The Republican. [volume] (Oakland, Md.) 1877-current, 1927-04-28

of college age-possibly as much as
anyone has ever had. 1 have come
into personal contact with hundreds
and thousands and tens of thousands
of them during the last thirty years,
so that l have pretty clear idea of
what they are like | have seen a
good deal of their inner life, and they
have let me know what they are
really doing and thinking about. Then.
too, l have been young myself, and |
have tried throughout all the years
that l have had associations with
young people to keep their point of
view and even though l was growing
old in years at least to keep young
in spirit.
There has been Il good deal of talk
and much writing and some preaching,
since the war at least, about our
young people. They are very different
from what young people have ever
been before, it is said. They do not
do the same things that we did when
we were young or if they do, it is in
a very different way. Very True!
What do 1 think of them? l am
asked this question wherever | go. Are
they going to the devil as fast as the
general public suggests that they are?
Are they wilder or less moral than we,
their virtuous predecessors, were? Are
they breaking away from all hamper
ing conventions, and giving up all re-
ligious principles and ideals? In short
what if anything, is the matter with
them?
No generation has ever seemed CON
ventional or self-controlled by the pre-
vious one. My father in England was
a dissenter from the recognized re-
hgious faith of his ancestors. He
Joined himself to a religious sect that
was quite in disfavOr in his family and
was considered as all but morally lost
by his father. He did some thinking
conventional religious and political
path which his ancestors had followed,
and he came to America to enjoy the
kind of freedom which he thought best
for himself and for his family.
He was, however, for all that, very
rigid in his views. There was no card
playing in his house his children were
not allowed to dance; and when Sun
day came all secular matters were set
aside. We did no work, we read no
books or papers which did not have to
do with sacred or religious matters,
and we went to church-walking if the
horses had been working during the
week-and sat quietly and sedately
with father and mother in the family
pew.
We younger children took up cards
later-seven-up and euchre-and we
learned to dance simple square dances
and in time the more extreme and
morally dangerous waltz. There was a
good deal said about the waltz when it
first came in. The morally fastidious
lifted their eyebrows and talked in I'M
dertones behind their hands when they
mentioned it, 1t was thought to be the
most risque social adventure upon
which modern young people had yet
ventured. We who assayed this view
social pleasure were thought to be
standing on very dangerous ground.
Our parents were worried about u.s. as
parents today are, it seems, about their
children.
Judson was talking to me the other
day about his boy who is just ready
for college. Judson and lived a mile
or two apart when we were his sons
age, our fathers being farmers. We
had in our youth about the same social
experience.
II never did the things when 1 was
his age that my boy does. He drives
off in our car fifty miles to a party or
goes ludI lar W ldhe IL girl W uluueI'
and the way he drives!
Of course, Judson was right. We had
no airplanes and no automobiles when
he and 1 were young, but we did have
a horse and buggy and I recalled to
Judson that he and had driven fifteen
miles once to dance. That wasn't 50
far, of course, but we went more slowly
and got back later very likely.
"They want so much more money
than we had" he went on. II never
spent a great deal of money. My boy
has more in a month than l had in
year."
That is all quite true, but we had as
much as any other fellow in the neigh
borhood had, and the cost of living was
almost UNNECESSARILY lower then than
now. The young person of today wants
little more than his neighbors have,
and that was all we wanted.
Before we judge our young people