Los Angeles herald., 1906-12-10
TELLS HOW TO
HAVE LONG LIFE
PASTOR DESCRIBES BLESSING
OF LONGEVITY
Urges Young People to Give Parents
Their Confidence Concerning AS
socistes, for Bad Companions
Shorten Existence

The Blessings Of Long Life" was the
subject of a sermon by Rev. Frank
J Dewitt Talmage yesterday. In part
he said
"An important step for young peo-
pie to heed, in order that a long earth
| ly life may be theirs, is to give their
parents their confidence, in reference
to the companions whom they are maxi
| ing their daily associates. You should
not only introduce these friends to
your fathers and mothers, but you
should tell your parents their true
nature, and you should tell your par
ents their bad characteristics as well
as their good Then, IL your father or
mother advise you not to associate with
this boy or that girl, or this young
| man or that young woman, you should
obey their wishes. They know best.
Mark me! If you will make friends of
the young people your parents wish
| you to go with, and no others, a pure
life-a good and noble life--ls almost
certain to be yours. Furthermore,
mark me also in this; If a son OF
Christian parents will persist in asso-
| ciating with those companions whom
his father or mother disapprove, In the
end that boy will turn out badly. He
will do this in physical and a moral
and spiritual sense. There is hardly
any exception to the rule.
Let me drive this truth a little
further home. What is the matter with
John Owens?' 1 ask. You know him
well. He lives on the same block. He
has good father and mother. A few
years ago he was one of the brightest,
happiest boys in the neighborhood. His
eyes were always dancing and full of
fun. He was always a leader In your
sports. No laugh was merrier than
his. Now he has dark rings under his
eyes. His skin is not a healthy color.
He looks as though he is going into a
decline When he meets me, instead of
holding his head erect and in a manly
way and looking me straight in the
| eye, he always slouches along with a
l hang dog expression. He never bows,
unless he is compelled to-. Oh, you
answer, the trouble is, John has gone
into bad company. He is not at heart
| a bad boy, but his aassco GATES are bad.
He goes with the ooys of the town,
who think it smart to hang around the
billiard balls and to bet and to tell
filthy stories You are right. No one
can go with Johns associates and have
a pure, good, clean mind. Through his
dissipated companions he is not only
wrecking his mental prospects, but
also his physical health All, is that
so? Too bad-too bad! we say. John
Owens dissipated career will be the
natural sequence of every boy or girl
who associates with companions whose
true characteristics a Christian father
and mother would not approve.
But the evil physical effects of inn
pure associates do not end with youth.
They inevitably find their elimination
in an unholy marital alliance aSNtsefr
the young daughter makes the wrong
kind of friends at school, there will
come a time when she will begin to
l associate with young men whose repu-
fof ara wi hot IUI,f fr !,
The influence of the one class on the
other is just as sure in its results as
| that the midnight darkness follows the
twilight glow. Then when the call of
love comes into the young maiden's
heart, instead of going and telling her
best friends, her mother, all about it,
! she will keep the secret concealed in
her own heart. Or, perhaps, she will
confide in her school friend, who is
| herself a girl of whose friendship with
| their daughter the parents do not ap-
prove. Cannot you hear the two young
girls talking about this love in their
hours of friendly intercourse? Then
comes the marriage. Perhaps it is an
| elopement. Then what follows? In
evitably an unhappy and an unholy
| home. Cannot you see the worried
look in the face of the young wife?
Cannot you count there many wrinkles?
| Cannot you see the hair prematurely
|
bell toll the funeral dirge, as the poor
wife's body is carried to its early
grave? What is the matter? Why did
she die? Oh you answer, she died
of a broken heart. She had good
for-nothing. worthless husband. He
abused her. He killed her All, my
| friends, that is not the direct cause of
that young wife's death. She prema-
turely died because in her young school
days she made friends with young
girls, which associates her father and
mother did not sanction. Her pre-
mature death was the direct result of
not then giving her parents her conf
dence. No daughter, no son should
make friends independent of the par
entail sanction.
"And why should you young people
not introduce your friends to your par
ents? Are your fathers and mothers
foolishly jealous? Like a miser, do
they wish to keep you from loving any
one else, or associating with any other
people but themselves? If you make
the right kind of friends are they not
glad? Is their home a prison of soli-
| tary confinement? When you as a low
ing son would bring home a de-
sirabe friend, does not your
mother always have a place for
him at the table? Does she not always
gladly welcome your boyhood asso-
| ciates? Why should honey bee live
with wasps and serpents, when she can
have the companionship of other bees
in the maternal hive? Why would d
gentle rabbit nest with copperheads
and foxes and coyotes, which are seek
ing to destroy her. when she can find
safety by the warm, loving breast Of
the mother who gave her birth? Can
flower bloom amid the noxious gases
of a sewer? Can a sapling wax strong
when the wood-worms are gnawing at
its roots? Can a dove have her wings
covered with silver and her feathers
with yellow gold, when in the be-
fouled company of buzzards she is
feasting upon carrion? Neither can
child lead pure life and grow spirit
ually strong, and come to an honored
old age when her associates are the
bestial and the impure and the bad.
To the right kind of friends thy Chris
tian parents are always ready to ex-
tend a glad, loving home greeting.
Beware, o, young man, when thy as
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