It is of the fresh,
frank, honest-hearted boy, who may be seen behind many a bank-counter.
At first, so active, trustworthy, and trusted,--yet with the constant
temptation of unemployed time and energies demanding supply of action.
Little by little these are supplied,--supplied by the billiard-table
and its concomitants. It is the same story,--first, rumors, then
equivocation, then exposure. Perhaps a petty sum is all; but, to the
austere justice of banking, this is as bad, nay, worse than millions.
And then a brief paragraph in the newspaper, and one more ruined young
man, sulking beside the family-hearthstone, his father's shame, his
mother's unextinguishable sorrow,--a candidate for crime, if he have
power of mind and spirit to feel, or an imbecile dependant, if he have
not.
Now preaching, whether lay or clerical, will not do much to prevent
this, especially if it be pitched (as it commonly is) upon too high a
key. _Preventing_ means, or used to mean, when words had a meaning,
_getting beforehand with anything._ And if young Homespun have from the
outset something he likes better, he will not take to the ivory balls in
pleasant weather, and in rainy weather will be apt to prefer even quite
a stupid book to the board of green cloth.
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