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MANNERS

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International Tract and Missionary Society · Oakland, California · Jan 6, 1887

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 13, No. 1.

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MANNERS.

UNDOUBTEDLY there is a very great decline in manners. Politeness threatens to become one of the lost arts. The young scoff at this notion, but men who remember earlier periods are conscious of a great change in public manners, and note a steady decadence therein. Ladies generally assent to this declaration, and speak with feeling, particularly of the decline of politeness among men in public vehicles. I think they are right. There was a time when no man thought of remaining seated while a woman stood, but now it is almost an exception for men in cars or omnibuses to surrender their seats, unless to very old or infirm persons. And the disregard of a once well-established rule of politeness is more marked among young men than old.
This, when we think of it, is a little singular—for was it not women that reared these young men? Are they not fresh from the tutelage of home? When we hear women complain of the ill-breeding of men, is it not pertinent to ask who it is but women that rear the youth of this land? From whom do boys get their first ideas of politeness? If men are ill-bred, are we not right in tracing the cause back to the nursery? Commonly the very last persons in public vehicles to show politeness to women are boys; and boys that accompany women are, if anything, more selfishly regardless of the claims of other women than almost any other class. Are we accustomed to see in crowded vehicles mothers directing their young sons to offer their seats to ladies? On the contrary, have we not often, on the entrance of a number of women, heard a mother whisper to her young escort for him to keep his seat? It is obvious that whether men shall be polite and courtly or not must depend on the manner in which they are reared. The women of the land can scarcely deny this proposition, and if it is true, they must admit that the remedy for the evil in the future lies absolutely and exclusively in their own hands.—Christian Union.