About the worst girl in all this world is the girl who doesn’t care what
people think or say about her conduct; the girl who goes to every “hop,”
to every party, who stays out late at night with the boys, who hangs
over the gate and talks to them, and who cuts a number of foolish
capers, and then when any one speaks to her, shoots her head ’way up in
the air, and turns up her nose, if she can, and says boldly: “Oh, I
don’t care; nobody has anything to do with me!” She is the worst girl in
the world, and she will never come to any good end. Every girl who is a
law unto herself in regard to all that she says or does is certain not
only to bring upon herself the condemnation of those whose good opinion
it is worth while to have, but she will most certainly incur the
punishment of a just God. And sometimes, I am sorry to say, I think that
when a girl proudly declares that she doesn’t care for the good opinion
of others she does so because she knows that she has already lost all
right to that good opinion.
[Illustration: THE “DON’T-CARE” GIRL.]
It is wrong, boys and girls, to undertake to run roughshod over the
so-called prejudices of the public. It is a foolish thing to take
delight in trying to shock people by your boisterous and unladylike and
unbecoming conduct. Every really wise and nice girl does care a good
deal for the good opinion of others, and particularly for the good
opinion of persons older than she is. She recognizes the fact that the
laws of conventionality and of good society are based upon what is right
and what is proper, and that no girl can with propriety set them at
naught.
Some girls go so far as to say that they “don’t care” what their own
fathers and mothers think. The wild girl who says this is setting at
defiance not only the human parental law, but also the law of God, which
plainly commands children to obey their parents.
Haven’t you ever seen a “don’t-care” girl? She is nearly always reckless
in manner and speech; she is bold and defiant; she is impudent beyond
mention; and she is very fond of ridiculing girls who do care a great
deal what others think about them.
No matter whose children they are--no matter what schools they have
attended--these “don’t-care” girls are no good, and good girls ought not
to associate with them. Every day such flippant girls are treading on
dangerous ground, and some day, unless a merciful God prevents it, she
will come to open disgrace and die and go to torment. I am hoping to see
the day when all the “don’t-care” girls will have passed out of
existence, and then all our girls will be of the refined and womanly
kind who do care a great deal about their conduct, their manners and
their morals. I don’t want my daughter to associate with any other
kind.