rapidly and strangely developed in this ordinarily pleasant pastime had become so pronounced as to make it clear that only drastic measures could check them and restore normalcy. For two years the ban held. Criticisms and complaints and petitions for restoration were many, and, at times, emphatic. Finally there came a time when it seemed wise to test the boys themselves.

It happened that those who would naturally be in charge at the time comprised a group of fellows of unusual poise and strength of character. We had several conferences. I had made up my mind that until the boys admitted the true character of the dangers involved I would give them no inkling of my attitude. The point desired was finally reached; with perfect candor the boys admitted even more than I was ready to grant myself. Then they took an interesting position. They argued, and convincingly, that no one stood in a better position than they themselves to apply needed remedies. "If we can run a dance to your complete satisfaction," they said, "and can prove to ourselves as well that the thing can be done, isn't the undertaking worth while? Won't we be in a position also to help straighten things out in college and in society as the result of our test?"

This seemed the time to act. Somewhat to their surprise, I announced myself ready to grant the request and to place squarely on their shoulders the full responsibility. For a moment they were a bit disconcerted, for they had expected help and guidance from me. I told them frankly that I preferred to leave the matter in their hands, but, at their request, I agreed to check over with them in advance any regulations which they might deem essential. A day or two later they presented to me a paper which they had carefully prepared, and in which they had outlined in detail the rules which they proposed to enforce. As I first glanced at them it was difficult to retain self-control. Later in the evening, after the boys had left, I sat down in the quiet of my study and made free use of my blue pencil. Frankly, if I had undertaken myself to prepare and enforce such regulations as those submitted, I should have invited a riot. The boys had outdone me, and by a wide margin.

The dance was held; the regulations were enforced to the letter. The committee themselves took no part in the actual dancing, so eager were they to carry the affair through to a successful conclusion. Again and again during the evening they would slip to my corner of the room and ask if I had any criticisms to offer. I had none. Parents who were present, many of whom had come from long distances and were thoroughly familiar with the character of dancing in various parts of the country, assured me that if they had not witnessed it with their own eyes, they would not have believed it possible for a dance to be conducted as was this one. When the affair was over, boys and girls alike united in acclaiming it the best dance they had ever attended.

Incidents like this are common in the life of every headmaster. To me, personally, the experience was one of the most gratifying I have ever known; nor was its influence limited, for from several sources since that time I have heard of similar activities on the part of these same boys to whom had been brought home the realization that they had accomplished something actually needed and distinctly worth while.

It might not be out of place here, in view of earlier remarks that have been made on the value of discipline, to note the fact that the boy in charge, and on whom the chief responsibility rested, had three years before been suspended from the school for a violation of school regulations. At the time his father had entered a vigorous protest against the severity of our action. In this particular case the boy, with greater sense and vision than his parent, had protested in the latter's presence against the plea for clemency. He had accepted the situation like a man, and it had given the final touch to that stability of character which had made him, at the close of his school course, one of the most influential factors in the student life, and one of the most dependable boys on whom it has ever been my privilege to lean.

Youth sometimes challenges us under conditions which startle us and shame us into a sense of our failure to appreciate potential power and our inability to recognize how close to the surface, even under most adverse conditions, lies that everpresent spiritual vision so eager and ready to find its realization in the ordinary activities of daily life. A striking example of this has taught me more than all the other experiences of my years as a schoolmaster.

A few years before the Great War a young fellow entered the school fresh from the environment of a small New England mill town. His parents had come to this country from England when he was but a little chap, and had been millworkers all their lives. Limited from necessity in their own education, they had definite ambitions for their children. Learning that he could work his way through the school, the boy had come to us prepared to undertake the task. He stayed with us three years, developing in the meantime a distinct talent in English literature. He entered Brown University and there displayed still further gifts of this same character, until, at the close of his course, he was deemed worthy to be called back to his college as an instructor in English literature. While he was serving in this capacity war was declared, and he was one of the first to enlist. Shortly after his arrival in France, and while serving as a lieutenant, he met a gallant death in action.

Not many weeks later the father called to see me, and to secure the boy's diploma which had been left in our keeping. As we walked down across the campus late one afternoon, we paused under the shadows of an elm tree, and the father, with deep feeling, unburdened his heart to me. "You know, Mr. Stearns," he said simply, "the loss of that boy means more to us than others can ever understand. I suppose all parents would say that," he added apologetically, "but in Egbert's case it is different, and I will tell you why.

