take that the distinguished man made was that he
went too far from shore with the boy. There are too many men to-day
who are doing the same thing. They are going out too far in social
life, they are too lax in the question of amusements, they are too
thoughtless on the subject of dissipation. Some day they will stop,
themselves recovering, but their boys will be gone.

Example counts for everything in a home. It there is any blessing in
my own life or others, if there has been any helpfulness in my ministry
to others, I owe it all to my mother, who lived before me a consistent
Christian life and died giving me her blessing; and to my father, who
with his arms about me one day said, "My son, if you go wrong it will
kill me." I was at one time under the influence of a boy older than
myself and cursed with too much money. I had taken my first
questionable step at least, and was on my way one night to a place
which was at least questionable if not sinful. I had turned the street
corner and ahead of me was the very gate to hell. Suddenly, as I
turned, the face of my father came before me and his words rang in my
very soul. If my father had been anything but a consistent Christian
man I myself, I am sure, would have been far from the pulpit, and might
have been in the lost world. There are those who seem to think that
the height of one's ambition is to amass a fortune, to build a palace
or to acquire a social position. My friend, George R. Stuart, says you
may build your palaces, amass your fortunes, provide for the
satisfaction of every desire, but as you sit amid these luxurious
surroundings waiting for the staggering steps of a son, or as you think
of a wayward daughter, all this will be as nothing, for there is
nothing that can give happiness to the parents of Godless, wayward
children. Some one has said, "Every drunkard, every gambler, every
lost woman once sat in a mother's lap, and the downfall of the most of
them may be traced to some defect in home life."

The real purpose of every home is to shape character for time and
eternity. The home may be one of poverty, the cross of self-sacrifice
may be required, suffering may sometimes be necessary, but wherever a
home fulfills this purpose it is overflowing with joy. One of my
friends has drawn the following picture which he says is fanciful, but
which I think is absolutely true to life:

Back in the country there is a boy who wants to go to a college and