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 THE 
 
 BOY PROBLEM 
 
 A Study in Social Pedagogy 
 
 BY 
 
 WILLIAM BYRON FORBUSH 
 With an Introduction by G. Stanley Hall 
 
 Fourth Edition 
 
 Of- THE ^ 
 
 -iVERSITY ) 
 
 BOSTON 
 
 Ube pilgrim press 
 
 CHICAGO 
 
f * * ' 
 
 ••• * «. 
 
 » w* c 
 
 
 GENERAL 
 
 Copyright, 1901, 1902 
 By William Byron Forbush 
 
INTRODUCTION 
 
 The author, who is both a clergyman and a Doctor 
 of Philosophy, has been among boys and done work 
 with them that I consider hardly less than epoch-mak- 
 ing in significance. Dr. Forbush understands the 
 natural boy and how to approach and handle him, and 
 has also put himself abreast of .the new psycho-ge- 
 netic and pedagogical literature. 
 
 The great fact of adolescence with all its multifari- 
 ous phenomena and its stages of transformation 
 might almost be called nature's regeneration. For a 
 few years before this, boys live with their mates and 
 adjust themselves as best they may to the will and 
 way of the adult Olympians about them in the per- 
 sons of teachers and parents, whose lives and ideals 
 seem strange and alien to them. But when the ephe- 
 bic reconstruction begins, one of its most radical 
 changes consists in opening the soul to influences that 
 come to it from riper years. Instead of a horizontal 
 expansion of interests in boy life, the soul now 
 reaches upward and is intensely sensitive to what the 
 coming years are to bring; so that this age is the 
 golden period of adult influence, provided it is wise 
 enough not to offend. 
 
 For one, I am profoundly convinced that a new 
 day is dawning in the work of the Church for the 
 young; that we must pause, reconsider, and take our 
 
 1 15788 
 
4 The Boy Problem 
 
 bearings anew; that there is a Hght about to break 
 forth from genetic psychology and pedagogy that will 
 show things in new relations and will convict some 
 of our best ways and means in the past of error and 
 bring a wealth of new suggestions. The Church, 
 the Sunday-school, teachers, and those who labor for 
 the neglected classes are now coming to see that they 
 must study and understand better those for whom 
 they work; and that everything must be adjusted to 
 their nature and needs. I welcome, therefore, this 
 little study, render thanks to the author that he has 
 presented here in meaty and compact form what many 
 would have expanded, and am glad of an opportunity 
 to heartily commend it to all lovers of boys. 
 
 G. Stanley Hall. 
 Clark University, 
 Worcester, Mass., Nov. i, 1900. 
 
PREFACE 
 
 TWere is a time when a boy emerges from the nar- 
 row bounds of a dependent self-Hfe and from the 
 limits of the school and the home, and seeks the larg- 
 er social world of the street and the "gang." The 
 instinct is legitimate and masterful and full of possi- 
 bilities of danger or help. Its recognition is recent 
 and literature upon it is slight. It constitutes the' 
 most pressing problem of adolescence. 
 
 The solution of the problem may be sought from 
 three sources : from a study of boy life, from a study 
 of the ways in which children spontaneously organize 
 socially, and from a study of the ways adults organize 
 for the benefit of boys. Such studies are the contents 
 ,of the first four chapters. Following these are some 
 conclusions and suggestions. 
 
 The matter of the training of the individual boy in 
 the home and the school is aside from the purpose of 
 this inquiry, whose aim is to discuss the boy as dealt 
 with in his social relations in the institutions of the 
 community and the Church. To the science of thi. 
 sort of education I have given the name social peda- 
 SOgy. 
 
 The importance of these modest and hitherto un- 
 classified instrumentalities has seemed so great to 
 those engaged in this work that a general fellowship 
 of workers with boys, to which has been given the 
 
6 The Boy Problem 
 
 suggestive name, "The Men of Tomorrow," was 
 formed in 1895 for the single purpose of studying 
 boys and their needs, and of bexroming a bureau of 
 information upon the subject. This alliance has, 
 through its conferences and by means of the mono- 
 graphs which it has published, quietly done much to 
 stimulate interest in the movement for boys. To the 
 men and women in the alliance, of which the author 
 is president, acknowledgment must be made for their 
 contributions of information and help without which 
 this study would have been impossible, and to them 
 he dedicates the results. 
 
 The author welcomes letters of inquiry and criti- 
 cism. The membership and facilities of "Thte Men of 
 Tomorrow" are also open to all who desire to insti- 
 tute or improve instrumentalities for work with boys. 
 
 Special thanks are here rendered to Drs. G. Stanley 
 Hall and Graham Taylor for permission to reprint 
 portions of this book which have appeared in the Ped- 
 agogical Seminary and The Commons. 
 
 William Byron Forbush. 
 Winthrop Church, Boston. 
 
 NOTE TO THE THIRD EDITION 
 The author has taken advantage of the call for an- 
 other edition, to go over his material again carefully, 
 and has made about two hundred changes and ad- 
 ditions. The sections on the Sunday-school and De- 
 cision Day, and the Bibliography have been entirely 
 rewritten. 
 
CONTENTS 
 
 X Boy-Life : a Digest of the recent scattered 
 literature of the Child Study of 
 Adolescence with special reference 
 to the Social Development of the 
 Boy 9 
 
 ^ By-Laws of Boy-Life : some Exceptions 
 to and Limitations of Generalities 
 about Boys 29 
 
 V Ways in Which Boys Spontaneously Or- 
 ganize Socially : a Study of the 
 **Gang" and Child-Societies ... 42 
 
 ^ Social Organizations Formed for Boys 
 BY Adults : a Critique of Boys' 
 Clubs and Church Work for Boys . 52 
 
 5 Some Suggestions as to How to Help 
 
 Boys: a Constructive Study . . .123 
 
 u The Boy Problem in the Church . . . 158 
 
 A Directory of Social Organizations for 
 
 Boys . 178 
 
 A List of Books and Pamphlets about Work 
 
 with Boys 188 
 
 A Reading Course on the Boy Problem . . .198 
 Index 200 
 
or THE 
 
 UNIVERSITY 
 
 BOY-LIFE 
 
 The boy becomes a social being by development. 
 It seems necessary to gather and summarize the re- 
 sults of child-study, now rapidly becoming familiar 
 yet still inaccessible to many, which show how that 
 development is made. 
 
 The birth of a boy is not his beginning. The pre- 
 natal child passes up through every grade of animal 
 life from the simplest and lowest to the highest and 
 most complex. Over one hundred and forty uselessi 
 organs appear, grow and are done away, like leaves/ 
 upon this tree of life, in this miracle of child-evolution/ 
 After birth this ''candidate for humanity" continues 
 this evolution^ this "climbing up his ancestral tree," 
 in which he has already repeated the history of the 
 animal world, by repeating the history of his own 
 race-life from savagery unto civilization. "The child," 
 says Chamberlain, "is-father of the man, and brother 
 of the race." 
 
 The period of a boy's life is rouglily divided as- fol- 
 lows : infancy, from birth to about six ;J childhood, from » 
 six to twelve ; adolescence from about twelve tO' man- 
 hood. 
 
 It is not until about six that, with the rise and sen- 
 sitization of memory, the continent of child-life ap- 
 pears above the sea to vision. Those years of moulding 
 
10 The Boy, Problem 
 
 and upheaval which we do not remember as to our- 
 selves and of which it is impossible to secure verbal 
 testimony, though silent, are not unimportant. Physi- 
 cally, infancy is characterized by the most restless 
 activity. "The period of greatest physical activity in 
 a man's life ends at about six." The infant is like the 
 wild creatures of the wood, and it is as cruel to confine 
 the physical activities of young children in the nur- 
 sery, the kindergarten and the school as those of 
 squirrels and swallows. Mentally, the infant boy ap- 
 pears to consist mostly of a bundle of instincjts. Of 
 these the simpler ones of grasping, locomotion, curi- 
 osity, etc., are m^ans of self-education, but the most 
 marked is imitation. ''These instincts are implanted 
 for the sake of giving rise to habits. This purpose 
 accomplished, the instincts, as such, fade away." 
 
 Childhood is marked by less violent but more self; 
 directed physical activity; in its earlier part by fre- 
 quent contests with the contagious diseases, and a 
 struggle for constitutional vitality (with a peculiarly 
 sickly year at abouf" eight) ; the development of the 
 higher instincts rather than those of a merely animal 
 quality ; and the emergence of the memory, the emo- 
 \ tions, the imagination and the self-consciousness. This 
 
 I period is a contmuation of the first rather than the 
 introduction to the third. These first two form that 
 age of immaturity and dependence, longer than that 
 granted to any other of the animal order, given to 
 ichildhood for its protection and preparation in the 
 nome and the school for the larger tasks of social and 
 rpdependent manhood. 
 
Boy-Life ii 
 
 \\ The instinct which is most prominent in this period 
 
 I* is the play-instinct. It is both expression and means 
 
 i of education. It expresses the awakening instincts, 
 
 // and so teaches us what the child's nature is. It is the 
 
 /I natural way by which the child finds out things. The 
 
 child's manner of play at different ages is distinctive. 
 
 Mr. Joseph Lee classifies the child in play as in order, 
 
 in the dramatic, the self-assertive and the loyalty 
 
 periods. 
 
 The infant plays alone, by creeping, shaking, fond- 
 ling, etc., developing the simpler instincts through 
 curiosity and experiment. The boy-child begins to 
 imagine and to personify in his games, and wishes 
 often to play with others. But that this social instinct 
 is as yet incomplete is shown by the fact that in games 
 it is each one for himself ; the team-work so admirable 
 among young men is entirely lacking, and even in 
 playing team-games eadh player seeks his own glory 
 and repeatedly sacrifices the welfare of the team to 
 himself. To take advantage of this play-instinct, 
 which enfolds in itself so many other instincts, is the 
 newest problem in education. 
 
 During these two periods the boy has been chang- 
 ing from a bundle of instincts to a bundle of habits. 
 The trails are becoming well traveled roads. jBoyhoodj 
 is the time for forming habits, as adolescemce is tho'p * 
 time for shaping ideals. This is the era for conscience- ' 
 building, as the later is the) era for will-training. Po- 
 liteness, moral conduct, and even religious observance 
 may now be made so much a matter of course that 
 
/ 
 
 12 The Boy Problem 
 
 they will never seem foreign. The possibilities for 
 wise parenthood to preempt the young soul for good- 
 ness are incalculable. 
 
 One reason why this is true is because verbal jnem- 
 ory is more acute than at any other period. "The 
 best period for learning a foreign language ends before 
 fourteen." This power of absorption forms the char- 
 acteristic of this second period. Our duty now is to 
 feed the child. The boy can absorb more nutriment 
 and also more information, more helpful or hurtful 
 facts, more proverbs of wisdom, more Scripture and 
 hymns, for future use, than ever again in his life. In 
 this absorptive rather than originative quality is the 
 strong distinction between this period and that which 
 follows. 
 
 The boy of this age is not mere animal. His emo- 
 tional instincts are growing. And of these love is 
 one of the deepest and one of the first. Although it 
 be true, as Paolo Lombroso says, that "the child tends 
 not to love, but to be loved and exclusively loved," 
 yet his loves mark the brightening dawn of the social 
 and altruistic instincts ; and so love for mother, for 
 teacher, for some older friend who is an ideal, love for 
 truth which is so startling in the unperverted child, 
 love for God and good things as He and they are 
 understood — these are all characteristic of the warm- 
 hearted days of boyhood. 
 
 Together with the ideas and ideals which the boy 
 absorbs by precept and imitation there begins to 
 appear sometime during this period the sense of per- 
 
\ 
 
 ^Moy-Life 13 
 
 sonal responsibility^' This manifests itself not in the 
 form of intellectual doubt or deep inquiry but rather . 
 in the acknowledgment of being under law. The hab- \ 
 its formed in this period are also strongly determina- 
 tive of the future trend toward righteousness or 
 wrong. Upon the very molecules themselves an im- *^ 
 placable and unerasable register is being made. 
 
 In summary, we may call this the Old Testament 
 era of the boy's life. The Bible, that marvelous man-^ 
 ual -of pedagogy, has been thought to reflect in either 
 Testament childhood and adolescence. "The key of 
 the Old Testament," says Sheldon, "is obedienca" 
 This we have said is the key to childhood. The law 
 must come before the gospel, the era of nature before 
 the era of grace. Those old heroes were only great 
 big boys, and it is an underlying sympathy with them 
 which explains why boys of this age prefer the Old 
 Testament to the New. There are sound reasons why 
 it should first be taught them. 
 
 Especially in religious ideas are boys under twelve 
 much like the ancients. Many times they actually 
 pass through the stages of religion passed through by/ 
 primitive peoples, namely, nature worship, mythology,! 
 fetishistic superstition* The contents of many a boy's 
 mind and pocket reveal a recourse to charms, incanta- 
 tions anci anthropomorphisms. At the best the God 
 of one's childhood is but a great man, and it is a sol- 
 emnizing fact that He often bears the face and nature 
 of the child's own earthly father.^ 
 
 It is of these "young Pretenders," as Sully calls 
 
14 The Boy Problem 
 
 them, that some to-me-unknown interpreter has thus 
 spoken recently in the Independent: 
 
 "There was a time when we thought the grasshop- 
 pers were old, a time when all our days passed Hke 
 long, happy years; and the length of one short path 
 that crossed a brook and held somewhere in its course 
 the summit of a hill, was a long journey to take. We 
 were the new heirs of creation then, not yet finished, 
 and taking kindly to our original dust. If our sires 
 were already looking forward to an inheritance be- 
 yond the grave, to us more particularly belonged the 
 earth and the fulness thereof. We possessed the land 
 and the sea. We diffused our own radiance, and the 
 very skies were blue for our sake. 
 
 ''Having no enemies to forgive, our prayers were 
 short; but our faith was expansive. We believed 
 everything and sighed for more. Somewhere in the 
 cool green shadows were good spirits that we never 
 saw, whose influence our little pagan souls confessed. 
 We dealt in miracles and prophecies as sincerely as 
 ever did a Hebrew prophet. A chirruping cricket was 
 the harbinger of fortune ; if the leaves of a little whirl- 
 wind passed but once around our devoted heads we 
 were invincible, and should a butterfly chance to 
 brush our cheek with its happy wings that was a 
 token of joys to come. All things were to us the signs 
 of blessings. 
 
 "Mentally we had the divine impulse. We were not 
 inventive because we were creative. We could have 
 made stars had there been a convenient heaven to 
 
Boy-Life 15 
 
 lodge them in. There was gold beneath the green- 
 sward of our hillside; the bead^ around our necks 
 were strands of pearls. And if we strutted through 
 some meadow, changing the ranks of larkspur to 
 brave knights and the daisies to fair ladies, we ruled 
 our realm with an 'even-handed justice' that might 
 have caused more substantial sovereigns to blush for 
 shame. We never cried for other worlds to conquer, 
 but climbed the intervening fence and extended our 
 creation over our neighbor's meadow. Politically we 
 belonged to every era of civilization, and were barba- 
 rians to boot. We were cave-dwellers who stormed 
 sixteenth century castles, Roman centurions setting 
 up modem republics. We were Don Quixotes in 
 valor, martyrs and fanatics in religion. But at heart 
 we were always communists, who understood the 
 common law of possession better than some latter day 
 economists. 
 
 "Learning we had not, nor needed ; but we did have 
 understanding. We were earth natives, with more 
 than an inkling of what transpires in the mind of an 
 ant, being not far removed from it nor from the stars 
 above our heads. Our inspirations gave us the ad- 
 vantage over facts and made us independent of the 
 'eternal fitness of things.' 
 
