The Monitor. [volume] (Woodstown, N.J.) 1884-1892, 1888-07-20
THE TEENS.

ant time of life? Boys will probably an
swer, When we 90 into business, or to col
lege. Girls will say, When we go into So
ciety, or get married. But I think it is
when you are going into your teens.
know that it does not seem so to most
people, for boys and girls are more unno-
ticed at that age than at any other. The
baby and the big brother or sister get all
the attention, while Master Kneebreeches
and Miss Ankle-skirt are crowded into a
corner. You are not so interesting just
now as you have been. or will be. Your
time of blossoms has gone; but your fruit
time las not come. And the life OF Jesus, as
told in the gospel, makes much Of this
time of life. The only thing that is said
OF him after his babyhood until he was
thirty years of age was, ''when he was
twelve years old What he did then is
told MS because it was a sort of prediction
of what he would be and do when he be-
came a man.
The Jews regarded this age as the turn
ing-point in life. Until the boy had passed
twelve he was called a child; after that a
man. He must then learn his trade; put
on the phylacteries; begin to study the
Talmud, OF holy books; be called to ac-
count for breaking any Of The laws of wor-
ship; take the name of Ben Hattorah, or
son of the law; and go up to the great
feast at Jerusalem-which was about
equivalent to joining the church. The
Jews also said thst th is was the age when
Moses first refused to be called the son of
Pharaoh's daughter, when Samuel heard
Gods call, and when Josiah had his first
dream of becoming a great and good king.
Now, these old Jews were wise in max
ing so much of the time of going into the
teens A portrait painter once told me
that a picture of a child younger than
twelve would not be apt to look like him
as he became a man; but that one taken
after that age would show the settled out
lines of features which even the wrinkles
of old age would not crowd ont. Your
physician will tell you that about the same
time the body, too, gets into shape. If
you are to be spindle-shanked or dumpy,
the stretch or the squat will nave begun TO
grow into You. A great writer, who has
had much to do with educating boys, says:
1.-THE latter life Of a man is much more
like what he was at school than what he
was at college,"
Swedish boy, a tough little knot, iell
out of the window, and was severely hurt;
but with cIenched lips he kept back the
cry of pain. The king, Gustavns Adol-
phns, who saw him fall, prophesied that
that boy would make a man for an
emergency. And 50 lie did, for he became
the famous General Bauer.
A woman fell into a dock in Italy. She
was fat and frightened. Not one of a
crowd OF men dared to jump in after her;
but a boy struck the water almost as soon
as she. and managed to keep her M until
stronger hands got hold Of her. Every
body said the boy was very daring, very
kind, very quick, but also very reckless,
for he might have been drowned.
That boy was Garibaldi; and if you will
read his life you will find that these are
just his traits all througl-that he was so
alert that nobody could tell when he would
make m attack with his red-shirted
soldiers, so indiscreet sometimes as to
make his fe~llow-patriots wish he was in
Guinea, but also so brave aud magnanim-
Gus that all the world, except tyrants,
loved to hear and talk about him.
A boy used to crush the flowers 10 get
their color, and painted the white side of
his fathers cottage in the Tyrol with all
sorts of pictures, which the m%ountaineers
CAPPED at as wonderful. He was the great
artist Titan.
An old painter watched a little fellow
who amused himself making drawings of
his pot and brushes, and easel and stool,
and said:-"That boy will beat me one
day SO he did; for he was Michael An
gelo.
A German boy was reading a hlood-and-
thunder novel. Right III the midst Of it
he said to liimself:-''Now, this will never
do. | get too much excited over it. l
can't study so well aftcrit. So here goes!'
and he flung the book into the river. lie
was Fichte, the great German philosopher.
There was a New England boy who
built a booth dow in the rear Of his faith
er's farm in q swamp, where neither the
boys nor the cows would disturb him.
There he read heavy books, like Locke,
son the Human Understanding, wrote
compositions, watched the balancing of
the clouds, revealed in the crash and flash
Of the storm, and tried to feel the nearness
of God who made all things. He was Jon
athan Edwards.
After the melting iron is poured into
the mould, it is left for a while that it may
take shape. But the first few moments
arc the most important; for then the sur
face of the great iron globules. which come
into contact with the damp sand Of the
mould, are cooled, and the shape is set.
The time after that serves to harden the
metal, not to change its form. Life in this
world is the mould in which our souls are
shaped for eternity; and the first years
after we have begun to think for ourselves,
to feel the pressure of right and wrong, to
g.