ALMOST A MAN.

CONTENTS.

Two lads had crossed the sunny meadow-land of
childhood and stood by the gate, at the entrance to
the rougher paths of youth leading up to the grander
heights of maturity. They glanced backward, but
not with regret, for their eyes shone with eagerness to
climb the upward way. As they waited, an angel came
bearing a gift for each, which he gave them, saying:
“I have brought you a wondrous gift, not for yourselves
but for others. Listen.”

And they bent their heads and listened. And one
said: “I hear most entrancing music. It thrills my
very being. It is for me, for me.”

But the angel said: “Listen again. Shut your ears
to those bewildering tones and you will hear a deeper,
holier strain.”

But the youth said: “No, I hear only that melody
which speaks to my own heart. I can hear nothing
else.”

The other youth too took the gift and, bending his
head at the command of the angel, said: “I hear that
sweet entrancing strain which speaks to myself, and
which promises me pleasure; but deeper than all that
I hear a tone soft, sweet and low, that sounds like the
voices of happy children, and of a mother singing to
her babe.”

The angel smiled. “It is for them,” he said, “that
you must keep your gift. And in the years to come
that music will be to you the sweetest in the world.”

So the youths started on their devious ways through
the hilly land of youth. There were bird-songs and
flowers; there were bright paths, and dark ones; there
were sunny by-paths, which ended in dreamy forests;
there were pitfalls in unexpected places; there was
often sorrow where they looked for joy, and failure
where they expected success. And the one listened
oft to the entrancing music of his angelic gift,
iv
and was led to think only of himself, and his eye lost
its fire, his feet often stumbled, and the days and
nights had no pleasure for him. As he reached the
heights of maturity he was met by a bright creature
who laughed with great joy when he offered her his
love and said exultantly: “I have kept myself pure
for you,” and he, knowing his own dark secrets, could
make no reply but hung his head and was silent.
And, thus silent, he heard no more the bewildering
music of his youth, but instead there came to his ears
the sound of a broken-hearted woman’s sobs, and the
weeping of children mourning the birthright that had
been lost for them in their father’s wayward youth.
And the man said sighingly:

But the other lad turned a deaf ear to the brain-bewildering
music and listened with his soul for the
happy melodies of the future. And his eye grew
brighter and his strength increased and his paths were
straight and clean, and as he neared the heights of
maturity he was met by one whose robe was shining
in its brightness and who whispered: “I have kept
myself pure for you.”

And gladly he answered: “And I for you;” and so
their lives became one, and the melody of happy
children’s voices drew nearer and nearer, and listening
to the sweet voice of the mother singing to her
babe, and looking into the bright and rosy faces that
with every glance and motion thanked him for their
dower of health and honor, he blessed the great Creator
from whom he had received the wondrous gift
of potential fatherhood, and gave thanks that he had
wisely listened to the angel’s voice bidding him keep
his gift for those whose life, in the years to come, was
to be his holiest possession.

By Mary Wood-Allen, M. D.

“Let me take your book of quotations, please.”

“Certainly, if I can find it. O, I remember. I
let Susie Glenn take it. No doubt I can find it in
her desk.”

As she spoke Miss Bell walked to the desk and,
finding the desired book, took possession of it. An
open note dropped from it and fell upon the floor.
Picking it up Miss Bell read: “My darling little
sweetheart,” and glancing at the close saw the signature,
“Carl.” Sending of notes in school was
forbidden, therefore Miss Bell had no compunction
of conscience in taking possession of this one, and,
on the impulse of the moment, read it aloud to Miss
Lane, her fellow-teacher. It was not only sentimental
in tone but there were mysterious phrases
which seemed to hold a deep and sinful significance.
The women looked at each other with sorrowful
faces.

“What shall I do about it?” asked Miss Bell.

“What a depth of wickedness it reveals!” exclaimed
Miss Lane. “Who would have imagined
that such a nice appearing boy as Carl Woodford
could be so base? And Susie Glenn too, such a
shy, modest little creature as she seems.”

“Do you suppose it is really as bad as it seems
to us? Those expressions which appear to indicate
such––such almost criminal intimacy perhaps they
do not understand fully.”

“Don’t you believe it,” said Miss Lane. “I
tell you these children are wiser in sin than we
older people can imagine. That boy needs to be
whipped within an inch of his life, the little reprobate!
I’d give him such a lecture as would make
his eyes open wide for once. I’d make him understand
that he’d better not let me catch him in such
mischief again. And I’d tell Mrs. Glenn about it
so that she could punish Susie.”

“I really am afraid that the result would not
be what we wish. Suppose we go and talk it over
with Dr. Barrett. Maybe she can tell us what to
do.”

Dr. Barrett received the ladies with cordiality
and professed herself willing to aid them in the
solution of their problem. She did not appear as
shocked as they did, and even smiled a little as
Miss Lane, in indignant tones, read aloud the
offending note.

“Don’t you think that little rascal should be
nearly annihilated?” she asked, turning to the
Doctor.

“I think he should be instructed,” replied the
latter. “Will you send him to me, Miss Bell?”

“Most gladly, but I don’t believe he will come.”

“Yes he will, if you don’t frighten him beforehand.
Don’t say a word to him about the affair,
but send him with a note to me and tell him to wait
for an answer.”

The next evening Carl appeared at the Doctor’s
residence with the note from Miss Bell. “I am to
wait for an answer,” he said.

Dr. Barrett only nodded as she wrote on steadily
for a moment, seeming too much engrossed in her
7
work to notice him. Then she read the note,
thought a moment, excused herself and left the
room. Returning immediately she said, “It will
be half an hour before the answer is ready. Can
you wait?”

“O certainly.”

“Then sit down here and look over the Youth’s
Companion while I finish my letter.”

For some moments there was silence and then
the Doctor, laying down her pen, turned to the boy
and said, pleasantly; “You are Carl Woodford, are
you not?”

“Yes, ma’am.”

“It has been so long since I saw you that you
have almost grown out of my knowledge. You are
getting to be almost a man. You must be fifteen
years old.”

“Not quite. I will be next June.”

“Almost a man,” said Dr. Barrett softly as she
looked thoughtfully into the fire. After a moment’s
silence she asked, “Carl, what is it to be a man?”

The boy drew himself up with a self-conscious
air as he replied.

“Why, to have your growth, and get into business
for yourself.”

“Well, that is not quite it,” said the Doctor
smiling, “for I have my growth and am in business
for myself, and yet I am not a man.”

“Maybe it means having a mustache,” said
Carl, with a slight flush.

“That has something to do with it certainly, but
Mrs. Flynn has a mustache, and she is not a man.”

“Well, I don’t know how to explain it then,”
said Carl.

“You have studied grammar, will you parse the
word man?”

“Man is a common noun, masculine gender,
third–––”

“What does masculine gender mean?”

“It means male.”

“Then to be a man means to be a male. How
does the grammar define gender?”

“The distinction of nouns with regard to
sex.”

“Have you studied physiology?”

“Yes’m.”

