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Our Young Men.
“My son, if sinners entice thee, consent thou
not.’’—Prov. 1: 10.
HE greatest lesson any young man can
learn is to resist Satan. It is much
harder to resist him in youth than when
one is older, simply because of inex
perience. The devil is a wily, treacher
ous being and it takes experience to
know how to deal with him.
Os course, if one constantly yields to
him in youth, it becomes harder to re-
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sist in mature life. Habit always fixes itself in the
course of time.
It is sad to see the great army of young men
marching to ruin. Ofttimes they are in the march
before they know it. They have been beguiled.
The devil has set his trap for them; his bait has
been of such a nature as to appeal to them, and
they are caught unawares.
The real problem for the young man of today is,
how may I resist s he devil?
A Young Man’s Home.
First, I wish to say that much depends upon his
home life. Henry Ward Beecher once said in ad
dressing an audience of mothers, “Show me a boy,
and I will show you his mother.” What a truth he
uttered! lam sure mothers do not realize the force
of it. Nothing tells quicker than the training of a
boy. “Train up a child in the way he should go:
and when he is old, he will not depart from it,” is
literally true.
Some people say, “I know a certain boy who was
trained well, and he went to the bad.” That may
be true so far as you knew about his training, but
back of every wrecked life there is a flaw some
where in the training. There is nothing that stamps
itself upon a boy’s memory more than the influence
of his home.
I remember a young man who made a profession
of religion in our church one Sunday evening. He
was a fine looking young fellow. He showed good
blood and good training. In talking with me after
his profession he said, “I have strayed away from
my mother’s training. I have gone the way of the
bad, but tonight my thoughts have gone back to the
old home a thousand miles distance, and I have
made up my mind that I cannot go longer in sin.”
This is the way it ever is. The mother who would
save her boy from ruin has got to save him when he
is young by throwing around him such influence as
will grip him in the days that are to come, and hold
him to that which is good.
A boy’s borne should be a magnet. “Gadabout
someness” is the biggest evil that a boy has to fight.
It will ultimately destroy the best that is in any boy.
I know what I am talking about, for I have seen
it operate. The problem of keeping the boy off the
street is largely solved by the mother. lam not sur
prised that some of our young men like to stay on
the streets. They like to stay anywhere in prefer
ence to home. Home to them is not made attrac
tive. Their room looks like a cyclone had struck it.
It is ofttimes not swept in days.s Bits of paper torn
up and thrown all over the floor. Not a single pic-
Le n G . Broughton
ture, except some old ones that are not fit for a dog
house.
Such a place is where many of our boys have to
do their thinking and reading. The boy’s room
ought to be the parlor, so far as its attractiveness
is concerned. If there is not enough money to have
a parlor and respectable boy’s room, then have no
parlor, and by all means take care of the boy.
Sisters are often to blame for the ruin of their
brothers. I have known them to get mad with their
brothers for not going to church with them, or the
like, when at the same time they fooled around the
house and let their brothers’ room remain unkept.
Think of a girl downstairs playing away at the
piano, while the boy sleeps upstairs in the dirt.
But there are other things to be done to make a
boy love home. Besides giving him a good, comfort
able room, he has got to have a sympathetic, peace
ful atmosphere. There is not so much difference in
boys, after all, as there is in mothers. A petted,
peevish, whining mother will produce an irritable,
contentious child. A mother should not impress the
bov with the fact that she is ever on the lookout for
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flaws about him. She had better shut her eyes some
times and not see them. To be forever nagging at
a boy about this and that is enough to make him
dread to go home. Perhaps he does need jerking
up here and there, but it should not be a perpetual
thing. Store up the points of complaint, and at the
proper time talk them over. Do not be forever drib
bling them out lest they get so common no attention
will be paid to them. A boy should not be handled
so as to make him dread to go home. Home should
be the one place he loves most.
The Boy and His Daddy.
Again, a real sure enough daddy is needed to save
a boy from ruin. Mother has to do considerably
more with the temperament than father, but cer
tainly father has to do more with the life than
mother. A boy must have respect for his father.
He will need his father’s counsel, and it will be of
no value to him unless back of the counsel is a life
that he can respect and honor. How important this
is! No father can treat it lightly. It should en
gage his best thought and most careful considera
tion.
