This disposition is always more or less present in children, and
particularly so in youth. It would appear in the minds of a great many
there is the necessity of a period of coltishness through which we all
must pass, and during which there would seem no help for us but a free
rein and copious mother-tears. As the world is growing wiser and better,
and as we all are coming to recognize this improvement of conditions,
these fatuous delusions are losing ground and now instead of it
appearing “big” to the child or youth to do those “smart” things, he is
beginning to realize that his standing in the community and the respect
which he wishes to command, must be governed wholly by the qualities of
manliness and gentility of which he is possessed.
It is a failing on our part individually to look upon our own as good
and all others as bad, where there is a difference, and however
comforting this may be to us, we must face the question squarely—that
there is just about as much bad in one as there is in the other. The
scales may not always balance in such a comparison, but usually they
will very nearly do so. The virtues which are possessed by different
individuals may not always be the same, but they always make up for the
more or less patent deficiencies.
For instance, our attention was once called to a very lovable young man,
weak in character and somewhat dissipated, who was so sympathetic that
he would show the deepest solicitude for the poor and helpless child,
the dumb brute in its sufferings, or the poor wounded bird. Had the
character of this young man been properly trained in the days of his
childhood, no thought would have been given by him to those things
resulting in dissipation, but that natural energy of young manhood would
otherwise have found vent, and have been a great good and a great
blessing.