 "Morally, we rejoiced in the sense of irresponsibil- 
 ity as the angels do in heaven. We had not congealed 
 into our proportion of virtues and vices. Those fierce 
 dragons, Right and Wrong, who do every man to 
 death soon or late, had not then passed the gates of 
 
1 6 The Boy Problem 
 
 our Eden. There was no forbidden fruit, no deeds 
 were evil, and the innocent lies we told were but 
 flights to try the wings of our fancy. Our conscience 
 was mere hearsay, an impartation from our elders. 
 For, while we had in us dim foreshadowings of im- 
 mortality, we were innocent Pharisees then in ethical 
 matters. All of life was a play, an acting of noble 
 parts ; and whether it was the role of pagan king or 
 pious monk, we were equally sincere. 
 
 "Sympathy was our chief quality. Of that we had 
 more than of what Elbert Hubbard calls 'poise.' A 
 sparrow lying dead in our path with crumpled wings 
 could bring a gush of tears to eyes that a few years 
 hence were to be dr>' and hard upon a field where men 
 lay dying of gaping wounds. But at the time we took 
 a solemn satisfaction in the sparrow's funeral. We laid 
 him in .state, and passed before his bier bowed with 
 ancient grief. And we buried him with his little dead 
 breast turned pathetically up to the blue skies that he 
 had loved. Afterward we spoke kindly of hirn, be- 
 lieving that he would sing for us in Paradise 'some 
 day' — so firmly did we cherish every sweet and kindly 
 hope. No one else believes so firmly as children do 
 in the resurrection, because to no one else does death 
 appear so unnatural. 
 
 "Our sense of justice was elemental, and it was long 
 before the Jungle Law of this world prevailed with 
 our spirits — never, in fact, till we had left far behind 
 the enchanted rainbow of childhood. Yet, even then 
 we had our share of skepticism. While we believed 
 
Boy-Life 17 
 
 so much that we did not see and could not know, we 
 distrusted each other with primitive candor that we 
 were obHged later on to put away with other childish 
 things. We were as shrewd as men are in our com- 
 mercial intc -courses, driving hard bargains with each 
 other in the matter of balls, June bugs and dead but-' 
 terfly wings. 
 
 ''We were religious bigots, clinging with unchristian 
 fervor to our fathers' creeds, and ready to die by these 
 ancestral ladders to heaven. But nothing was so rare 
 among us as a self-confessed and mortified sinner ; 
 for in those days our sins distinguished us more than 
 our virtues did afterward. Besides, humility was an 
 unknown sentimentality with us. Our very Pharisa- 
 ism consisted in thanking our heavenly bodies that we 
 were not as good as some were — prim, pale little faces 
 that stared at us rnournfully from the pages of our 
 story-books. With what brimming eyes of compas- 
 sion did>we regard' these little premature saints, who 
 always died and went to heaven — but after such har- 
 rowing sorrows and awful chastenings ! 
 
 "Finally, we belonged to the universal secret order 
 of childhood, irrespective of race or station, an order 
 so exclusive that Hans Andersen was the only .man 
 ever initiated, though some think Homer would have 
 been eligible, if there had been any children among 
 the gods and heroes of his day. Those who have 
 watched children, strangers to each other, going 
 through the signs and equivalents of becoming ac- 
 quainted, know that such an order does exist in the 
 
i8 The Boy Problem 
 
 form of some childish telepathy. And though we 
 might, as a matter of precaution, confess our sins to a 
 priest, the secrets of this divine order have never been 
 divulged. To our fathers we may have confided a few 
 worldly maxims, as a partridge flutters deceitfully 
 before the hunter to conceal her brood, but we had 
 our mental reservations, peopled with our own fairies 
 and will-o'-the-wisps, and ruled over by our own gods, 
 which, were quite independent of any other gods in 
 heaven or earth. And written above the door of our 
 interior was this solemn injunction, 'Except Ye Be- 
 come As Little Children Ye Cannot Enter Here!' 
 But can a camel ,pass through the eye of a needle ? or 
 a sinful man enter the gates of heaven? or a Solomon, 
 with his 'vanity of vanities,' catch sight of that 'im- 
 mortal sea that brought us hither?' " 
 
 Adolescence is bounded at the beginning by ap- 
 proaching puberty, and at the end by complete man- 
 hood. The so-called American boy, who was really a 
 Persian in his love of war, or an Athenian each day 
 telling or hearing some new thing, or a Hindu in his 
 dreams, or a Hebrew in his business sense, is rapidly 
 coming down through the millenniums, and has 
 reached the days of Bayard and Siegfried and Launce- 
 J[ot. 
 
 It is the time of change. By fifteen the brain stops 
 growing, the large arteries increase one-third, the 
 temperature rises one degree, the reproductive organs 
 have functioned, the voice deepens, the stature grows 
 by bounds, and the body needs more sleep and food 
 
Boy-Life 19 
 
 than ever before. It is the emotional agg. No songs 
 are too g ay, no sorr ow^eygT"so"fearml. It is' the time 
 for slang, because no words in any dictionai;"y can 
 possibly express all that crowds to utterance. It is the 
 time for falling in love most thoughtlessly and most 
 unselfishly. The child wants to be entertained con- 
 stantly. This is a natural condition. "It is as neces- 
 sary to develop the blood-vessels of a boy as crying ;\ 
 is those of a baby." It is the enthusiastic age. The 
 masklike, impassive face at this age is a sign of a loss 
 of youth or of purity. "He who is a man at sixteen ' 
 will be a child at sixty." 
 
 This emotional, restless disposition, which is so 
 closely associated with rapid and uneven growth, the 
 new sense of power and of self-life and dreams of 
 adventure, is often manifested in a craving to roam, 
 to run away from home, to go to sea. The boy is 
 simply seeking his place in the world. Ambitions are 
 strongly evident now, though often irrational and 
 fantastic. Their nurture is the determining factor in 
 the choice of the life-work. __ 
 
 Physical restlessness is often associated with intel- 1 
 lectual restlessness and curiosity. It is a time of 
 stubborn doubts, painful and dangerous, but signs of 
 mental and moral health. Starbuck fixes the acme of 
 the doubt-period at eighteen. Together with the 
 doubts there is frequently an obstinate positiveness, 
 so that, as Gulick says, "the boy is a skeptic and a 
 partisan at the same time." For several years after 
 twelve a boy is apt to be filled with the feeling that 
 
20 The Boy Problem 
 
 there is something about himself that needs to be 
 settled. 
 
 This widening of interests, emotional and intellec- 
 tual, is accompanied by a gradual social broadening. 
 While in the early part of this period egoistic emo- 
 tions are apt to be disagreeably expressed, vented 
 sometimes in bullying and again, in an opposite way, 
 by extreme self-consciousness and bashfulness, this 
 sooner or later develops into a clearer recognition of 
 one's self and a finer recognition of others. Adoles- 
 cence has been termed an unselfing. There is a yearn- 
 ing to be with and for one's kind. This is seen in the 
 growing team-work spirit in games, in the various 
 clubs which now spring up almost spontaneously, in 
 the slowly increasing interest in social gatherings and 
 in the other sex. 
 
 This is also a time of moral activity and ideals. "A 
 new dimension, that of depth, is being added." Boys 
 now begin to day-dream and make large plans. A 
 boy is capitalized hope. He may become morbidly 
 conscientious or painfully exercised with the search 
 for absolute truth. Those very emotions which lead 
 to bullying and showing off are capable of being di- 
 verted unto courage and chivalry. This is the age of 
 hero-worship. On conversion at this age many are 
 eager to exercise their social consciousness and emu- 
 late their heroes by becoming ministers or mission- 
 aries or slum workers or men of achievement. Boy- 
 ideals are always immediate. Like a vine they must 
 twine around some standard. As Professor H. M. 
 
Boy-Life 21 
 
 Burr says, "If the boy's ideal of manhood is Fitzsim- 
 mons, he immediately sets about punching some other 
 boy's head. If he thinks the Hfe of an Indian the ideal, 
 he straightway takes to the woods or whoops it up in 
 the alley, as the case may be." For this reason the 
 wise boys' club leader who proposes an attractive newj, 
 plan will take heed always to carry it into effect at' 
 the very next meeting, ftlie encouragement and direc- 
 tion of these ideals into orderly and definite channels 
 is a matter of infinite importance^ 
 
 But the peculiarity of this period that most attracts 
 attention is that of crisis. It seems to be well proven 
 that there comes a time in the adolescence of almost 
 every boy and girl when the various physical and 
 moral influences of the life bear down to a point of « 
 depression, and then rise suddenly in an ascending/ 
 curve, carrying with them a new life. There is first a/| 
 lull, then a storm, then peace ; what results is not boy! [ 
 but man. This crisis, in religious matters, is called/ 
 conversion, but is by no means confined to or peculiar 
 to religious change. "It is," says Dr. Hall, "a natural 
 regeneration." If the Hughlings-Jackson three-level / 
 theory of the brain be true, there is at this time a final ( 
 and complete transfer of the central powers of the 1 
 brain from the lower levels of instinct and motor pow- 
 er to the higher levels. "It is," says Lancaster, "the 
 focal point of all psychology." Dr. Starbuck's careful 
 though diffusive study shows that this change is apt 
 to come in a great wave at about 15 or 16, preceded 
 by a lesser wave at about 12, and followed by another 
 
22 The Boy Problem 
 
 at about 17 or 18. It consists in a coming out from 
 the little, dependent, irresponsible, animal self into 
 the larger, independent, responsible, outreaching and 
 upreaching moral life of manhood.. Professor Coe 
 shows that the first wave is marked by decided re- 
 ligious impressibility, but that the number of conver- 
 sions that can be dated is greater in the second period. 
 
 There is a marked difference in the way this "per- 
 sonalizing of religion," as Coe calls it, comes to boys 
 and to girls. With boys it is a later, a more violent 
 and a more sudden incident. With boys it is more 
 apt to be associated with periods of doubt, with girls 
 with times of storm and stress. It seems to be more 
 apt to come to boys when alone, to girls in a church 
 service. 
 
 Next to the physical birth-hour this hour of psychi- 
 cal birth is most critical. For "at this formative stage" 
 — I quote from the Committee on Secondary Educa- 
 tion — "an active fermentation occurs that may give 
 'wine or vinegar." "This," says President Hall, "is the 
 day of grace that must not be sinned away." 
 
 The period of adolescence is by many divided into / , 
 three stages, embracing respectively the ages from j 
 twelve to sixteen, sixteen to eighteen and eighteen to ' 
 twenty-four. These might be termed the stages of 
 ferment, crisis and reconstruction. Mr. E. P. St. John 
 classifies them as physical, emotional and intellectual » 
 stages. The three waves of religious interest corre- M 
 spond with these stages. I have not attempted to clas- J 
 sify the phenomena of these stages here, desiring 
 
Boy-Life 23 
 
 rather to give the impression of the period as a whole. 
 Most of the phenomena which I have spoken of begin 
 in the earhest stage, reach their culmination in the 
 second and begin in the third to form the fabric of 
 altruism and character. Of course the instinctive, the 
 sensuous and the sentimental are apt to precede the 
 rational and the deliberative. 
 
 We are evidently approaching the end of the plastic 
 period. The instincts have all been given. The_habits 
 are pretty well tormed . There is plenty of time to 
 grTTw7but not much to begin. The character of most 
 boys is fairly determined before they enter college. 
 Now the father looks one day into the eyes of what 
 he thought was his little boy and sees looking out 
 the unaccustomed and free spirit of a young and un- 
 conquerable personality. Some mad parents take this 
 time to begin that charming task of "breaking the 
 child's will," which is usually set about with the same 
 energy and implements as the beating of carpets. But 
 the boy is now too big either to be whipped or to be 
 mentally or morally coerced. 
 
 We hesitate whether more to be afraid of or alarmed 
 for this creature who has become endowed with the 
 passions and independence of manhood while still a 
 child'in foresight and judgment. • He rushes now into 
 so many crazy plans and harmful deeds. Swift states 
 that a period of semi-criminality is normal for all boys 
 who are healthy. Hall calls it an age of temporary 
 insanity. This age, particularly that from twelve to 
 sixteen, is by all odds the most critical and difficult 
 to deal with in all childhood. It is particularly so 
 
24 The Boy Problem 
 
 because the boy now becomes secretive, he neither 
 can nor will utter himself, and the very sensitiveness, 
 longing and overpowering sense of the new life of 
 which I have spoken is often so concealed by incon- 
 sistent and even barbarous behavior that one quite 
 loses both comprehension and patience. These are 
 the fellows who, though absent, sustain the maternal 
 prayer-meetings. 
 
 Tlie very apparent self-sufficiency of the boy at this 
 period causes the parent to discontinue many means 
 of amusement and tokens of affection which were re- 
 tained until now. The twelve-month-old infant is sub- 
 merged in toys, but the twelve-year-old boy has noth- 
 ing at home to play with. The infant is caressed till 
 he is pulplike and breathless, but the lad, who is 
 hungry for love and understanding, is held at arms' 
 I length. This is the time when most parents are 
 ' found wanting. And in this broad generalization I 
 do not forget what Madonnas have learned in the 
 secret of their hearts and from the worship of the 
 Child, nor what wise Josephs have been patient to 
 discover who have dreamed with angels. 
 
 Love and waiting must now have their perfect work. 
 Cures by the laying on of hands are to be discouraged. 
 The father, whose earlier task was to be a perfect 
 Lawgiver, must now become Hero and Apostle. It 
 is a comfort to know that this era will pass swiftly 
 away and that the child will suddenly awake from 
 many of his vagaries and forget his dreams. There 
 is a certain preservative salt of humor, common to 
 
Boy-Life 25 
 
 lifTI 
 ad- 1 
 
 boyhood and demanded of parenthood during this / 
 trying era, by means of which children often grow up 
 much better than thein parents can bring them uj 
 
 Our last glimpse of this conservatory of young life 
 shows us the habits full-grown and the instincts bud- 
 ding successively into fresh ones. These buddings or -^ 
 "nascencies" I will refer to again. Here is a heap of ( 
 knowledge, much of it undigested and some of it false. 
 Here, too, if he has passed the crisis I spoke of, is the 
 little new plant oj. faith. There was a faith which he 
 had before which he borrowed from his mother, but a 
 man cannot Jiv.e_ his whole life long on a borrowed 
 Jaith* It is new, it is little, but it is his own, and it ! 
 is growing. But here is something strange. Strong, 
 vigorous, fearful at first and afterward dangerous 
 looking, here is a plant that has suddenly taken root 
 and grown bigger than all. It_isjh£_Willi That is ' j 
 what all this storm and stress means. This is what is • 
 born in the emergence from the dependent to the 
 independent being. Shall we pull it up and throw it ' 
 away? What ! and leave him a weakling child through 
 Hfe? Shall we bind it down? What! and maim him 
 forever ? Let it grow ; but let it grow properly. This 
 Will is dangerous but needful. You can't have births 
 without some risks. If this boy is ever to be a man, \ 
 it will all depend on what is done with his Will. " 
 
 / Social pedagogy in dealing with a being who is now 
 commg to have a social nature pays its first and chief 
 attention to will-training.^ For there is no more im- 
 portant, more neglectecTsubject. It is an art, as one 
 
26 The Boy Problem 
 
 tersely says, "which has no text-book and of which it 
 is impossible to write one." 
 
 The public school fails in will-training because it 
 gives the will no exercise. "Our schools," says Wil- 
 liam I^ Crane, ^'permit us to think what is good but 
 not to do what is good.'f The home, especially the 
 city home, fails for the same reason. The child's at- 
 tention has been shared by a thousand sights, nothing 
 holds him long, and he cannot find ways to use his 
 instincts actively. The Church fails because it has 
 tried the wrong thing: it has taught the children to 
 examine their spiritual interiors and to sing, "Draw 
 me nearer till my will is lost in thine," and not to hal- 
 low their wills, as Phillips Brooks wisely said, "by 
 filling them with more and more life, by making them 
 so wise that they shall spend their strength in good- 
 ness." 
 
