Part 4

The girl sulked off to the fountain swinging the pitcher and loitering along the way. When she reached there no old woman was in sight, but beside the spring was a tall, beautiful young woman who asked her for a drink. The ugly one replied, "There is the pitcher, draw the water for yourself."

When she was about to go, the young woman said sharply: "Stop! the words that fall from your lips are evil things, and they shall look like the things they are. Every word you speak shall be a spider or a snake, until you learn to speak kindly."

The girl trudged off home scarcely thinking about what the woman said, little knowing that it was the same fairy who had spoken to her sister. But when she began to answer her mother, spiders and snakes dropped from her lips, and she was very much frightened.

I wonder whether our words would be pearls or spiders if we could see them? Let us make them pearls.

SUFFOCATED TREES

We sometimes hear of people being suffocated by gas, but it is not often we hear of trees being suffocated.

But the other day I was walking down the street, and noticed that all the trees on one side of the avenue for several blocks were dead. They looked as if they had been fine, strong, healthy trees, and I could not understand why they had all died, until I was told that a gas-pipe beneath their roots had leaked, and that the escaping gas had killed the trees.

I am sure you and I know people who are like those dead trees: they have become discouraged and wilted, and if you and I could dig down into their lives we should probably find something like that poisonous gas which has ruined them.

Sin is the most poisonous thing that gets into one's life.

If a boy or girl has done wrong and is hiding it from his father and his mother, and his conscience is pricking him all the time, then he cannot be sunny and healthy like a growing tree. He becomes cross and easily provoked, and is sulky and wilted.

If you have done something wrong, which you ought to tell your parents about, do not go to sleep until you have told them. If you do, you will wake in the morning with dread, and you will go around all day with a dull ache which will spoil all the sunshine. Moreover, if you begin keeping secrets from your parents in this way you will have no one to check you in your misdeeds. Your parents may punish you, but they are the best friends you have. And besides, there is no punishment like hiding a feeling of guilt. The next best thing after keeping from doing wrong is to own up to it in an honest way when you have done wrong. Many a boy and girl would have been saved untold trouble if they had only been frank with their parents. One of the saddest days in any boy's or girl's life is when they first keep a guilty secret from their parents.

ULYSSES AND THE SIRENS

When you boys and girls get older and further along in school, you will probably learn of a famous Greek whose name was Ulysses. He was noted as a heroic seaman, who travelled over dangerous seas and into unknown lands.

In one of the seas where Ulysses sailed was an island known as the Isle of the Sirens. The sirens would attract sailors to their shores by beautiful music. But when the sailors drew near the land they would irresistibly cast themselves into the sea, to their destruction.

Now Ulysses had heard of the sirens through Circe, and he wanted to hear the maidens sing, but he did not want to come within their power. So this is the way he managed it. One day he put wax in the ears of all his sailors, so that they could not hear the music, and then had himself strapped to the mast. Then he ordered the sailors to row near enough to the island for him to hear the music. In this way he heard the singing, but did not get caught.

That was a clever way of getting tempted, and yet not getting caught, was it not? But someone has said in a joke it would have been better if Ulysses had had an orchestra on board which would have made better music than the sirens. Then neither Ulysses nor the sailors would have been tempted to go too near the dangerous isle.

That is a pretty good way of dealing with all kinds of temptation,--not by trying to keep temptation out, but by putting something more attractive in its place. If you are tempted to go to the moving pictures, when you were told not to, do not simply stand around outside the place with nothing else to do. Go off and play something which will be more attractive than moving pictures. If you are told that you must not go fishing, don't sulk around wishing that you could go. Just go at baseball or something else, and soon you will have forgotten about the other thing.

Always put something else in the place of the thing you are not to do, and it will help you to overcome temptation.

POISON-LABELS

You have all seen bottles of poison, and you know when your father or mother buys poison from the druggist there is a label on the bottle marked "POISON" in large letters, and on the label is a picture of a skull and crossbones. This is done to warn people from drinking the poison.

Now, if a druggist were to put clear, pure water into a bottle, and put a label marked "Poison" on it, no one would drink the water if he were choking, for fear of being poisoned.

