Now then, as knowledge of all kinds may be gained without being received, or meant at all to be applied, as the answer to this question, so it may be quite distinct from wisdom.  And when I use the term thoughtfulness, as opposed to a child’s carelessness, I mean it to express an anxiety for the obtaining of this wisdom.  And farther, I do not see how this wisdom, or this thoughtfulness, can be premature in any one; or how it can exhaust before their time any faculties, whether of body or mind.  This requires no sitting up late at night, no giving up of healthful exercise; it brings no headaches, no feverishness, no strong excitement at first, to be followed by exhaustion afterwards.  Hear how it is described by one who spoke of it from experience.  “The wisdom that is from above is first pure, then peaceable, gentle, easy to be entreated, full of mercy and good fruits, without partiality and without hypocrisy.”  There is surely nothing of premature exhaustion connected-with any one of these things.

Or, if we turn to the third point of change from childhood to a Christian manhood, the change from selfishness to unselfishness, neither can we find any possible danger in hastening this.  This cannot hurt our health or strain our faculties; it can but make life at every age more peaceful and more happy.  Nor indeed do I suppose that any one could fancy that such a change was otherwise than wholesome at the earliest possible period.

There may remain, however, a vague notion, that generally, if what we mean by an early change from childishness to manliness be that we should become religious, then, although it may not exhaust the powers, or injure the health, yet it would destroy the natural liveliness and gaiety of youth, and by bringing on a premature seriousness of manner and language, would be unbecoming and ridiculous.  Now, in the first place, there is a great deal of confusion and a great deal of folly in the common notions of the gaiety of youth.  If gaiety mean real happiness of mind, I do not believe that there is more of it in youth than in manhood; if for this reason only, that the temper in youth being commonly not yet brought into good order, irritation and passion are felt, probably, oftener than in after life, and these are sad drawbacks, as we all know, to a real cheerfulness of mind.  And of the outward gaiety of youth, there is a part also which is like the gaiety of a drunken man; which is riotous, insolent, and annoying to others; which, in short, is a folly and a sin.  There remains that which strictly belongs to youth, partly physically—­the lighter step and the livelier movement of the growing and vigorous body; partly from circumstances, because a young person’s parents or friends stand between him and many of the cares of life, and protect him from feeling them altogether; partly from the abundance of hope which belongs to the beginning of every thing, and which continually hinders the mind from dwelling