The Universalist. [volume] (Chicago [Ill.]) 1884-1897, 1888-07-14

kept before" Now, don't 90 INFO agonies
OF anxiety over Rob's slow tastes" and
wonder where he required such an unwor-
thy ideal. Don't begin to pine, and won
der what you can do to get him out of
this debased state, and how shatter this
dream of horses and stables. Rob has
not yet been lost to a senEe of the pro-
prieties. Test him. "How will it be about
| Sunday driving, swearing hostler boys,
and fast men loupging around your liv-
cry stable?" See Rob's eyes fash as he
gets up, and although he has never taken
a lesson in elocution, see how he assumes
a dramatic attitude, which, though born
of nature, is full of highest art, as he
says: "Neverl II had livery stable,
1 would close it on Sunday, except in
cases of extreme necessity; and I would
discharge a swearing hostler; and kick
every loafer out Of my office"
kick" is a strong word, Rob; but you
will be preacher instead of the proprie-
tor of a livery stable. I don't know,
Rob, but I would rather see you a con-
scientious man in charge of livery sta
BILE, than-well, Rob, see you know
what true manhood is"
A boy-man, with the boy at it's best in
him, and with a developing man in
him and with just ideal Of true man.
hood to guide him, is one OF the most
hopeful and promising students wise
teacher can take in hand; and the class
he represents is one of the most import.
ant that comes within the reach and
under the influence of the church.
| The boy proper lives in the world Of
sense. The boy-man in the world of sem
timent. The former stands at the open
door (sll windows are wide open, too to
receive impressions from the outside
world. He does not think of himself.
He thinks of things outside. He is gath
ering ideas. He is creating vocabulary
He loves real things. His very powers
Of imagination at their height are used
to take In and make real the great world
of fact. The very errors into which he
is led by the vividness of his imagination
are but perversions of the faculty by
which he follows after facts, and by
which he frames hypothesis to account
for them, and for their relation to each
other.
The boy-man lives in the world of SEN
timent. His windows are closed; but
they are of colored glass, and he looks
out on world illumin ated by his fancy.
He is himself now the center of that
world. He lives among exaggerations
and intensities. He dreams and dreams.
He walks in false lights. The eal is in
danger of becoming the unreal, and the
unreal the real. The far future out Of
sight is out of mind. He has grown into
materislistic life. The foundations Of
conscience are shaken. The eternal
phases OF Christianity have little mean
ing to him, and with them have gone the
ethical. Possibly the lack OF true eth
ical training accounts for the attenuation
or instability OF his theology.
Therefore Rob needs an early, late and
continuous discipline in Christian ethics.
In his boyhood he needs to be brought
under the law. In his transition from
| childhood to youth he needs to see the
| duty side OF the Christian religion. Per-
haps he needs less of heaven, and of the
easy way OF forgiveness, and more of the
divine demand and of the divine justice,
and of the rsmifcations of moral obliga-
ton, insistent and inexorRble through all
the relations of life.
The way to save Rob from the evil pow
or of his life of sentiment is to school him
in duty, duty every day and every hour
clemorous for recognition and persistent
in demands; duty to mother and father;
duty to troublesome baby and weary
some Ned and fault-fnding old aunt;
duty to servants and to plsyn ates; duty
in fields of study and recreation, as in
church attendance and worship.
Rob, the youth-the boy -man-must
be boy; he must also be man. He must
have an ideal Of true manliness; he must
be protected from the fervors and unre,
slities of his sentimental youth-time by
stout training in the nature, demands,
and applications of true Christian ethice.
Congregationalist.