they are gone forever. The transition is real and such an individual is no longer a genuine young man.

A definite period-a distinctive epoch of life is embraced between these years. The Young Men of America, therefore may be considered to be composed of all male individuals between the ages of fourteen and twenty-eight years.

These fourteen years embrace just two links, of seven years each, in the chain of life-one link before reaching the prevailing legal age of twenty-one, and one link after the legal majority has been attained.

According to the Census of 1900, the total population of the United States was 76,303,387, and of this number 39,059,242 were males. Almost exactly one-third of this number or 13,019,747 were young men between the ages of fourteen and twenty-eight. There are therefore at the present time in the United States 13,000,000 male children and boys. under fourteen,

13,000,000 YOUNG MEN

between fourteen and twenty-eight and 13,000,000 men beyond the period of young manhood.

This vast army of young men, taken as a whole, constitutes a distinct class of individu

als, in many respects resembling each other, and in various ways interested in each other to a remarkable degree. Their natural sympathies are more uniform and mutual, and their business interests and social relations are more closely allied than those of any other similar number of individuals that now live or perhaps ever did live. While they are scattered throughout the length and breadth of three and one-half million square miles of territory, their intercourse with each other is more free, their interests and aims are more of a unit, and they are more universally in touch, through a common sympathy, than is the case with the inhabitants of the most closely populated city. They are more easily influenced by each other, and each in turn is more directly responsible for the acts and welfare of his fellows, than can be said of any other class of individuals. During this period of life, friendship and goodwill are purest and most sincere, personal magnetism is at its height and the social and fraternal ties are now at their strongest.

Says the eminent Lord Brougham: "At this enviable age, everything has the lively interest of novelty and freshness; attention is perpetually sharpened by curiosity; and the memory is tenacious of the deep impressions it thus receives, to a degree unknown in after life." During these years, opportunity is at its

flood, ambition, courage and hope heed naught but conquest and victory, care and anxiety are at the ebb; disappointment now is only discipline, failures simply stepping stones to greater success, and at this time every loyal hearted and truly courageous "Young American" should possess that kind of determination, valor, and zeal which shirks no duty, fears no obstacle, and knows no defeat.

The thirteen million young men of America are a potent factor, not only in promoting national advancement, but in shaping the world's history. They represent the greatest available power of concerted human force the world can produce. Their patriotic loyalty, moral worth, and manly strength render our land absolutely invulnerable to any and every external foe.

The latent force represented by these thirteen million young men is quite beyond mental comprehension. Were they to form in line, marching ten abreast and twelve feet apart, they would form one unbroken column 2800 miles long. Were they to clasp hands they would form two unbroken lines, reaching from the Atlantic to the Pacific ocean. If each one built a house, of the average size, the buildings would line both sides of eight streets reaching across our continent. They represent sufficient labor to dig the iron ore from the mines, manufacture it into wire, lay the foundations, and construct

and complete the great New York and Brooklyn Bridge in three hours.

The great Chinese wall is the unrivalled wonder of the world's industry. It is 1259 miles long, 20 feet high, 25 feet thick, and contains 20,000 towers 40 feet square at the base and 37 feet high. It took hundreds of years to build it and it is the most stupendous structure erected by man. If laid down in the United States it would reach from Niagara Falls to Dallas, Texas, or from New Orleans to New York. It would wall our Atlantic seaboard from Nova Scotia to Florida; yet with the aid of modern machinery, the Young Men of America represent enough force to dig the clay from the earth, manufacture the bricks and construct the wall complete in five days. they would begin to save and place at interest one dollar per week and continue to do so until sixty years of age, they would thus accumulate a sum surpassing the entire wealth of every kind and nature, both personal and real, public and private, of the United States at the present time.

If

For each one to be sick one day is equal to 31,000 being sick an entire year. They represent enough labor to go into the forests and hew the timbers, to go into the mines and dig the iron, and manufacture it into steel rails and spikes, and construct a railroad reaching from

New York City to San Francisco between the rising and the setting of the sun.

For each one to invest one hundred dollars, would capitalize thirteen thousand banks, each having a capital of one hundred thousand dollars. Two cents daily from each would send three hundred thousand young men to college. For each one to waste ten cents daily is equal to the destruction of three hundred and seventyfive thousand houses, costing twelve hundred dollars each, annually, or equal to reducing to ashes a town of five thousand inhabitants every day in the year.

That these thirteen million young men represent fully as much intellectually and morally as they do physically, is a fact too often overlooked. In every way they represent the dominating factor in our national make-up.

Perhaps no class of individuals is so little understood as young men. Yet no class exhibits qualities more natural and uniform.

Those older in years, under the guise of leadership and philanthropy, have spent much time trying to solve the problem as to what to do with our young men.

Young men have been looked upon as a care -as wards and dependents-in the realm of business activity and progressive civilization. The world is slow to learn, and when it is taught is quick to forget, that young men are