 General Francis A. Walker was the first to show 
 just what the country did for the boy. He used' the 
 simple illustration of the squirrel seen on the way 
 from school, the trap designed and built for his cap- 
 ture and the successful result. There was a single 
 keen interest, a natural instinct awakened, that in- 
 stinct exercised by a voluntary muscular effort carry- 
 ing an originative task to completion: result, not 
 merely a captured squirrel but strengthened will pow- 
 er. Johnson, our authority on play, says : "There are 
 no really good men without strong^ills, there are no 
 strong wills without trained muscle^s. We learn to do 
 by doing. We learn to will by willing." 
 
 With this hint social pedagogy goes to work. "You 
 
Boy-Life 27 
 
 can only get a purchase on another's will," James 
 says, "by touching his actual or potential self." Hall 
 says, "Will is only a form of interest." We trained 
 the boy's conscience, his passive self, by filling his 
 mind with rules, but we can train his will, his' active 
 self, onlv by interesting and making active his in- 
 stincts. Lancaster says, "The pedagogy of adoles- 
 cence may be summed up in one' sentence, Inspire 
 enthusiastic activity."yi spoke of the "nascencies" of 
 instinct. Every little while an instinct pops up in a 
 boy's mind and feebly feels for utterance. If it is not 
 noticed it sinks back again to rest, or it becomes per- 
 verted. All boys have the constructing instinct. If 
 it is neglected it either fades away or becomes the 
 destructive instinct. Some wise man sets the boy to 
 •whittling or modeling and the instinct becomes an 
 ardent interest. Such happy alertness, thinks Mosso, 
 was the encouragement that made a Raphael and a 
 Da Vinci. It will satisfy us if it gives our boys the 
 good instead of the evil will. 
 
 It is also a curious fact that a multiplicity of inter- 
 ests just at this time multiplies rather than diminishes 
 the power of acquisition. Thus social pedagogy may 
 use many instrumentalities to encourage the inter- 
 ested and self-directed activities of boys in maturing 
 their wills into principle and character. 
 
 The results of this chapter suggest that the last 
 nascencies of the instincts, the completion of the hab 
 its, the psychical crisis and the infancy of the will, all 
 coincident with the birth of the social nature, together 
 form a period of danger and possibility in boy life. 
 
 I-: I 
 
28 The Boy Problem 
 
 For helping this age, social pedagogy, the combina- 
 tion of educative forces in a social direction, is a new 
 and most important science. 
 
II 
 
 BY-LAWS OF BOY-LIFE 
 
 Starbuck, speaking of religious training, says: 
 "One can scarcely think of a single pedagogical 
 maxim which, if followed in all cases, might not vi- 
 olate the deepest needs of the person whom it is our 
 purpose to help." This is true of all training. The 
 parent, teacher or social worker who should try to 
 bring up a boy or a group of boys by means of the 
 digest of information in the last chapter would find 
 that in real life, as in .Latin Grammar, there are more 
 exceptions than rules. 
 
 Some children will very closely follow the diagram 
 of growth which I have suggested; most children will 
 accommodate themselves to it in a general way, vary- 
 ing dates, order and distinctness of detail ; while a 
 few will seem to defy all laws in their development. 
 
 I feel it necessary to interrupt the logic by which 
 (having shown the social nature and needs of adoles- 
 cence) I proceed to suggest the ways by which those 
 needs are being and should be supplied, in order to 
 relate some of the by-laws to the constitution of boy- 
 life and impress the necessity of knowing the lads 
 who are to be helped, in their individualities. 
 
 In every group of boys we notice instances of De- 
 lay or Precocity in development. This may be hered- 
 itary, temperamental or accidental. This boy comes 
 
30 The Boy Problem 
 
 of a slow, stolid, substantial stock and matures slowly. 
 Here is one of a tropical temperament who is pre- 
 cocious. Sickness, lack of nutrition or care, an ac- 
 . cident, a sorrow, may have kept that one back. This 
 ^ shows how necessary it is to know the exact home- 
 
 ; 
 
 ) 
 
 conditions and the life-history in order to know the 
 boy. One may entirely lose power with a boy by be- ' 
 ing too quick or too slow for him. There is a well 
 known "clumsy age" between 14 and 16 when the 
 skill of the hand becomes stationary or retrogrades 
 while the power of appreciation of the fine and true 
 grows on. This is caused by the fact that the bones 
 are growing faster than the muscles in that short pe- 
 riod of stupendous physical increment^ A similar 
 period of deterioration in the pleasure in, and the 
 quality of, the drawings of children, beginning with 
 the tenth or twelfth year, is noted by Chamberlain, 
 wjiich he explains by the fact that the child awakes 
 to the true appreciation of his work as 'nothing more 
 than a poor, weak imitation of nature, and the charm 
 of creative art vanishes with the disappearance of the 
 former naive faith in it.' This coming down out of 
 .the realm of childish imagination unto the level of 
 seeing things as they are, coupled with new desires 
 after the ideal which are limited in execution by man- 
 ual clumsiness, helps to explain some of the moodi- 
 ness and gloom of the period. 
 
 The influence of Temperament on the phenomena 
 
 of development is not to be neglected. Dr. Coe has 
 
 i made a most suggestive study of this, but has applied 
 
By-Lazvs of Boy-Life 31 
 
 it chiefly to the adult. It is noticeable in adolescence. 
 Although Lotze has made an ingenious and often ob- 
 servable parallel between the sanguine temperament 
 and childhood and the sentimental and adolescence, 
 the diversities of temperamental nature which are to 
 be permanent are already visible. The readiness but 
 trivality of the sanguine, the cheerful conceit of the 
 sentimental, the prompt, intense response of the chol- 
 eric and the ruminative nature of the phlegmatic tem- 
 peraments are each noticeable in individual boys. 
 The "child-types" which have been classified are only 
 differences and combinations of temperaments. Less- 
 haft recognizes six among children entering school : 
 the hypocritical, the ambitious, the quiet, the effemi- 
 nate-stupid, the bad-stupid, the depressed. Siegert 
 names fifteen: melancholy, angel-or-devil, star-gazer, 
 scatterbrain, apathetic, misanthropic, doubter and 
 seeker, honourable, critical, eccentric, stupid, buf- 
 ioonly-naiz-'e, with feeble memory, studious, and blase. 
 These characteristics, with their special relations to 
 sensibilities, intellect and will, are to be noted and 
 used as diagnoses for individual treatment. 
 
 Racial Differences are quite marked in regions 
 where there are many illiterate boys of foreign birth 
 but they rapidly disappear from notice under the 
 fluence of the pubHc school. I am indebted to Mr. 
 Thomas Chew, who has nearly two thousand boys 
 under continual observation in the Fall River Boys' 
 Club, for his impressions of two classes of foreigners 
 — the French Canadians and the Hebrews. "The 
 
 ms 5 
 
 th, r 
 
 in- 1 
 
52 The Boy Problem 
 
 French Canadians are behind our American-born 
 boys. I am pretty sure that they comprise almost 
 every ilHterate boy in Fall River. They are behind 
 the other boys in playing games. They need educat- 
 ing in play and in trustworthiness. They lack the hon- 
 or-sense. I do n't see how I could put them upon their 
 honor as we do other boys — they would hardly know 
 w-hat I meant. Th!ey do well under the care of an 
 Americanized boy. Probably they will become better 
 citizens in another generation or two. . . The older 
 Jewish boys are clannish. They like to meet, exer- 
 cise, bathe, etc., with their own race. Their religious 
 scruples as to food should be respected. The Jews 
 read more than other boys. The Irish stick together 
 in the election of officers for the various societies. 
 They do not seem capable of rising out of their in- 
 born prejudice of the English. The Jew is the only 
 one of the lot who will thank you for a good turn." 
 
 Mr. George W. Morgan of the Hebrew Educa- 
 tional Alliance of New York has contrasted the Irish 
 with the Hebrew boy, and made some acute observa- 
 tions of the latter: 
 
 "One of the most striking traits of the Jewish char- 
 acter is its intensity. Look at the intellectual side, 
 and you immediately say that the Jew is developed 
 mentally at the expense of the complementary sides of 
 his nature. It is said of the Irishman that if he cannot 
 easily pick a quarrel, he begins to step on his neigh- 
 bor's toes as he spits on his hands and prepares for a 
 clinch. With perh'aps more truth might it be said of 
 
By-Laws of Boy-Life 33 
 
 the Jew that if he cannot disagree with his companion 
 on some subject, he begins a volley of pointed query- 
 ing tO' establish by what chain of reasoning his com- 
 panion can possibly agree with him. He is a most 
 accomplished mental gymnast. Fix your attention 
 on his emotional nature ; and if you know him you will 
 decide that the strength of his passions is his distin- 
 guishing trait. His nerves are tuned to a high pitch 
 and readily responsive to the sympathetic touch. 
 Strike a discordant note, and his frame vibrates with 
 suppressed antithetic emotions. The gamut is run 
 with surprising alacrity. With his will you deal witli, 
 the inflexible. His plans once formed, he will plod 
 the years as days, cope with difficulties if surmount- 
 able, and if otherwise bide his time until conditions 
 change. He may all along be chafing with impa- 
 tience; but the callous comes, and on he goes. There 
 is, however, a limit to this intensity. The friction 
 from such velocity wears upon the machine. The 
 Jew is physically the inferior of his Gentile brother. 
 He travels faster, but often falls before the race seems 
 run. We see, therefore, that the Jew is an extremist." , 
 Ethical Dualism, a trait of semi-development! and S £ 
 one with which we are familiar among American ne- ' 
 groes, is characteristic of immaturity. None of us. 
 entirely shake it oK. Not only is the Sunday boy dif- 
 ferent from the Monday boy, the boy praying differ- 
 ent from the boy playing, the boy alone or with 
 his parents or his adult friend different from the boy 
 with his comrades, but, as in savagery, the ethics of 
 
 K ,^n: 
 
34 The Boy Problem 
 
 the boy with his "gang" is different from that with 
 other boys. It is the old clan ethics. This idea thafi 
 loyalty is due only to one's own tribe, and that other 
 people are enemies and other people's property is 
 legitimate prey, is just the spirit which makes the | 
 "gang" dangerous, and which suggests the need of 
 leaching a universal sociahty, and of transforming the 
 clan allegiance into a chivalry toward all. The clan is) 
 a step higher than individualism; I would recognize 
 it, but I would lead its members to be knights rather 
 than banditti. "The age which the boy has reached," 
 'says Joseph Lee, "is that where Sir Launcelot, the 
 knight errant, the hero of single combat, is develop- 
 |ing into Arthur, the loyal king." 
 
 Another trait of adolescence is the Survival of Im- 
 maturities. These are not immediately cut off. Ill- 
 ness, nerve fatigue, unknown causes may bring them 
 back. The* emotional era is often babyish. A later 
 survival is the craze for the lodge in early manhood, 
 which seems to result from the fact that the adolescent 
 love of chivalry and parade has not previously been 
 satisfied. 
 
 Adolescence not only gives "reverberations" of th^ 
 past ; it prophesies its future. This comparatively un- 
 noticed fact must modify many of our conclusions and 
 much of our practice. It is easy to overemphasize 
 the fact that the child is a savage. He is also a seer. 
 As in Joel, our "young men see visions" and "upon 
 the handmaidens is poured out the Spirit." Tennyson 
 said children were "prophets of a mightier race.* 
 
By-Laws of Boy-Life 35 
 
 Chamberlain calls the child "the general genius/' and 
 shows that if we knew better the art of developing the 
 individual we should not during the process of aging 
 destroy the promise of youth. This is to be done, in 
 general, by keeping in advance of the child and giving 
 him something to reach up to without making him 
 unchildhke. He knows by prophetic instinct much 
 that he has not experienced, and he reads as well as 
 feels. We can give him some information which shall 
 seem like empty rooms, but he will soon hasten on 
 and, if the information be vital truth, populate these 
 v'acant formularies, and make that which was first 
 habit volitional. This explains why some religious 
 instruction which was not based on child study has 
 produced pretty good results, while some other with 
 good enough theories has failed. The latter was not 
 nourishing enough. As an illustration of what I 
 mean, let me instance the place of art in a child's life. 
 The psychologist who remembers only the fact that 
 children reverberate may say: Give the child only 
 large outlines and crude colors. But he who remem- 
 bers that the child is also a prophet says: Do this if 
 you will, but give the boy also the Sistine Madonna 
 and her Child. It may correct the grotesquen'ess of 
 his imperfect imagination now, and either a certain 
 Messianic prophecy in his soul will reveal its beauty, 
 or else, having been habituated to it in childhood, it 
 will hang cherished forever on the walls of memory 
 when he can fully understand. Appeal to your own 
 memory of home pictures and tell me if this is not wise. 
 
36 The Boy Problem 
 
 Another curious fact about maturing life is that it 
 comes on in waves. Between these are Lulls. These 
 lulls were called to my attention by some heads of re- 
 formatories before I read about them. Those who 
 have seen Starbuck's charts of the period of conver- 
 sion are familiar with the triple rise and fall of that 
 age. It is not confined to adolescence. Middle-aged 
 people have testified to having regular fluctuations of 
 religious interest once in two years, others during 
 successive winters. Some of these cases are explain- 
 able, some are obscure. The tendency of nervous en- 
 ergy to expend and then recuperate itself, the fact of a 
 yearly rhythm in growth, greatest in the autumn and 
 least from April to July, pointed out by Malling-Han- 
 sen, the influence of winter quiet and leisure upon re- 
 ligious feeling, these are suggestive, 'in boyhood 'it 
 is probable that the first lull is a reaction from the 
 shock of the puberal change, the second a reaction 
 from the year of greatest physical growth, and the 
 third a reaction from the year of doubt and re-crea- 
 tion. The boy, then, who suddenly loses his interest 
 in religion or work or ideals is not to be thought in a 
 desperate condition, and somebody ought to tell him 
 that he is not. There is rtothing to do but wait for 
 this condition, which is natural and helpful to over- 
 wrought energies, to pass, as it surely will. 
 
 An altogether different modification of child- 
 growth is the presence of a very strong Personality 
 with or near the child. Sometimes it is a playmate 
 who blesses or blasts for a time the lives of a group of 
 
By-Laws of Boy-Life 37 
 
 boys. It is a matter of observation that every new 
 boy introdticed into a boys' club alters the effective- 
 ness of methods which have hitherto applied and 
 sometimes makes a previously successful plan a fail- 
 ure. "The King of Boyville" is no fiction in many a 
 community. Sometimes this personality is that of an 
 adult man or woman who seems to exercise, volun- 
 tarily or involuntarily, an almost hypnotic influence 
 upon children. Happy the leader of boys who has 
 that power and who can wisely use it! Warm- 
 hearted and trustful, the lad is always easily seduced. 
 His future depends more upon the first great friend- 
 ship of his adolescence than upon any other one in- 
 fluence. 
 
 Something has been said about the importance of 
 recognizing and following the lea'dings of th.e natural 
 interests or the instincts of boys in trying to- help X 
 them. This must always be done, but it must not be \ 
 overdone. When social intercourse begins natural ' 
 instincts begin to be perverted. It is the best and not \ 
 tbe worst manifestation of his means of guidance ' 
 which is to be followed. One must distinguish be- 
 tween instincts and whims. The time and place of 
 assembly, the rules and restrictions of membership 
 and the development of the plans of an organization 
 for boys, if left to the boys themselves, soon become ^ 
 entirely unsatisfactory to all concerned. ^ 
 
 All that I have said shows the care that must be 
 taken not to misinterpret boyhood. Things do not al- 
 ways mean what they seem to or even what the psy- 
 
/ 
 
 38. The Boy Problem 
 
 chologists suggest. I spoke of the curious articles 
 found in a boy's pocket as evidences of a sort of fe- 
 tishism. They may be nothing of the sort ; they may 
 be simply the evidences of an elementary esthetic 
 taste. It takes time and many revisings of one's 
 opinion to arrive at the point where one discovers 
 that what a boy says is seldom all he means, and that 
 what he does is but a slight indication of what he is. 
 
