's duties become a farce; let
them exact as much of him as the world will exact also; that is,
efficiency, accuracy, thoroughness, and fidelity.

Sec. 4. A SCHOOL OF SOCIAL MINISTRY

The family trains lives for social ministry. The unsocial lives come out
of unsocial homes. The home that exists for itself alone trains lives
that exist only for themselves; these are the homes that throw the sand
of selfishness into the wheels of society; they ultimately effect social
suicide through selfishness. The attitude and atmosphere of the home are
of first importance here. As we think, so will our children act. If the
home is to us a place without responsibilities for the neighborhood,
without duties to neighbors, without social roots, then it is a school
for industrial, commercial, and social greed and warfare. As we think in
our hearts and talk at our table, so are we educating those who sit
thereat.

If we would have our homes really efficient and worthy agencies for
education in social living, the first thing to do is to seek the social
atmosphere, to cultivate all those influences which young lives
unconsciously absorb. We all know that character comes through
environment in large measure, and that the mental and spiritual
environment is by far the most potent. Here is something that affects us
more than the finest or poorest furniture and that gives the real zest
and flavor to any meal. The choice of our own reading enters here, not
only the matter of reading in sociology, but of all reading, as to
whether it blinds with class prejudices, intensifies caste feeling, or
atrophies social sympathy by pandering to selfishness and sensuousness.
The control of our own feelings and judgment enters here. Do we
sedulously cultivate charity for others? Do we stifle impatience,
bitterness, class feeling? Do we guide the conversation of visitors and
the family group so that antisocial passions are subdued and a spirit of
brotherly love and compassion for all is cultivated? Here men and women
have opportunity to give evidence of a change of heart; here they need
that awakening to social consciousness which is a new birth, a
regeneration into the life of the Son of Man who came to give his life.

By its active ministry the family is training for social living. When a
child carries a bowl of soup to some sick or needy one, he learns a
lesson never to be forgotten. The memories of hours of planning and
preparation for some neighborly