“Was it the physiology of man or woman?”

“Why, it didn’t say anything but physiology.”

“You studied, then, only those organs in which
men and women are alike, as in their muscular and
nervous systems, and in the organs of digestion; in
fact you learned only of the organs which are for
the preservation of the individual. You learned
nothing of them in regard to sex, which is termed
special physiology.”

A wave of color was creeping over Carl’s face,
seeing which the Doctor said:

“As you have never studied this special physiology
supposing you try to forget that any one has
ever told you anything about it, and let us for a few
minutes talk of it as of God’s laws. We believe
God to be pure, and we cannot believe that he
would make a law that was founded on impurity.
It is true we are able to think of his laws in an
impure way, but that is our fault, not his. Let us
now try to think his pure thoughts after him. If
there are two sexes created by the Almighty he
must have a pure purpose in creating them. We
9
seldom think how much of beauty and melody and
loveliness is due to sex.

“It is because of sex that we are gathered
in families and enjoy all the delights of home. It
is because of sex that we have ties of kindred,
brothers, sisters, father, mother, uncles, aunts and
cousins. Think of the pleasant home gatherings at
Christmas or Thanksgiving, or upon family birthdays,
with all the relatives, old and young, meeting
in love and sympathy; think of the sweet
prattle of children in the home; think of the tender
ministrations of mother or sister in times of sorrow
or illness or death, and remember that these are
possible because of sex. Men may build themselves
fine club houses where they congregate to smoke or
drink or eat together, but these are not homes.
Women may go away by themselves into a convent
and give up the world, but in so doing they give
up the home; for in a real true home there must be
parents and children, and this comes through sex.
We may go even farther and say with Mr. Grant
Allen that everything high and ennobling in our
nature springs directly from the fact of sex. He
claims that to it ‘we owe our love of color, of graceful
forms, of melodious sound, of rhythmical
motion, the evolution of music, of poetry, of
romance, of painting, of sculpture, of decorative
art, of dramatic entertainment. From it,’ he
says, ‘springs the love of beauty, around it all
beautiful arts circle as their centre. Its subtle aroma
pervades all literature, and to it we owe the
heart and all that is best within it.’

“We read of knights of old fighting for ‘fayre
ladye,’ of heroes who died to save wives and children;
10
we cannot take up a book of poetry without
realizing how love of men and women has been
the inspiration of the poet in all ages. And this
is not all that we owe to sex. In all organic
life we find the same force at work. The song
of the nightingale is a call to his mate, the
chirp of cricket, the song of the thrush, the
note of the grasshopper, every charming voice in
wild nature are notes of love, and were it not for
these, field and forest would be silent. Among the
animals we can trace the beauty of form and of
covering to the same source. And even in the
inanimate world of plants and trees we find sex as
the source of life and beauty. The bright tinted
flowers are the homes of the father and mother and
babies of the plant and without the male and female
principle in plants there would be no bud or blossom
and no fruit. Remember when you see the
beauty of the apple orchard in the spring and the
glowing fruit in the autumn that these are the
expression of sex-life in the tree.”

“My!” exclaimed Carl, “I never thought of
all that before.”

“I presume not, and many who are older than
you have no thoughts of sex but those which are
low and vile. But when you consider how the
same principle reaches through all nature, and upon
it depends so much that is beautiful and charming
you cannot believe that is in itself vile and unholy,
can you? If we are to think God’s thoughts after
him we must come to look upon sex as something
to be thought of and spoken of only with reverence,
never to be jested about or debased in any way.
You begin to see that more is involved in the
11
coming into manhood than you had supposed. But
we have not gone over the whole matter yet. You
have read the first chapter of Genesis how that God
made man in his own image, and out of the dust of
the earth. We do not suppose that he made him
out of dirt and water, as a child makes mud-pies,
but we may accept this as a statement of the scientific
fact that in man are found the same elements
as in the earth, such as iron, soda, lime, etc. What
we want to think of now is the statement that God
created man by his direct power. Then we are told
he made woman also. These are the first living
human beings of whom we have record. Who is
the third?”

“Cain.”

“And who made Cain?”

“God,” answered Carl glibly, as if that must
be the only orthodox answer.

“In the same way that he made Adam and
Eve?”

Carl blushed and was silent.

“You were not embarrassed when I spoke of
the creation of Adam and Eve, you have no reason
to be embarrassed when I speak of the creation of
Cain. All was in accordance with the divine will,
and must therefore be right. We cannot say positively
that God thought this or that, but we have
a right to judge from his acts what his purposes
were. We have a right to suppose that he created
the earth intending to people it with human beings.
Of course every possible plan for doing this was
open to him. He might have created each individual
as he did Adam, but what would have been the
result? We should have stood, each one alone, in
12
selfish solitariness, like a lot of ten-pins, able to
knock each other down but not to help each other
up. Each one would have been thinking only of
himself and his own selfish interests. This plan
could not commend itself to a compassionate Creator,
and we can imagine that he would say to himself:
‘That would never do. I must put these, my
children, in such relation to each other that they
will have love for each other; that they will be
bound by ties so strong that nothing can break
them; they must be created in such a way that they
will also understand their relation to me and love
me as their life-giver. To do this I will share with
them my greatest power, that of creation. I will
let them help me people the world. By this creative
power they shall come to understand how I,
their heavenly Father, love them, and yearn over
them, and by their dependence as children upon
their parents they shall learn to depend upon and
trust me.’ From the plan God adopted for peopling
the earth we may suppose this to have been his process
of thought. So you see that sex comes as a
wondrous gift from God, a gift endowed with a
marvelous power, and therefore to be held most
sacred. When I spoke of you as being almost a
man it was with the thought that now is being conferred
upon you this gift of sex.”

Carl looked up with some surprise. “Why, I
have always been a boy.”

“True. And a boy is a being who will become
a man. But he is not endowed with the functions
of sex until he is about fourteen years old. Then
sex begins to make itself felt in his whole being.
He grows taller rapidly; he gains in breadth; he
13
begins to see the long-looked-for mustache; he
notices the growth of the special organs of sex; he
begins to feel more manly; to enjoy the society of
girls as never before; and desires to treat them with
more attention. This is a time when, if he is
wrongly taught, he may fall into great wrong-doing
and injure himself, and not that alone, but those
who are to come after him. I have not yet told you
of the great responsibilities that come with this gift
of sex.”

Dr. Barrett rose and, bringing a book from the
shelves, opened it and showed Carl an illustration,
saying; “Did you ever see such a picture as this?”

“What are they?”
asked he. “They look
like pollywogs.”

“As much like them
as anything. But they
are not pollywogs. They
have a bigger sounding
name than that. They
are called spermatozoa, or
each one is a spermatozoon.
They are so tiny
that they are not visible except with the aid of a
microscope, and yet they are alive and very active.
They live and move in a fluid called semen, and
they are the living principle contributed by the
male to the formation of a new creature. Each one
contains in itself all the particular traits, characteristics
or talents which the father would confer on
the child of which this spermatozoon would form a
part. You are like your father in some things, I
suppose.”

