hose pen has been an
inestimable blessing to American youth:--

"Among the first lessons which boys learn of their fellows are
impurities of language; and these are soon followed by impurities of
thought.... When this is the training of boyhood, it is not strange
that the predominating ideas among young men, in relation to the other
sex, are too often those of impurity and sensuality.... We cannot be
surprised, then, that the history of most young men is, that they yield
to temptation in a greater or less degree and in different ways. With
many, no doubt, the indulgence is transient, accidental, and does not
become habitual. It does not get to be regarded as venial. It is never
yielded to without remorse. The wish and the purpose are to resist;
but the animal nature bears down the moral. Still, transgression is
always followed by grief and penitence.

"With too many, however, it is to be feared, it is not so. The mind
has become debauched by dwelling on licentious images, and by
indulgence in licentious conversation. There is no wish to resist. They
are not overtaken by temptation, for they seek it. With them the
transgression becomes habitual, and the stain on the character is deep
and lasting."[42]

[Footnote 42: Ware.]

Sentimental Literature.--In another connection, we have referred
particularly to the bawdy, obscene books and pictures which are
secretly circulated among the youth of both sexes, and to their
corrupting influence. The hope is not entirely a vain one that this
evil may be controlled; but there seems no possible practicable remedy
for another evil which ultimately leads to the same result, though by
less gross and obscene methods. We refer to the sentimental literature
which floods the land. City and school libraries, circulating libraries,
and even Sunday-school libraries, are full of books which, though they
may contain good moral teaching, contain, as well, an element as
incompatible with purity of morals as is light with midnight darkness.
Writers for children and youth seem to think a tale of "courtship, love,
and matrimony" entirely indispensable as a medium for conveying their
moral instruction. Some of these "religious novels" are actually more
pernicious than the fictions of well-known novelists who make no
pretense to having religious instruction a particular object in view.
Sunday-school libraries are not often wholly composed of this class
of works, but any one who takes the trouble to