“The opportunity of the boys’ camp leader is, first, to engage in the service that counts most largely in securing the future welfare of those who will soon be called upon to carry on the work that we are now engaged in.  Most people are so busy with their own present enjoyment and future success that they pay little heed to the future of others.  They may give some thought to the present need of those around them because it more or less directly affects themselves, but the work of character building in boys’ camps is one that shows its best results in the years to come rather than in the immediate present.

“In the second place, the opportunity comes to the camp leader to know boys as few other people know them, sometimes even better than their own parents know them.  When you live, eat, sleep with a boy in the open, free life of camp for a month or so, you come in contact with him at vastly more points than you do in the more restrained home life, and you see sides of his nature that are seldom seen at other times.

“Finally, the opportunity is given to the man who spends his vacation in camp to make the time really count for something in his own life and in the lives of others.  To how many does vacation really mean a relaxation, a letting down of effort along one line, without the substitution of anything definite in its place!  But he must be a dull soul, indeed, who can come to the right kind of boys’ camp and not go away with his muscles harder, his eye brighter, his digestion better, and his spirit more awake to the things that pertain to the Kingdom of God.

“Then again the camp leader must have the ability to forget himself in others.  Nowhere can the real play spirit be entered into more completely than in camp life.  A watchman is the last thing he must be.  That spirit of unselfishness which forgets its own personal pleasure in doing the most for the general good, is the ideal camp spirit.  As Lowell puts it in the Vision of Sir Launfal, it is: 

Not what we give, but what we share,
For the gift without the giver is bare.

“The results of all these points which I have mentioned are some very positive things.  One is the very best kind of a vacation that it is possible to have.  How frequently we hear in response to the question about enjoying a vacation, ’Oh, yes, I had a good enough time, but I’ll never go back there again.’  To my mind that indicates either that the person does not know what a really good time is, or that his surroundings made a good time impossible.

“Another result of camp is the real friendships that last long after camping days are over.  Of these I need not speak.  You and I know of many such and what they mean in the development of Christian character in the lives of our men and boys.  And, after all, there is the greatest result of all, the sense of confidence in the ultimate outcome that comes with having a share in the work of bringing others to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ.”