 The by-laws of Hfe which I have named are largely 
 those which accompany childhood in which there is a 
 real progression. It remains to mention those excep- 
 tions, common enough to necessitate knowledge of 
 them, where the life becomes stationary or makes 
 retrogression. These are the stages of atavism, dehn- 
 quency and defectiveness, degeneracy and idiocy. 
 
 Atavism is not dearly distinguished from heredity. 
 Indeed, Virchow defined it as "discontinuous hered- 
 ity." It is not in itself a step toward degeneracy. 
 Probably we are all atavistic when asleep or fatigued. 
 The inheritance may be from a good rather than an 
 evil ancestor, of sturdiness of body, genius of mind or 
 purity of soul. Whatever it be, it is very apt to show 
 itself during adolescence. Then it is that the child 
 who has always been like its mother suddenly grows 
 like its father in looks or character, or, becoming an 
 entirely strange being, it is remembered or discov- 
 ered that an ancestor two or three generations back 
 had these qualities. A happy advantage may be taken 
 of a favorable atavism. If the atavism be in the di- 
 rection of degeneration now is the time for warning 
 and guiding the child in his formative years. 
 
By-Laws of Boy-Life 39 
 
 Adopting the biological theory of E. Ray Lankester 
 as to the three conditions which may result from nat- 
 ural selection, Balance, Elaboration and Degenera- 
 tion, Dr. George E. Dawson has made some suggest- 
 ive studies of psychic arrests. Each of these arrests, 
 which constitute the retrogressive stages of defective- 
 ness or degeneracy, he explains as the persistence of 
 lower appetites and instincts. Vagrancy and pauper- 
 ism represent the persistence of the unproductive 
 food-appetites of animals, children and savages ; theft 
 is the persistence of the predatory instinct; gluttony 
 and drunkenness represent the indiscriminate food- 
 appetites; unchastity is a defectiveness in sex-evolu- 
 tion; assault is a persistence of the preying instinct. 
 These arrests, if temporary, are Uke the temporary 
 stages of physical growth, and are transformed if sur- 
 rounding conditions are healthful. If there is a total 
 arrest of the eliminative process we have the results 
 in the crimes and offences of the delinquent classes. 
 If these lower qualities are not only persistent but be- 
 come diseases, we have moral monsters. Regarding 
 the last class he makes some most vigorous sugges- 
 tions. But we are here concerned only with his ad- 
 vice as to the treatment of the second. He urges a\ 
 recognition that the cause of a large proportion of im- 1 
 moral tendencies is an incomplete elimination of the_J 
 sub-human traits. "Education as a moral agency," / 
 he says, "must be chiefly serviceable during the pe- \ 
 riods of life tliat recapitulate the great groups of ge- 
 netic instincts and habits. Such are the periods of 
 childhood and adolescence." 
 
40 The Boy Problem 
 
 The practical advice which he gives is most helpful 
 to those who in trying to help a number of boys or 
 ■girls in social groups in community or church are 
 puzzled or disheartened at the presence of one or 
 more partly delinquent or immoral children. He 
 counsels that we remember that these survivals can- 
 not be extirpated in a moment. He urges the great- 
 .est caution as to tempting these children toward the 
 evils to which they have tendencies, because if the 
 functioning of these immoral survivals can be kept 
 from occurring, the reduction of their power must in- 
 evitably follow. If, especially during adolescence, ap- 
 peal is made to the emotions and the reason, the 
 functions which had retrograded may be transformed 
 and brought up to the level of those around them. 
 Let bullying be changed into chivalry toward the 
 weak, destructiveness into constructiveness, general 
 obstreperousness into enthusiastic activity. Johnson 
 found that the use of play and crafts had an especially 
 favorable enlightening and awakening effect upon de- 
 fective youth. 
 
 These are the lines of effort which have already been 
 pressed as the proper means of training the wills of 
 normal children. We thus learn that they are to be 
 doubly emphasized in strengthening defective wills 
 and stimulating arrested lives to new growth. 
 
 The impression which this chapter will leave is not 
 one of encouragement to those who are about to en- 
 ter on work with boys after taking a fifteen minutes' 
 course in child-study or in servile obedience to the 
 
By-Laws of Boy-Life 4^ 
 
 limitations of some popular society for the moral im^ 
 provement of the young. The matter of spiritual 
 t herapeutics demands powers of observation, collation I 
 and application of a rare kind. It suggests a prepara- I 
 tion for work with boys which is severe in its de- 
 mands, but none too severe for labor with material so 
 plastic and so sensitiv!e to impression. This prepara- 
 tion may not be necessarily scholastic. To be a young 
 man and thus to have recently been a boy, or to be 
 the father or mother of boys, and to have common 
 sense, insight and patience — these are long steps on 
 the way to mastery with boys. The peculiar disposi^ 
 tions and vagaries of boys are most of them the tern • 
 porary stages through which they pass in the strug- 
 gle toward maturity and they suddenly disappear at 
 the close of the puberal epoch, but they are never- 
 theless true materials of character and they must be 
 studied and understood and used for their higher 
 rather than their lower possibilities. Other things 
 being equal, the best way to help a boy is to under-j 
 stand him. 
 
Ill 
 
 WAYS IN WHICH BOYS SPONTANE- 
 OUSLY ORGANIZE SOCIALLY 
 
 The interests of infancy are all in the home. This 
 is the parent's unhampered opportunity. During boy- 
 hood the home shares with school the boy's time. But 
 with the development of his social instinct by means 
 of play new acquaintanceships begin to use the crev- 
 ices of his time. First he plays at home with a chosen 
 companion or two, then he ventures forth to the 
 ball field and the swimming hole with a larger group, 
 finally his journeys are farther, his stay is longer, the 
 group is more thoroughly organized and a mob spirit 
 is apt to arise which passes from unorganized play 
 and sportive frolic to barbarous and destructive dev- 
 iltry, and we have, in city and country, the fully devel- 
 oped ''gang." 
 
 Accounts of the doings of these "gangs," from the 
 comparative innocence of property destruction and 
 hoodlumism to organized theft, assault and murder, 
 appear in the daily press continually. Hardly less 
 dangerous in tendency are many of the clubs which 
 more quietly meet indoors. A recent report of the 
 University Settlement of New York City calls atten- 
 tion to the candy stores as informal social centers 
 which lead to the pool room, the saloon, the cheap 
 show and the club room, and to "Recreation Clubs," 
 
Boys* Spontaneous Organizations 43 
 
 where, a younger member reports, "they have kissing] 
 all through pleasure time, and use slang language,"! 
 and — the ^lembers are from 14 to 18 — "they don^tl 
 behave nice between young ladies." 
 
 Ofttimes watchful parents can prevent the evolu"^ 
 tion of the social instinct from reaching the mob-stage f, 
 or the manifestation of lawlessness by redeeming and 
 transforming these energies, but the fact that this is 
 not everywhere being done — and this not among the 
 poor entirely, either — gives room for new and vigor- 
 ous forms of educative philanthropy. » 
 
 Convincing proofs that this early social instinct 
 craves development as much as that of adult man, and 
 suggestive indications of the ways in which it turns 
 and may best be turned are seen in a study of those \ 
 interesting organizations which boys themselves spon- I 
 taneously create. Dr. Henry D. Sheldon's question- 
 naire as to the spontaneous institutional activities of 
 American children furnishes me my figures ; but I 
 have arranged them to bear simply upon the point we 
 are considering, adolescent boyhood. How general ^ 
 the expression of this social instinct is, is seen in the L 
 fact that of 1,034 responses of boys from 10 to 16, 851 I 
 were members of such societies. This did not include 
 societies formed for boys by elders, and it did include 
 many boys who from isolation never had the slightest 
 chance for such society making. 
 
 The study of the societies which children spontane- 
 ously form ought to be more suggestive than that of 
 those which elders in their adult wisdom or ignorance 
 
/ 
 
 \ 
 
 I 
 
 44 The Boy Problem 
 
 form for them. If will is only interest, interest should 
 be the best criterion of how to help the will. From 
 1,022 papers collected there were reported 862 socie- 
 ties. 64 boys belonged to more than one society. The 
 ages were 10 to 17. Of 623 societies, fully described: 
 
 Those having secrets numbered 23 or 3^ per cent. 
 
 Social clubs (for "good times") numbered 28 or 
 434 per cent. 
 
 Industrial organizations numbered 56 or 83/2 per 
 cent. 
 
 Philanthropic associations numbered 10 or i^^ per 
 cent. 
 
 Literary, art, and musical clubs numbered 28 or 
 4% per cent. 
 
 Predatory societies (migratory, building, hunting, 
 fighting, preying) numbered 105 or 17 per cent. 
 
 Athletic and game clubs numbered 379 or 61 per 
 cent. 
 
 The ages 11, 12 and 13 were the ages of the largest 
 number of societies formed, the numbers being: at 8, 
 28; at 9, 44; at 10, 118; at 11, 155; at 12, 164; at 
 13, 188; at 14, 90; at 15, 80; at 16, 34; at 17, 11. 
 
 We need not treat these figures so seriously as to 
 consider them everywhere infallible, but they certainly 
 confirm the observations which we have made our- 
 selves. 
 
 We notice the following facts : 
 
 I. The period of greatest activity of these societies 
 is between 8 and 15, over 87 per cent being formed 
 during that period, only 7 per cent before 10, and 
 
Boys' Spontaneous Organisations 45 
 
 only I per cent being formed at 17. This is accounted 
 for by the growth of the social disposition with adoles- 
 cence and, in a lesser degree, by the fact that some of 
 the earlier societies persisted later, and by the fact 
 that in later years the church and school societies 
 formed by elders take the place of many voluntary 
 societies. 
 
 2. Physical activit y is the key-note of these socie- 
 ties at all ages. The predatory and athletic societies 
 number yy per cent. Add to these the industrial and 
 we have 85^ per cent of the whole. 
 
 3. Thejj terary, ^rt and musical interests are very 
 small, while the philanthropic and religious are infini- 
 tesimal. 
 
 4. The interest in athletic societies increases by 
 leaps from 8 to i.^, and then diminishes with even 
 greater rapidity toward the end, while the interest in 
 library societies, though never very large, grows with 
 maturity. The predatory societies are at their highest 
 ,at II, and thence gradually disappear. 
 
 The boys' societies are largely summer societies. 
 Had the figures been so classified as to show this ac- 
 curately we should perhaps find that the literary and 
 philanthropic features do really have some importance 
 in. tlie months when outdoor activity ,is restrained. 
 With this limitation recognized, we must still believe 
 that physical activity is the interest central through- 
 out the year. 
 
 5. Girl s and boys do not naturally nro-aniT-f^ j-f^- 
 gethe r. Dr. Sheldon's paper shows that the interests 
 
46 The Boy Problem 
 
 of boys and girls in their societies are nowhere paral- 
 lel. Girls form three times as many secret societies as 
 boys, five ti mes as many social societies, three times 
 as many industrial, twice as many philanthropic, and 
 three times as many literary, while the boys fo rm f our 
 times as many preda tory and s even times as many 
 ath letic s ocieties as the girls. Physical activity was 
 the feature in 10 per cent of the girls' as against yy 
 per cent of the boys' societies. 384 girls as against 
 257 boys were found in societies formed for children 
 by adults. "Girls are more nearly governed by adult 
 motives than boys. They organize to promote so- 
 ciability, to advance their interests, to improve them- 
 selves and others. Boys are nearly primitive, man : 
 they associate to hunt, fish, roam, fight, and to contest 
 physical superiority with each other." 
 
 If these facts mean anything in the way of instruc- 
 tion, they mean this : 
 
 I. Boys should be sought just before their own 
 
 social development tends to become dangerous, at 
 
 a bou| TO. and held until the organizing craze is over 
 
 and the years of adolescence are well past. Dr. Shel- 
 
 ' don found 257 boys in societies formed for them by 
 
 adlilts, of whom all but 40 were from 10 to 15, but 
 
 only 7 of whom were beyond 15. Is it not almost 
 
 more dangerous to hold a boy till the most critical 
 
 year of his life, and then let him go than not to touch 
 
 him at all? 
 
 I 2. Physical activity must be made the basis of social 
 
 V work for bovs, if it is to reach and hold their natural 
 
\ 
 
 Boys' Spontaneous Organisations 47 
 
 interests. Other things may be accepted or endured 
 by them, but this is what they care for. A contact 
 which begins with athletics, walks, physical develop- 
 ment and manual training may ripen into the literary,w,' 
 the scientific, the ethical and the religious influences. 
 But it would seem wise to utilize the ruder instincts 
 which are on the surface before reaching down to the 
 deeper ones. 
 
 3. Wherever possible, girls and boys should be 
 organized separately. Before adolescence they are | 
 not interested in the same things nor in each other. In j 
 all social work constant intimacy between maturing |j 
 b(>ys and girls fosters an undesirable precocity and in- 
 troduces unnecessarily perplexing problems. The 
 boys should have male or at least virile leaders. The 
 women who succeed in work with boys are usually 
 tliose who can do something the boys Hke to do better 
 than they can. The ideals and capabilities of most 
 women leaders do not point to the highest efficiency 
 with boys of the adolescent period*, while a manly man 
 with some slight athletic prowess, a wiUingness to 
 answer questions and patience to guide by adaptability 
 rather than by domineering, can do almost anything 
 with a group of boys. 
 
 Two facts that have not been mentioned must be 
 named, which will appear in new light from the 
 knowledge gathered in the first chapter. • One is the 
 fact that the instincts upon which the activities even 
 of the worst "gang" are built are the innocent and 
 natural ones of adolescence. To get together, to work 
 
48 The Boy Problem 
 
 off physical energy, to roam, to contest, to gather 
 treasures and meet new experiences, and — a httle later 
 — to enjoy female society : these are not in themselves 
 mischievous desires. Again, when child-societies are 
 at their best they often do very charming and admi- 
 rable things. They build,, they work together, they 
 parade, they revive old-folk games, they imitate the 
 employments and festivals of their elders. As Colozza 
 tells us, all ''child-societies are play-societies. Play is 
 a great social stimulus. The lively pleasure which is 
 felt in play is the prime motive which unites children." 
 We see here not only the fact that play educates in- 
 dividually, upon which I shall say more later, but that 
 it educates socially. However serious may be the 
 purpose which adults have in forming societies among 
 children, I think it to be essential to approach them 
 joyously, even gaily. Let there be even in the in- 
 strument of highest spiritual aim not only a play- 
 method but the play-spirit . Otherwise the child must 
 feel, "Oh, that tiresome grown-up person-with-a- 
 mission! Does he not know that I live in a world of 
 play? Why will he drag me off to his world of work, 
 instead of coming into mine?" The instincts which 
 already exist in child-societies are those which we are 
 to imitate and transform to their best uses. 
 
 The temporariness of these societies, which is almost 
 universal, I should say, is interpreted by the truth we 
 have learned: that the SQcial-Goascious ness is n ot yet 
 com plete. It never is, in many of us. Not every man 
 is a clubable man. Jealousy is the explosive that most 
 
Boys' Spontaneous Organisations 49 
 
 frequently destroys the child's club. If there is any 
 organization at all it is apt to be that of an unlimited 
 monarchy. When a second boy wants to be monarch 
 the trouble begins. The matter is often settled, as in 
 a colony of bees, by the new monarch withdrawing 
 with his own satellites and forming a new kingdom. 
 The unsatisfactoriness of these frequent changes and 
 the desire for organization that shall be permanent 
 enough for enjoyment explains some of the willing- 
 ness which boys show for adult intervention. This is 
 \\'hy I think questions of leadership and parliamentary 
 <^ law, which are so vexing at this age, should be firmly 
 dismissed by an adult leader, and his organization 
 built upon the higher social frame to which he has 
 himself attained, that of the democracy, with real, 
 complete but unobtrusive leadership in himself. 
 
