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Page 2
Referring once more to what I have said about obtrusiveness,
forwardness, or boldness, being an unpleasant characteristic of the
manners of many young people of the present day, I want to impress upon
you that much of this boldness arises from lack of deference or
reverence for parents, teachers, and older people. This lack of
deference is a great defect of character in any young person. It is
painfully noticeable in many homes where children never seem to think of
paying any respect to the presence of their parents or older people;
where they will monopolize conversation at table, interrupt their
parents and guests to ask irrelevant questions or relate irrelevant
incidents, enter a room abruptly, and, without waiting to learn whether
any one is speaking, at once begin to speak of something pertaining to
their own affairs. All this is bad behavior and bad manners. It is
morally wrong as well. God has commanded that we shall honor our father
and mother; and one beautiful precept of scripture is, "Thou shalt rise
up before the hoary head and honor the face of the old man."
To sum up in the short space of one letter the more important truths I
would impress upon your mind in regard to behavior and manners, let me
say this: There are good manuals of etiquette and social form which
should be read and studied by all young people. There are, also,
constant opportunities for observation of the conduct and manners of
polite people, by which young people may and should profit and learn to
observe the outward forms of society. These are easily learned and
practiced; but the finest, best, most genuine good manners can never be
acquired except as they become the natural expression of gentleness,
kindness intelligence, respect for parents and elders, and an earnest
desire to do good to our fellow beings. Strive, my dear child, to
cherish these graces in your heart, and good behavior and good manners
will naturally follow.
LETTER II.
SELF-CONTROL AND SELF-CULTURE.
_My Dear Daughter:_--One great and difficult lesson is given to each of
us to learn in this life, which must be learned if we ever hope to live
happy or useful lives. It is the lesson of self-control. Parents and
teachers and circumstances may help or hinder in the learning of this
lesson; but it depends mainly upon yourself, upon your own individual
will, whether you shall learn it or not. It is the first lesson which
wise parents and teachers strive to teach a child. It is the
fundamental, the all-important lesson of life. It extends to every
department of our nature and affects every act and-event of our lives.
Take notice with me how the possession or non-possession of the power of
self-control affects the lives of young people in a few particulars.
Certain self-evident duties are imposed upon every rational being. One
of the first of these is the duty of being usefully employed a large
portion of our time. It is probable that nearly all young people have a
certain dislike for work, and self-control must come in to help them do
the work that belongs to them to do. It may help you in acquiring this
self-control to reflect often what a really great thing it is to be able
to compel yourself to do from a sense of duty what you are naturally
disinclined to do? also what an unworthy and, indeed, contemptible thing
it is not to be able to make yourself do what you know you ought to do.
You are perhaps disinclined, for instance, to rise when you should in
the morning. You feel disposed to indulge your ease and comfort, and to
lie in bed when you know you should be awake and preparing for the day.
Here is one of the very instances in which if you will learn to control
and compel yourself you will soon reap substantial reward. The more you
indulge yourself, the harder does the task of rising and getting ready
for the day become. But say to yourself, "I will waken right away," rise
and walk around a little, and you will be surprised to find how soon the
habit of prompt rising will become easy. You have your morning duties to
perform, or your lessons to learn. If you say to yourself, when it is
time you should begin, "I will not loiter, but immediately set about my
work or study," you will find in the very act and determination a help
and strength, and pleasure even, which you can never imagine before you
have experienced it. God has so made us that in the very performance of
duty, however trivial, there is a reward and strength and a very high
kind of pleasure. But we need firm self-control to compel ourselves
thus to do our duty. I shall rejoice if any words of mine lead you to
test for yourself the truth of what I have said.
Self-control should extend to our speech, temper, and pleasures. To be
able to control the tongue is rightly esteemed one of the greatest of
moral achievements. You remember what the apostle James says, that "if
any man offend not in word, the same is a perfect man, and able also to
bridle [control] the whole body." It is so easy to say cross or unkind
words; so easy to make slighting or gossiping remarks about companions
or friends; so hard to efface the painful effects of such hasty or
ill-considered speech. It is so easy to make a petulant or disrespectful
reply to parents or teachers when they reprove; so much harder, yet so
much better, to acknowledge a fault and feel and express sorrow for
wrong-doing. Your own conscience and consciousness tell you how much
happier you feel when you have done the latter. Yet you need, over and
over again, to fortify yourself against temptation to hasty or
ill-natured or improper speech by determining beforehand that you will
not give way to the temptation; that you will control yourself. And
whenever you have allowed yourself to be overcome by such temptation you
should make it the occasion of serious reflection and earnest resolve to
be more guarded in future. You will have attained a great deal in the
direction of high and noble character when you have learned to control
your speech. It is the same in regard to controlling your temper. But
there is one truth of which I can assure you: If you will learn to be
silent and not speak at all when you feel that your temper is getting or
has gotten the better of you, you will soon get the better of your
temper. There is no such efficient discipline for a hasty temper as
determined, self-imposed silence. Then, too, there is a dignity about
silence under provocation that is impressive and effective. The greatest
disadvantage at which any person can be placed in the eyes of companions
and friends is that of losing control of one's tongue as well as of
one's temper. In nearly every case where we receive provocation or
affront, speech may be silver, but "silence is golden." The person who
keeps control of his temper controls everyone.
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