“Yes, I am like papa in size and in my love
for mathematics. He says I have his quick temper,
too.”

“That leads me to speak of another fact. You
see that you were a part of your father during his
whole life, and you were affected by all that affected
him. You were changed or modified by his habits.
If he tried to curb his quick temper, it has made it
easier for you to control yourself; but if he allowed
it full sway, it has made it harder for you. If he
were truthful and honest, it has made it easy for
you to be the same; but if he were wild and dissipated,
it would make it easier for you to yield to
the same temptations.”

“Was that what he meant when he said he was
not surprised that Will Grey was so bad a boy, for
his father was a very wild young man?”

“Yes, that was exactly what he meant.”

“If that is so why don’t fathers tell their boys
about it so that they can behave better when they
are young?”

“That is just what I think they ought to do,
but unfortunately people have thought they must
not talk of these things to young folks for fear it
will make them bad instead of good.”

“Well, I guess that would depend upon the
way they told it. Now they don’t tell it right, but
leave the boys to be told in wrong ways, and that
really does lead them to be bad. No one ever
talked to me as you have to-night, and I am sure
it makes me want to be better.”

“That ought to be the effect, and I believe it
would be if boys were only ‘told right,’ as you say.
But I have told you only half the story. Here is
15
another picture. These are called ova. One is
an ovum, and these are the principle the mother
gives to the future
child. They are
greatly magnified.
It would take 240
of them lying side
by side to make a
row an inch long,
so we say they are ¹⁄₂₄₀
of an inch in
diameter, but tiny
as they are, each
ovum contains all
the traits or talents that the mother gives to the
child of which this particular ovum may form a
part. Your mother is English, your father American.
Their childhood and youth were spent thousands
of miles apart, and yet both were working by
the habits of their lives to create you in your peculiar
traits and talents. Are you like your parents
in any of their capabilities?”

“Yes, I am like mother in her love for music;
you know she is a fine musician.”

“Yes, and in the cultivation of her own musical
ability she made it easier for you to learn music;
just as your father, in his study as an engineer, has
given you a love for mathematics.”

“But my grandfather and great-grandfather
were engineers, and I am going to be one, too.”

“It is true that you inherit from your grandparents,
also, but it must be through your parents,
and they may have changed the direction of the
inheritance. This important fact you should know
16
and remember. You can change yourself by education
so that the inheritance of your children may
be quite changed. For example, if you know that
you lack perseverance, you can, by constantly making
a mighty effort to overcome this defect, compel
yourself to persevere, and this would tend to give
your children perseverance. So you see we need
not despair because we have inherited faults from
our ancestors, but we should determine all the more
that we will not pass these defects on to later generations.”

“I guess that is what Dr. Brice meant when he
said that mother’s good care of her health had overcome
in us children to a great extent the tendency
to consumption which is in her family. Nearly all
my cousins on her side die with it, but when she
was a little girl her father made her live out of
doors all the time and she grew strong, and we none
of us seem to have any tendency to consumption.”

“You see then the value of caring for yourself
in youth, not only for your own sake but for that
of your children. Your mother did not know that
she would ever have children to be benefitted by
her out-door life. But one day she met a young
man who pleased her, and as they grew to know
each other better they came to love each other so
that they wished to leave home and friends and
make their own home and live their united lives
separate and apart from all the rest of the world.
So they were married, as we say. Marriage is the
union of one man and one woman under the sanction
of the law. This is the closest and most sacred
human relation. In this relation the spermatozoon
of the man unites with the germ or ovum of the
17
woman and a new life is begun. When your parents
knew that such a little life had begun in their
home they felt a great and holy joy, and desired
that every good might surround it in its development.
You were the first to come into your father’s
home. After your life had begun you were still so
small as not to be visible to the naked eye, and
would have been lost had you come into the world.
But a home had been prepared for you in your
mother’s body, where day by day you grew and
grew. The food which she ate nourished you as well
as herself. The air which she breathed was life to
you as well as to her.

“You have seen the father-bird bringing food to
the mother-bird as she sits upon her eggs and waits
for the birdlings to come forth, and you have
thought it a pretty sight to watch his tender care
of her. Even so your father watched over your
mother and you. He provided everything as pleasant
as possible, he removed every care from her
path so that she might be happy and so make you
happy. His love for her took on a new and strange
tenderness it had not known before. And she, holding
you warm and close in the embrace of her body,
thought of you and loved you. She wondered how
you would look; she dreamed of you; she fancied
she could feel the touch of your fluttering fingers;
she made your little wardrobe and with each stitch
wove in some tender thought of the baby whom she
had never seen. Then one day she cried out with
great anguish of body but joy of heart, ‘O my
baby is coming.’ Then through long hours she
suffered, going down almost to the gates of death
that you might have life. But she never murmured;
18
in spite of all her pain and anguish of body
her very soul was full of rejoicing that soon she
would hold you in her arms. When all those hours
of peril and anxiety were past and you were laid in
your mother’s arms, your father came and bent
over you both with a measureless love, and looking
into your little face they knew what the Scripture
meant when it said, ‘And they twain shall be one
flesh,’ for were not you a living fulfillment of that
saying? You were a part of each united in a living
being who belonged to them both. Then for the
first time could they realize, even dimly, the yearning,
tender love of their heavenly Father who had
granted to them to know by experience his feelings
towards his children.”

Great tears had gathered in the boy’s eyes as
she talked, and now with choking voice he said,
“I don’t think I can ever be disobedient again, Dr.
Barrett. I did not understand it all as I do now.
You know we only hear these things talked of
among the boys, and I had come to feel that there
was some reason why I ought to be ashamed of my
father and mother; but it all looks so different to
me now. I wish you could talk to the other boys
as you have to me.”

“It may not be possible for me to do so, although
I should be glad to do it, but you can help them to
think more truly on these subjects. You can
especially help them to treat women and girls with
more respect than they often do, because you can
see how an injury to any girl is an injury to the
whole world.”

“I don’t quite see that,” said Carl.

“You can see that if any one had injured your
19
mother in her girlhood it would have been an injury
to all her children, can you not?”

“O yes.”

“And that injury might be passed on to future
generations. There lived a poor girl, about a hundred
years ago, who was uncared for by good people
and wronged by evil ones, and to-day she is
known as a ‘mother of criminals,’ and no one can tell
where the mischief will end. You would feel very
indignant if you knew that some one had done your
mother an injury in her girlhood, and you would feel
the same way should any one wrong your sisters.”

“I knocked Bill Jones down last week because
he said something to my sister Kate.”

“You felt a righteous anger and manifested it.
Well, in all probability you will some day marry.
If so, there is in the world to-day the girl who will
be your wife. How do you want her to be treated
by the boys who are her school-companions? Do
you like to think that they are rough with her, or
playing at lovering with her? Is it a pleasant
thought that she is allowing them to caress her or
write her silly sentimental notes?”

Carl’s face was scarlet, but he answered bravely;
“No, it isn’t.”

