Mississippi leader. (Jackson, Miss.) 1892-1895, 1895-03-12
A PLAIN TALK TO BOYS.
Fatherly Advice from the Ripo Tx
perience of Sam JonesL
Warnings Against Swearing. Drinking. Ly-
Ing. Stealing and lad Associates
Ono Standard of Morals-Appcal
to Surrender the Life to God.
lcoPYRrGHr, 1851

luVlnR oeen DOy once mySel1 ana
now the father of two boys, claim
that this qualities me for the task of
talking to you plainly and candioly.
The scenes and memories of my boy
hood days live with me; they are a part
of me. My mothers face; my moth
er's voice; my mothers counsel; my
fathers example; my fathers instruc-
tions, like mothers, will abide as long
rs memory holds it's place. You boys
to whom | address myself carry with
you the same memories largely that
carry with me. The incidents and in
nocence of your young lives are n liv-
ing fragrance about your life to-day.
If 1t had always been as it is to-day
with you boys, would life be worth liv-
ing? There was a time, boys, when
your downsittings and uprisings were
known and watched over by mother,
no sun by day or moon by night ever
brought regrets and reinorse to your
tender conscience. But how now?
That day when you uttered your first
profane oath, it shocked you and con-
fused you; it was violence to your
own nature; but repeated oaths have
come from your once pure lips until
now you swear by note without re-
morse. The day when you took your
first drink of intoXicants, while every
fiber of your being felt it's vivifying in
fucnce your conscience rang the bell
of warning and told you that was the
first step towards drunkard's grave,
and you felt that it's pleasure was
poison and that in its sweetness there
was snare, and with the conscious
ness that you had taken the first wrong
step, you could see then as you cam
not see now that it "biteth like
serpent and stingeth like an adder"
Tho drink habit, boys, once fastened
upon you will become the instigator of
all other habits of vice and sin. Whisky
will make an honest man steal, truth
full man lie, and will transform a gen.
tleman into vagabond. The greatest
crime you can commit against yourself,
your family and your country, Is to be-
come a drunlsard, for when a man Is
once drunk then he is fully equipped
and qualified for any'crime known to the
decalogue. Every murdered wife and
butchsred mother; every child that has
fallen under the cruel strokes of a
drunken father, the crimes of arson, of
rape and burglary, they oil point their
fingers alike to the criminal, who when
filled with booze did the deed. 1t Is
not only ruinous to health but moral
manhood, and character falls before the
foe called drink, and none have been
able to withstand It's power. II you
have never drank, say that you never
will drink and stick to it, If the drink
habit is more or less fixed upon you,
run for your life; quit or die; no delay
ing or parleying; but quit now, this
very moment, and quit forever. Then,
boys. let me say to you that another
fruitful source of your ruin is bad COM
pany. That boy does not live who can
have vile associations and run with evil
companions without damage to his
moral character and ruin to his upright
life. Boys do not go to destruction one
by one; they go in groups, In schools
and squads. When you get your con-
sent to loiter about billiard halls, gam
bling hells and saloons with their
hordes of evil doers, then you have al
ready got your consent to go to destruc-
ton. An angel from Heaven could not
long consort with that gang and be
ANYTHING else but devil. say to you,
bows, take care of yourselves at night;
where you go and what you do after
the sun goes down in the evening will
tell on your character; darkness may
hide your deeds, and the fond mother
may be sleeping quietly on her pillow
unconscious of her boys midnight rev.
Ell, but it will tell on your character
tomorrow.
Another fruitful source OF harm to
you, boys, is that you always erect one
standard of morals for your sister and
another for yourself, when God means
they shall be the same; let every boy
force himself to conform to the same
standard of morals that he erects for
his own sister. You are out OF place,
Young man, If you are where your
sister cannot maintain her purity and
preserve her character. Again, boys,
let me say to you the houses where
shameless women revel-God tells ns in
His own words that her house Is the
way to hell going down to the chambers
of death. A house cannot stand with
its foundations disrupted; no man can
stand long and stand erect, whose life
is not pure. Whatever tends to Inn
purity in the life Of our young men Is
one Of the most potent factors In the
disruption of home life and will sooner
or later overthrow the affairs OF our
God around which the family circle
gathers. Whatever differentiates the
standard of men and women, OF the
boy and his sister, is false and fatai;
remember this, boys, and guide your
life bv the same standard OF morals
and purity that you erect for your
sister. To you, boys, would say again.
that integrity in word, and honesty In
vour dealings, is essential almost be-
yond my power to state the facts. Die
before you would tell q lie; suffer any
thing before you would be dishonest.
A lie is twin brother to theft; q mar
is a more despicable character than .
thief: YOU can lock and watch against
q thief, but liar defies locks and SEN
tries. .sIt is tangled web we weave
when once we labor to deceive" lie
demands q bad motive to begin with,
and constant looking after in the future
lest it should appear to be lie; !
would rather father and take care OF .
thousand truths than to daddie one lie
--a 1<<l~ .ftar IL Whatever is wrong