in the youth who allows his conscience to be blunted by evil communications. The avenues of evil must

be closed.

Juvenal, a Pagan moralist, gives this advice:

"Nil dictu foedum visuque hæc limina tangat
Intra quæ puer est."

Sat. XIV, 44.

Let nothing shameful to tell and to be seen,
Enter those doors within which a child dwells.

43. SOCIAL DUTIES.-General View: Social duties arise from the relation of man to man and the varied conditions and circumstances under which men live.

In some respects, there is an equality of condition in the great fundamental principles of right and justice, all stand on an equal footing. "The rich and poor meet together: the Lord is the maker of them all." (Proverbs 22: 2.) There is an equality of rights; and there is due a reciprocity of duties; but in the accidental conditions of life there. is diversity and contrast,-there is the wise and there is the simple; the learned and the ignorant; the rich and the poor; the strong and the weak; the moral and the immoral.

These diversities in gifts and character are partly from causes too recondite to be seen and known; in part, from what we call the accidents of birth and of life; and in large part they result from the use the individual makes of the faculties and means bestowed upon him by nature.

Whatever the causes, the facts exist, and need

careful consideration; hence the wide scope there is for the exercise of the better feelings of humanity in social duties.

Friendships, love and care in home relations, in business and civic matters-the affections for these obligations-we have by nature. They are natural affections and are moral in an elementary sense. There is no virtue in conformity to them. There is a great lack of virtue in the neglect of them. Virtue can arise only when the exercise of the natural affections is accompanied with sacrifice or personal danger, as in warding off harm from the defenseless.

Philanthropy, Benevolence: Love to man and good-will are natural affections of the soul; and if these good qualities have been more or less supplanted by contra dispositions, namely, by misanthropy and malevolence, it is due to sin and transgression, and argues an abnormal state of the

soul.

"We are all by nature brethren, placed in the same or in similar circumstances, subject to the same wants and infirmities, endowed with the same faculties, and equally dependent on the great Author of our being; we cannot be happy but in the society of one another, and from one another we daily receive, or may receive, important services. These considerations recommend the great duty of universal benevolence, which is not more beneficial to others than to ourselves; for it makes us happy in our own minds, and amiable in the minds of all who know us."—Beattie, in Moral Science.

"And now, Philanthropy! thy rays divine
Dart round the globe, from Zembla to the Line;
O'er each dark prison plays the cheering light
Like Northern lustres o'er the vault of night.

From realm to realm, with cross or crescent crown'd,
Where'er Mankind and Misery are found,

O'er burning sands, deep waves, or wilds of snow,
Thy Howard, journeying, seeks the house of woe.
He treads, inemulous of fame or wealth,
Profuse of toil, and prodigal of health.

Leads stern-eyed Justice to the dark domains,
If not to sever, to relax the chains;-

Gives to her babes the self-devoted wife,
To her fond husband liberty and life."

-Thos. Brown.

Hospitality: Webster defines it, "The reception and entertainment of strangers or guests without reward, or with kind and generous liberality."

This virtue, sentiment and idea of duty is native to the heart of humanity, and among all people is very generally honored. Exceptions there have been and are, and the frown of disapproval marks the general rule and law.

Atrocious instances have met with severe rebuke and punishment. The refusal of the tribe of Benjamin to deliver up to merited punishment those vile and wicked men who disgraced all Israel by a flagrant violation of the rights and duties of hospitality resulted in forty thousand slain of their men of war-all the tribe but six hundred--a remnant spared that the tribe might not be extinguished.

Among many noteworthy instances of hospitality is that of the poor negro woman, in the heart of Africa, towards that celebrated explorer Mungo Park.

We have a striking instance of the fitness and beauty of the sentiment and duty of hospitality in Queen Dido's word of welcome to Eneas, when, after the Trojan disaster and a tempestuous voyage, he, with his followers, landed upon her shores; thus:

66

Non ignara mali miseris succurrere disco." Lib. 1, line 630.
Not ignorant of misfortune I learn to succour the unhappy.

And another instance in the friendly greeting "What cheer?" with which Narragansett Indians hailed Roger Williams, as his canoe approached in search of a settlement which he made, and called Providence. "Love ye the stranger; for ye were strangers in the land of Egypt." (Deuteronomy 10: 19.)

44. THE ETHICS OF AMUSEMENT.-That we are constituted for a certain degree of light enjoyment is evident from the fondness of children for play and of youth for sports and games of various kinds. Little boys love to contest with each other in running a race. They delight in flying a kite, especially when grandpa helps them; and the larger ones delight in the bat and ball; and the girls with the boys, great and small, love the croquet ground, lawn-tennis, rowing and skating. These games are exhilarating, healthy, and quicken and invigorate the powers of body, soul and spirit. Yet valuable amusements can be degraded, and are when they are indulged in to excess.

In games there is a desire to excel. This is natural and harmless and gives a zest to the amuse

ment, when this is a simple desire for the supremacy unaccompanied with thoughts or feelings of triumph over the defeat of contending playmates; but the moment there enters into the soul a pleasure or satisfaction from the chagrin of another, or the moment that the desire of supremacy is carried to the degree of a feeling of triumph on the one side, and of pain on the other side from defeat, then the good morals of the amusement have departed, and there enters a vicious tendency. Amusements, to be moral, must be for the sake of the amusement, and the resulting good. When evil results, then they become immoral. Amusements in themselves innocent when engaged in with moderation, in a temperate manner, may become evil from too long continuance, excess of zeal, or from being conjoined with bad habits, as the use of slang words, coarse jests, or vulgar remarks-even to profane language; and from indulgence in cheat, fraud, white-lies-all which tend to accustom one to bad habits.

There is, too, another point of view that shows an ethic-character. Some persons may engage in amusements who have no difficulty in submitting themselves to the proper restraints of reason and a good conscience, and so to them the amusement is harmless; but more persons have not this self-control, and with them amusement degenerates into vice. Now, what is duty? Doubtless it is the duty of the selfpoised, those who can amuse themselves innocently, to forego certain amusements provided thereby they can help their weaker friend or neighbor to recover from a bad habit.