Don’t Snub a Boy

Review and Herald Publishing Association · Washington, D. C. · Mar 9, 1911

Don’t Snub a Boy

DON’T snub a boy because he wears shabby clothes: when Edison, the great American inventor, first entered Boston, he wore a thin, shabby suit in the depth of winter. Don’t snub a boy because his home is plain and unpretending: Abraham Lincoln’s early home was a log cabin. Don’t snub a boy because of the ignorance of his parents: Shakespeare, the world’s poet, was the son of a man who was unable to write his own name. Don’t snub a boy because he chooses a humble trade: the author of “Pilgrim’s Progress” was a tinker. Don’t snub a boy because of physical disability: Milton was blind. Don’t snub a boy because of dulness at his lessons: Hogarth, the celebrated painter and engraver, was a stupid boy at his books. Don’t snub a boy because he stutters: Demosthenes, the greatest orator of Greece, overcame a harsh and stammering voice. Don’t snub any one: not alone because, some day, he may far outstrip you in the race of life, but because it is neither kind nor right nor Christian.—Selected.