"You know when he was in school how he developed a love for English literature. Gosh, how he did love his Shakespeare! Well, he used to come home Saturday nights to spend the weekends with us, and he would come bounding into the room where we were sitting, smoking and gossiping and whiling away the time with our friends, and he would almost shout, 'Oh, I want you to hear this great passage I found in Shakespeare this week.' Not many of those people knew much about Shakespeare," said the old man with a touch of humor, "and the prospect of listening to a passage from Shakespeare did not appeal very much to them. Some were a bit restless and some were ready to leave; but Egbert wouldn't have it. He would laugh and say, 'No, you can't go; you have got to hear this passage and you are going to like it.' And then he would read to them.

"And so it went from week to week. Always he would come home, bounding into the room and eager to read them a passage from the Shakespeare that he loved. And by and by they didn't show any more restlessness. Pretty soon others began to drop in, and, before the year was over, the room would be crowded on Saturday nights, waiting for Egbert to come home and read them Shakespeare. Gosh," said the father fervently, "it was great,

And then he went to Brown University and there he developed love for Browning, just as he had developed in school his love for Shakespeare, and again he would come home for the week-ends, and, bounding into the room as before, he would say, 'Oh, I want you to hear this wonderful passage I found in Browning coming up on the train from Providence to-day.'" The father chuckled. " Browning was pretty stiff," he said, "for that crowd, and the old restlessness once more appeared; but, just as before, Egbert wouldn't stand for that, and he would say, 'No, you have got to stay and hear it, and you are going to like it, just as you did the Shakespeare.' And then the same thing happened as before; the restlessness disappeared; more neighbors drifted in; and, before the year was over, the room would be crowded, and all waiting for Egbert to come home and read them Browning."

The old man paused for a minute. Then, with the tears starting in his eyes and with dramatic intensity, he lifted his hands towards the sky and said, "Mr. Stearns, that boy just lifted us up into a world we had never known before. Gosh, but it was great!"

This incident has been constantly in my thoughts. And the more I have pondered on its deep significance the more strongly have I becorne convinced that Egbert Tetley, still a youth and blessed with the visions of youth, has pointed out the path, and the only path we can tread in security, along which we are bound to go if the present-day unrest among the masses is to be permanently quelled. However much the laboring man may clamor for a better living, the inarticulate cry which springs from the depths of his being is, after all, a cry not for a better living but for a better life; and that life is found not in the realms of the material world but in the realms of the spirit. "Society," says Aristotle, "originates in the need of a livelihood, but it exists for the sake of life." Our modern world has placed all the emphasis on living. That emphasis must be changed.

The comment of a prominent member of the Workingman's Party in England on the description of "The Athenian Constitution" by Thucydides has deep significance. Of that classic constitution of an ancient democracy, the Greek philosopher writes:

"Our Constitution is named a democracy because it is in the hands not of the few but of the many. But our laws secure equal justice for all in their private disputes, and our public opinion welcomes and honors talent in every branch of achievement, not for any sectional reason but on grounds of excellence alone. And as we give free play to all in our public life, so we carry the same spirit into our daily relations with one another. We have no black looks or angry words for our neighbor if he enjoys himself in his own way, and we abstain from the little acts of churlishness which, though they leave no mark, yet cause annoyance to those who note them. Open and friendly in our private intercourse, in our public acts we keep strictly within the control of law. We acknowledge the restraint of reverence; we are obedient to whomsoever is set in authority and to the laws, more especially to those which offer protection to the oppressed and those unwritten ordinances whose transgression brings admitted shame."

And the English workingman, voicing the deep-seated longing of the human heart, says:

"I believe that it is this great Hellenic spirit consciously or unconsciously seeking expression which is the cause of the great industrial unrest of this and other lands; we are not covetous for the rich man's gold or land, only in so far as we realize that they are the economic bases of life; and it is life that we want, full, rich, free, and many-sided."

Perhaps a schoolmaster who is privileged to come in contact with such incidents as that related above may be excused if he rebels with some heat at the kind of intellectual and moral food we are offering our boys and girls in these modern days. They ask for bread and we give them a stone. They are hungry for meat and we offer them offal. The sugar coating with which we conceal the poison within will not prevent that poison from doing its deadly work. Those who are willing, through the medium of the printed page, the stage, the selfish home, and the lax social life of the time, to cater, for their material gain or personal comfort, to the weaker instincts of our boys and girls are selling their souls, and for a frightful price. And those who fail to recognize the presence in youth of those higher and finer and spiritual desires are blind and ignorant. It is to the youth of to-day that the reforms of to-morrow, so sadly needed by a distracted world, must be entrusted.

