will always give it most enjoyment,
and a happy youth is in itself an end. It is the time when the power of
enjoyment is most keen, and it is often accompanied by such extreme
sensitiveness that the sufferings of the child for what seem the most
trivial causes probably at least equal in acuteness, though not in
durability, the sufferings of a man. Many a parent standing by the
coffin of his child has felt with bitterness how much of the measure of
enjoyment that short life might have known has been cut off by an
injudicious education. And even if adult life is attained, the evils of
an unhappy childhood are seldom wholly compensated. The pleasures of
retrospect are among the most real we possess, and it is around our
childish days that our fondest associations naturally cluster. An early
over-strain of our powers often leaves behind it lasting distortion or
weakness, and a sad childhood introduces into the character elements of
morbidness and bitterness that will not disappear.

The first great rule in judging of pleasures is that so well expressed
by Seneca: 'Sic praesentibus utaris voluptatibus ut futuris non
noceas'--so to use present pleasures as not to impair future ones.
Drunkenness, sensuality, gambling, habitual extravagance and
self-indulgence, if they become the pleasures of youth, will almost
infallibly lead to the ruin of a life. Pleasures that are in themselves
innocent lose their power of pleasing if they become the sole or main
object of pursuit.

In starting in life we are apt to attach a disproportionate value to
tastes, pleasures, and ideals that can only be even approximately
satisfied in youth, health, and strength. We have, I think, an example
of this in the immense place which athletic games and out-of-door sports
have taken in modern English life. They are certainly not things to be
condemned. They have the direct effect of giving a large amount of
intense and innocent pleasure, and they have indirect effects which are
still more important. In so far as they raise the level of physical
strength and health, and dispel the morbidness of temperament which is
so apt to accompany a sedentary life and a diseased or inert frame, they
contribute powerfully to lasting happiness. They play a considerable
part in the formation of friendships which is one of the best fruits of
the period between boyhood and mature manhood. Some of them give lessons
of courage, perseverance, energy, self-restraint, and cheerf