The Lambertville record. [volume] (Lambertville, N.J.) 1872-1968, 1892-02-24
WEDNESDAY. FEB. "a. 1892.
ADVICE TO YOUNG MEN.

academy:
What will you do with your lives?
We, who are older, who have lived long
or and travelled further, are usually
ready enough with our counsel; but it is
your ideal that must lead you now, and
not the advice of others. Honor and
truth we take for granted. II would be
virtuous," said an old philosopher,
though no one were to know it, just as
I would be clean, though no one were to
see me-"
The book of commonplace precept
need not be opened here. Yet there is
one word of counsel which now more
than ever-in this Pagan age of denial
and democracv-ought to be spoken to
the youth of America. Be yourselves,
and never abandon your noble aspira-
tions.
You cannot live in absolute independ-
ence of the world. You must have
affiliations with other persons. But it is
not imperative that those affiliations
should be numerous, and you have it
within your power to make them select
You are under no obligation to initiate
Others or to do as others do.
You ought never to permit your
minds to be inundated with the igno-
rance, the erudity and the vapid chatter
of commonplace persons. Do not too
much reverence the past. Old burdens
that have rolled from tlD shoulders OF
weary and dying men and women should
not be taken up again by you.
1t is your life that you must live; it is
not theirs; and now that they rest from
their labors, let their works follow them.
Neither must you suppose yourselves en-
joined to assume the burdens that other
persons have created in the present day.
AVOID TOO MANY FRIENDS.
Let thosc attend to grievances who
have them, and do not allow your spirits
to be detected, your hopes darkened and
your lives encountered with the vices.
the errors, the follies and the weakness
of failures and of fools. 1t is. no d,mbt.
pitiable and deplorable that failure and
fools should exist and suffer; but they
must not be permitted, merely because
they exist ind suffer, to drag you also
into failure and folly. Respect the sane
tity of your souls, and beware of super
fluous contact with other lives.
For it IL only the teinporaryand the
expedient that is grcgarious. In every
great moment OF life-in every time of
insight or inspiration or crisis--the hui
man being is alone. The object of cdnr
cation, therefore, should be the develop.
ment and building of an original, noble.
adequate character-not simply prep
aration for industrial pursuits. bur an
armament for everlasting life.
The occupations of this world, how
ever important, are transitory. The soul
of man is immortal Other views, am
aware, are commonly entertained. peo-
pie who claim to be practical but IRE
only narrow are never weary OF dcchn-
ing that education must be sensible and
not visionary. An effort to worry tlle
public mind on this subject is part Of
the errant activity Of the complarcnt
man of business, all the world over, and
has been so, at periodic intervals, for
many years.
remember its pernicious existence
long ago-the Jealous sheer at whnt was
called book loarning," as opposed 10
what was called practical knowledge Of
affairs; meaning thereby cotton. iron.
coal, the Stock exchange and the r.
vised Statutes.
SOME SHEER AT EDUCATION.
Not long since--in 1890. in the news
papers of New York--that epidemic Of
mean commonplace burst forth with uii-
COMMON virulence, and various indiyid-
uals, in every case possessed of more
wealth than sense. appraised us that
scholastic training is superIluous. h.
cause it aims to furnish an equipment
wholly in excess of what is requisite for
business.
Ny dear old friend, William Warren,
the comedian. used TO tell. in his ininit-
able way, q story about pompous
tradesman OF the conventional kind,
who once was addressing the pupils at
Sunday school. Il knew little boy.
he said, "who always obeyed his mother,
always washed his face in the morning.
always came early to Sunday school,
never stole an apple. And where do
you think that good boy is nows' To
this inquiry small voice piped out IN
answer, In heaven, sir" mo, SIR
cried the disguised orator. mot in
heaven! He's in store!'
That is the mental drift Of those enc
mics of the higher education. TO their
minds the chief end Of man is to get him
self employed in store. They are what
Joseph Jefferson calls 'sthe selfish made
men of our time" Certainly the fact is
significant that the sensitive feeling is
all on one side.
Educated men are not worried. IL
education has not always given them
wealth, it has given them blessings that
no prodigality Of wealth can buy, and
by this token they know that the prov
ince of education is not to train young
people for business, but to embark them
upon life-of which business is only an
incident. The best wisdom Of the wis
est Of mankind has always taught that
lesson.
Make your business tributary to your
mind, and not your mind subservient to
your business. New York Tribune.