 There are a good many other things, odd, humorous 
 or suggestive, about the spontaneous institutions of 
 boyhood. I spoke in the last chapter of the clan- 
 ethics of the "gang." This tribe-loyalty usually leads 
 to rivalry between gangs. Sometimes it is ''town and 
 gown;" sometimes it is between the boys of neigh- 
 boring cities, as, a few years ago, when a crowd of 
 Charlestown and a crowd of Cambridge boys met on 
 the bridge that was then between the two cities, it 
 always meant a fight ; most often it is between neigh- 
 borhoods or streets. The social settlement clubs are 
 very careful to consider these local jealousies by not 
 forming a club from more than one neighborhood. I 
 never knew this to be considered in a church, but I 
 
50 The Boy Problem 
 
 have seen instances where it would have been most 
 • desirable to do so. These jealousies might not only 
 f be recognized, but their contests turned to more 
 I profitable emulations. There is general testimony 
 that it is difficult to do good social work with poor 
 »^and rich boys at the same time and place. I believe 
 that respect of others won in emulation and even in 
 fighting is the seed of affection and awakened kinship. 
 It is a proverb that "Two boys never can become 
 chums till they have had a fight." In some ways I 
 believe these emulations between boys ol different 
 classes can be produced and controlled to the advan- 
 tage of both. I believe from experience that it is 
 possible in this age of ready social interests to create 
 artificially a "gang" out of a group of hitherto unre- 
 lated boys which shall develop passionate friendships 
 and loyalties, constitute a lifelong fellowship and be- 
 come a microcosm of the social ideal. The summer 
 camp sustained by the rich boys of the Groton School 
 for the benefit of poor boys gives some encourage- 
 ment in this direction. The democratic influence of 
 athletics in our pubHc schools is, I believe, one of the 
 saving forces of the republic. 
 
 In passing from the consideration of the spontane- 
 
 -^y*ous groupings of boys we may remark that soon after 
 
 \l sixteen the social instinct takes quite a new form, in 
 
 I the "pairing" tendency. The boy in his first love is 
 
 j always found with one chosen girl ; each boy also has 
 
 his chum. Two chums often combine with two girls, 
 
 and we have a clique. These pairs and cliques are 
 
Boys^ Spontaneous Organisations ^t 
 
 sore interruptions to the continuity especially of 
 church societies for young people. These anti-social 
 tendencies, arising so late and so unexpectedly, are 
 baffling because they are among those who have ar- 
 rived at a maturing and independent age. Though 
 difficult, they are not discouraging, for they mark the 
 rise of the great loves and friendships of Hfe. 
 
 The social instinct thus describes a circle. The 
 phases of childhood, adolescence and maturity are 
 these : domestic, anti-domestic, domestic ; education by 
 one's elders, by one's contemporaries, by one's chil- 
 dren. Life swings out from the home and back to it 
 again. During the anti-domestic age of adolescence 
 social opportunities are greatest. The return to the 
 home with maturity and the subsequent giving birth 
 to children begin a new circle in another generation. / 
 
 II 
 
IV 
 
 SOCIAL ORGANIZATIONS FORMED FOR 
 BOYS BY ADULTS 
 
 As detailed descriptions of the many methods that 
 are being used to help boys are found in the literature 
 of the different movements, it seems sufficient to give 
 the briefest analysis of the worth of most of them with 
 a fuller discussion of plans that are especially sug- 
 gestive. (See the Chart at the end of the book). For 
 this analysis I have devised a system of rubrics sug- 
 gested by a table in Mr. George E. Johnson's *'Edu- 
 cation through Plays." The rubrics are as follows: 
 
 I. Age to which the method is in its present form 
 appropriate, indicated by numbers from lo to 17. 
 
 II. Number of boys to which the method applies, 
 indicated by numbers. 
 
 III. Kind of education afforded, indicated by let- 
 ters, the amount shown by increasing sizes of type, as 
 p, p, and P. 
 
 p — physical (bodily strength) 
 ath — athletic (bodily agility) 
 m — manual (mastery of hand) 
 i — industrial (mastery of trade) 
 c — civic 
 1 — literary 
 
 art — artistic (including dramatic, literary and pic- 
 torial) 
 
Organisations Formed for Boys by Adults 53 
 
 s — scientific 
 
 alt — altruistic (social and philanthropic) 
 
 e — ethical 
 
 r — religious 
 
 IV. The Instincts made use of, the emphasis — 
 small, moderate or large — being indicated by increas- 
 ing sizes of type, as acq, acq, ACQ : 
 
 acq — acquisitiveness, the collecting and appropriat- 
 ing instinct. 
 
 chs — chastity 
 
 cln — cleanliness 
 
 con — constructiveness 
 
 cur — curiosity, desire to find out 
 
 drm — dramatic instinct, desire to personify, imagi- 
 native imitativeness 
 
 eml — emulativeness 
 
 imt — imitativeness 
 
 love 
 
 loy — loyalty, the mixed instinct of love, proprietor- 
 ship and responsibility (as felt in the college frater- 
 nity) 
 
 phy — physical activity 
 
 play 
 
 pug — pugnacity, the desire to overcome 
 
 soc — sociability, the desire to be with others as dis- 
 tinct from the love-instinct, which involves the desire 
 to serve 
 
 V. Part of the boy trained, the value of the train- 
 ing indicated by sizes of type as before : 
 
 b — body 
 
54 7"^^^ ^oy Problem 
 
 V 
 
 1 — intellect 
 
 f — ^feeling 
 
 w — will 
 
 r — religious nature 
 
 VI. Regard paid to the Temperaments, the amount 
 of regard to each indicated by sizes of type : 
 
 sang — sanguine 
 
 sent — sentimental (melancholic) 
 
 chol — choleric 
 
 phleg — phlegmatic 
 
 VII. An estimate of — rather, a guess at — ^the pro- 
 portion of the boy's interests excited (with the pre- 
 sumption that it is possible socially to excite 50 of 
 100), the amount indicated in numbers meaning per 
 cents. 
 
 This analysis is based on the belief that, no matter 
 what the announced aim of any form of help, the 
 ^problem is one, namely, that of manhood-making. So, 
 while the list is classified by certain general character- 
 istics, each plan is measured by its applicability to the 
 entire boy. 
 
 Of course this chart is not scientifically accurate, 
 and very likely there is some personal bias in its ap- 
 preciations of value. You can change these to suit 
 yourself. But if a plan has any worth, this gridiron of 
 qualifications ought to show of what sort it is. 
 
 I wish you would go over this table carefully, read- 
 ing it first across the page to analyze each form of 
 work by itself and then taking two forms of work at 
 a time and making comparison. Note in the first 
 
Organisations Formed for Boys by Adults 55 
 
 column which clubs are applicable to boys all the way 
 along and which reach only early or late adolescence. 
 In the next column see which clubs work on the 
 group and which on the mass idea. Under "Kinds 
 of Education" see how few furnish athletic or physical 
 training. The columns on the Instincts, Part Devel- 
 oped and Temperaments Regarded should be studied 
 together. Of the 28 methods only 8 reach as many 
 as 10 of the 15 instincts named. In how few are the ' 
 athletic and play-instincts recognized at all. Notice « 
 that the physical and manual methods regard the chol- ' 
 eric temperament, while the religious methods reach I 
 mostly the sanguine and sentimental. I supposeV) 
 phlegmatic boys are not so numerous nor so social as^ 
 others. Very few of the methods named appeal 
 strongly to them. 
 
 You may disagree with the estimates in the last 
 column, but it is graphic as showing how much a boy 
 with all the instincts of a boy will be interested in the 
 several plans. Some of the plans which show the 
 largest per cents are without the religious element.^ 
 The home is counted as the educational institute that 
 most interests the boy, its only imperfection at its best 
 being that it does not afford the larger social fellow- 
 ship. 
 
 Nearly every plan has its one strong point, a 
 few have several good ideals, some could be easily 
 strengthened by imitation of others, and some would 
 be worth while only as supplementary. This is true 
 of all the civic and ethical methods, I think. 
 
56 The Boy Problem 
 
 No one is "the best." The personality of the leader 
 counts so much that many a plan that "works" in one 
 place will not do in another, and such is the fickleness 
 of the adolescent boy that no one plan is all-inclusive. 
 There is no patent way of saving boys. 
 
 The various methods which have 'been mentioned 
 divide into two classes: those which have and those 
 which have not the religious element. We have the 
 methods used in churches and the methods used out- , 
 side churches. Some will tell us that this division \ 
 is also a caste line, and that the community clubs reach 
 street boys while the church clubs reach only boys 
 from good homes. I fear this is often true. The ex- 
 act fact is that the community clubs in ignoring the 
 religious element are able to reach Protestant, Ro- 
 manist and Hebrew, which no single church can do. . 
 If one believes the community clubs are therein faulty / 
 he must also remember that they are more widely in- 1 
 clusiva The community clubs are by no means an- 
 ti-religious, and are heartily willing to encourage their 
 boys to supplement their club-life with church influ- 
 ences. The two types must be recognized, and each 
 may well be more tolerant of. the other. In the com- 
 munity clubs we study every form of pedagogy except 
 the religious. In the church clubs religious peda- 
 gogy is central, and the other forms are usually sub- 
 sidiary. The former propose to make good men, im- 
 pelled by every true motive except the religious, 
 which they leave the church to give. The latter 
 should propose to make good men, impelled by every 
 
Organisations Formed for Boys by Adults 57 
 
 true motive, including the religious. Probably the 
 community club can make the more boys good and 
 the church club can make the fewer boys better. 
 
 Among the non-religious or "community clubs" 
 which exist in our cities we find two theories which 1 
 seem to be radically different. The "mass clubs" (or, / 
 as they used to be called from their originator, the 
 "ColHns Clubs"), have one, and the "group clubs" \^ 
 (usually in connection with social settlements), have 
 the other. I think Mr. William A. Clark, the Head of 
 Gordon House, has fairly stated the settlement view : 
 
 "The boys' club of twenty years ago was a very sim- 
 ple affair. The membership in such a club varied from 
 .800 to 2,500. Any boy in the city could be admitted 
 J*", to the club. The workers consisted of a doorkeeper, 
 librarian and superintendent. During the club ses- 
 sion the superintendent was obliged to walk about the 
 rooms as a moral policeman. Occasionally visitors 
 from the various churches came to assist by playing 
 games with the boys. Later a few industrial classes, 
 such as carpentry, clay-modeling, wood-carving, cob- 
 bling, typesetting, etc., were added. A penny savings 
 bank was a leading feature of this sort of club, and 
 occasional entertainments. Finally, with this plan, it 
 is possible to have an exceedingly large membership. 
 This in itself is a strong feature in the minds of many. ; 
 Large figures look prosperous in a report. « 
 
 "With the advent of the university settlement a new 
 plan of club came into being. During the past five 
 years the majority of boys' clubs throughout the 
 
SB The Boy Problem 
 
 country are now being formed on what may be termed 
 the settlement club plan or on some modification of 
 I it. It differs from the old plan radically, in that it is 
 I always very much smaller. The whole drift of boys' 
 club organization for the past ten years has been to- 
 ward smaller clubs. The most characteristic plan of 
 a Settlement Boys' Club in brief is this : A group of 
 boys, eight or ten, usually of the same gang, all com- 
 ing from the immediate neighborhood. This neigh- 
 borhood idea is, as you know, one of the basal princi- 
 ples of the settlement. Such a group usually meets 
 once or twice a week in charge of a leader. The pro- 
 gram for the little club varies with the taste of the 
 leader and the boys. The leader, as a rule, is a per- 
 son of refinement. 
 
 "The legitimate aim of the large club is to keep as 
 many boys as possible off the street, giving them a 
 cheerful room with games and books. The aim of 
 the settlement is to take a small group, and through a 
 refined, tactful leader 'with a social soul,' as one man 
 ' expresses it, moraUze these boys by the power of 
 friendship. Th^ superintendent of a club of 1,500, 
 assuming that he is equally as well educated and re- 
 fined as the settlement type of man, can only be a 
 friend to these boys in theory. Friendship means 
 knowledge. No man can know 1,500 boys. Most 
 workers find it hard enough to know ten boys well. 
 
 "And yet the esprit de corps of 100 boys, for in- 
 stance, is different from the esprit de corps of a group 
 of ten. Personally I believe that the group idea and 
 the mass idea should be combined in the plan of the 
 
Organisations Formed for Boys by Adults 59 . 
 
 club. The old type of club has features of strength] 
 which should not be lost in the new plan." ' 
 
 Thus far the group clubs seem to have the advan- 
 tage. They are further strong in that the boys' club 
 is often one of an ascending group of clubs, embrac- 
 ing the whole family and giving*! a place into which 
 the boy may graduate. In thoroughness, compre- 7 
 hensiveness and the power of personality the group j 
 club is a model social instrument. -^ 
 
 The mass club, however, is open every night to , 
 every boy. To keep a boy off the street every night // 
 in the week is what the mass clubs actually do. "If v\ 
 we can only keep the boy where he can be found when ^ 
 he is wanted," says Thomas Chew, "we are doing a 
 good deal." The mass clubs propose to reach the y 
 t oughest boys in the city ; the group clubs as frankly 
 do not. It is easy to see that the street arab is un- 
 likely to enter voluntarily under the surveillance and 
 patronage of a refined lady or gentleman from the 
 Back Bay in a small room, and that while the superin- 
 tendent of the mass club may not know each arab per- 
 sonally, each arab will know him. Mr. Chew argues 
 that as the influence of Washington and Lincoln ex- 
 tended farther than the limits of their personal ac- 
 quaintatice, so the boys' club superintendent is the 
 hero and guide to a much larger circle than he can 
 personally know. It is also true that the mass club 
 superintendent serves a much longer time in one club 
 than does the volunteer settlement worker and that he 
 knows the boy on the street, in the school yard, and 
 
6o The Boy Problem 
 
 in the police court as well as in the orthodox way in 
 the home. The introduction of a fine building or 
 equipment in the section of the very poor has also 
 sometimes seemed to estrange the very class for which 
 it was provided, and has caused its activities to be re- 
 garded as charitable doles rather than as social 
 brotherhood. 
 
 The two forms of work seem to be learning from 
 each other. The mass plan has the advantage of 
 bringing a very large number of needy boys under 
 wholesome influence, removing them from the street 
 and filHng their minds and hands too full for the or- 
 ganization of mischief. By using the mass idea first 
 the suspicions and feelings of restraint that would be 
 excited by the confinement of a group are done away 
 with, the wilder physical instincts are satisfied first 
 and time is given the boy to settle down to the quieter 
 group methods. Thus some settlements keep their 
 I ' new boys in the gymnasium and the large assembly- 
 room for a time before admitting them to the group 
 clubs. On the other hand the mass club director 
 does not deal with boys in the mass because he likes 
 to. As far as he sees the need of individual workers 
 who will divide the mass into groups and as far as he 
 succeeds in getting such workers he is doing so and 
 is thus approaching the group-plan of the settlement 
 clubs. The bdst mass club workers reach the homes 
 of their boys as regularly as does the average pastor 
 those of his people. It is equally true that many a 
 group club leader sighs for the splendid esprit de corps 
 of the larger club, where the boys never feel that they 
 
Organisations Formed for Boys by Adults 6i 
 
 are being patronized and really believe they own the 
 whole building. 
 