To maintain the proper kind of respect he has got
himself to be a man of integrity and honor. When
he says a thing he must mean it. He has got also
to demand and maintain obedience and respect from
the boy. To be slack at this point means inevitable
ruin.
Many fathers today, because of the rush of busi
ness, are turning over to the mother the discipline
and correction of their boys. It is contrary to God’s
plan. She has her sphere, but she cannot take a
father’s place. In all matters pertaining to life and
conduct father’s stern government is to be recog
nized, and woe be unto him if he dares to shirk it.
The father ought to lead the way for the boy to
follow. It is a shame to see a boy sent off to Sun
day-school while father lies around the house uncon
cerned and indifferent. Such lessons do not tell for
good in days to come. If the father would be proud
of his boy when he is a man, he has got to take the
most sacred interest in him while he is approaching
manhood.
How unconsciously the boy imitates his fath
er. It is seen in almost every step that he takes.
The story of the child who was found frozen to
death in the deep snow, following in the footsteps
of his father, is one that in one way or another is
seen repeating itself every day in our midst. There
goes father. He is unconscious of what is taking
place behind him, but alas, alas, when it is often
too late, he looks behind and finds that the boy so
dear to him is following in his footsteps to ruin!
The Golden Age for August 23, 1906.
Time and Money.
The inestimable value of time is another thing
that a young man must take into account. The
curse of to-day is throwing away time. Our young
men throw away more time than they imagine.
The average young man is in great need of educa
tion. He may have book learning, but he needs a
knowledge of affairs. He can get it if he will. He
may not have the opportunity to go to college, but
he has plenty of time to acquire knowledge if he
will only utilize it properly. Every young man
ought to set apart some of his time for reading and
study. When he gets to be a man of affairs he will
find it almost impossible to do it. This will keep
the devil out of his life. The busy young man who
is careful about his time furnishes very little op
portunity for the devil to do his work.
With the present facilities for obtaining learning,
with night schools to help, there is absolutely no ex
cuse for the ignorance that we find among the young
men of today.
The waste of money is another thing that should
engage serious thought. One of the greatest sins
of the present day is extravagance. A gentleman
in our city of wide influence and great knowledge,
and a man who knows young men, said to me recent
ly, “I believe that seventy-five per cent of the
young men of today live beyond their income.”
What can we expect of the future business men
of the country when such is true of our young men?
I think girls are responsible largely for it. They
encourage the waste of money. They are perfectly
content to let a young man of small wages spend
more money on them than he can afford. Girls know
about what the average man gets for his labor, and
they have no right to encourage extravagance.
Think of a young man spending two or three dol
lars a week for flowers and the like to adorn his best
girl. Perhaps some of them do need a bit of fixing
up, but woe to the young man who starts out in that
business.
Young men ought to set apart some of their earn
ings. It is a good rule to follow, never to spend all
of one’s income.
Learn to Say “No.”
Again, a young man who wants to resist the devil
must learn to say, “no.” I believe this is the very
best lesson for life. It is mighty hard sometimes,
but it pays.
It was hard for Daniel that day when he sat at
the table and refused to drink wine. It looked for a
time that he forfeited every prospect that he had of
favor with the king. But not so, the king, though
a wicked man, was bound to recognize the character
in a young man who could say, “no.”
It was hard for him to refuse to worship idols.
Certainly it looked hard when they thrust him into
the den of lions. But God was watching the man
who had keyed his life to resist wrong doing.
It was hard for Joseph in bondage to resist the
witchery of the wife of Potiphar. It looked for a
time that he had shut the only door by which he
might escape, but not so. What the average man of
the world would call a shut door was one of the
things that gave him a world-wide opportunity.
It was hard for Job, when his body was covered
with sores and his wife turned her back on him, to
remain firm and refuse to turn his back upon God.
But it was the only thing under the sun that brought
victory.
So the young man of today whose life is to count
has got to practice saying “no.”
I once met a distinguished citizen of Great Brit
ain. We were together some time and he gave me
a bit of his history. He said: “I was reared a
poor boy. I went to the city when a young man. I
got a good position and made friends of some of the
socalled best people.