s real--
Yea, nothing can hold against hell but the Winged Ideal."

Let the world look to it, then, that the exalted qualities of youth
which make it indiscreet, audacious, exhilarant--yes, and spotless,
too--be not discouraged, repressed, destroyed; for these qualities are
"the salt of the earth; but if the salt have lost its savor, wherewith
shall it be salted? it is thenceforth good for nothing but to be cast
out, and to be trodden under foot of men."

Speaking to the world of business and of society, I therefore plead
for tolerance of all the fresh, clean, high, and splendid--absurd, if
you will--"illusions" of the young man seeking his seat at the table
where all men eat, and where all, at the end, must drink the same
hemlock cup.

For if these "illusions" are destroyed and replaced with the wisdom of
the serpent, Tennyson's "Locksley Hall" will, sure enough and in sad
reality, be replaced by the "Locksley Hall Sixty Years After." Take
the young man, then, by the hand, take him to your heart, and, instead
of destroying, catch, if you can, some of the glory, the faith, the
freshness, the "illusions" of his youth; remembering that Wordsworth
uttered an ultimate note when he said:

"Our birth is but a sleep and a forgetting;
The soul that rises with us, our life's star,
Hath had elsewhere its setting,
And cometh from afar.
Not in entire forgetfulness,
And not in utter nakedness,
But trailing clouds of glory, do we come
From God, who is our home."

And it is these clouds of glory that still surround the young man when
he stands brave and sweet and full of faith, and with his mother's
precious precepts and counsels ringing in his ears, before the great
old world, wrinkled by its infinite centuries.

But you, young man, you for whom I am asking the world's helpful
regard--when you read this do not go to pitying yourself. That is
fatal. Do not get the notion that the world is not giving you your
just due. If you have such an idea, thrust it instantly from you. If
you think the world has downed you, up and at it again. If, a second
time, it knocks you out, still up and at it again. And keep smiling.
Never whine--you deserve defeat if you do that.

Be a "thoroughbred," as the expression of the hour has it. After "you
conquer and prevail," you will find that the world has a kindly and
even a loving heart. All you have to do is to keep in condition and
keep fighting. And tha