 Sometimes the group idea is carried to an extreme. 
 I once visited a settlement at night and asked to see 
 its boys' work. We went to the top story of a build- 
 ing and, after a search for a key, succeeded in entering 
 a dark room where there wxre some sloyd benches, 
 which I was assured were used on ''some other even- 
 ings." A group of young men was also seen in 
 another small room. No doubt a few boys were be- 
 ing very thoroughly helped, but somehow it seemed 
 like knitting-work. On the same evening in an old 
 ramshackle building in the same city a hundred and 
 fifty boys were crowding the rooms to the doors with 
 their games, gymnastics and classes in a mass club, 
 and were doing so every night in the week. On the 
 other hand they were being graduated into the street 
 in droves at sixteen for lack of room and of any wise 
 institution to receive them. Here we see the two 
 dangers — in one plan, of coddling a few, in the other, 
 of providing no resources for the many until the ages 
 of immaturity and special temptation are over. 
 
 Both kinds of clubs are reaching out rapidly into 
 new fields of work and it is easy to see that modifica- 
 tions are soon to appear in many institutions. Both 
 are emphasizing and receiving splendid results from 
 summer work in club farms, excursions, camps, club 
 gardens and vacation schools. The poHce court 
 work of the mass club director is believed to be form- 
 ing an important influence upon those who are at the 
 
62 The Boy Problem 
 
 brink of a criminal career. The group clubs, again, 
 are strengthening their groups by insisting that the 
 volunteer workers who are leaders shall regard their 
 work not as a sentimental fad or temporary mission 
 but that they remain long enough to let their refined 
 personalities avail for something of permanence. 
 
 At no place more than at Lincoln House, Boston, 
 partly perhaps because this institution sprang out of 
 a boys* club, has the class and club method of educa- 
 tion been elaborately developed. Indeed, this has 
 become so characteristic that the House is now a great 
 evening school rather than a settlement. Yet the 
 settlement ideas of fellowship and mutuality are still 
 retained by the social workers, and in the classes the 
 thoughts of play and informality are so much retained 
 that they are given the name of Play Work Guilds. 
 The course for boys in creative work in arts and crafts 
 after leaving the kindergarten age is as follows: 
 
 "Age 6 to 8: Advanced kindergarten course 
 (Course H) in clay. 
 
 **Age 8 to 10 : Course HI clay, perhaps varied with 
 paper sloyd, 
 
 "Age ID to II : Simple fret work, varied with 
 Course H in paper sloyd, or Course IV in clay. 
 
 "Age II to 12: Fret work, Course II, varied with 
 Course I in cardboard sloyd. 
 
 "Age 12 to 13: Wood sloyd, Course II in card- 
 board, freehand drawing, advanced course in clay. 
 
 "Age 13 to 14: Simple cabinet-making, wood-carv- 
 ing, Venetian iron work, basket-making, printing, 
 lettering, drawing, water-color work. 
 
Organisations Formed for Boys by Adults 63 
 
 "Age 14 to 17: Cabinet-making, leather work, let- 
 tering, printing, weaving, metal work, water-color 
 work, drawing." 
 
 These boys have also the gymnasium and the small 
 group boys' club (8 to 10 boys) in which, as they may 
 choose, they take up collections, scrap-book making, 
 travel-study, simple fancy work, animal study, and an 
 endless variety of things which teacher and boys can 
 pursue together. 
 
 The ideal is to find new materials for applying the 
 Froebel and Sloyd principles in the classes and thus 
 bridge the industrial work of the kindergarten and 
 the advanced cabinet-making and leather work by a 
 continuous, creative industrial and art education for 
 children of all ages, and in the clubs to relieve the edu- 
 cational seriousness and the necessity of confinement 
 and application by more lively and spontaneous social 
 intercourse. The two so interlock that it is hard to 
 tell at times which is class and which club work, 
 0( In large clubs, especially street boys' clubs, two im- 
 portant things should not be neglected. One thing is 
 to arrange some way by which the boys as they get 
 crowded out of the club by age shall be graduated into 
 some other wholesome organization, such as the Y. 
 M. C. A. The other thing is for the director to afford 
 an opportunity for religious care by furnishing to 
 each priest and pastor in the community the list of 
 boys of each church who attend his club. The club 
 should supplement itself in this way by affiliation withy 
 every possible moral agency. 
 
64 The Boy Problem 
 
 A very deep question is as to the relation of all this 
 work to that fundamental institution, the home. The 
 craze for organization and cooperative industry, ap- 
 parent among society people even more than among 
 the poor and among adults more than among chil- 
 dren, suggests the dire possibility that human life may 
 sometime become one great club-system. As to 
 street boys it seems sufficient to reply that they v^ill 
 not stay at home, anyway. With Frank S. Mason, 
 founder of the Bunker Hill Boys' Club, we may say: 
 "It is a true and trite saying that a good home is a 
 better place for a boy at night than a boys' club. If 
 all homes were perfect homes, then would the boys' 
 club be useless : if it were possible to reform many 
 homes, it would not be necessary to form boys' 
 clubs; it if were possible for public school teachers 
 to stand in the same relation to their classes as does 
 the director to the members of his club, there would 
 be no need of boys' clubs ; could the churches be in- 
 spired to do this kind of work, and do it with the 
 breadth with which it is done in the boys' club, the 
 boys' club would have no existence. It is, therefore, 
 in my mind, an important, but not the only means of 
 reaching the boy, and it, as well as other possible 
 means, should be pushed to the utmost in every city 
 and town in the country." 
 
 Without going into the matter of the tendencies of 
 other organizations as to the home, there are already 
 manifest in the boys' club movement some signs that 
 are encouraging in this regard. The activities of the 
 club themselves react upon the home. Boys bring 
 
Organisations Formed for Boys by Adults 65 
 
 home artistic handiwork to adorn the home, and pa- 
 pers and books to be read at home; boys leiarn to 
 cook, to repair and make furniture and to cobble 
 shoes, and apply this knowledge at home; boys are 
 given unfinished work to take home and finish. Both 
 the settlements and the mass clubs find that they be- 
 gin with the boy but cannot finish their work until I 
 they touch the rest of the family. At Lincoln House* 
 the elaborate system of scores of clubs — of children, 
 boys, girls, young men, young women, fathers, moth- 
 ers, reaching 1,200 people — actually grew out of one 
 club for boys. This is the natural tendency every- 
 where. The result of these indications is to draw out 
 from their homes for one or more times a week the 
 children and then the parents, to inspire and teach 
 them and give them new resources, trusting that they 
 will return and apply these acquisitions in home life. 
 A more normal way of helping the home would seem 
 to be that of the Home Library System. The aim 
 here is the opposite one, of going into the home 
 and stimulating its better elements. The plan is this. 
 A book-shelf of books is loaned to a poor home and 
 a volunteer visitor comes in, not to talk religion or 
 morals or give charity, but to gather a group of eight 
 or ten children and read to them. Games and pic- 
 tures are circulated in the same way and the pass- 
 books of the Stamp Saving Society are distributed 
 and collected. The ways in which this plan refines, 
 educates, encourages cleanliness, morality, frugality, 
 sobriety, pride in the home and the genuine spirit of 
 
66 The Boy Problem 
 
 friendship, and satisfies the play-instinct and the 
 social nature may be rdadily imagined. The only 
 trouble with this splendid idea is that it is millennial. 
 The poor want the excitement of the street and of the 
 crowd, and the good people who might come to help 
 ' want to do something that is connected with an an- 
 nual report, an institution and the fellowship of other 
 refined folk, who are also workers. Yet this sort of 
 thing is something that anybody can start right off 
 and do, and without waiting for anybody else to be- 
 gin or to organize. At the South End House in 
 Boston the Home Library plan is being used as a 
 corrective to the anti-domestic and the institution- 
 alizing tendencies. The scheme is to plant these 
 home libraries as outposts through different parts of 
 the neighborhood rather than to group all the clubs 
 in one large building. I think it may be desirable 
 and possible to satisfy both this love for the larger 
 social atmosphere and that for the domestic circle 
 among the same people by coordinating the two 
 methods. 
 )^ Another agency for helping the city boy in which 
 the reHgious element is present is that of the Boys' 
 Branch of the Young Men's Christian Association. 
 The boys' department was an afterthought; in few of 
 Ihe association buildings was adequate provision 
 made for it, and the number of flourishing branches is 
 not yet very large. But the officers of the interna- 
 tional movement are awakening to its importance 
 and, with the present emphasis upon the religious 
 
Organisations Formed for Boys by Adults 6y 
 
 crisis of adolescence, it seems likely that this will in 
 time become the most important thing in Association 
 work. The Associations have an almost ideal equip- 
 ment for boys' work, but the fact that it is monopo- 
 lized by the men at the time when the street boys can 
 use it has emphasized the tendency, which the pro- 
 hibitive fees and the general trend of the Association 
 work have made, to adapt the work to schoolboys of 
 the upper and middle classes of society. There is 
 certainly need enough in our large cities of an institu- 
 tion especially for these boys, who' are as much in dan- 
 ger physically and morally as those who are poorer. 
 A plan which has been adopted lately with excellent 
 wisdom is, when an old building is abandoned for a 
 better one, not to sell it, but to give it entirely to the 
 boys' department. This has suggested the possibiHty 
 that the boys' departments which haVe this special 
 ccjuipment may enter into work for street boys upon 
 broader lines than heretofore. The admirable inter- 
 national organization, with its centralized office and 
 close oversight of its branches, would certainly give 
 an executive and economical direction, which the 
 street boys' clubs in their scattered efforts have sorely 
 lacked. On the other hand, it is difficult to see how 
 the Association, confined in its support and ideals to 
 Protestant people of the evangelical type, could work 
 in Hebrew, Irish or French neighborhoods success- 
 fully unless it curtailed its distinctively religious 
 •methods. 
 
 The Association, although Its boys' work is so new, 
 
68 The Boy Problem 
 
 has already gone into the following many and sug- 
 gestive departments of work for boys, enumerated by 
 Mr. E. M. Robinson, the International Boys' Work 
 Secretary of the movement: "The gymnasium, with 
 its swimming-tank and bathing facilities; the bowling- 
 alleys, the basket-ball leagues and baseball clubs, 
 foot-ball games^the cross-country running, the out- 
 ings, bicycle clubs, rough riders, hiking clubs, canoe 
 and boat clubs, the boys' summer camps, with their 
 multitudinous activities; hospital corps, drum corps, 
 the small clubs in the building, camera clubs, stamp 
 clubs, coin clubs, magic clubs, natural history clubs, 
 educational clubs, observation parties, popular talks, il- 
 lustrated lectures, library, reading-rooms, games, de- 
 bates, literary societies, the educational and industrial 
 classes, sloyd, carpentry, printing, electricity, scroll- 
 sawing, basket-making, etching, sketching, poster- 
 painting, music, commercial branches and English, 
 the committee service of boys and conferences and 
 conventions of boys, the gospel meetings, prayer- 
 meetings, Bible classes of various kinds, with black- 
 board, water-colors, paper-pulp maps, and models; 
 stereopticon and illustrated lessons, chalk talks, 
 chemical talks, Yoke Fellows* Bands, missionary 
 classes, junior volunteer leagues, personal workers' 
 bands, etc." Of all these the most important con- 
 tribution is the boys' camp. To this means of return 
 to the natural country of boyhood, the free life of out- 
 of-doors, the Association has applied itself with lar^e 
 wisdom and patience. The interesting light which 
 
Organisations Formed for Boys by Adults 69 
 i» 
 
 these camps throw upon boy nature, and boys' needs, 
 the susceptibility to healthy moral and religious im- 
 pressions at these places and the fruitful results, I 
 shall speak of in another chapter. 
 
 The boys' department of the Association is con- 
 ferring many benefits upon the churches. It does a 
 valuable social work in bringing together boys from 
 different denominations. In many great cities it deals 
 with as many boys who are outside as are inside 
 churches. In other places the preponderance of girls 
 in the young people's societies and the lack of Sun- 
 day-school lessons and methods adaptable to boys has 
 laid upon it a great opportunity and burden. The As- 
 sociation is teaching the churches riiany Tessons as.to 
 the ways to approach boys, the desirability of organ- 
 izing them apart from girls and of recognizing the . 
 various ages, and the way to teach them the Bible and [ 
 religion. In its triangle representing "Spirit, Mind ' 
 and Body" its aim is all-round development of the 
 entire nature. Too often the Church has thought of | 
 the boy as all spirit. In some small cities I have felt j 
 that the superior success of the Association has cre-^ 
 ated a clashing with the churches. Must the Asso- 
 ciation always insist on having all parts of the tri- 
 angle represented in its own walls? Might it not be 
 better sometimes if the y\ssociation in its boys' work 
 should be largely the convenient federation of athletic 
 and supplementary agencies which no single church 
 can adequately support, while its secretary cooperates 
 in helping the development of means of spiritual nur- 
 
yo The Boy Problem 
 
 ture for boys in the churches tliemselves? I am per- 
 suaded that in many a community the pastors, though 
 unable to provide institutional features for their boys, 
 have very carefully planned spiritual instrumentali- 
 ties, with which boys' meetings, Bible classes and 
 committees at the Association are a well meant but 
 unjustifiable interference. Let the Secretary quietly 
 yield to every effort for nurture in the local church. 
 Instead of conducting boys' Bible classes, let the 
 secretary, for example, be the teacher of the teachers 
 of boys' classes in the separate Sunday-schools. 
 
 The boys' department has continually to fight 
 against a foe which is already the too-successful enemy 
 of the men's department, namely, the idea that one 
 goes to the Association to get something, that the 
 fee of $3, $5 or $8 represents an outlay which on? 
 must scrupulously insist on getting back in the form 
 of physical benefits or even of spiritual blessings. It 
 is against this tendency, which associates itself so 
 readily with the subjective type of religion which the 
 Association used to foster, that Dr. Luther Gulick 
 has waged such a determined warfare. It is the re- 
 mainder of that selfishness in religion that makes 
 many a Christian parent feel that he can trust better 
 the approach, the subsequent care and the product 
 of religious experience in his boy in the Church than 
 in the Association. The improvement of the quality 
 of men who take up the secretaryship of the boys' 
 department will be the way to overcome this ten- 
 dency. The idea that a more sentimental, a little 
 
Organizations Fonned for Boys by Adults yi 
 
 weaker-minded and a somewhat nondescript type of 
 man will do in the boys' work, and that a junior sec- 
 retaryship is only a stepping-stone to something 
 higher is giving place to the recognition that this 
 work demands the life-consecration of men of the 
 same ability and training as the public school masters 
 of boys of this same age. The practical way for this 
 reform to be brought about will be for the communi- 
 ties which support the Association to give the boys' 
 director a somewhat better salary than that of an as- 
 sistant janitor or a shipping-clerk. One of the finest 
 forces to counteract this tendency in the individual is 
 the recent effort to secure evangelizing of boys by 
 their own Christian fellows. As on the foreign field 
 it is the native worker who is most efficient, so a boy 
 of one's own age is to another boy the ''native work- 
 er" most adapted to lead him to Christ. The influ- 
 ence of such altruism, if sincere and unaffected, upon 
 the young Christian himself is most enlarging to thC: 
 
 soul. ■ !'i ^ I i' '.^^^ll^ljlii 
 
 The thought that the boys' department exists not 
 for itself but for the community and for the churches 
 IS coming into slow recognition. A few Associations 
 have already begun to plant their outposts away from 
 their fortresses, their own buildings. The first line of 
 offense is apt to be the boat-house or the camp. In 
 Haverhill, Mass., there are three boys' departments 
 and soon there are to be five, only one of which is lo- 
 cated in the Association building, the rest being in 
 churches in different districts of the city. In Cleve- 
 
"^2 The Boy Problem 
 
 land a branch is known as the West Side Boys' Club, 
 in Halifax, N. S., it is the Other Fellows' Club. In 
 some small places the secretary gets hold of a *'gang" 
 before it becomes dangerous and persuades it to be- 
 come affiliated with the Association, either as a spe- 
 cial club in the main building or as an outpost branch. 
 The Boys' Brotherhood of Philadelphia grew out of 
 the Association. This taking advantage of the neigh- 
 borhood and "gang" spirit is an intelligent recogni- 
 tion of social conditions and makes it possible for the 
 Association to do a much more elastic and compre- 
 hensive work. Many Associations are dividing their 
 membership privileges into those for street boys, 
 employed boys and school boys. No doubt it is 
 done for convenience only, and the division lines are 
 natural, but Mr. Lincoln Brown criticises the ten- 
 dency as indicating "a petty system of caste growing 
 up between the upper and lower middle class youth in 
 our land . . . between the sons of shopkeepers and 
 those of the respectable day laborer." ^ 
 
 We have been speaking thus far of instrumentali- 
 ties suited to large and crowded populations. But it 
 is coming to be recognized that the small cities and I 
 the large towns also have their boy problem. There 
 life is a smaller pool that stirs ceaselessly about itself 
 and much of the sin which in the great city flows past 
 the child on the wider current of many interests sticks, 
 because of the influence of some strong evil person- 
 ality or by reason of the greater relative importance 
 and strength of village "gangs," which are unre- 
 
Organisations Formed for Boys by Adults 73 
 
 strained by uniformed police and city walls. The 
 nearness ot the country is both the clanger and the 
 salvation of these boys, for the boys who live! nearer 
 to nature are more full of will ana mdependence 
 either for good or tor evil, while m country conditions 
 themselves may be found the antidotes to the ills of 
 boy-life. 
 
