Sacramento daily record-union., 1888-09-01

young man can read 1t without being In
spired and strengthened by its teachings
and guided by its counsels Z. DF.
Nc. 103 FIFTH AVENUE,
New YORK, March S, 1879. I
My Dear Son: | would gladly save YOU
from much annoyance and from many sor-
rows by giving you the benefit of my own
experience. | have been through the pre-
paratory schools and the university, and |
know all their trials and temptations. |
also know how prone boys are to think
that the times have changed since their
fathers were young, and that the true rules
for the conduct of life have ceased to be
the same. My son, as you grow older you
Will find :hat from the time of Solomon to
this hour human nature has not changed
at all, and that the guide to a prosperous
and happy life is precisely the same
as 1t was when the wise man wrote. The
boy who is fortunate enough to have a
father whose experience is large and varied,
and who communicates it with no possible
motive but the best good of his child, has
great advantage if he will heed what is
told him, but viii suffer all the more
deeply in the end if he comes to see that
the care and the earnest warning and the
faithful counsel have been disregarded
Danish forever from your mind that
folly which young men so very stupidity
cherish, that ''the world and the wavs of
the world are essentially different now
from what they were forty years ago" and
settle forever in your mind certain princi-
pies which you are never to doubt, and
never to swerve from in your course of life.
First-That there is great first cause
which rules the world; a something which
we can but dimly comprehend, because it
is too vast for our minds. 1t is the infinite.
1t is God. 1t is fruitless to try ''to find
out God" He is ''our Father in Heaven
this is all that the simple child can know;
it Is all that the most learned man can
ever know. That the Great Creator is
just and merciful, and rules by equal laws,
we have every reason to believe; and that
it is one of the Creators laws that our
lives may be influenced by earnest prayer
for guidance in the right way, there is no
doubt.
do not mean that to pray for specific
things, such as riches and honors, will
bring riches and honors as matter of course.
but that honest and earnest prayer to our
Father in Heaven for guidance in the way
that is for our best good is sure to bring
strength and enlightment to the mind, and
thus to aid us in the affairs of life.
Every day ask your Heavenly Father to
guide you in all things in the way which
is right, and you will not go wrong.
Most of the scientific men Of our time
devote themselves to the study of the laws
of matter, and they seem to forget that
man, even while on earth, has a spiritual
as well as a material nature. They find
nothing but matter in the brain which
they dissect, and they jump at the conclu-
sion that there is nothing but matter.
Their discoveries in the laws of matter
are wonderful and invaluable, but they
utterly neglect the study OF spiritual laws,
which are as real and as certainly part
of man as the grosser substance. That the
sonl survives the body, and that it is hap
py or miserable, according to the deeds
done in the body" never allow yourself to
doubt. If skeptics wish to talk to YOU
about it, don't argue; arguments on these
subjects never do any good; you might as
well argue that you love your mother.
Practice what | suggest, and you will
know from conscious experience that what
l tell you is true, and you will be
made much happier and serener day by
day, and far more prosperous in this world
When in the family of the Rev. Henry
Seymour, at Holme Pierrepont, you saw
how cheerful and serenely happy they all
were under the influence of religious life.
Second-That truth, unfaltering integ-
mn 81 H. j
parted from under any circumstances.
Lies come from meanness, low vanity,
cowardice and of depraved nature, and
they always fail of their object and bring.
the liar into contempt. Without strict
integrity, justice and honor, no one can
have continued success in anything, or
lasting respect from anybody. Every one
Is found out sooner or later, and much
sooner than he supposes. Indeed, your
true character is sure to be known, and
sure to be justly appreciated.
l pray you, my son, never trouble your
self about popularity. Do right, the best
you can, deserve respect, and you will be
certain to have it.
If you see a fellow-student who is al
ways manly, honorable, brave and Just,
and who deyotes himself to the duties be-
fore him every day, who resists tempta-
tions TO pleasures which interfere with his
health, and hence with his success, YOU
cannot help admiring and respecting him;
and so 1t IS with the most laded idler at
Christ Church. Oxford has never gradu-
ated man who was an indolent failure at
the college who ever became an eminent
success afterward, and she never will.
AtfafA 70 +b.o Il
Of the university. 1t sometimes enters the
shallow heads of young men that it is
clever and spirited to transgress the rules.
1t is supremely silly. 1t requires neither
brains nor courage to break the laws, and
comes of desire to get cheap notoriety
through cowardice or vice, and the aspir-
ing idiot always fails in the end. Thieves
and burglars break laws; true men keep
them; they are made for good.
The great secret of making the labors of
university life or of other life easy is to do
each duty every day. If you let burden
of arrears accumulate it will discourage
you. If you have five things to do each
day, they are easily done; but if you put
them off with the idea that you can do
fifty on the tenth day, you will surely fail.
Mind not what others do; they may be
able to waste more time than you can
afford; more likely, however, that they
will fail. Many in Christ Church do not
expect to make any figure in the world,
and have no ambition but to pass through;
and many affect to despise the diligent.
If you have not determined purpose to
take stand as scholar, and to lead an
earnest, manly life after you leave Oxford,
then leave it now, and save me the morti-
fication and expense, and yourself the re-
proach and scorn which your countrymen
hestow upon wasted opportunities. Do
well, and there is nothing in my power
which | would not do to advance you. Be
q failure, through your own Incidence,
and indulgence, and though you