EVERY LADDER HAS TWO ENDS.
When a small boy, I was carrying a not very large ladder, when there was a crash. An unlucky movement had brought the rear end of my ladder against a window. Instead of scolding me, my father made me stop, and said very quietly: “Look here, my son, there is one thing I wish you to remember; that is, every ladder has two ends.” I never have forgotten it, though many years have gone. Don’t we carry things besides ladders that have two ends? When I see a young man getting “fast” habits I think he sees only one end of the ladder, the one pointed toward pleasure, and that he does not know that the other is wounding his parents’ hearts. Many a young girl carries a ladder in the shape of a love for dress and finery; she only sees the gratification of a foolish pride at the forward end of that ladder, while the end that she does not see is crushing modesty and friendship as she goes along thoughtlessly among the crowd. Ah! yes, every ladder has two ends, and it is a thing to be remembered in more ways than one.—Sel.