The writer passed some time in a town where these discourtesies were
promulgated. I boarded with a pious family, where a large number of male
students boarded also. There was one class of influences and _passions_
pervading that place. All female influence and restraint were withdrawn.
And what was the result? The boys were forbidden to smoke, or chew
tobacco, or play at cards. They reckoned me as a "right jolly good
fellow," because I could be induced to play a game of euchre with them;
but they occasionally smoked me out of their rooms, and I was repeatedly
compelled to check their wonted flow of licentious conversation. Cards, as
an innocent amusement, I could stand, but the "accomplishments" referred
to I could not endure. Shall I, as a physician, mention the positive
evidence, the pathognomonic indications which were revealed to me in the
faces of many of those young men; of vulgar habits, which are less often
or seldom revealed in those who customarily associate in pure female
society? They had little or no respect for the opposite sex. Their ideas
of them, thoughts and conversations, were most gross. If some now and
then, as they occasionally would, took a stolen interview, a walk at
night, when "Old Prof." was asleep, it was with no more exalted views of
purity than any other midnight criminal prowlers are supposed to cherish.
And the girls? Alas! they were ready to flirt with every strange man,
drummer, or else, who came into the village. The aforesaid pious landlord
assured me further, what my eyes did not see, that he knew of girls
climbing out of the windows at night, and partaking of stolen rides and
interviews as late as midnight; and he pointed out to me one coy, plump
little miss, who he knew "had been out as late as one or two A. M., taking
a ride with a gentleman scholar."
The scholars all met in the "chapel" for prayers. Are sly glances, winks,
or billets-doux prayers? If so, they prayed fervently.
Any well read, observing physician will tell you of the ruined healths of
the majority of females educated at such exclusive seminaries.
And what is the reverse of this exclusiveness?
Bring the sexes up together. Teach them together, as much as is
consistent. They will each have better manners, be more graceful, and
possess clearer ideas of propriety, more beauty and better health, than by
the plan of a separate education.
We all dread to grow old. Don't talk of second childhood. Keep the first
youthfulness fresh till the last. Love will do much towards continuing
this desirable state. Says the _Phrenological Journal_, beauty comes and
goes with health. The bad habits and false conditions which destroy the
latter, render the former impossible. Youthfulness of form and features
depends on youthfulness of feeling.
"Spring still makes spring in the mind,
When sixty years are told;
Love wakes anew the throbbing heart,
And we are never old."
If, then, we would retain youthful looks, we must do nothing that will
make us _feel old_.
O, the folly of parents in some things! The nonsense of sixty is the
sweetest kind of sense to sixteen; and the father and mother who renew
their own youths in that of their children may be said to experience a
second blossoming of their lives. Teach them to talk to you of their
friends and companions. Let the girls chat freely about gentlemen if they
wish. It is far better to control the subject than to forbid it. Don't
make fun of your boy's shamefaced first love, but help him to judge the
article properly. You would hardly send him by himself to select a coat or
a hat--has he not equal need of your counsel and assistance in selecting
that much more uncertain piece of goods, a sweetheart?
There is a great deal of popular nonsense talked and written about the
folly of our girls contracting early marriages. It is not the early
marriage that is in fault, it is the premature choice of a husband. Only
take time enough about selecting the proper person, and it is not of much
consequence how soon the minister is called in. Keep him on trial a little
while, girls; look at him from every possible point of view, domestic or
foreign. Don't be deluded by the hollow glitter of handsome features and
prepossessing manners. A Greek nose or a graceful brow will not insure
conjugal happiness by any means. A husband ought to be like a watertight
roof, equally serviceable in sunny or rainy weather.