The Doctor continued. “Some day, in all likelihood,
a little girl-child will climb upon your knee
and call you papa. No creature can ever be to you
what that little daughter will be. If any one should
injure her–––.”

“I’d kill him,” broke in Carl hotly.

“If you feel that way, dear boy, you should remember
that every girl is some one’s daughter, perhaps
some one’s sister, will probably be some one’s
20
wife and some one’s mother, so that all girls should
be sacred to you, treated with chivalrous courtesy
and protected even as you feel you would protect
those who may belong especially to you.”

“But don’t you believe in boys and girls being
friends at all?”

“Most assuredly I do. Nothing is more charming
than the frank comradeship of girls and boys,
and that is why I am so sorry to see them spoil it
with sentimentality. They ought to be good
friends, helping each other, having jolly good times
together, but never in ways that will bring a blush
to the cheeks of either, now, or in the years to
come.”

A rap sounded on the door and the maid entered
with a note which she gave to the doctor, who
handed it to Carl, saying, “Here is the note for
Miss Bell. I have kept you waiting a long time,
but I hope it has not been unprofitable.”

“Indeed it has not. I am ever so much obliged
to you, I am sure.”

“And if you ever wish to talk to me again you
will feel free to come, will you not?”

“Yes, ma’am, I surely will,” answered the
lad with a frank clasp of the hand.

“Wait a moment,” said the doctor, “I have
just thought of a little book that I am sure you will
be interested in reading. It is called ‘A Gateway
and a Gift,’ and it deals with some of the questions
we have been talking about this evening. You can
lend it to some of your boy friends if you wish.”

“Thank you,” said Carl, taking the book which
the doctor handed him, and then with another
“Good night,” he walked away in the darkness.

The note which he gave to Miss Bell the next
morning read merely:

“Don’t say anything to Carl. Just wait.”

If Miss Bell had seen a note slipped by Carl into
Susie Glenn’s hand an hour later she might have
thought it an evidence that the doctor’s plan had
failed. But had she read the note her opinion
would have been that it had succeeded. It read:

“Dear Susie:––It was real mean of me to write
that note yesterday. Will you forgive me? Say,
Susie, I think all this nonsense about lovers and
sweethearts is silly rot, don’t you? Let’s be just
friends. Respectfully yours,

Carl.”

Susie’s answer was short but to the point. It read:

“All right. Let’s.

Susie.”

Several months later Miss Bell and Miss Lane
called again on Dr. Barrett.

“Have you come with another problem?” asked
the doctor.

“No, we have come to report progress and to
learn, if possible, just how it has come about. There
has been a wonderful change in the school. The
girls and boys are no less friendly, but it is without
that silly sentimentality which was so annoying.
They are now just real good comrades, and seem to
help each other in being orderly, polite, and studious.
How did you do it?”

“Perhaps all credit is not due to me, but I will
say that I gave Carl the instruction I thought he
needed and he has passed the good word along.
Several of the boys have met with me once a month
to study concerning themselves, and I can see that
they have grown to have a reverence for themselves
and a deep regard for all womanhood. Carl was in
22
last evening, and said, ‘Dr. Barrett, I am so glad
Miss Bell sent me with that note to you, for your
talk to me that night has changed my whole life,
I know. I feel so much cleaner all through, and
have so much more respect for myself. And I
think so differently of girls and women, and especially
of my mother, and I realize as I never did before
how important a thing it is to be almost a man.’”

Three gateways span the path of earthly existence:
one at the entrance which we call the gate
of birth; one at the close which we call the gate of
death, and one at the entrance to the wondrous Land
of the Teens, which we call the gate of manhood or
of womanhood. At each of these gates a wonderful
gift is presented to each individual. At the gate
of birth it is the gift of earthly life, at death
it is the gift of continued life, and at the gate which
opens into the Land of the Teens it is the gift of
creative life. You see that each gift is of life.

The path of earthly life, beginning at the gateway
of birth, passes through the sunny meadow-land
of Childhood, and also through a strange, mysterious
land to which we have referred as the Land of the
Teens, before reaching the Heights of Maturity.
This Land of the Teens is peculiar in that the
inhabitants are neither children nor adults, and yet,
with the inexperience of children, they have many
of the desires and emotions of grown-up people.
This constitutes an element of great danger, while
23
another source of danger is the fact that adequate
guidance is not always given in this transition
period, or, if proffered, is proudly rejected by those
who think that being in their “teens” makes them
wise above that which is written.

When we visit foreign lands we are grateful for
guidance and direction, especially if we are not
acquainted with the language; so, if we do not hire
a guide we, at least, buy a guide-book. It seems
to me, then, that we ought not to rebel against
guides through the Land of the Teens, realizing
that one who has traveled through a country
can point out beauties and warn against dangers
which would not be recognized by the inexperienced
traveler.

We can visit England, Italy, or Germany many
times, and at each journey can profit by former
experiences, but we pass through the Land of the
Teens but once, and the lessons we learn on that
journey we can only utilize for the benefit of
others. This is why many people on the Heights
of Maturity are anxious to light a beacon for those
who are still in their “teens.” They would
gladly help others to shun the by-paths where
they have met disaster, for they have learned
the very solemn truth that in youth one is determining
what maturity shall be. The seeds sown
in the sunny meadow of Childhood and in the
broader fields of the Land of the Teens are harvested
in the uplands of Maturity, and the harvest
is always greater than the seed sown. The petulance
and pouting of the child hardens into the
gruffness, bad-temper, and moroseness of the man;
the idleness and shirking of the youth becomes the
24
shiftlessness and unreliability of the adult; the boy’s
neglect of duty and unwearied search for pleasure
may be harvested in dissipation and ruin in mature
life. It is, then, a very serious thing to be passing
through one’s “teens,” and the wise youth will
welcome any guide who will show him a safe path.
May I claim the privilege of acting for a little time
in that capacity?

The King of this land has made laws for its
government and wisdom, has builded paths wherein
one may walk in safety. The laws made by the
King are not harsh and cruel, but are beneficent,
and he denies no real good. He says to the traveler,
“You belong to me, and I am desirous of your
highest welfare; therefore, obey me and you shall
be rewarded; disobey me and you shall be punished.”
It needs some moral courage to bravely stay
in the path of Wisdom, for there are many allurements
to leave it; more particularly as the inexperience
of the traveler does not warn him of the dangers
of following pleasures that lead away from wisdom’s
ways. The guide worthy of trust must not
fail to point out these dangers; and the prudent
youth will listen to the warning voice and walk in
Wisdom’s ways, for “all her ways are pleasantness,
and all her paths are peace.”

We talk much about our personal liberty, and
assert that we have a right to live in Maine or California,
but we have not that much liberty in regard
to dwelling in the Land of the Teens. If we are
ever to reach the Heights of Maturity we must
spend ten years in the Teens. We cannot sell our
domain, nor give it away, and we cannot even hire
some one to cultivate it for us. This being the case,
25
it becomes important for us to study the soil and
how best to develop its advantages.

