Grand River times. [volume] (Grand Haven, Mich.) 1851-18??, 1855-11-14
DON'T DEpEND ON 0Fd THER.n

DON OEFEND ON "FA IHER.
Stand up here young man, and let us talk
to you--yeu have trusted alone to the con
tents of your " fathers purse" or to his fair
fame for your influence or success in business.
Think you that father has attained to EN-
inence in his profession but by unwearied in
dustry! or that he has amassed fortune
honestly, without energy and activity! You
should know that the faculty requisite for the
requirement Of fame and fortune, is essential
to, nay inseparable from the retaining of eth
er of these Suppose that father" has the
"rocks," in abundance, if you never earned
anything for him, you have no more business
with those "rocks" than a gosling with a
tortoise and if he allows you TO NEEDLE with
them till you have learned their value 10y
your own industry, he perpetrates untold mis-
chief And if the old gentleman is lavish OF
his cash toward you, while he allows you to
idle away your time, you'd better leave him
yes; run away, sooner than be made All i'm
beetle or scoundrel through so corrupting an
Influence. Sooner or later You must learn to
rely on your own resources, or you Will not
be anybody. If you have never helped your
self at all, if you have become idle, if you
have eaten your fathers bread and butter,
and smoked fathers cigars, and cut swell
in fathers buggy, and tried to put ON tath-
er's influence and reputation, You might rath-
er have been poor canal boy, the son of a
chimney-sweep, or bloot-back-and, in
deed, we could not swap with you the situa-
ton of poor, halfstaved, motherless calf!
Miserable objects you are to depend upon
your parents, playing gentleman, (alias dam
dy loafer.) What in the name of common
sense are you thinking of! Wake UP, there !!
Go to work with either your hands or brains,
or both, and be something. Don't merely
have it to boast of that you have grown in
your Gathers house that you have yege-
tated as other greenhorns! but let folks know
that you count one.
Come, off with your coat, clinch the saw,
the pillow handles, the scythe, the axe, the
pick-axe, the spade-anything that will en-
able you to stir yonr blood fly around and
tear your jacket rather than be the passive
recipient of the old gentleman's bounty =
Sooner than play dandy at Dad's expense,
hire yourself out to some pOtatoe patch, let
yourself to stop hog holes, or watch the bars;
and when you think yourself entitled to a
resting spell, do it on your own hook. If you
have no other means of having fun of your
own, buy with your own earnings all empty
barrel, and put your head into it and holler,
or get into it and roll down hill, don't, for
PHYS sake don't make the old gentleman
furnish everything, and live at your ease.
Look about, you well-dressed, smooth-faced
do-nothing drones! Who are they that have
wealth and influence in society. Are they
those who have always depended alone on
the old gentleman's purse! or are they those
that have climbed their way to their position
by their own industry and energy? True,
the old gentleman's funds, or personal infu-
ence, may secure you the forms of respect,
but let him loose his property, or die, and
what are you? A miserable fedgling-a
bunch of flesh and bones that needs taking
care off.
Again we say, wake up-get up in the
turn round, at least twice before
breakfast--help the old man, give him now
and then generous lift in the business
learn how, take the lead, and not depend
forever on being led, and you have no idea
how the discipline will benefit you. Do this,
and our word for it, you will seem to breathe
a new atmosphere, possess new frame, tread
a new earth, wake to a new destiny-and
then you may begin to aspire to manhood.
Take of, then, that ring from your lily fin
ger, brake your cane, shave your upper lip,
hold up your head, and, by all means, never
again eat the bread of idleness, nor depend
DR "Fdther." .-..........
WAS ONCE YouNG.-It is an excellent
hing for all who are engaged in giving in
truction to the young people, frequently to
all to mind what they were themselves when
7oung. This practice is one of the most
likely to impart patience and forbearance,
md to correct unreasonable expectations. At
me period of my life, when instructing two
n three young people to write, / found them,
IS thought, unusually stupid. l happened