volution as well as of individual
development. Personally it is a time of tremendous stress,--physical,
mental, and moral; the young person who escapes turmoil being the
exception, not the rule.

Certain of the physical changes which occur are familiar to all, but the
deep meaning of these changes is less generally understood. The parent
who has wisely guided the child to this critical period has done much,
but it would be a mistake to suppose that all has now been done that
can be done.

The habits of self-reliance, self-control, and right thinking formed
through the years of childhood will indeed help now. But there awakens
for the first time a new force: the child is, in a literal as well as
figurative sense, being born anew. At this new birth, which is sometimes
very difficult, he enters into a hitherto unknown world of interests and
feelings. While the change from child to adult may proceed as a gradual
and placid unfolding in some individuals, in the great majority it
advances with irregular and disturbing demonstrations. This great change
takes place in girls generally at from thirteen to fifteen, and in boys
a year or two later, though it is not completed for a period of five or
six years. During this time the most profound alterations take place in
nearly all parts of the body; the mind undergoes a similar
metamorphosis, so that often the child so carefully watched from
babyhood seems entirely superseded by a new being.

This is preeminently the age of romance. It is the borderland where is
fought the battle of individuality, and it is probable that at this time
is decided in a very deep way what is to be the trend of the whole after
life. There is at this period such susceptibility to impressions that
there may be indelibly stamped mental images that are the exact opposite
of those of childhood, the childish memory remaining as a thing apart
and by itself,--a curious separation and continuation of two lines of
ideas, which every one has perhaps experienced to some extent and on
some subject.

It is probable that impressions received now are of more importance in
determining conduct than at any other period, or at least in determining
it for a long period of years, the period when the individual makes his
strongest impression upon the world. Reversion to the faith or the
ideals of childhood, which so often occurs in old age, is of slight
importance to society as compared to the influence of the individual