We find that the land has three divisions: the
Domain of the Body, the Field of Intellect, and
the Garden of the Heart,––the same divisions that
exist in the Sunny Land of Childhood, and that we
have been cultivating ever since we were born.
These are the kingdoms which came to us with the
gift of life. We recognize that the gifts which come
to us at birth and death are of life for ourselves
alone, and we have had no thought during our
childish years except to develop our powers for our
own advantage. It may be we have not felt perfectly
satisfied with our lot in life, but we have felt
that we were not responsible for this. We did not
choose to be born in America instead of Asia,
though we do not rebel at this fact. We did not
select to be white instead of black. It is not our
fault if we are born of a family in which consumption
is an inheritance; and, on the other hand, we
can claim no credit to ourselves if we have inherited
strong bodies with healthful tendencies. It is
our misfortune, and not our fault, if we are not
quite perfectly poised by nature; it is our good fortune,
not our foresight, if we have genius instead of
mediocrity. The gifts that come to us through
inheritance are ours without blame or credit to
us but they bring with them the responsibility of
their use. We are responsible for maintaining or
increasing our dower of health by obedience to
physical laws; responsible for the cultivation of
our intellects, for the development of inherited virtues,
and the annihilation of inherited vices.

If you study your characteristics and talents
26
you find that they repeat those of your ancestry.
Your eyes, hair, mouth, chin, your stature, figure,
complexion, your talents, capabilities, tendencies,
your likes and dislikes, your faults as well as your
virtues are repetitions of those who preceded you in
this living network of existence of which you form
a part. If you are not like father or mother you
may be like grandfather or great-grandmother. If
you do not find yourself repeating the characteristics
or personality of any one ancestor, you may
find yourself a composite photograph of several.
And even if you cannot trace in yourself a likeness
to any family representative, you may still be
assured that from some of them your traits have
come to you. You have only to recall the complexity
of your sources of inheritance and then
remember how many words can be spelled from the
twenty-six letters of the alphabet to see that you
can hardly measure the peculiar forces of mind and
body that may come to you though that power of
transmission which we call heredity.

It may occur to you to ask why, if we are not
responsible for our inheritances, is it needful to give
them any particular thought? There are two reasons
why we should consider the good and bad characteristics
which may be ours through inheritance.
In the first place, heredity is not fatality, and we
are not absolutely obliged to follow the paths which
our ancestors marked out for us, and in the second
place, we can, by understanding our own characters,
mark out better paths for our posterity. We are
not only receivers of life, but we may be also givers
of life, and this is the gift that comes to you at the
entrance to the Land of the Teens. Can you imagine
27
a more important period in the life of an individual
than that point where is intrusted to him the
physical powers which make him the arbiter of the
destiny of those who come after him?

The gift of possible life for others is even more
marvelous than that of actual life for one’s self and
brings with it greater responsibility. It is accompanied
with marked physical changes. You have
observed them in yourself, though you perhaps have
not understood them. Up to this time you have been
but a child, and all your physical forces have been
occupied in keeping you alive and growing. But
you are now to become a man, with powers that
will unite you to the race; powers that will give
you the ability to form a new link in the living
chain that now ends with you. You have noticed
the rapid unfolding of your bodily powers; you
have become conscious of new and strange emotions;
you have, it may be, found yourself becoming
irritable and have felt bewildered with the new
aspects of life and have wondered what it all means.
It may be you have felt as did one boy who said to
his mother, to whom he confided all his problems of
life: “Mamma, I want to kick and cry, and I don’t
know why.” The mother knew. She understood
the strange unfolding that was going on in his
physical organism, and she kindly explained it to
him, telling him that he must have patience with
himself, and govern himself by his judgment and
not allow himself to be carried away by impulse,
assuring him that God would hold him as responsible
for purity of character as He would the dear
sister of whom they all felt so careful. He should
reverence his manhood, even as he expected her to
28
reverence her womanhood. This is necessary, not
only for the good of each individual, but also for
the eternal interest of future generations.

This entrance into the Land of the Teens is a
serious, even a dangerous period, for if you have
not had right instruction you may be led, or fall
into habits of wrong doing or thinking. If you are
rightly taught you will begin to have an added
reverence for yourselves in that God is dignifying
you with new powers that will bring you more
nearly into co-partnership with himself. These
powers, the most sacred of all that have come to
you, need years for development, and should be
guarded by pure thoughts and kept for their holy
office of promoting the earthly usefulness and
eternal blessedness of those who hereafter will owe
both earthly and immortal life to you.

I have said that we are not responsible for the
dower of virtues or of vices which are ours by
inheritance, but we are responsible for the inheritances
of our children, and this is a most solemn
thought. Do you not begin to see that we cannot
value ourselves too highly if we have the right idea
of what our real worth is? We can scarcely overestimate
the results of our own deeds. We may
think it does not matter if we do not always tell the
exact truth; if at some times we equivocate and at
others exaggerate, but when we remember that
truth is the foundation of character, and realize
that by our little equivocations or exaggerations we
may be weakening the foundations of many who
are from us to receive their talents and tendencies,
we begin to see that the matter is a very serious
one. I am sometimes told that young people
29
will not be influenced by a consideration for the
welfare of unborn generations whose existence is
very problematical in their thought; but my observation
is that young folks are much more sensible
than we give them credit for being. More than one
young man has said to me: “I was never taught
that my conduct and thought would impress themselves
upon my children, but now that I see that
such is the case, I am sure that I will hereafter be
more careful of my life than I ever have been.”

This field of investigation is a broad one, and
even if you never have an opportunity to study the
subject scientifically you can still be of incalculable
benefit to humanity by ever remembering that you
are living for an earthly, as well as for a heavenly
immortality. The young people who to-day are in
the Land of the Teens are they who are determining
the characteristics of the men and women of the
Twentieth Century, creating the standards of
thought and action, the methods of business, the
level of morals, in fact the whole status of society
in the world of a hundred years to come.

It is a very wonderful fact that God has so
created us that the result of our deeds is not limited
to our own lives, but makes its impress upon those
who are to come after us. We are not separate
units, but are links in a living chain of endless
transmission. This fact makes our lives of far
greater consequence than if, in their results, they
were limited to ourselves. If we are anxious concerning
the future of our country, we may take
to heart the thought that it will be what we ourselves
have made it. The Bible expresses the same
idea in many ways. “Whatsoever a man soweth,
30
that shall he also reap,” does not mean merely that
his own future will be influenced by his conduct,
but that his future in his children will be a record
which he himself has made.

Men often make their wills and bequeath to their
children their gold or houses and lands, but sometimes
against their wills they bequeath to their
children a bodily dwelling of inferior material, and
so poor in construction that it very soon falls into
decay through disease, or in very early life becomes
a tottering ruin. It would seem rather amusing to
us if one should sit down and write his will and say:
“I bequeath to my daughter Mary my yellow,
blotched and pimpled complexion, resulting from
my own bad habits of life. I bequeath to my son
John, the effects of my habits of dissipation in my
youth, with a like love for alcoholic liquors and
tobacco. I bequeath to my son Harry my petulant,
irritable disposition, and the rheumatic gout which
I have brought upon myself by disobedience to
physical law; and to my daughter Elizabeth, my
trembling nerves and weak moral nature.” But
this is, in truth, what many parents do, and the
children find it a sad, instead of an amusing
fact.

