"Your strictures are unmerited,
Our follies are inherited,
Directly from our gran-pas they all came;
Our defects have been transmitted,
And we should be acquitted
Of all responsibility and blame.
We are not depraved beginners,
But hereditary sinners,
For our fathers never acted as they should;
'Tis the folly of our gran-pas
That continually hampers--
What a pity that our gran-pas weren't good!
Yes, we'd all be reverend senators,
If our depraved progenitors
Had all been prudent, studious and wise;
But they were quite terrestial,
Or we would be celestial,
Yes, we'd all be proper tenants for the skies.
If we're not all blameless sages,
And beacons to the ages,
And fit for principalities and powers;
If we do not guide and man it,
And engineer the planet,
'Tis the folly of our forefathers--not ours."
But the lesson of these lines is not that you should lie back in
inaction, making no effort to overcome your defects because they are
inheritances. There is for you a wiser lesson in the theme than that.
When Marshall Ney was taunted with the fact that the Imperial nobility
had no pedigree he proudly replied, "We are ancestors."
There is a grand thought for you. If your ancestors did not do the best
for you, will you not profit by your knowledge of this fact and do the
best for those who shall look back to you as their ancestor? Supposing
that your parents in their youth had said: "I will take care of my
health so that my children may be born with vigorous bodies; I will make
good use of my intellect so that my children will inherit an added
capacity for acquiring knowledge; I will obey all laws of morality so
that my children will by inheritance tend toward virtue;" and supposing
that you to-day, with healthful bodies, keen intellects and upward
tending moral natures, were reaping the reward of their forethought,
would you not bless them for it?
You have no right to remain listless and discouraged because of your
inheritances, whatever they may be. Hear the inspiriting words of Ella
Wheeler Wilcox:
There is no thing you cannot overcome.
Say not thy evil instinct is inherited;
Or that some trait inborn, makes thy whole life forlorn,
And calls for punishment that is not merited.
Back of thy parents and grandparents lies,
The great Eternal Will; that, too, is thine
Inheritance--strong, beautiful, divine;
Sure lever of success for one who tries.
Pry up thy fault with this great lever--will;
However deeply bedded in propensity;
However firmly set, I tell thee firmer yet
Is that great power that comes from truth's immensity.
There is no noble height thou canst not climb;
All triumphs may be thine in time's futurity,
If whatsoe'er thy fault, thou dost not faint or halt,
But lean upon the staff of God's security.
Earth has no claim the soul can not contest.
Know thyself part of the supernal source,
And naught can stand before thy spirit's force
The soul's divine inheritance is best.
The youth of to-day have in their own hands the molding of the future,
not only of themselves, but of the nation, by the every day habits of
their lives. By their thoughts and aspirations, by the moral tendencies
which they are cultivating in themselves, they are determining what
shall be the characteristics of the nation in a hundred years to come.
Shall this be, in a hundred years, a nation of drunkards? The young
people of to-day are deciding that question. Shall it be a nation of
invalids? This, also, the young people are deciding. Shall it be a
nation filled with greed of gain, with a low standard of morals, with
dishonest methods in business, or shall it be a nation wherein vigorous
health is the rule, unflinching courage, absolute integrity and pure
morality shall everywhere reign? What the young people of to-day are
making of themselves physically, mentally and morally, is deciding what
shall be the future of the country.