Daily Kennebec journal. [microfilm reel] (Augusta, Me.) 1870-1975, 1874-06-03
NO. 1873.
THE GOOD FELLOW.

mistrusts his goodness, or realizes how
selfish, how weak, how unprinciple, and
how bad fellow he truly is. He never
regards the consequences of his acts as
they relate to others, and especially those
of his family friends. Little fits of gener-
osity towards them are supposed to atone
for all his misdeeds, while he inflicts upon
them the disgraces, inconvenience, and
burdens which attend selfishly dissolute
life. The invitation of friend, the taunts
of good-natured boon companions, the
temptations of jolly fellowship, these are
enough to overcome all his scruples, if he
has any scruples, and to lead him to ig-
more all the possible results to those who
love him best, and must care for him in
sickness and all the unhappy phases of his
selfish life
The Good Fellow is notoriously careless
of his family. Any outside friend can lead
him whithersoever he will-into debaunch-
cry, idleness, vagabondage. He can
ask favor, and it is done. He can invite
him into disgrace, and he goes. He can
direct him into a job OF dirty work, and he
straightway undertakes it. He can tempt
him into any indulgence which may suit
his vicious whims, and. regardless of wife
mother, sister, who may be shortened in
their recources SO as legitimately to claim
his protecting hand, d,-regardless of honor
able father and brother,-he will spend
his money, waste his time, and make him.
self a subject Of constant and painful anx-
iety, or An unmitigate nuisance to those
alone who care a straw for him. What
pay does he receive for this shameful sac
rifice ? The honor of being considered a
GOOD Fellow" with set of men who
would not spend cent for him if they
should see him starving, and who would
laugh over his calamities. When he dies
in the ditch, as he is most likely to die,
they breath sigh over the swill they drink
and say, latter all, he was Good Fell
low"
The features of the Good Fellows case
which makes it well nigh hopeless, lis,
that he thinks he is Good Fellow. He
thinks that his pliable disposition, his readi-
ness to do other good fellows service,
and his jolly ways, atone for all his faults.
His love of praise is fed by his companions
and thus his self-complacency is nursad.
Quite unaware that his good fellowship is
the result of his weakness; quite unaware
that his sacrifice of honor, and the honor
and peace of his family. for the sake of out
side praise is the offspring of the heartless
selfishness, quite unaware that his disre-
gard of the interests and feelings of those
who are bound to him by the closest ties
of blood, is the demonstration of his utter
ly unprincipled character: he carries an
unrufiled, or a jovial front, while hearts
bleed or break around him. OF all the
scamps society knows, the traditional good
fellow is the most despicable. A man who
for the sake of his own selfish delights, or
the sake of the praise of careless or un-
principled friends, makes his home a
scene Of anxiety and torture, and de-
grades and disgraces all who are associat-
ed with him in his home life, is whether
he knows it or not, brute. If man
cannot be loyal to home, and to those who
love him, then he cannot be loyal to any
thing that is good. The is something
mean beyond description, in any man who
cares more for anything in this world than
the honor, the confidence, and love of his
family. There is something radically
wrong in such IL man, and the quicker,
and the more thoroughly he realizes it, in
a humiliation which bends him to the
earth in shame and confusion, the better
for him. The traditional good fellow is
bad fellow from the crown of his head to
the sole of his foot. He is as weak as a
baby, vain as peacock, selfish as pig,
and as unprincipled as a thief. He has
not one redeeming trait upon which a
reasonable selt-respect can be built and
bracea
Give us the bad fellow, who stands by
his personal and family honor, who sticks
to his own, who does not treat his
frinds while his home is in need of the
money he wastes, and who gives himself
no indulgence of good fellowship at the
expense of duty! A man with whom the
smile of wife, or mother, or
sister, does not weigh more than thou
sand crazy braves OF boon companions, is
just no man st all.-Dr. j. G. Holland, in
Srribupr'e for lime