it to-day he would be marked at once. Then, drinking and gambling were
looked upon as the wild oats a young man might sow, without losing
caste. To-day, the young man who drinks and gambles is looked upon as
of doubtful social position, by both men and women. To-day, in making
their lists of invitations, leaders in society cross out the names of
dissipated young men as promptly as they do those of fast young women.
Whereas thirty years ago there was rather a mantle of sentimental
charity fitted on the shoulders of a disreputable young fellow, to-day
he is roughly talked of as a "drunkard" or a "common fellow"; terms
that no one dreamed of applying to him then. There has been nothing
that public opinion, especially that section of it that may be called
social opinion, has changed in more than in the standard it fixes for,
and demands from, all men, and particularly young men. The result is
that when a man wants to be superior to vice now, he has the moral
weight of a sounder public opinion and finds the road easier than he
would have had thirty years ago.

I have said nothing to you about any higher inducement to commence a
better life every day, than those you can find in the world. They are
quite sufficient, or ought to be. A healthy body, a clear mind, success
in the world--these are the rewards which a good life offers here.
There is just one other word about what it offers elsewhere. I am not
a preacher, you need not be afraid of a sermon. I am just one of
yourselves; only I have come over a longer road than you have, and
have seen more of its pitfalls as well as more of its sign-boards. Nor
do I pretend to know more than you of what it offers elsewhere. But
I just wish to say one word to recall what you already know; what you
must know. There is nothing that we all know better--nothing that is
more surely planted in the human mind than that this is only a part
of our life; that when we shall reach a future existence, we shall