Proper Education
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pursue the downward path, for they have so abused their consciences
that sin does not appear so exceeding sinful. These evils, which exist
in the schools that are conducted according to the present plan, might
be remedied in a great degree if study and labor could be combined.
The same evils exist in the higher schools, only in a greater degree;
for many of the youth have educated themselves in vice, and their
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consciences are seared.
Many parents overrate the stability and good qualities of their
children. They do not seem to consider that they will be exposed to
the deceptive influences of vicious youth. Parents have their fears as
they send them some distance away to school, but flatter themselves
that, as they have had good examples and religious instruction, they
will be true to principle in their high-school life. Many parents have
but a faint idea to what extent licentiousness exists in these institutions
of learning. In many cases the parents have labored hard and suffered
many privations for the cherished object of having their children obtain
a finished education. And after all their efforts, many have the bitter
experience of receiving their children from their course of studies with
dissolute habits and ruined constitutions. And frequently they are
disrespectful to their parents, unthankful, and unholy. These abused
parents, who are thus rewarded by ungrateful children, lament that they
sent their children from them to be exposed to temptations and come
back to them physical, mental, and moral wrecks. With disappointed
hopes and almost broken hearts they see their children, of whom they
had high hopes, follow in a course of vice and drag out a miserable
existence.
But there are those of firm principles who answer the expectation
of parents and teachers. They go through the course of schooling with
clear consciences and come forth with good constitutions and morals
unstained by corrupting influences. But the number is few.
Some students put their whole being into their studies and concen-
trate their mind upon the object of obtaining an education. They work
the brain, but allow the physical powers to remain inactive. The brain
is overworked, and the muscles become weak because they are not
exercised. When these students graduate, it is evident that they have
obtained their education at the expense of life. They have studied day
and night, year after year, keeping their minds continually upon the
stretch, while they have failed to sufficiently exercise their muscles.
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