and our lives most pure and happy.
And here I may present the subject directly to young women. If they
would secure the deepest respect and holiest friendship of the young men
with whom they associate, they must themselves be refined, elevated, and
noble in their characters and lives. If they would exert their best
influence upon young men, and benefit them most by their association
with them, they must be truthful and high of soul.

All young men bow before female worth. Their evil thoughts forsake them;
their wicked habits flee away from them for the time being. Let a
depraved man _feel_ that he stands in the presence of pure, cultivated
womanhood, around which is wrapped the mantle of Jesus, and through
which breathes the spirit of his holy religion, and he will be ashamed
of himself, and long to be sufficiently pure and elevated to commune in
sacred friendship with her spirit. Oh, if young women could only realize
the moral powers which they could gather up within themselves, and wield
over their male associates in all the walks of life, by a proper
development of their minds and hearts, and a truthful submission to the
principles of moral right, how different would they be, and how changed
would be the face of young society! That young women do wield a mighty
influence over young men we admit; but it is not so great nor so good as
it should be. Much of it is directly evil. It is trifling, deceitful,
volatile, changeable, and not unfrequently carnal. It is often low,
worldly, irreverent, base. I am sorry to say it, but young women rebuke
but very little the evil doings of their male associates. They chide not
the waywardness of young men as they ought. They smile upon them in
their villainy. They court the society of young men they have every
reason to believe are corrupt. They will meet without a shudder or
disapproving frown, in the ball-room and the private circle, men whom
they know would glory in being the instrument of the moral ruin of any
woman. Young women who claim to be good, and who would not for a fortune
be guilty of a moral impropriety, often wreathe the villain's way in
smiles.

Young men in "high life" can smoke and chew, drink and swear, in woman's
presence, and she turns not away in disgust nor rebukes them with a cut
of their acquaintance. There are a large class of young women who only
ask that the young men shall behave tolerably well in their presence,
asking not what they do behind their bac