Youth to-day is restless. All over the world are to be found evidences of this fact. The attempt of the older generation to straighten out, on oft-tried and unworthy bases, the world chaos resulting from the war, jars badly with youth's idealism. The intangible verities of life which inspired youth to take up arms are now inspiring him to offer himself and his talents that those same and spiritual verities may be placed in permanent control. Never has youth faced a greater opportunity; and never has youth needed more sadly the wise counsel and guidance born only of experience. At heart youth knows this; but the counsel and guidance it desires do not seem to be coming just now from the older generation, who alone are qualified by experience to give it.

Those who believe that youth, because it has vision and ideals, is capable of accomplishing this Herculean task without the help supplied by the experience of the human race and the aid of its elders are as blameworthy as those who refuse to recognize the inherent possibilities of youth. Youth is receiving noisy and constant advice and admonition to-day, and youth is naturally bewildered. It could hardly be blamed should it in despair seek to choose and follow a path of its own making. If it does, it will not be from preference.

A clergyman, long known for erratic and radical utterances, has recently added his voice to the discordant chorus. If correctly quoted, he has said, "To defy the counsels of the older generation, to act in a spirit of rebellion against constituted and respectable authority is the first duty of youth." And to make his meaning clearer this champion of lawlessness would include the authority and wise counsel even of parents.

But this is not the cry of youth. We must not confuse youth with infancy. This is the petulant cry of babyhood. Youth will recognize it as such and will not heed it.

Youth must and will retain its visions; it must realize them in the great world in which it is called upon to play its part. These visions must be kept clear and compelling, but youth must keep its feet on the ground. "Idealism," some one has wisely said, "is a mighty good thing, but even aeroplanes have little wheels on them so that they can run on the ground when necessary." Youth cannot safely break with the past. It cannot ignore the teachings of history. It cannot part with human experience. It must see for itself the pitfalls that human progress has always encountered in its path. It must recognize the elements that have contributed to human success. It must profit by all that the world has taught the passing generations of mankind, and it must frankly acknowledge the abiding presence of unchanging moral law.

"The dangerous age," says an editorial writer in one of our daily newspapers, "is no longer twenty-one but forty." To-day youth challenges the older generation. What answer are we to give to that challenge? Our first duty clearly is to readjust our own bearings, reestablish, if they are no longer there, in our own lives the old and tested standards of human conduct, accept again and gladly, for the welfare of ourselves and of society, the dictates of moral and civil law, find our true and finest self-realization in the service of society, and acknowledge our need of and dependence upon Almighty God. Once we have revamped our individual lives the distressing conditions in the social world will disappear. Then and only then shall we be prepared to issue our challenge for which youth to-day waits. Home and school and Church must unite, that our call may be clear and loud and easily understood. And the call must be that of a moral and spiritual, not a material, idealism; for only such a call will youth understand, and to only such a call will youth respond.

That call must come to-day.

"Why worry about the boys?" said a friend with whom I had been discussing the incident of the New Haven fire. "The boys are all right." Yes, the boys are all right. But these boys will be men to-morrow. And we must not forget that it was the boys who played the heroes in that great crisis, the boys who still retained the visions and idealism of youth. The older generation, the men to whom the visions of youth were already lost, were fighting for their own worthless lives in those critical moments, and even at the expense of the lives of the weak and helpless whom they trod under foot. It is the men and the women of to-morrow who demand our thoughts and our service to-day.

An incident in the career of Mr. Lloyd George, the British Prime Minister, related by a recent writer, seems to rue to offer us a clue as to the character of the call we must issue to youth if we are to secure the response we seek.

It was in the early stages of the war. Coordination was everywhere lacking. Especially was this true among the manufacturers of ammunition. And this lack of coordination was costing the British government and the Allies untold wealth in lives and money, and threatening even to make possible an early victory for German arms. In this crisis the Prime Minister called a conference of the heads of all the munition factories in the United Kingdom. The critical situation was made clear. The compelling need of close and full cooperation was vigorously emphasized. The manufacturers were urged to pool their interests, forget their rivalries and jealousies, and, for the common good, reveal their cherished trade secrets. But they stolidly declined. Their patriotism was appealed to, but with no better success. Even the clear explanation of threatened disaster to the cause of the Allies, and the inevitable destruction of the British Empire, left them unmoved. Hours of pleading accomplished nothing. Finally, when it seemed that nothing could undermine the selfishness of those who had the power to save or wreck the great cause, Mr. Lloyd George attacked them from a different angle and on another and a higher plane. Leaning forward over the table, and with that dramatic earnestness which has characterized him in great moments he said: " Gentlemen, have you forgotten that your sons at this very moment are being killed---killed in hundreds and thousands? They are being killed by German guns for want of British guns. Your sons, your brothers---boys at the dawn of manhood! They are being wiped out of life in thousands! Gentlemen, give me guns. Don't think of your trade secrets. Think of your children. Help them. Give me those guns."