And there are boys and girls just like that good, pure, fresh water with the poison-label on it. They are good at heart. They are kind and unselfish and obedient, but nobody will have anything to do with them because they put such terrible poison-labels upon themselves.

I will tell you what some of these poison-labels are which frighten people away from boys and girls. One of them is slang. Now, of course, some girls and boys who are inwardly little ladies and gentlemen use slang, but usually slang is used by low-bred people who have not words enough to say what they want to. And consequently when you use slang, if people do not know that you are well-bred boys and girls, they think that you are coarse and vulgar, and they will have nothing to do with you.

Another poison-label that boys sometimes stick on is swearing. And of course that is always bad-mannered. Another is smoking. Another is bad company. I knew a boy who was really good at heart, but who persisted in going with bad boys, and no business man in town would take him into his business because of that terrible label.

Girls sometimes wear such poison-labels as forwardness; that is, they are always making themselves heard and seen. Others are proud. Others chew gum.

I have not time to mention all of these different labels. You can think of them for yourselves. What I want to say is that it is too bad for such good, useful, well-intentioned and wholesome boys and girls to put on labels which lead people to think less of them than they should think. For by these things they spoil their chances of getting into the company of well-bred people.

LIES THAT WALK

We usually think of a lie as a thing that is spoken. But there are other kinds of lies. Some girls that I once knew went to an office in New York and bought some labels with the pictures and names of hotels in Europe printed on them. They pasted these on their suit-cases.

Now, as you probably know, when people go to Europe some of the hotels paste labels on your suit-cases and trunks when they take your baggage to the station. Some people come home with their baggage quite covered over with these slips of paper, and one can easily see by these labels what a long distance the owners of the luggage have traveled.

These girls who bought those labels in New York, but had never been to Europe, were trying to make people believe that they, too, had traveled in foreign countries.

Of course you know what that sort of deception means: it is telling a lie without speaking it.

So you see these lies went with the suit-cases. And wherever those girls carried their bags, the lies walked along with them, and said to everyone who looked at them, "Our owners have been to Europe."

Of course, no self-respecting boy or girl would do such a thing. But you must also be careful not to act falsehoods by pretending things in school, or acting at home as if you don't know about things when you do. Don't try to fool _yourselves_, then you will not try to fool other people.

WELLINGTON AND THE SOLDIER

No boy likes to be called a coward, and some boys do things that are dangerous for fear that their friends will think they have no courage. Sometimes it is more cowardly to do a dangerous thing like that than not to do it.

Do not think that you are a coward because you are afraid of dangerous things. Some of the bravest men the world ever saw have been afraid, but in spite of their fear they went firmly on.

A story is told of Lord Wellington, a great English general, who saw a young man in his army who was white with fear just before a battle, and yet did not run away. Lord Wellington said: "There is a brave man. He knows the danger, and yet he faces it." Another story is told of a soldier who was making fun of a second who was badly frightened just before battle. The frightened soldier said to the other one: "Yes, I am afraid. And if you were half as much afraid as I am, you would run away."

The lesson I want to draw is this, that it is not cowardly to be afraid of things which have danger in them. It is cowardly to run away if you ought to face them. And if you ought not to face them it is cowardly to go headlong into them, just because of some other boy's foolish dare.

I remember a playmate who used to bite the heads off the fish he caught, just because another boy dared him to. It used to make him terribly sick, but he was too much of a coward not to do it. Some boys take up smoking and drinking and swearing for the same reason. Any boy who does that sort of thing is a coward.

ABRAHAM'S GUEST

You have all heard of Abraham, who went out from his home in Ur of the Chaldees to find God. And you remember how he dwelt in tents, and had hundreds of cattle. And you know how good he was to his nephew, Lot.

There is a story told about Abraham which you will not find in the Bible. Abraham received into his tent one day an aged traveler. After he had invited the traveler to dine with him at his sunset meal, Abraham went out to offer up his evening sacrifice to God. But the traveler would not join him in prayer and thanksgiving. Abraham was angry because of the old man's lack of religion, and drove him from his tent.