 In the small towns and in larger places where i 
 Protestant churches predominate I am persuaded that I 
 this work may best be done by the churches, either | 
 formally or by substantial cooperation. They have / 
 the workers and the facilities. If it be true, as I think 
 it is, that the places in America in which it is most 
 desirable to live are the large towns and small cities, 
 one great reason why this is so is because it is pos- 
 sible in such places to coordinate the religious, intel- 
 lectual, social and physical life of the community, not 
 for boys only but for all, that there shall be no bar- 
 riers between them, but that all shall be for the har- 
 mony of well-rounded human development. Con- 
 trary to the usual impression, I believe that the sum- 
 mer as much as the winter is in such places a favor- 
 able time for work with boys. The country out-of- 
 doors itself is the best laboratory, the best club-house 
 for boys. Here they are at home and so are known 
 and dealt with at their best and most naturally. It 
 used to be thought that boys could safdy be left to 
 themselves during the summer vacation, but it is 
 coming to be realized that this is the time when the 
 gang-spirit often becomes most obnoxious and that, 
 
74 The Boy Problem 
 
 while no doubt the child absorbs much knowledge 
 and power from Mother Natiire, yet there are great 
 possibilities in directing and interpreting this outdoor 
 education. 
 
 An experiment which makes this emphasis upon 
 summer activities and yet which carries the boys 
 through the year in a large country town is that of 
 the Andover Play School, devised and superintended 
 by George E. Johnson, late Superintendent of Public 
 Schools in Andover, Mass. Mr. Johnson, who adds 
 to the qualifications of being an expert athlete and an 
 authority upon the place of play in education those 
 rare traits, which win confidence, of patience, thor- 
 oughness and perseverance in observation and effort, 
 has brought into being a social institution of great 
 value and suggestiveness. It is based upon the play- 
 instinct, with all the other allied instincts of which 
 play is an expression. Its purpose is to utilize those 
 neglected instincts in education, and much is made 
 of will-training by self-origination and execution of 
 handiwork. Mr. Johnson describes the plan as fol- 
 lows in the Pedagogical Seminary: 
 
 "It is a school for boys ranging from ten to four- 
 teen years of age. Its sessions have been evening! 
 sessions in the \\'inter and day sessions during the 
 summer vacation. The work of the school has been 
 based entirely upon the play interests of the boys at- 
 tending. The work has varied somewhat according 
 to the season of the year, but the description will con- 
 cern mainly the work of the summer sessions. 
 
Organizations Formed for Boys by Adults 75 
 
 'The school was in session for six weeks during 
 July and August, the school day was from half past 
 eight to twelve, and forty boys were regularly in at- 
 tendance. There were three periods in the school 
 day, the first and third being one hour and a half in 
 length and the second one hour. A free choice of 
 occupation was granted at the beginning of the term, 
 very little occasion for change in the divisions oc- 
 curring thereafter. 
 
 "Perhaps the favorite occupation, on the whole, 
 was the wood-work. There was a complete sloyd out- 
 fit and a trained sloyd teacher. No attempt was made 
 to hold the boys to a formulated course. The wood- 
 work was to serve as a sort of supply shop for the 
 apparatus used in the school. The boys made their 
 own butterfly nets and fish nets for the nature work. 
 They made the mounting boards used in mounting 
 the specimens, the cases for the permanent collec- 
 tions, developing cages for the caterpillars, aquaria 
 for the fishes, box traps for catching squirrels, etc. 
 If a boy was interested in archery, he made his bow 
 and arrows ; if in cricket, a bat ; if in kite-flying, a 
 kite ; if in making a present for a younger brother or 
 sister, a toy table, perhaps. Mothers, too, reaped the 
 benefits of the shop; for a boy often turned from his 
 toy-making to the making of a sleeve-board, ironing 
 board, bread board, shelf, or something else for the 
 house. Sometimes the boys united in making some 
 giant afifair of common interest; as, for example, a 
 great windmill which supplied power for turning the 
 
76 The Boy Problem 
 
 grindstone, or a dam and sluiceway for the water- 
 wheel, or a catamaran for the swimming-pond. One 
 summer the boys built a log cabin. 
 
 "The nature work was hardly less popular than the 
 toy-making. Nearly every morning there might have 
 been seen a company of ten or a dozen boys starting 
 out with the leader in search of butterflies or fishes, 
 and for the incidental study of birds, or frogs, or 
 snakes, or whatever came to their notice while hunt- 
 ing. The older boys devoted themselvtes mainly to 
 the butterflies, the younger to the fishes. Nearly 
 every species of butterfly to be found in Andover dur- 
 ing the season was captured, many kinds of caterpil- 
 lars taken and developed into chrysalides in the 
 cages, and nearly all the different kinds of fishes to be 
 found in the streams and ponds of Andover were 
 caught and studied. The work consisted largely of 
 outdoor tramps, but there was also laboratory work, 
 the description and drawing of the worm, chrysalis 
 and butterfly. Honey bees in an observation hive 
 and ants in nests made of school slates covered with 
 glass were watched. Some of the ants' nests were 
 successfully kept and watched for months, one boy 
 keeping a colony all winter. Tlie microscope was 
 frequently used in the laboratory work. Note-books 
 on fishes were also kept. The interest of the boys 
 was deepest in the gathering and general observation 
 and naming of specimens, the watching and feeding 
 of the fishes, and less in the minuter observation, 
 drawing and naming the parts. The zeal in the hunt- 
 ing of specimens was often intense. 
 
Organisations Formed for Boys by Adults yy 
 
 "Allied to the nature work was the gardening. A 
 part of the school-yard was plowed and a definite por- 
 ton allotted to each boy who chose gardening. Vege- 
 tables of various kinds were planted. Flower plants 
 were also a part of the care and possession of the 
 boys, and were taken home and transplanted by the 
 boys at the close of the school. The following spring, 
 many of these boys were reported to me as having 
 started gardens of their own at home. 
 
 "In the winter session stamp and picture collections 
 . were substituted for the nature collections, the stamp- 
 collecting craze spreading like wild-fire among the 
 school children last winter, some of the candy and 
 cigarette counters suflfering thereby, to my certain 
 knowledge. 
 
 "The second period of the day, one hour in length, 
 was spent in outdoor play. In one section of the 
 playground might havfe been seen a group of boys 
 engaged in a match at archery. In another section, 
 the older boys, perhaps, divided into opposing sides 
 by some natural grouping which lent zest to emula- 
 tion, were hard at a spirited game of ball. Elsewhere 
 some of the younger or less athletic boys were play- 
 ing at tenpins on the smooth driveway, or at bean 
 bags. There were also, at times, football, basket-ball, 
 ring-toss, tag games, boxing, wrestling, racing, jump- 
 ing, vaulting, gymnastic tricks, kite-flying, boat rac- 
 ing at Rabbitt's Pond, swimming races at Pomp's or 
 in the Shaiwsheen. Three times a week there was a 
 division in swimming. The swimming lessons often 
 
78 The Boy Problem 
 
 served as a good opportunity for collecting speci- 
 mens or plants for the aquaria. On rainy days there 
 were indoor games, which partook more of the nature 
 of social or parlor games and which were intellectual 
 rather than physical. 
 
 "The musically incHned boys were always eager for 
 an orchestra. This took the form of the kindersym- 
 phonie. The talents and attainments of the boys 
 made the music necessarily crude, but it was much 
 enjoyed by them. The vioHnists were children who 
 came for the orchestra alone, the play-school boys 
 being confined mainly to time-beating instruments. 
 There was a class also in piano-playing which met 
 twice a week. 
 
 "The printing department appealed to some as real 
 play. The press served in printing the names of the 
 boys in the several departments, the baseball teams, 
 headings for school exercise papers, cards, some bill- 
 heads, and, best of all, a four-paged paper issued at 
 the close of the last school, containing compositions 
 of the boys on the work of the various departments, 
 names of prize-takers, cuts of drawings made in the 
 nature work, list of specimens captured, and the like. 
 "Besides the drawing in the nature work, there was 
 a division in drawing for those who preferred it to 
 any other occupation they might have during that 
 period. The work took the form, mainly, of large free 
 drawings from objects. This was the nearest allied 
 to regular school work of any department, unless we 
 except the library from which the boys eagerly drew 
 books of stories, history or nature, for home reading." 
 
Organisations Formed for Boys by Adults 79 
 
 The essential things about this remarkable lillipu- 
 tian community seem to be the intelHgent contact 
 with nature, the devising and making by the boys of 
 their instruments of play and work — but nothing like 
 formal sloyd or classroom drill — and the natural and 
 friendly social relations with the boys of the adult 
 workers, some of whom were paid and some volun- 
 teer. 
 
 Mr. Johnson has planned a Play-School curricu- 
 lum to run from boyhood to manhood, of which he 
 has furnished me the following outline. Not all of it 
 has yet been carried out, but the syllabus shows its 
 natural gradations, and indicates how the churches 
 can so fit themselves in with the scheme, by furnish- 
 ing workers, committees and supplemental instruc- 
 tion, that the plan shall become a complete institute 
 of social pedagogy: 
 
 ''General Outline of Work. Andover Play-School 
 and Boys' Club 
 
 "Group I. Boys ten to fourteen years old. 
 
 "Play-School, winter session: Wood-work, gymna- 
 sium, games, collections, music, printing, library, sav- 
 ings bank. 
 
 "Spring: Garden class started, nature work inci- 
 dentally. Outdoor games 'patroned' Saturdays. 
 
 "Summer: Vacation Play-School. 
 
 "Group TI. Boys fourteen to eighteen years old. 
 
 "Winter: Sloyd, mechanical drawing, gymnasium, 
 athletic club, games with coaching, checkers, chess, 
 v/hist, billiards, music, banjo club, collections, print- 
 
8o The Boy Problem 
 
 ing, paper issued, savings bank, instruction in various 
 branches, library (reading watched, hints given, use 
 cf library). 
 
 "Spring, summer and fall: Outdoor gymnasium, 
 patronage of athletic teams, game-master for the 
 Fiichardson Field. 
 
 "Group III. Age eighteen to twenty-two. 
 
 "Winter: School of politics, gymnasium, athletic 
 club, games with tournament and coaching, music, 
 dramatics, printing, etc., continued, instructions in 
 various branches, library continued, savings bank 
 (Andover Bank). 
 
 "Spring, summer and fall: Outdoor gymnasium, 
 patronage of athletic teams, game-master, etc. 
 
 "Miscellaneous: Church committees to keep track 
 of various ages. Lectures for information, morals, 
 citizenship, health, purity. Socials." 
 
 Mr. Johnson's modest but thorough work with 
 boys is a silent indictment against those who think 
 that they are doing their duty by the boys if they 
 open a village gymnasium or reading-room or start a 
 boys* brigade or boys' appendix to the local Y. M. C. 
 A., and thus give their boys wholesale to the care of 
 one man or a part of one man for a few weeks in the 
 winter. 
 
 By beginning in a small and natural way, with a 
 leader who has mastered the idea and who is a person 
 of efficiency and a few volunteer workers who know 
 something about tools, insects, plants or sports, and 
 a group of boys, and a very little apparatus, this sort 
 
Organizations Formed for Boys by Adults 8i 
 
 of work ought in any place to grow to something very 
 servicdable and fruitful, without any of the barren- 
 ness, extravagance and public indifference which usu- 
 ally seem to be connected with an institution. I have 
 been called in counsel with the people in some large 
 towns who, after talking over various agencies which 
 would call in an outsider as director, made up their 
 minds that there were enough people of ability and 
 sense and enough native beneficent agencies at home 
 to do the work themselves. I look forward to the 
 day when every such town shall have a charmful but 
 benevolent Pied Piper with his assistants around 
 whom the social interests of all the boys in the place 
 shall center. 
 
 The Rev. Edward P. Pressey is conducting at Mon- 
 tague, Mass., a sort of handicraft social settlement, 
 aiming to secure a more attractive and wholesome 
 country life by reviving the old crafts among young 
 people. 
 
 At the Chautauqua Boys' Gub, in New York, the 
 use of some of these activities suggests the possibility 
 of their adaptation to boys' camps and summer assem- 
 blies. 
 
 In the Vacation Schools of the large cities, in addi- 
 tion to regular sloyd, clay modelling, leather work, 
 sewing, printing, weaving, etc., there is often instruc- 
 tion in nature study by flower-analysis, water-color 
 painting and observation of animals in cages. At one 
 such school the younger children gave an exhibition 
 of a rural scene, representing "a country house with 
 
82 The Boy Problem 
 
 barn, horses, cows, lambs, chickens, pigs, etc., a well 
 with an old-fashioned bucket in the foreground; in 
 the background ploughed land and a grain field, 
 fenced. On the other side of the room was the repre- 
 .sentation of a country store filled with all sorts of 
 things from vegetables to saddlery, etc. The idea 
 was to represent the products of the farm and the fac- 
 tory gathered in one store, thus showing graphically 
 the interdependence of city and coimtry, of manufac- 
 turing and agriculture, and the dignity of all labor." 
 Here is a certain amount of the self-origination of 
 Mr. Johnson's school, and a rather pitiful attempt to 
 give an artificial rural atmosphere in a city brick 
 schoolhouse. The summer play-grounds are becom- 
 ing municipal institutions, extensions of the public 
 school system, just as fast as they are recognized as 
 creators of health and morality. Summer philanthro- 
 pies are supplementing the vacation schools and sum- 
 mer playgrounds by giving each year a larger num- 
 ber of city children the air and tonic, the freedom and 
 nurture and healing of the country. 
 
 Let us now turn to some of the agencies, found in 
 both city and country, in which the religious element 
 is central. So important and so neglected is the boy 
 problem in the church that I shall give an entire chap- 
 ter to a constructive study of aims and methods. 
 What I shall do here is simply to describe some of the 
 methods now in existence. 
 
 The most popular way of helping boys in the church 
 t present is in the Junior or Intermediate Endeavor 
 
Organisations Formed for Boys by Adults 83 
 
 Society and kindred organizations. The Endeavor 
 movement soon found a practical difficulty in the fact 
 that its young people, some of whom were quite 
 young when they entered, remained in the society 
 year after year, and that just as soon as their average 
 age began to increase it became almost impossible to 
 gather in younger members. To meet this need, in 
 1884 Junior societies and a few years later Interme- 
 diate societies began to be established, formed in com- 
 plete imitation of the societies of older young people. 
 Thus naturally, and yet we may say somewhat 
 thoughtlessly, an institution was introduced into our 
 churches with the same name and methods as one al- 
 ready existing, but with no query as to whether means 
 that were adaptable to persons from 16 to 60 would 
 be perfectly natural to boys and girls from 10 to 16. 
 
