p. 198 | A WORD TO BOYS by Frank H. Converse

Seventh-day Adventist Publishing Association · Battle Creek, Mich. · March 25, 1880

FromThe Review and Herald, Vol. 55, No. 13

A WORD TO BOYS.

By Frank H. Converse

You all wish, and doubtless mean, to be or to do something in your day and generation; that is, presuming you have an average amount of common sense. “But,” you say, “we want to have a good time, too.” Well, whether you will or not depends considerably upon your ideas of enjoyment. If you expect to find it in the way in which certain story papers represent enjoyment, you will utterly and entirely fail. If, on the other hand, you are content to take what comes into every well-regulated, decent life in the way of honest, legitimate amusement, that is quite another thing. But one thing remember. God put no one here on earth to be brought up to manhood by hand. To eat, drink, and be merry, and trust to luck for the result, is fatal to soul and body. Our own hands are to be put to practical use. To a great extent we make our own luck, we forge our own fate, and as we do this trusting to the Helper of all, so is the future result. No matter what unsound reading may say about it, there is no such thing as drawing through life with one’s hands in his pockets, squeezing only the sweetness out of existence, and throwing away the bitter rind, as though life were a Florida orange. Mind, this is not preaching, so don’t skip. And let me say that there is something more dear, boys,—something better,—than the life of success to which I hope you all aspire. It is not only to be an honorable, upright man in your dealings with mankind, but it is also to become a disciple of the Lord Jesus Christ. It is not only here that you are to prepare for, but hereafter. God help you all to do it.—Frank H. Converse, in Christian Weekly.