p. 527 | GIVE THE BOYS TOOLS

Seventh-day Adventist Missionary Society · Oakland, California · Nov 25, 1880

GIVE THE BOYS TOOLS.

ALMOST all boys are naturally mechanics. The constructive and imitative faculties are developed, in part, at a very early age. All boys are not capable of being developed into good, practical, working mechanics, but most of them show their bent that way. There are a few cases in which the boy has no competent idea of the production of a fabricated result from inorganic material, but such cases are rare. Given the proper encouragement and the means, and many boys whose mechanical aptness is allowed to run to waste, or is diverted from its natural course, would become good workmen, useful, producing members of the industrial community. The mechanical boy ought to have a shop of his own. Let it be the attic, or an unused room, or a place in the barn or woodshed. Give him a place and tools. Let him have a good pocket-knife, gimlets, chisels, gouges, planes, cutting nippers, saws, a foot rule and material to work. Let the boy have a chance. If he is a mechanic it will come out, and he will do himself credit. If he fails, he is to follow some calling that does not demand mechanical skill.