Later in the evening the angel of the Lord appeared to Abraham and asked him why he had driven out the old man. Abraham replied:

"Lord, he refused to acknowledge Thee!"

The Lord replied: "What! I have borne with this old man for eighty years, and you could not bear with him for two days!" After that, so the story goes, Abraham helped everyone who came along, no matter what his religious belief might be.

That is a good story for boys and girls to remember when they feel that they cannot forgive someone who has done them a wrong. What would become of you if God never forgave you when _you_ did wrong? It is this spirit of forgiveness that Christ means to teach us when He says in the Lord's Prayer, "Forgive us our debts as we forgive our debtors." If, then, you say that prayer and refuse to forgive anyone who has done you a wrong, you mean that you want to have God act just as unforgiving with you as you are with your enemies. That would be terrible,--to ask God not to forgive you. None of us would dare pray like that.

You remember Peter came to Christ once and asked how often we were to forgive people. Peter thought seven times was enough. But Christ said, "No, you must forgive until seventy times seven." That would be four hundred and ninety times. Christ did not mean exactly that many times. But He meant more times than you can think. That is, if you are a follower of Christ you are to forgive a person as often as he is sorry for having done you a wrong, and comes to you and asks your forgiveness.

ABOUT GENEROSITY

When we speak of a person as being generous we usually think of someone who gives his money, or whatever belongs to him, freely to others. But did you ever think that people can be generous with their thoughts, too?

Let me show you what I mean by that. There were once two boys who went to visit at a farm where they kept Shetland ponies, and of course both boys wanted to ride them. So one day they persuaded the man in charge of the ponies to put the saddle on a handsome black one and lead him out into the yard for them to mount. But when it came to actually getting on the pony's back, the younger boy was afraid. Although the older boy urged him, he would not take a ride. Finally the other boy mounted and rode gaily off, and came back beaming with delight. But instead of being proud, and thinking the other boy cowardly, he went over to the younger lad and said: "Now you get on. I know you can ride him." And when at last the other did ride off, the older boy's eyes danced with delight, and he clapped his hands to encourage the younger boy. That is one of the best forms of generosity.

Another illustration of it is when you are on a baseball or football team, or in a contest of any sort, to be able to say when you are honestly beaten that you were beaten by a better team. When you can say that, it takes half the sting out of defeat and makes those who win admire you more than ever.

Don't be stingy with your thoughts about people. Always think the best about others, and believe the best, and you will grow to be open-hearted, friendly, lovable and big.

SUN AND WIND

Once upon a time, according to an old fable, the sun and the northwind had a contest to see which could take a man's coat off the more quickly.

The northwind tried first. It gathered together all its forces in its own corner of the earth, and then rushed forth upon this man who was walking along a country-road. The wind blew and blew, and it seemed as if the traveller's coat would be blown from his back or torn to tatters. But the harder the northwind blew the tighter the man drew his coat about him, and the wind could not get it off his back. After it had spent all its force it gave up in despair.

Then the sun had its turn. It came out without noise or violence like the northwind. It did not whistle in the treetops nor bluster through the bushes. It did not buffet nor struggle with the man. It just went on pouring forth its heat. And it seemed as if it could never win, any more than the northwind. But soon the traveller took out his handkerchief and wiped the perspiration from his face. Then, before long, he took off his hat. Soon he unbuttoned his coat, and finally he took it off of his own accord. The sun had won the contest against the northwind!

Now, a fable is meant to teach a lesson. The lesson of this fable is that gentleness wins where only strength and rudeness fail. If some one has done you a wrong, the way to deal with him is not to try to "get even" with him, as we say. Nor is the best way to get angry with him and scold him. The Bible tells us that the way to overcome your enemy is to do good for evil, for it says by so doing you will "heap coals of fire upon his head."

Usually it is the weak people who bluster like the northwind, and storm and brag. Strong people are usually quiet. There is an old saying that "if you are right you can afford to keep your temper, and if you are wrong you cannot afford to lose it." Be gentle. You will win more that way than by getting angry.

