Effect of Modern Education. Promoter of Skepticism
By W. S. Sadler
DEMORALIZATION OF THE YOUNG MAN. No. 7.
Effect of Modern Education. Promoter of Skepticism.
THOUSANDS of young men are in attendance at the various schools, colleges, and other educational institutions throughout the land. They are in these institutions of learning to receive a training and preparation for their life-work. The institution that undertakes the solemn responsibility of training the minds and characters of the rising generation should be an institution permeated throughout by the principles of eternal truth and the everlasting Gospel. Our much boasted higher and modern education is from day to day demonstrating its inability to inculcate either Christian principles or purposes into the minds and characters of the youth whose future usefulness and character development have been intrusted to the watchcare of American schools and colleges. A tendency to infidelity, a spirit of skepticism, and an inclination to doubt both the truth and authenticity of the Bible, have all kept pace with the development of the modern educational idea. The popular education of to-day is one essentially antagonistic to the principles of Christianity, and hence must indirectly contribute to the demoralization of the young man, notwithstanding its boasted high or classic nature. Christian education alone provides the way of escape for the young man of to-day who would save his mind from the sowing of the tares of doubt and infidelity. The Theater, Amusements, etc.
Real happiness will come to the young man of to-day only as a result of his unselfish and disinterested efforts to make others happy. True happiness and real pleasure are never found by seeking for them. They come only as the result of that unselfishness and self-denial which lead us to spend and be spent for the good of others. The youth of to-day are engaged in sowing but little of this kind of seed, and hence they reap but little of genuine happiness, joy of heart, and real peace of mind. And so to those who are unwilling to pay the cost of true happiness, Satan comes with the demoralizing influences of the theater, drama, vaudeville, and various other amusements, which he promises will divert their unsettled minds, and calm their unsatisfied hearts. There are often urged in this connection the great educational advantages of the stage and its environments; but we very seriously question the value of these public amusements and performances as promoters either of purity of thought or righteousness of deportment. While it is true that there are some things on the stage which the worldly-minded might accept as good, yet it can not be denied that there are others so evil that the English language does not afford terms of criticism too severe with which to denounce them. Ruination lurks all about them, and moral devastation is found in their wake. In the cities are to be found the dance-hall, together with other resorts, provided with every possible attraction calculated to entice the youth within their bounds, to enjoy what the devil would make it appear are the "pleasures of sin for a season." Afterward is the rude awakening to a realization of the sad reality that they have been disappointed, and deceived, and have secured but the counterfeit of true happiness,—artificial pleasure. The Ballroom, Dancing, etc.
Society of to-day, and even many churches and professed Christians, have come to look upon the ballroom and its associations with a favorable eye. All parents, all Christians, can but regard the ballroom, with its modern dances and waltzes, as one of the devil's direct and special creations, calculated to demoralize, ruin, and destroy the youth who participate in them. Physicians and ministers unite in their testimony of condemnation against these things, which are in every way calculated to violate the principles of modesty, morality, and propriety. Did the English language afford suitable terms, we might relate incidents that would clearly show that the ballroom is responsible for the destruction and downfall of many youth. Regarded as a Man when Only a Boy.
A tendency greatly to be regretted is that which makes it possible for the boy of to-day to enter, at such an early age, upon his career as a young man. Is it to be wondered at that the grandparents of to-day are led to remark, with sorrow and regret, as they view the actions of the modern young man: "It was not so when I was a child. Boys and girls were young until they were eighteen or twenty years of age, but now they must be regarded and addressed as young men and young women at the age of fourteen or fifteen years." But this is a fast age, and the young man of to-day becomes, in the estimation of both himself and society, a man at a time when, for the sake of the development of character and morals, he should be regarded by both parents and society as a boy only. Nowadays things are done in a hurry. Education is largely superficial; moral training is almost wholly left out of many a young man's experience. All these things conspire together to form a great deficiency in the general character and usefulness of the average young man. It is often said of a young man that he is a very nice fellow, with the exception that he is sowing his "wild oats." From nature, experience, revelation, and society, we learn that "whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also reap." Gal. 6:7. If the seeds of vice, dissipation, idleness, and skepticism are sown, they will surely bring forth their harvest in the after life and character of the individual, as well as in the eternity which is to follow. That the young man of to-day may sow for vice and reap virtue, is one of the saddest delusions which the enemy of the soul has ever succeeded in fastening upon the youth of this generation. Let no Christian young woman regard the waywardness of the young man of to-day as a matter of small consequence, and pass it by with but little thought. Let the Christian girl of to-day demand of the young man, in point of character and morals, all that he expects of her. Let the principles of modesty, Christianity, and loyalty to true principles, characterize her every attitude. If the bulwark of woman's natural modesty be broken down in the eyes of the young man, the resultant gap will stand as an open gateway to the field of his demoralization. Let the young woman of to-day arise, awake, discern her duty in these respects, and recognize the great possibilities she has for doing good, and the sad consequences of their neglect? Small as the influences of neglect in this matter are, they empty into the channel that flows over the Niagara of self-destruction into the whirlpool of physical, mental, and moral ruin.