On the other hand, if one has led a life of uprightness
and morality, and has obeyed physical
law, his children will inherit his physical vigor,
and his moral stamina. It becomes of exceeding
great importance that these facts should be known
to the young, in order that they may endeavor to
overcome their own weaknesses, and strengthen
their own good qualities for the sake of future
generations.

This heredity, the transmission of the qualities
of the parent to the child, is found among plants
and animals as well as in the human race. The
seed of a plant produces another plant of the same
kind, and the farmer knows when he sows wheat,
that his harvest will be wheat, and he should know
just as certainly that if he “sows wild oats” in his
youth he may expect “wild oats” in his children.
The character of the food we eat, the air we breathe,
the occupations we follow, the habits we create, are
the forces which shape not only our own destiny,
but create the tendencies of our children.

With these thoughts in mind, the question of the
use of narcotics becomes one of great importance.
There are few, if any, tobacco users who are anxious
that their boys should early begin the use of the weed.
But they do not realize the fact that in their own
use of it they may have diminished the vital force
of these boys, transmitting a tendency to disease, or
perhaps an appetite for the tobacco itself, and not
only will the boys feel the effects, but the girls as
well. As the thought of men is turned in this
direction, proofs are accumulating of the evil
results to the children of tobacco-using parents.
A prominent physician says: “I have never
known an habitual tobacco user whose children did
not have deranged nerves, and sometimes weak
minds. Shattered nervous systems, for generations
to come, may be the result of this indulgence. The
children of tobacco-using parents frequently die
with infantile paralysis. I have known two cases
in which the crying of the baby could not be stopped
until the tobacco-pipe was placed between its
lips.” Dr. Pidduck asserts that in no instance is the
32
sin of the father more strikingly visited upon his
children than the sin of tobacco using. “The
enervation, the hypochondriasis, the hysteria, the
insanity, the dwarfish deformities, the consumption,
the suffering lives, and early deaths of the children
of inveterate smokers bear ample testimony to the
feebleness and unsoundness of the constitution
transmitted by this pernicious habit.”

The effect of alcohol upon the child is equally
marked, and from all sides comes the testimony that
the degenerations do not stop with the individual,
but pass on to succeeding generations. Sometimes
the influence is seen in the stunting of the growth,
both mentally and physically. Dr. Langden Downe
reports several cases of this sort where the children
had lived to be twenty-two years old and still remained
infants, symmetrical in form, just able to
stand beside a chair, utter a few monosyllabic
sounds, and to be amused with toys. Dr. F. R.
Lees, referring to the injury inflicted upon the liver
by alcohol, says: “And recollect, whatever injury
you inflict upon this organ, to your posterity the
curse descends, and as is the father, so are the
children.” Dr. Kerr asserts that the effects of injury
to the mind and body may not always show
themselves in the drinker himself, yet it is doubtful
if his children ever entirely escape the effects in one
form or another. These effects may be manifest in
insanity, or in a tendency to diseases of the stomach,
liver, bowels, lungs, or other organs; or with a like
love for alcoholic stimulants. Not only may the
child be weak in body but also in intellect. It is
the statement of a score of observant physicians that
33
the children of intemperate parents are apt to be
feeble in body and weak in mind.

Another very striking thought in this connection
is that while the physical effects may not show
in the individual himself, nor in his children, they
may be manifest in the deterioration of his grandchildren
and great-grandchildren. A prominent
temperance advocate who was laid up with rheumatic
gout, which is apt to be the result of alcoholic
indulgence, replied to a friend who wondered
that he, a drinker of cold water, should suffer
with this disease, “Yes, my ancestors drank the
liquor and I foot the bills.” In 1834 the Parliament
of the British House of Commons made a
report of intemperance in which they stated that
the evils of alcoholism “are cumulative in the
amount of injury they inflict, as intemperate parents,
according to high medical testimony, give a
taint to their offspring before birth, and the poisonous
stream of spirits is conveyed through the milk
of the mother to the infant at the breast; so that the
fountain of life, through which nature supplies that
pure and healthy nutriment of infancy, is poisoned
at its very source, and a diseased and vitiated appetite
is thus created, which grows with its growth,
and strengthens with its increasing weakness and
decay.”

A tendency to commit suicide seems to be a
marked bequest of an inebriate parent to his children,
and it is well to state that in the opinion of
medical men who are dealing with all forms of
inebriety, the evils resulting to the children may be
transmitted by parents who have never been noted
for drunkenness. Continual moderate drinking
34
keeps the body so constantly under the influence of
alcohol that a crowd of nervous difficulties and disorders
may be transmitted even more surely than
from the parent who has occasional sprees with long
intervals of sobriety between. It is not only
through the drinking father that injury is done to
the children, but the mother may have a vitiated
inheritance from her father and transmit it to her
children.

When we recall the fact that one hundred thousand
men fall into drunkard’s graves every year,
we are appalled at the thought of that vast army
marching on to death and destruction. As we
listen, we can, in fancy, almost hear the tramp,
tramp of that “mighty host advancing, Satan
leading on.” In the front rank comes the one
hundred thousand men who shall fall into drunkard’s
graves this year, and behind them the one
hundred thousand men who are to fall next
year. They come with sound of revelry and song,
and close beside them press a crowd of weeping
wives and mothers and little children, starved,
crippled, and murdered, who are to be fellow victims
with the drunkard. Not very far back from
the front row come one hundred thousand young
men in the very prime of young, vigorous life,
just beginning to drink their first glass of wine or
beer, with no intention of ever standing in that
front row, yet having started on the way. Back of
them, one hundred little school boys who think it
manly to ape the follies of their predecessors. Back
of them, one hundred thousand little toddlers whose
feet stagger in their innocent helplessness. Back
of them, one hundred thousand mothers with babies
35
in their arms. Oh, how sweetly those baby eyes
look up into the loving eyes that are brooding over
them. Is it possible those baby brows will ever lie
low in the gutter, those sweet lips be stained by
oath or glass; those crumpled rose-leaf fingers ever
strike the murderous blow incited by alcohol? It
must be, if that front rank of one hundred thousand
drunkards is to be recruited, for the drunkards
of the future are to-day babies in their mother’s
arms. Do you who read these words intend to join
this vast army of prospective drunkards, or will
you belong to the cold-water army that is marching
on accompanied by health, vigor, industry,
prosperity, success and long life?

We must not be so interested in the inheritance
of evil qualities as to forget the transmission of
good. We read in Exodus, twentieth chapter, that
the sins of the fathers are to be visited upon the
children unto the third and fourth generations of
them that hate the Lord, but mercy will be shown
to thousands of generations of them that love Him
and keep his commandments. As we have seen
the sins of the fathers are visited upon the children
in transmission of diseased bodies, perverted
moral natures and weakened wills, and realize that
the promise is being fulfilled in the visitation of
the sins of the fathers upon the children, let us
see if the other promise is being fulfilled also, in
the mercy shown to thousands of them that love the
Lord and keep His commandments.

