Page:The High School Boy and His Problems (1920).pdf/30

 often as not first from ignorance that he does these things, ignorance of the fact that it is he and not his environment that is changing. He often blames his parents or the conditions under which he lives for his discontent and unhappiness, while the truth is that all these new feelings and desires which are striving to get control of him are the result of sexual changes which are going on in his body, and which are causing him to look at life from an altogether different angle. A most important thing for him now and for the future is that he learn to control these desires and not that he let them control or subdue him.

All sorts of temptations will come to him at this time. If he can be made to understand that his body with all its parts is a sacred thing which his creator has given into his care to keep clean and strong and undefiled, if he can turn aside vulgar suggestions, if he will refrain from impure words and impure thoughts, and impure acts of all sorts, he will learn self-control of immeasurable value to him not only as a boy but as a man. For all these things sap a growing boy's strength, they reduce his vitality, they undermine his character, they make him less able to think and, worst of all, they make him far less a man.

Bad sexual habits in the developing boy are the greatest evil of which he can be guilty. They take away his initiative, they increase his self-consciousness, they rob him of his physical strength, and they weaken his mind. It