of an idol temple grow,
And sun-white Love is blackened into lust,
And man's impure doth into flower-cups flow,
And the fair Kosmos mourneth in the dust.

O Thou, out-topping all we know or think,
Far off yet nigh, out-reaching all we see,
Hold Thou my hand, that so the top-most link
Of the great chain may hold, from us to Thee;

"And from my heaven-touched life may downward flow
Prophetic promise of a grace to be;
And flower, and bird, and beast, may upward grow,
And find their highest linked to God in me."

Possibly you will say at once, "Oh, my boy has no taste for natural
history, and he would take no interest in this kind of thing." All the
better his finding it a bit dry--it will rid the subject of some of its
dangerous attraction. I have yet to find the boy for whom the Latin
Grammar has the least interest; but we do not excuse him on that ground
from grinding at it. Whether he takes an interest in it or not, you have
to teach him that he has got to know about these things before going to
school, to guard him from the danger of having all sorts of false, and
often foul, notions palmed off on him. I do not say that pure knowledge
will necessarily save, but I do say that the pitcher which is full of
clear spring-water has no room for foul. I do say that you have gained a
great step, if in answer to the offer of enlightenment which he is
certain to receive, you have enabled your boy to acquit himself of the
rough objurgation--forgive me for putting it in schoolboy language: "Oh,
hold your jaw! I know all about that, and I don't want any of your rot."
I do say that early associations are most terribly strong, and if you
will secure that those early associations with regard to life and birth
shall be bound up with all the sanctities of life--with home, with his
mother, with family, with all that is best and highest in life; then his
whole attitude in life will be different. But if these early
associations are linked with all that is false and foul, some subtle
odor of the sewer will still cling about the heart of the shrine, a
nameless sense of something impure in the whole subject; an undefinable
something in his way of looking at it, which has often made the purity
of men--blameless in their outer life--- sadden and perplex me almost as
much as the actions and words of confessedly impure men.

IV

But, whatever is the importance I attach to pure teach