An English specialist in children’s diseases has
carefully noted the difference between twelve families
of drinkers and twelve families of sober parents
during a period of twelve years.

INTEMPERATE.	TEMPERATE.
Produced 57 children; 25 died in the first week of life. These deaths due to convulsions, or œdema of brain and membranes. 2 were idiots. 5 dwarfs. 5 epileptics. 1 had chorea. 5 were deformed. 2 became drunkards. This leaves only 10 who showed during the whole of life a normal disposition and development of body and mind.	Produced 61 children; 6 died in first week, of weakness. 4 had curable diseases. 2 showed inherited nervous defects. This leaves 50 who were in every way normal, sound in body and mind.

If it were not a fact that health, purity, integrity,
intellect and virtue were being transmitted to
a far greater extent than sin and vice, there would
be little good in the world, but the transmission of
these good qualities is so extended, so like the air
and the sunshine and the water, a common thing,
that we almost forget to recognize it. When we
turn our thoughts to the investigation of this phase
of the subject, we find that vigorous parents have
healthful children, that powers of intellect are
transmitted, and that honesty and uprightness in
the father warrants us in expecting the same in the
son. We recognize the transmission of powers of
intellect in the fact that where the parents have a
peculiar talent, we very generally find the same
talent in their children. We are acquainted with
musical families, mathematical families, artistic
families, and in the study of renowned people of
the world we find evidences of this transmission of
intellect. We also learn that the effects of education
are transmissible, and if the parents are educated
along a certain line the children receive education
37
along that line much more readily. This fact becomes
a wonderful incentive to us to build up all that
is best in our own natures in order that through us
the world may receive an impetus towards higher
and better things.

Sometimes when your faults and defects press
upon you with tremendous force and you find it so
very hard to overcome them, you may be tempted
to lay the blame on your ancestry who gave you
such a dower, who by their lives handicapped you
in your life-struggle. You may feel inclined to
say with some writer, to me unknown, who says:

HEREDITY.

But the lesson of these lines is not that you
should lie back in inaction, making no effort to overcome
your defects because they are inheritances.
There is for you a wiser lesson in the theme than
that. When Marshall Ney was taunted with the
fact that the Imperial nobility had no pedigree he
proudly replied, “We are ancestors.”

There is a grand thought for you. If your
ancestors did not do the best for you, will you not
profit by your knowledge of this fact and do the
best for those who shall look back to you as their
ancestor? Supposing that your parents in their
youth had said: “I will take care of my health so
that my children may be born with vigorous bodies;
I will make good use of my intellect so that my
children will inherit an added capacity for acquiring
knowledge; I will obey all laws of morality so
that my children will by inheritance tend toward
virtue;” and supposing that you to-day, with
healthful bodies, keen intellects and upward tending
moral natures, were reaping the reward of their
forethought, would you not bless them for it?

You have no right to remain listless and discouraged
because of your inheritances, whatever
they may be. Hear the inspiriting words of Ella
Wheeler Wilcox:

The youth of to-day have in their own hands
the molding of the future, not only of themselves,
but of the nation, by the every day habits of their
lives. By their thoughts and aspirations, by the
moral tendencies which they are cultivating in
themselves, they are determining what shall be the
characteristics of the nation in a hundred years to
come. Shall this be, in a hundred years, a nation
of drunkards? The young people of to-day are
deciding that question. Shall it be a nation of
invalids? This, also, the young people are deciding.
Shall it be a nation filled with greed of gain, with
a low standard of morals, with dishonest methods
in business, or shall it be a nation wherein vigorous
health is the rule, unflinching courage, absolute
integrity and pure morality shall everywhere
reign? What the young people of to-day are
making of themselves physically, mentally and
morally, is deciding what shall be the future of the
country.

The cross is considered as an emblem of self-denial,
the immolating of selfish wishes upon the
altar of universal good.

In a nobler sense it means not so much self-denial
as the creation of nobler desires, so that the
individual wants only those things which he rightfully
should have; he is not obliged to deny himself,
because he asks nothing but that which is
noble and pure. In this sense the cross is not so
much the emblem of self-denial as an emblem of
self-ennoblement––the exaltation of self.

The White Cross typifies the purifying of the
life from the desire of mere sense pleasures. It
means the noble manhood which claims for itself
the privilege of chastity and the rewards of purity.

The White Cross army is composed of men and
boys over fourteen years of age who unite to resist
vice, to secure safety for the home and for society,
to become all that becomes true manhood. In organized
co-operation there is strength. It is not
only the “long pull” and the “strong pull,” but
the “pull altogether,” that is thoroughly successful.

Hundreds of men are living the white life individually,
but are not associated together in an effort
to influence others. Such association would
result in more rapidly spreading the idea of the
responsibility of the individual, would create public
opinion, would give moral support to those who
might find their unaided strength inadequate to
meet the temptations of the world, in short, would
41
furnish the conditions favorable to the highest
ideals of social and individual life.

The White Cross Society aims to unite men in
such an organized effort for the elevation of moral
standards. Its members are pledged to the keeping
of a fivefold obligation. The first of these appeals
to the chivalry latent in the heart of every
man, making him a protector of every woman,
however lonely or friendless she may be, recognizing
her potential value to the race; protecting
her against his own selfish desires, against the open
and covert assaults of other men, against her own
unwisdom, if need be.

The second obligation pledges the White Cross
knight to a pure heart expressed not only in conduct
but in word. He will think and speak reverently
of life in all its phases, and help to cleanse
the language––written or spoken––of all that pollutes
the heart or vitiates the imagination. The
third obligation claims for the White Cross soldier
the glory of living up to the highest moral standards,
of being as pure as the noblest woman that
lives. The fourth recognizes the power of influence
and binds the members to a helpful interest
in all humanity.

The fifth covers the whole scope of life in the
obligation to use every effort to fulfil the command,
“Keep thyself pure.” The heart of the true man
must throb a quick response to the appeal made to
him by the White Cross.

It means marital fidelity, it implies the sanctity
of the home, it creates individual purity, and that
insures social purity, it means a nobler manhood, a
grander womanhood, a safer childhood.

The appeal is made to you individually. Will
you not become a White Cross knight? Will you
not, even if you cannot join an organized society,
become a standard-bearer of the White Cross,
pledging yourself to its five obligations? Soon
you will find others willing to unite with you in
this great work, and the society will be formed.

Each one who reads this book may become a true
and faithful knight of the White Cross, no matter
where he may be, in city mart or lonely farm, in
busy shop or quiet school, and not only may he be
a soldier, but he may be a recruiting officer, inducing
others to enlist under the White Cross banner.

THE WHITE CROSS PLEDGE.

