In the olden times parents used to rule their children, but in these
days and times there are many people who believe that the children rule
their parents. So many misguided parents in these days and times believe
in sparing the rod and spoiling the child. Boys don’t get many whippings
at home nowadays, and if a boy happens to get a good flogging at school
it will cause a big row, and sometimes cause the teacher to be
threatened with arrest. Whenever my teacher used to whip me I was always
afraid to mention it at home for fear of getting another. I heard a man
say the other day: “Never whip a child; raise your boy on love and
kindness and reason!” Yes; and when that boy is twelve or thirteen years
old somebody will have to go to him and talk to him and try to persuade
him not to whip his father or mother.
[Illustration: I JUST WISH I COULD HAVE MY WAY WITH THOSE BOYS FOR ABOUT
TWO MINUTES.]
I was at church the other day and I saw two boys about ten or eleven
years old. After service they lit their cigarettes and went marching
off as big as Trip. A man of the old school looked at them for awhile,
and then, turning away, he said:
“I just wish I could have my way with those boys for about two minutes.”
I didn’t say anything, but deep down in my heart I sympathized with the
old man, and felt that both of the youngsters ought to have had a good
whipping.
Some girls are almost as bad as some boys. Girls are most too fast in
these days. As soon as they get their dresses to their shoetops they are
gone. They go crazy over their clothes, for they think that they must
keep in the fashion. They read too much trash, for they think that is
the way refined and cultured people do. Old-fashioned modesty is at a
discount. The girls don’t wait for the boys to come now--that is, many
of them don’t; they go after them. I have seen some girls running around
in these new-fashioned night gowns, and they call it a Mother Hubbard
party. If their mothers don’t allow them to go with the boys they will
slip around and meet them somewhere anyhow. And where they are allowed
to go with the boys they generally go to extremes. What business has a
little girl--ten or twelve or fourteen years old--to be locked-arms with
a little stripling of a boy, going home at night from church or some
social entertainment. It always disgusts me whenever I see it. Worse
than a mannish boy is a womanish girl. What business has a little girl,
or a larger one, to allow a man to throw his arm around her waist in
the round dance? It is immodest, to say the least, and there is not a
good mother in the land who approves it. A girl who goes to a
promiscuous ball and waltzes around with promiscuous fellows puts
herself in a promiscuous fix to be talked about by the dudes and rakes
and fast young fellows who have encircled her waist. Slander is very
common, I know, especially slander of young ladies; there are not many
young ladies who escape it; but the trouble about it is that it is not
all slander--some of it is the truth.
In the olden times when folks got married they stayed married, but
nowadays the courts are full of divorce cases. The land is spotted with
what are called “grass widows,” and in many a household there is hidden
grief over a daughter’s shame. Why is it? What causes it? Lack of proper
training and care of the young. Habits are great things--good habits or
bad habits. If girls are reared to clean their teeth and keep their
fingernails clean they will keep them clean all their lives. If boys are
reared to chew tobacco and smoke they will never quit. The same about
loving and courting and getting married. Much depends upon training,
upon habits. Young flirts make old flirts. Young devils make old
devils!