"I began to train my boy in the use of his faculties immediately after his birth. He was bound to use them anyway, and therefore I took care that he used them properly. I taught the child to observe accurately, to analyze and synthesize and make sound deductions. Neither his mother nor myself confused him with baby talk, meaningless sounds or foolish gestures, and thus, altho he learned to reason so early, his mind was no more burdened than that of the ordinary child.
"I knew that as soon as he began to speak his first interest would be in the sounds he was uttering, and so I trained him to identify the elements of sound. Taking a box of large alphabet blocks I named each to him day after day.
"In this way he learned to read and spell correctly before he was two years old. What was still more important, he learned to reason correctly."
(2524)
Productions, Interchange of—See Christianity, Social.
Profanity—See Ambassador, The Minister
as an; Swearing.
PROFANITY AND PRAYER
Is not much of our praying of as little significance as the profanity mentioned below:
Mr. Pierson was a man of no religious
principles. Without exception he was the
most profane man I ever knew. He would
hardly utter a word without an oath. His
habit of profanity had become so inveterate
that it seemed almost as involuntary as his
breathing. The wife of a clergyman, for
whom he was working at one time, reproved
him, when he pleasantly replied:
"Why, madam, I don't mean anything when I swear, any more than you do when you pray."—Asa Bullard, "Incidents in a Busy Life."
(2525)
PROFANITY IN FORMER TIMES
Swearing in the drawing-room and in the "best society" was no uncommon thing ninety years ago. Even the ladies themselves not rarely indulged in it. Dean Ramsey tells an anecdote that well illustrates how it was regarded. A sister was speaking of her brother as much addicted to the habit, and she said, "Our John swears awfu', and we try to correct him for it; but," she added, apologetically, "nae doubt it is a great set-off to conversation."—Minot J. Savage, The Arena.
(2526)
PROFESSION
The lives of some who are estimated as
men of holiness are like the bodies in certain
ancient tombs, that retain the form and features
they had when living, but which crumble
at a touch. They are surrounded with
all the ornaments of the living, and have
the shape of men, but they are only dust. So
a touch of temptation or any test of life applied
to some men causes their apparent
saintliness to crumble.
(2627)
Profession, Empty—See Church, Deadness of the.
PROFESSION VERSUS CHARACTER
In a former pastorate there was a man
in my congregation who could talk like
Demosthenes or Cicero. He used excellent
grammar, and seemed to know the Bible
pretty well from Genesis to Revelation. He
could quote Longfellow, and Tennyson, and
Whittier, and a stranger would be charmed
by his eloquent utterances. And yet when
he rose to talk in a prayer-meeting, the
crowd began to wither, and when his talk
was over the prayer-meeting was like a
sweet-potato patch on a frosty morning, flat
and blue. The people knew that in his life
there was something unsavory, that he would
drink before the bar with worldly friends,
and that he was not as honest as he might
be. His good grammar and fluent utterances
did not make amends for the unsavoriness
of his character. There was another man
in that congregation who would sometimes
come to prayer-meeting with a circle of coal-*dust
around his hair. He was a coal-cart
driver, and he was now and then so hurried
to get to the prayer-meeting that he did not
make his toilet with as much care as he
ought. But the people leaned over to listen
when he talked. And why? Because they
knew that he lived every day for God. He
would pick up a tramp on the road, and give
him a mile ride on his cart, that he might
talk with him about Jesus. His religion
tasted good. Bad religion in good grammar
does not taste good. I would rather have
good religion in bad grammar, than good
grammar in bad religion. (Text.)—C. A.
Dixon.
(2528)
