purity but it is oftener the destroyer than the conservator of it, and many girls and boys adopt unclean practices from utter ignorance of their injury and bad effects. Before twelve years, they can only be closely guarded and watched, with a general caution not to tamper with their bodies. After that age, it is the mother's duty to make some explanation to the girl and boy, which shall impress upon them the sacredness of sex and somewhat of its functions. Many mothers dislike doing this, fearing they may be robbing their children of their innocence. There are few cases in which such information at the age named would be premature, since girls and boys after that age will observe, will be curious, and will receive explanations from some source, and it can be given by no one so judiciously and with such a conservation of purity as by the mother. There may be some advantage in communicating this knowledge earlier, but there are also many objections to premature disclosures, and in most cases, if the associations have been right, curiosity is not awakened earlier. If a child however asks, and his reason is sufficiently developed to understand, the mother can explain as far as she thinks wise, or will satisfy him, but it SHOULD BE THE TRUTH as far as it goes, and the subject should never be treated otherwise than with earnestness and respect.

XIV

HABITS OF YOUTH

THE more one observes the development of human nature, the more is one impressed with the fact that next to the irretrievableness of birth comes the irretrievableness of early training and education. The momentum of life and endeavor receive direction during the early years, and right inspiration must be given while the heart and mind are plastic, and before the habits are completely formed, else one's nature becomes less receptive to it. Habits are partly formed before the age of consciousness, but the spiritual inspirations come after that period, and he who welcomes their advent continues to have moral awakenings all through life; if, however, during the impressionable period the inspirations are disregarded, their voice becomes less and less distinct. When one realizes the stupendous responsibility involved in the training of the young heart and mind and how often the opportunity is lost in ignorance and neglect, one must deeply deplore that the importance of this training is so often unappreciated.

At the critical time when the ideas are awak

ening, when the heart is searching for its anchorage and the character is building, the minds of innumerable boys and girls receive no higher nourishment than that afforded by the study of arithmetic, history, geography, sometimes a little music and dancing; and the thoughts are entirely occupied with these and a few pastimes. The deeper motives and high principles of life are either ignored, or are made secondary; how can nobleness and high-mindedness issue from such sowing? The good grain must be sown all along, and though it may be for a time apparently unproductive, some day it will put forth the blade and come into ear; when the need comes the growth will be revealed.

Happiness is not dependent on material conditions except in the imaginations of those who view life falsely; pleasure may be increased by a plethoric purse, but pleasure and happiness are themselves frequently divorced, and is not that happiness which is not dependent on sensuous enjoyment the higher and the more enduring? If pleasure has been the object of existence in early life, when one reaches the meridian and is less eager for the enjoyments which animal spirits crave, life seems very dark and unattractive because the higher intellectual and spiritual resources have been undeveloped.

It is not advised that young men and women

renounce the world and all its pleasures, but that these shall not always have first place to the exclusion of the nobler aims of life. Urge upon young men the value of a symmetrical development so that while they need not deny the benefits of money and of business energy and enterprise, they do not make of material gain a Juggernaut Car that shall override and crush out all the better spirit and nobler elements of life. Impress upon them that its possession is not worth doing wrong for, that nothing in this life is worth doing wrong for; also that with the acquisition of wealth they shall recognize the responsibility and moral guardianship thereof. Teach them that almost more difficult than knowing how to acquire is knowing how wisely and beneficially to expend it; that it must not be a means of self-indulgence only, but a power of good for others as well.

Young men should be educated to appreciate the higher qualities of womanhood, the pure soul, the strong conscientiousness, the womanly tenderness, and where these can be found. united with a sound education there is a basis of a happier marriage than one in which the attraction is a pretty face, a shapely figure and a goodly fortune.

It depends on the man's education and the influences of his own home life what qualities

he will seek in a wife, and if his own principles are fixed and his nature elevated above purely sensual lurings, he will consider the right qualifications in the selection of his life companion.

A young man can surround himself with no greater safeguard than a confidential relation with his mother; many young men consider it a concomitant of their manhood and growing dignity to be very reticent about all their affairs as soon as they commence associating with young women, thus depriving themselves of a potent influence at a time when it is most advantageous. A few mothers are indiscreet and do not well guard the confidences that are reposed in them, and this naturally causes a young man to discontinue them. If the mother is wise and has the right sympathy with human nature as manifest in the youthful heart, if she sacredly guard confidential disclosures, her sons and daughters will be encouraged to confide in her. It depends on the spirit in which the confidences are met whether the confider will continue to hold them desirable; if the mother is harsh, or curious, or too communicative, she has only herself to blame, if the cautious considers these disadvantages; but the joy and profit of a frank relation between a wise mother and son, or between mother and daughter, is inestimable. When it is denied a careful investigation of the cause may convince the