218 STATE BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. 



HOW DISSIPATION COMBS. 



A mistake many of our girls make is to devote too much of their time 

 to novel reading. The reading of an occasional novel of pure and health- 

 ful tone may be not only an innocent diversion, but a good mental stimu- 

 lant. But the reading of the lighter sort of novels, which, while not 

 teaching bad morality, do represent life in a morbid and unreal light, 

 awaken cravings that can never be satisfied. It is a mental dissipation 

 of a very dangerous sort if carried to excess. This intemperate craving 

 for sensational fiction weakens the mental grasp, destroys the love of 

 good reading, and takes away all relish for the realities of life, making 

 one who is addicted to it a weak, frivolous, petulant, miserable being. 



Finally, my dear girls, I do desire to emphasize this: Consecrate your 

 lives to some good purpose. God has some purpose concerning you, 

 some good work for each of you to do, and he wishes you to devote the 

 power which he gave you when he created you to that service. What 

 kind of work He has for you, I cannot tell. But I know he is calling 

 every one of you to some enobling work. The joy of life must be not 

 in being ministered unto, but in ministering. God help you, girls, to 

 understand it before it is too late. There is so much good in living, if 

 one knows how to live. There is a bright and better way expressed fully 

 in the well known motto: ''Look up, not down; look forward, not back- 

 ward; look out, not in; and lend a hand." Set your feet in that path, and 

 follow it patiently and you will find it the path that shineth more and 

 more unto the perfect day. 