Before that moral appeal selfishness collapsed; material interests were forgotten; jealousies disappeared. Trade secrets were thrown upon the table, interests were pooled for the common good, and from that moment a steadily increasing supply of arms turned the tide of battle and assured final success to the Allied cause.

So our appeal to youth must be on the higher grounds of moral and spiritual values. After all, these are the values for which youth fought in the Great War, as it has fought for them in all times of crisis. These values it can comprehend. It will not willingly offer its strength and its life for the sordid values of materialism. But it will offer its all for the enduring verities of the Spirit. And youth needs only to be shown that the warfare for the preservation of these spiritual verities is constant and as widespread as the human race. Hourly and everywhere this eternal struggle is waged. Youth should be in the thick of it, and would be, if the nature of that strife could only be made compellingly clear.

This then is our task, a sacred task too, and worthy of the best we can give it. We must not forget either that it is youth that has the greater stakes in the ultimate issue. And youth at heart is sound. Nor will youth refuse us its coöperation and support. In spite of the silly clamor of those who would have us believe that modern youth has unaccountably been endowed with some superhuman sense which gives it access to all the realms of wisdom denied in the past, and renders it innocuous to moral poisons, which, from the dawn of history, have worked their ills on humankind, youth still looks to those of age and experience to guide it in ways that human experience has proved to be wise and safe. In the days to come, when the responsibilities of manhood and womanhood rest heavily upon its shoulders, youth will demand a reckoning from its elders. And youth will have no gratitude in its heart for those who, in the pursuit of their own selfish pleasures, have neglected the greater and more sacred task for the lack of which the solid satisfactions that properly belong to the years of maturity must ever be denied.

Youth has still its God-given visions of what life can and should be. Only as it realizes these visions in its later years will it find life, rich, and full, and free; and experience teaches us only too plainly that youth must have the help of its elders if it is to reach the high goal that these visions challenge it to seek. It is our duty and it is our privilege as well to face this task and accept this responsibility. We are not doing it to-day.


 

A Book Every Parent Should Own

The Job of Being a Dad

By FRANK H. CHELEY

Author of "The Adventures of a Prodigal Father," "Camp Fire Yarns" "Told by the Camp Fire," Editor-in-Chief of "Modern Boy Activity."

This job of being a real dad to a real boy really is the biggest job in the world. It is the best paying proposition in tangible dividends that was ever known --- mutual confidence, esteem and fellowship.

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This book is very readable but best of all it is practical, suggestive and inspirational.

Eight full page illustrations.

For sale at all booksellers --- $1.75 net

W. A. WILDE COMPANY, Publishers

How to Find Your Rating as a Real Dad

The following chart is devised and
recommended as a simple and very
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successes and failures as a Dad

20 Points for Boy Knowledge and Helpful Home Influence
Maximum of  
10 points For setting aside out of every week adequate time for participation in the boy's work, play, study, activities and interests.
5 points For having definitely studied the problems of boy life and development.
5 points For providing definite place and responsibility for the boy in the life of the home.

20 Points for Care of Mental Needs and Development of the Boy
5 points For providing a definite program of mental activity adequate for your boy (OUTSIDE of his regular school work).
5 points For personally carrying out a plan, in a thoroughly adequate manner, covering the matter of sex education.
5 points For providing simple shop, tools, necessary books and other simple equipment necessary to stimulate broad mental development.
5 points For arranging definite study time with the boy on suitable subjects.

20 Points for Care of the Physical Needs and Development of the Boy
5 points For providing a definite program of physical activity adequate for your boy.
5 points For having a specific plan in operation for the establishment of fundamental health habits.
5 points For an annual physical examination, including eyes and teeth.
5 points For personal participation with the boy in outdoor sports and games.

20 Points for Care of Spiritual Needs and Development of the Boy
5 points For providing a definite plan of spiritual activity and interest adequate for your boy.
5 points For encouraging, making possible, and participating WITH the boy in some definite service to others.
5 points For the regular conduct of any definite form of home worship and religious training.
5 points For, with reasonable regularity, personally accompanying the boy to some form of public worship.

20 Points for Care of Social Needs and Development of the Boy
5 points For providing a definite plan of social activity adequate for your boy.
5 points For success in making your home gang-headquarters.
5 points For a definite plan of home training in thrift and money matters.
5 points For a personal relationship to a gang of boys of which YOUR boy is a member.
  Total Credits ...................

W. A. WILDE COMPANY, Publishers

© W.A.WILDE CO.


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