THE BOY AND THE TURTLE

Theodore Parker was one of the greatest preachers America ever had, and this story is told of him as a boy. One day, as he was going across the fields, he came to a pond where he saw a small turtle sunning itself upon a stone which rose out of the water. The boy picked up a stick, and was about to strike the turtle, when a voice within him said, "Stop!" His arm paused in midair and, startled, he ran home to ask his mother what the voice meant. Tears came into his mother's eyes as she took the boy in her arms and told him that it was his conscience which had cried "Stop!" Then she told him that his conscience was the voice of God, and that his moral safety depended upon his heeding that inner voice.

The same thing is true of all boys and girls. If you obey that inner voice in questions of right and wrong, it will speak to you clearly.

But if you neglect it, it will grow silent, and you will be left in darkness and in doubt as to what is right and wrong.

Some people call this voice the "inner light," and that is a very good name for it. Every time you walk by the light you put fresh oil in the lamp, and the light grows stronger and the way clearer.

Whenever that inner voice speaks to you and tells you that a thing is wrong, don't argue with the voice and give reasons for doing the thing that is wrong. Obey the voice at once, as Parker did, and it will save you endless trouble.

THE BOY AND THE NICKEL

A man once found a boy crying on the street, and asked the little chap what he was crying about. The child told him he had just lost a nickel. The stranger gave him another, and then the boy began to cry again. This greatly astonished the man, and he asked him why he was crying again. The little chap said, "Because, if I hadn't lost that other nickel, I'd have two now."

That was, of course, a very foolish way to look at it, but that is the way a great many people look at things. This is what is called covetousness. Covetous people always want something they have not, and so they are usually unhappy.

The way to be happy is to think of the things you have, and not of the things you have not. A man was once told that Cæsar was going to cause him great unhappiness, and he replied that if Cæsar could blot out the sun with a blanket he might make him unhappy. But if he had the sun to shine upon him, he would still be happy. We all have the sun to shine upon us, and other things a-plenty to be happy over, if we will just count them up. Let us not be like the little boy crying about the nickel he did not have.

THE THREE FATES

Boys and girls in ancient Greece believed that there were three fates, in the form of three women seated above the clouds, who spun the thread of everyone's life, and cut it off with shears when death came.

We no longer believe in such things, but we still speak of fate. Boys and girls sometimes say that they are fated to fail in examinations, and so think they cannot help failing. But that is no more true than the belief about the three women which the Grecian boys and girls held. As a matter of fact, nothing outside of us makes evil things happen to us. We make our own fates. Or shall I say, we _are_ our own fates? Someone has said, "Our fates lie asleep along the roadside until we waken them." That is very true, as I think I can show you by a story.

Not long ago I was riding on a train up through Vermont. A boy came into the car selling papers, books, candy, fruit, and other things. There was a boy opposite me in the smoking-car who wanted to appear very smart and manly. He was smoking a cigar and looking very much traveled. The trainboy offered him a book which had a bad title and worse pictures in it. But in front of this young chap sat two bright-faced, innocent-looking boys who did not pretend to be anything but what they were. The trainboy offered them salted peanuts. In front of those boys sat a fine, clean-looking, well-bred man. The trainboy offered him a good, wholesome book.

Now, three fates were in that car in the form of that trainboy, and each person invited his own kind of fate by what he was in himself. That is true all through life. Be true, and you attract truth. Be evil, and you attract evil. Your fate is what you are.

THE INCH-WORM AND THE MOUNTAIN

Out in the state of California there is a great valley known as the Yosemite Valley, and here once lived a tribe of Indians who tried to explain how the wonderful streams and trees and rocks came to be.

The story of one of the highest peaks, El Capitan, is very interesting. One day some Indian boys went fishing in a beautiful lake in the Yosemite, and after they had grown tired they lay down in the sun upon a rock beside the lake. They soon fell fast asleep. How long they slept they did not know, but when they awoke they found that during their sleep the rock on which they lay had been stood on end, so that they were now nearly a mile high in the air and had no means of getting down. They were in a bad plight.