I Promise, by the Help of God:

1. To treat all women with respect, and endeavor to protect
   them from wrong and degradation.
2. To endeavor to put down all indecent language and
   coarse jests.
3. To maintain the law of purity as equally binding
   upon men and women.
4. To endeavor to spread these principles among my
   companions, and try to help my younger brothers.
5. To use all possible means to fulfil the command,
   “Keep thyself pure.”

Name_______________________

FOR MEN.

By Sylvanus Stall, D. D.

GIRLS

Have long been wanting a book written by Dr.
Wood-Allen for them to correspond with the one
by the same author for

BOYS

At last the demand has been met and the doctor’s
new book,

Almost A Woman,

Presents in attractive form the pure instruction
needed by the girl.

MOTHERS

Will find this just what they have been wanting to
put into the hands of their daughter.

… By MARY WOOD-ALLEN, M. D.

---

TEACHING TRUTH.

Price, 25 Cents …

This little brochure aims to answer in chaste and scientific language the queries of
children as to the origin of life. The reception it has met with is best indicated
by the testimonials received from the press and through private letters.

The principal of a young ladies’ school writes: “I invited our girls to the parlor
and read your brochure, which was listened to with the deepest interest. At certain
portions of the reading nearly all were in tears. It is a most pathetically pure, chaste
presentation of a grand subject. You would have rejoiced could you have heard the
expressions from the young ladies. Surely, dear Dr. Allen, God has blessed many
through your instrumentality.”

Read this book if you read no other but the Bible this year.––Emma Bates, Valley
City, N. D.

Please send me some more copies of your unique and valuable little book. I cannot
keep a copy over night. It would be an evangel to every young person in whose
hands it might be placed. I would also invite the public school teachers to examine this
rare little book.––Frances E. Willard.

A skilful, graceful, and reverent effort to assist parents in what has been a delicate
and difficult task. The author deserves the praise that belongs to the successful pioneer.––George
N. Miller.

The success of the “Teaching Truth,” and “Child-Confidence Rewarded,” together
with the frequent requests for some inexpensive book for the instruction of boys approaching
manhood, has led to the writing of “Almost A Man.” It is intended to help
mothers and teachers in the delicate task of teaching the lad concerning himself, purely
and yet with scientific accuracy.

A booklet designed to help mothers and teachers in the instruction of boys.

Ought to be in the hands of every parent in the land.––Toledo Blade.

Chaste and pure, and admirably adapted to mothers in this most difficult, universally
neglected but very important line of work.––Early Education.

Many mothers will be glad to read what such an authority as Dr. Wood-Allen has
to say on so important and delicate a subject.––Mother’s Journal.

Worth its weight in gold to the puzzled mother, telling her exactly what she wants to
know. This book deals reverently with the great mystery of life.––Ladies’ Home Journal.

Too much cannot be said in its favor.––School Education.

I can conscientiously recommend it to all who are interested in the physical and
moral welfare of youth.––C. A. Dorman, M. D.

Such literature cannot fail to accomplish great and lasting good.––Eng. F. Storke,
M. D.

Many have given good advice, but this is the best.––Rev. Kent White.

I believe this little book would do incalculable good if placed in the hands of boys
after they have reached ten years of age.––Wm. G. Lotze, Gen. Sec. Y. M. C. A., Denver,
Colo.

Teaching by metaphor, parable, and allegory has been the method of many
of the wisest instructors.

No one can claim originality in comparing the body to a house, for that
comparison is as old as literature.

But the simile is still of interest to the juvenile mind, and as science is ever
making new discoveries, there is continual demand for new and interesting works
on physiology.

Dr. Wood-Allen in this new book has united scientific facts and metaphor
with the skill that would be expected from her by those acquainted with her literary
powers.

The book will be found equally valuable as a text-book, a supplementary
reader or a reference book in schools, or as a book of pleasant home instruction.
Teachers in Normal Schools will find it a most suggestive aid in teaching physiology.
As it contains the most reliable scientific facts in regard to alcohol, tobacco,
and other narcotics, it fills the demand created by the school laws compelling
the teaching of the action of narcotics on the human body.

TESTIMONIALS.

A charming book.––Frances Willard.

Only a scientific person can understand how really good it is. It has been to
me intensely interesting, and I hope sincerely that the world at large will appreciate
it.––J. M. W. Kitchen, M. D.

It gives me pleasure to note that the book, both by its subject-matter and its
pleasing form of presentation, is well adapted to the use for which it is intended.––B.
A. Hinsdale, Professor of the Science and Art of Teaching, University of
Michigan.

I find here, wrought out in attractive form, some of the most important knowledge
that our young people ought to know. It is suitable for a supplementary
reader in the upper grammar grades of the public schools. Part Second particularly
is of the highest value to the boys and girls in our grammar and high schools.––W.
S. Perry, Principal of High School, Ann Arbor, Mich.

This excellent work ought to be, not only read, but studied by every one in
and out of our schools who is interested in preserving the integrity of our bodily
and mental functions. The author’s method would make knowledge invigorate
and mature the judgment and not burden the memory, and this is the germinal
idea in all sound education.––Geo. E. Seymour, Professor of History, High School,
St. Louis, Mo.

In this supplementary chapter are given the scientific
facts of special physiology, written in Dr. Wood-Allen’s own
delicate style. Many who have become aroused to the fact
that accurate scientific knowledge is the surest safeguard of
purity, are themselves not well enough instructed to be able
to teach their children. This booklet meets the need of all
such, and gives just what is wanted to instruct young people
in regard to the sacred origin of life. Every one who
owns “Teaching Truth” and “Child-Confidence Rewarded”
will desire to possess this booklet also, for it supplements
these perfectly.

“This little book treats of child-purity with the same delicate
but masterly hand shown in Dr. Allen’s other writings.”––Union Signal
of July 5, 1894.

“Unique and valuable.”––Frances E. Willard.

“I am delighted with it.”––Katherine Lente Stevenson, Chicago.

“Most charmingly written.”––Alice B. Stockham, M. D., Chicago.

“The good it will do is incalculable.”––Emily S. Bouton, in Toledo
Blade.

“The best you have done yet. I can recommend it.”––Earl
Barnes, Professor in Leland Stanford University, Palo Alto, Cal.

It is sui generis, deals frankly and scientifically
with the moral problems of the home, the
school, and society.

It embodies the work of the White Cross, White Shield,
Mother’s Meetings, Child-Culture Circles, and the Rescue
Work. Also deals with the subject of Reform and Legislation for
Morality, and yet continuing to emphasize, most emphatically of all,
the necessity of right instruction as the surest means of promoting
purity. Co-operating with the National Superintendent of the Department
of Health and Heredity, it discusses all topics of health and
inheritance, pre-natal influences, etc. Physical education will also
have its share of attention.

Crusaders of old endeavored to overthrow evil by “force and
arms.” The New Crusade proposes to emphasize the positive
side of life, and waging a peaceful war, aims to supplant
Ignorance by Knowledge; to eradicate Vice by Virtue; to displace
Disease by Health, and to dispel Darkness by Light.

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