is true of fashion is true of everything
else. As it would ill become mothers to leave their family for a time and
learn the milliners' trade, she makes choice of one of her daughters to be
educated in that trade. This young girl after she has learned dressmaking
takes the place of the mother in the matter of providing clothes for the
family, and becomes in a large measure the mistress of the house. The same
thing happens to the baking department of the family. A score of new kinds
of pies and cakes have become fashionable in our day, and it is the
daughters that have the greatest opportunity to earn this baking of
pastries the quickest. The consequence is that the mother soon turns out
to be only a _second rate cook!_ Fully aware that she can neither cook nor
make dresses, she resigns her position as head of these departments,
respectively to her daughters, who, when once master of the culinary and
millinery, affairs, will soon be master of the balance of the household
affairs. Need I say that the fathers of this generation are served about
the same way by their sons? And it is the same between the teacher and the
pupil. "Old fogy teacher" or "he has the old ways yet" are expressions
that are too common to require any explanation. Happily, most old teachers
have cleared the turf, and yielded their laurels to a host of youngsters,
ranging in age from about sixteen to twenty years! Thus all difficulties
are surmounted in this line, and "Young America" has the reins to himself!
Look at the improvements that have resulted from the efforts of inventive
genius, and at the progress that the arts and sciences have made. We are
in a _new world_, so different from that of our forefathers, that their
experiences count almost nothing in this new era. It is a sad picture to
see the young and the inexperienced thus groping in the dark, but it is
the inevitable consequence of the new turn that things have taken since
the inauguration of the _age of reason_ [dating from the introduction of
printing (?)], Nevertheless, the young would display much greater
prudence, if they would bring many of their schemes and purposes to a
lower temperature by sitting still when age rises to speak, and were they
to take heed of the counsels and admonitions of those who are older than
themselves.
This radical change in the affairs of the world being recognized, it
becomes apparent how the power and influence of the Church and Schools
must abate in a m
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