Our College
33
There has been, with many parents, a fearful neglect of duty. Like
Eli, they fail to exercise proper restraint; and then they send their
undisciplined children to college to receive the training which the
parents should have given them at home. The teachers have a task
which but few appreciate. If they succeed in reforming these wayward
youth, they receive but little credit. If the youth choose the society of
the evil-disposed, and go on from bad to worse, then the teachers are
censured, and the school denounced.
In many cases, the censure justly belongs to the parents. They
had the first and most favorable opportunity to control and train their
children, when the spirit was teachable, and the mind and the heart
easily impressed. But through the slothfulness of the parents, the
children are permitted to follow their own will, until they become
hardened in an evil course.
Let parents study less of the world, and more of Christ; let them
put forth less effort to imitate the customs and fashions of the world,
and devote more time and effort to moulding the minds and characters
of their children according to the divine Model. Then they could send
forth their sons and daughters, fortified by pure morals and a noble
purpose, to receive an education for positions of usefulness and trust.
Teachers who are controlled by the love and fear of God, could lead
such youth still onward and upward, training them to be a blessing to
the world, and an honor to their Creator.
Connected with God, every instructor will exert an influence to
lead his pupils to study God’s word, and to obey his law. He will direct
their minds to the contemplation of eternal interests, and open before
them vast fields for thought; grand and ennobling themes, which the
most vigorous intellect may put forth all its powers to grasp, and yet
feel that there is an infinity beyond.
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The teacher who is severe, critical, overbearing, heedless of others’
feelings, must expect the same spirit to be manifested toward himself.
He who wishes to preserve his own dignity and self-respect, must be
careful not to wound needlessly the self-respect of others. This rule
should be sacredly observed toward the dullest, the youngest, the most
blundering scholars. What God intends to do with those apparently
uninteresting youth, you do not know. He has, in the past, accepted
persons no more promising or attractive, to do a great work for him.
His Spirit moving upon the heart has aroused every faculty to vigorous