d become old
and walk with a stick! This, the author relates, pierced his heart; and,
indeed, if _this_ failed, he must have had the heart of a tiger; but,
even _this_ would not succeed with the associate of a prostitute. When
_this vice_, this love of the society of prostitutes; when this vice has
once got fast hold, vain are all your sacrifices, vain your prayers,
vain your hopes, vain your anxious desire to disguise the shame from the
world; and, if you have acted well your part, no part of that shame
falls on you, unless you _have administered to the cause of it_. Your
authority has ceased; the voice of the prostitute, or the charms of the
bottle, or the rattle of the dice, has been more powerful than your
advice and example: you must lament this: but, it is not to bow you
down; and, above all things, it is weak, and even criminally selfish, to
sacrifice the rest of your family, in order to keep from the world the
knowledge of that, which, if known, would, in your view of the matter,
bring shame on yourself.

330. Let me hope, however, that this is a calamity which will befall
very few good fathers; and that, of all such, the sober, industrious,
and frugal habits of their children, their dutiful demeanor, their truth
and their integrity, will come to smooth the path of their downward
days, and be the objects on which their eyes will close. Those children
must, in their turn, travel the same path; and they may be assured,
that, 'Honour thy father and thy mother, that thy days may be long in
the land,' is a precept, a disregard of which never yet failed, either
first or last, to bring its punishment. And, what can be more just than
that signal punishment should follow such a crime; a crime directly
against the voice of nature itself? Youth has its passions, and due
allowance justice will make for these; but, are the delusions of the
boozer, the gamester, or the harlot, to be pleaded in excuse for a
disregard of the source of your existence? Are those to be pleaded in
apology for giving pain to the father who has toiled half a lifetime in
order to feed and clothe you, and to the mother whose breast has been to
you the fountain of life? Go, you, and shake the hand of the
boon-companion; take the greedy harlot to your arms; mock at the tears
of your tender and anxious parents; and, when your purse is empty and
your complexion faded, receive the poverty and the scorn due to your
base ingratitude!

LETTER VI

TO