Heroism and hero-worship is the central thought of history from the time of Gideon to the time of Sheridan, and down to our present time.  Virtue, we must remember, should strike just like electricity from a dynamo.  You remember that was the continual word of that Great Master of ours.  Someone in the crowd has touched me, Virtue has gone over into somebody else.  Virtue has gone out of me; strength has gone out of me and gone over into somebody else.  I am talking about something that I do not understand; but something that you will know.  Have you never, at the close of the day, when you were tired, discouraged, wondered whether it is worth while to keep up the fight?  When you had been knocked flat and were pretty sure you were out, and then you sat down for a little time by some strong man or strong woman, and probably they did not say a great deal to you.  They were men and women of few words, and you did not say a great deal to them, but after a little it began to come upon you that come what would you would fight again?  Courage had come into you.  You do not know where it came from, or how it came in, but you borrowed it and you go on your way the stronger because of the infection from that strong man.

We must be healthy and strong and sympathetic.  We must be a child with the child and a boy with the boy, and yet we must lead and not follow.  We must be firm and patient and hopeful and courageous, and we must infect these boys and girls with the very best that we have in us and something that is a little better yet, and how are we going to get it?  Why, we must be continually infected from others; that is the only way.  I don’t care how big your reservoir is, your irrigation reservoir, if there isn’t a stream going into it, it is going to be empty sometime.  Look out for the streams which come in from the hills and the heights of glory into your lives.

This is the glory of our life and our work.  You are making the youth of the twentieth century, as I said to you, and you are doing something grander; for every bit of good that you give here in Utah will spread back to us in Massachusetts and you are moulding the race into conformity with that which is deepest and most permanent and most eternal in environment, and hence all the powers of Nature are on your side.

“We are two,” said Abbe Bacha to Mahomet, as they were plodding from Mecca to Medina.  “No,” answered Mahomet, “We are three.  God is with us.”  We cast in our efforts with this grand tide of events which is sweeping on toward a better age and better race, and we cannot fail.  Therefore, let us gird up our loins, be strong and of a very good courage; for, as I have said to you once before, you shall lead these little people into the land of hope and promise which the Lord swore unto their ancestors, their fathers, that He would surely give them.

GENERAL SUBJECT

The Adolescent, or High School Age