Older
men and women have been heard to murmur that too much has been done for
the young person's sake, too many things sacrificed. Religion has been
made very easy--too easy, it is said. Unpleasant demands have been
kept, it is suggested, too much in the background. We all know parents
who confess that their children are permitted to do things at home of
which they, the parents, disapprove, lest they should go elsewhere and
do worse. It is alleged that the same thing often happens in the
Church for the same reason. Ah! you must be careful what you say lest
you offend the young! This is an indulgent, a good-natured, a
compromising time. Behind this solicitude the best reasons lie, but is
there no danger to these young people in all this amiability? Is it
_quite_ impossible for a young man to be put in peril by our very
anxiety to save him?

Yes, there is such a possibility. It arises when we shrink from that
plainness of speech which is, after all, friendship's best service. Is
it not better to offend, even to wound deeply, than to speak only the
smoother things, however kindly the intent, and, so speaking, fail to
produce that great renunciation, that strengthening of bands, that
strong grasp of the Eternal which alone mean safety in future years?
We know that the whole question is encompassed with difficulties. It
is hard to write it, but the best friends of the young are not always
those preachers who are most tender concerning their feelings.

And not for the sake of the young only is this note of sternness
needed. It may be recalled that, some time ago, the columns of a
well-known religious weekly contained a discussion as to which are
morally the most perilous years of a man's life. The conclusion
reached therein was startling, but bore the test of reflection. We
have generally assumed that "the dangerous years" are those of early
manhood, the years that lie between leaving school and marriage. In
those years the youth has probably left the Sunday School behind him,
probably hangs only loosely to the Church. He feels the vigour of his
young manhood stirring within him. He is drinking his first draughts
of the wine of life. Restraints are being relaxed and companionships
are being formed, while there is a sense of freedom almost intoxicating
in its exhilaration. These are the days that we have commonly
described as the most perilous of life.

Probably, however, we have been wrong in this conc