18
THE BATTALION.
merit. He may be a quiet bc.^, a boy who has his future
course mapped out and who cares for little else than to silently
pursue his way tending to his own business and expecting
everybody else to do the same. He i« a silent constant force
that will in the course of time produce its effect. We look at
the man maybe and he meets us with the same simple un
affected expression that he has worn all through life, then
wonder where there can be anything great in such a puny
piece of flesh, but unless we are close observers we always
expect great forces and great effects to be accompanied by
noise and bluster while reflecting shows us that the greatest
and most powerful forces in the universe are the most silent
and noiseless. Again there are many fellows that are thought
to be modest deserving fellows that are really good for noth
ing lazy chumps, a sort of negative characters, so to speak,
that have no special will power of their own but just join in
with the crowd. They have many friends simply because
they never oppose anybody in anything, but good or evil al-
ways join in with the crowd. They are like the negative ele
ment nitrogen feebly united with most anything but remain
ing with nothing. The presence of such an element may be
necessary but it is a sure sign of moral decay. These nave
good reputation but not character. It really requires con
siderable courage to do anything wrong, it requires strong
will and vigorous strokes to stem the tide of popular opinion
There are men who for various reasons court popular opinion,
and it is doubtful whether or not the men whom the world
counts greatest are really the greatest. They may be said to
be those who best represent and conform to the wishes of the
age. But as popular sentiment, the mediocre, is always to
a greater or less extent imperfect and contaminated men that
represent it are not the best nor the ones that possess the
greatest amount of courage of the age.
There is a class of boys lazy, good for nothing fellows that
go through life like a machine, they mechanically live at
present and dream of the future. Good fellows, yes truly
good for nothing, to many minds a boy that has some vices if