 An interesting test as to whether these Junior soci- 
 eties do actually suit young children may be taken 
 from the results of Dr. Sheldon's study, already re- 
 ferred to, of the societies, clubs and gangs which 
 children spontaneously organize. If interest is the 
 key to influence, what boys Hke to do is a criterion as 
 to the sort of things which it is wise to do for them. 
 Three things were definitely discovered regarding 
 these societies: physical activity, in the forms of play, 
 construction, wandering and athletics, was the su- 
 preme interest, 85^ per cent of the societies having 
 this as its characteristic; leagues for religious expres- 
 sion were almost entirely absent; boys and girls al- 
 most never organized together. 
 
84 The Boy Problem 
 
 We see at once that these Junior societies ignore 
 these three facts, for they are mostly organizations 
 for sitting still, they aim directly at religious expres- 
 sion, and they include boys and girls together. 
 
 Religion in a child may be real, but it is only a 
 promised It is not yet ^time to talk about it or dis- 
 play it in any vocal way. "Oh, that I might do some- 
 thing for God!" not, "Oh, to say something!" is his 
 cry. 
 
 With boys especially this is. a time of reserves, the 
 distance between apprehension and expression is never 
 so long as now, it is more important to brood than to 
 utter, and public prayer or testimony or opinion is, in 
 this imitative age, sure to be parrot-like and unnatural. 
 It is a period when a boy tries to be honest with 
 himself. The insistence upon the ironclad, lifelong 
 pledge and the easy tolerance of its frequent infrac- 
 tion does this quality of his nature a serious wrong. 
 "To do whatever Jesus would have us do," says Dr. 
 O. S. Davis in a kindly critique, "is to express our 
 religious life through all the activities of our being, 
 and it is made the first element in the Christian En- 
 deavor consecration. But the boy is obliged to sub- 
 sume under this head all the positive, manly, heroic 
 activities of his practical life. These are the implied 
 duties of the pledge. Positive courage in action, 
 manly chivalry in daily, life, fidelity in school, honesty 
 in the beginnings of trade and handiwork, high ideals 
 in the duties of citizenship, — these are the implied vir- 
 tues of the Christian Endeavor pledge." "Nothing 
 
Organizations Formed for Boys by Adults 85 
 
 tends more to give to children a sense of unreality," 
 says Sir Joshua Fitch, "than the habit of exacting 
 from them professions of faith which do not honestly 
 correspond to their present stage of religious experi- 
 ence." When a boy wants to talk in meeting at this 
 age there is generally something the matter with him. 
 I have often observed that it is not the best or most 
 thoughtful boys who do the praying and talking in 
 these meetings. It is rather those of quick but shal- 
 low natures who ought to be repressed rather than 
 •encouraged, and who are learning a light and easy 
 manner of rehgious expression which may later easily 
 become weakly fluent and more or less consciously 
 hypocritical. A bright boy who was asked to join an 
 Endeavor Society replied, "No, they talk too much j 
 with their mouths." On the other hand an immature 
 boy of a deeper nature will often be led into giving 
 expressions of himself, honest at the time, which he 
 later recognizes as crude and overwrought, the result 
 of which may be to silence his lips forever or to per- 
 suade him that he has lost, in losing its temporary 
 fervor, the reality of his religious life. This may help 
 explain why it is that the Endeavor movement, origi- 
 nated largely to feed and fructify the church prayer- 
 meeting, has been such a disappointment in this re- 
 gard. He must be blind who does not see that in 
 New England at least, the mid-week meeting is ceas 
 ing to be a place for the giving- of personal religious 
 experience. 
 Another fact which I have already mentioned is 
 
86 The Boy Problem 
 
 I tliat life to adolescents comes on in waves, between 
 \ which are rhythms or lulls. 1 hose who have much to 
 do with boys intimately and many men from their 
 memory of childhood have testified that conversion 
 is quite apt to come in three successive waves of in- 
 creasing power about two or three years apart. Be- 
 tween these waves there is a period of depression, 
 caused perhaps by puberal or other physical changes. 
 This is "the pin-feather age," the blunder period. In 
 these lulls the child is apt to think he has lost his faith 
 or sinned away his day of grace. The Junior methods 
 are very apt to intensify the morbidness and intro- 
 spection of these curious intermediary periods. 
 
 It seems to me that Dr. Coe has in his study of 
 Temperaments cut the ground away forever from un- 
 der that hoary heresy that "the prayer-meeting is the 
 thermometer of the church." The exact truth is that 
 it is the thermometer of the people of sanguine or 
 melancholic temperaments in the church. Sainthood, 
 as he points out, has in all ages, especially the me- 
 dieval, been granted to those of devout feeling and 
 devout expression, and it has only been seldom that 
 men have "perceived that merely filling one's station 
 in life in the fear of God is a spiritual exercise." The 
 saints of the Endeavor movement — and they are real 
 saints — are men of the devotional type. They pub- 
 lish or push the writings of Meyer, Murray, Morgan, 
 Moody and McGregor, who are also saints and of the 
 same type; they encourage a Comradeship of the 
 Quiet Hour, which appeals to saints — of the same 
 
A 
 
 Organizations Formed for Boys by Adults 87 
 
 type; and they believe that the prayer-meeting is the 
 thermometer of the Christian. But there are other 
 good people who think the writings of those saints 
 who begin with M tiresome, who if they had a quiet 
 h40ur would say their prayers all through and then 
 
 ' have fifty-seven minutes in which to start up and do 
 something useful, and to whom either a prayer-meet- 
 ing is irksome or personal participation in it painful 
 
 ^nd unprofitable. They were m^de that way. They 
 r^/^are of the choleric type. 
 
 It is no reflection upon the manliness of the former 
 class when Professor Coe points out that women are 
 overwhelmingly of sanguine or melancholic tempera- 
 ment, and that it is something more than mere coin- 
 cidence that women should be in the majority in the 
 churches where "the forms of religious life natural to 
 the choleric temperament are habitually discounted in 
 favor of those natural to the sanguine and melan- 
 cholic temperaments." 
 
 Whether this tendency has begun to show its re- 
 sults in the Endeavor movement there is time, but 
 perhaps there are not sufficient data, to make evident. 
 It is a fact that in the states and the denomination in 
 those states in which the movement started the socie- 
 ties have lately fallen oflf very largely in membership. 
 A statistician in whose trustworthiness with the use of 
 figures I have unusual confidence, made a careful 
 study which proved to him that, while the offices in a 
 large group of Endeavor societies several years ago 
 were mostly held by young men, another recent can- 
 
88 The Boy Problem 
 
 vass showed that to a startHng degree they were now 
 held by young women. Testimony comes to me 
 from many sources that the proportion of young men 
 in these societies is falHng, and that it is increasingly 
 difficult to hold young men of the active type in their 
 membership. The application of all this to boys is 
 just here. While Lotze may be right in his generali- 
 zation, which I mentioned, that the sanguine is the 
 temperament of childhood, the melancholic of adoles- 
 cence, the choleric of maturity and the phlegmatic of 
 age, yet that is only saying that with most boys the 
 melancholic is the passing stage on the way to matu- 
 rity, and that when we emphasize the prayer-rneeting 
 and the prayer-meeting pledge we are laying stress 
 upon an influence which many boys will soon out- 
 grow. It is not denied that susceptible boys, under 
 the influence of friendship for a good leader, will take 
 such a pledge and keep it. All this argument is sim- 
 ply to prove that it is not a good thing to do, in view 
 of its later consequences. Indeed, when we think how 
 little training or result is actually obtained in the 
 average society by the sort of vocal expression which 
 is offered, it hardly seems worth the while. A boy 
 may learn to sing heartily Mr. Wells' metrical para- 
 phrase of the pledge : 
 
 "When our Juniors meet we will try to be there ; 
 We'll say a few words, or we'll pray a short prayer," 
 
 ibut a boy is not to think that because a time comes 
 when he cannot do this freely he is necessarily any 
 worse a boy — and the boys ought to know this. For 
 
Organisations Formed for Boys by Adulis 89 
 
 the sake of that large number of boys whom the 
 prayer-meeting pledge will sooner or later alienate, if 
 not because it is such a frequent occasion of perjury 
 to others, I would put participation in the devotional 
 meeting on the basis of an elective. 
 
 The psychologist finds fault with the plan because 
 it is not adapted to boys. It often meets Sundays and 
 so reaches only the boy that wears the Sunday suit. 
 It is an altogether different boy who goes out into life 
 Monday. It ignores almost entirely the instincts for 
 physical activity, out-of-doors, natural science, con- 
 structiveness, play. This fault is not inherent, and 
 many progressive leaders are making the activities 
 much more free and varied. 
 
 The chief trouble with the plan is that it is a plan for 
 grown-up people. Boys do not like to sit still. Its 
 meetings are based on the class-meeting idea, and 
 boys were never made to go to class-meetings. It 
 usually has women leaders, and this makes the matur- 
 ing boy uneasy. It often has in it children of all 
 ages, and the clan-bounds of boys are very strict 
 about equality of age. 
 
 The psychologist finds other weaknesses which the 
 boy would not be able to define. He finds fault be- 
 cause the leader is not only generally a woman, but a 
 young, inexperienced and untrained woman. The ef- 
 fort is made to get the best leaders, but the United 
 Society officers have repeatedly said, that if a trained 
 leader cannot be secured, a zealous young person or a 
 committee of young people should go ahead with the 
 
90 The Boy Problem 
 
 society. The soul of an adolescent child is too fair 
 and fine a thing to be handled by a willing but ig- 
 norant girl or bandied about by a committee. If the 
 pastor, if the deacons or deaconesses, if the wise fa- 
 thers and mothers do not see here the most important 
 work of the church, then let the spiritual nurture of 
 the children come in some other way. 
 
 The organization is smitten with the plague of 
 uniformity, which possesses the Sunday-school. No 
 matter what the local membership or circumstances, 
 every band is urged to take the uniform topics and to 
 adopt the same affiliated ideas. Tliese topics deal 
 much with rest, peace, resignation and introspection, 
 essentially feminine themes, when, as Gulick has 
 pointed out, the whole trend of a boy's nature is 
 heroic, objective, katabolic. In actual practice the 
 pledge too often becomes a "half-way covenant" 
 which, instead of a stepping-stone into the church, is 
 made a substitute for church membership. 
 
 On the other hand such religious bands as these are 
 splendid untrammelled opportunities for^ children to 
 serve God and perform religious duty. They give in- 
 stant definiteness to consecration. The word "En- 
 deavor" was an inspiration. It expresses the ideals 
 of youth. To try, to persist, to attain, these are the 
 things a boy wants to do. The Junior idea has in it 
 the three things which I shall say later are fundamen- 
 tal to work that shall help boys : something to love, 
 I something to know, and something to do. There is 
 the hearty devotion to the personal Christ, the dis- 
 
Organisations Formed for Boys by Adults 91 
 
 position to seek wiser ways of instructing the children 
 and the splendidly planned' activities of the various 
 committees. Notice how the boy who wriggles like 
 an eel during the prayer-meeting and pops up to give 
 a "testimony" and then pops down to stick a pin into 
 his neighbor — with equal enthusiasm — shines in do- 
 ing the chores of a social or in works of mercy for 
 which on^ would suppose he would have no heart. 
 He wants to be doing something. If I were going to 
 have a caste called ''the active membership" at all, I . 
 would have it consist of those who are active witlv^ 
 their hands rather than with their tongues, an inner 
 guild of those who will agree to take definite tasks 
 and do them. The wiser Endeavor leaders are gath- 
 ering up to themselves the activities of the various 
 straggling minor societies of the church and some 
 of them are adding drills, athletics, camps, etc. The 
 Endeavor hosts, "the army of the daybreak," have the 
 enthusiasm, the confidence, the consecration and the 
 opportunity to take hold of the boys, and do for them 
 what no one else can do. Let the directors of the" 
 movement gradually retire methods that are merely ^ 
 imitative of adults and that insist on iron conformi- 
 ties, and affiliate with themselves some of the other 
 forms of work named in this chapter, and then the 
 movement will furnish the leadership and the goal to 
 a multitude of boys who need only the right touch 
 to ripen them into Christian manhood. 
 
 In connection with the twentieth birthday of the 
 movement, in February, 1901, a statement was issued 
 
92 The Boy Problem 
 
 by the trustees of the United Society defining the 
 flexibility and adaptabihty of the movement, in which 
 it was declared that the essential of the pledge is ''to 
 do what Christ would like to have us do," and that 
 societies based upon several very inclusive principles 
 which nearly all can accept are in fact Christian En- 
 deavor Societies, without regard to the special meth- 
 ods of organization or service, for which each should 
 "turn for authoritative instruction to the pastor and 
 church with which it is connected." Secretary Baer 
 adds to the official announcement of this step : "Pas- 
 tors have the fullest liberty to frame the covenant ob- 
 ligation into any form of words they deem wise, and 
 so long as they have the element of obligation care- 
 fully expressed . . . the society is a Christian En- 
 deavor Society." President Francis E. Clark, an- 
 swering a personal letter from the author in which he 
 asked if a society of boys, formed without special 
 Christian Endeavor features but preparatory to mem- 
 bership in an older society, could be classed as a Jun- 
 ior or Intermediate Endeavor Society replied: "It 
 seems to me with the Juniors and Intermediates that 
 there may be even larger flexibility than in the Senior 
 society, especially when the pastor has them tinder 
 his own supervision and is training them for useful- 
 ness in the church, which of course is the great object 
 of Christian Endeavor. You say 'without special 
 Endeavor features,' but special Endeavor features 
 embrace the learning of Scripture, simple prayer ser- 
 vices, catechetical methods, and all possible kinds of 
 
Organizations Formed for Boys by Adults 93 
 
 work appropriate to boys and girls. Many or all of 
 these plans you would approve of, I am confident, 
 and the children's society along these lines would 
 be, I should think, a good Junior society. We desire 
 that there should be the utmost liberty consistent with 
 keeping the Endeavor movement on a genuinely re- 
 ligious, and an outspokenly rehgious basis." 
 
 These statements are surely most gratifying and 
 will be timely in preventing unfortunate revolts from 
 a movement that has been guided with such unselfish 
 and thoughtful devotion. While the United Society 
 may not pioneer the freer methods here suggested, it 
 does thus admit them, and if they have value they will 
 leaven the organization. The Endeavor movement 
 was certainly the first recognition of the activities of 
 the young, and while it may, in practice, have dispro- 
 portionately emphasized the activity of the tongue, it 
 still stands for activity of every sort and holds out a 
 kindly hand to new methods. Though originated 
 and shaped before the new philosophy of education 
 became paramount, its fellowship means hospitality 
 and unity. Children look forward to being enrolled 
 in it. It is the neardst step to what I shall urge, the 
 affiliation in one organization for nurture and activity 
 of all the children in the church. I counsel then that 
 while one may well use what seem to me more fruitful 
 methods than the formal prayer-meeting, the iron- 
 clad pledge with its police executive, the lookout 
 committee, etc., and may actually give to the society 
 formed some other name — since names are cheap and 
 
94 ^^^^ Boy Problem 
 
 may be multiplied — ^the chief designation should be, 
 the Boys' Christian Endeavor Society. This retains 
 the fellowship, prevents the multiplication of petty so- 
 cieties and enables the boys to be graduated into the 
 Young People's Society of Christian Endeavor, 
 which is probably already in the church. That, too, 
 must feel the influence of the new methods, yet can 
 makel use of more of the regulation Endeavor prac- 
 tices. 
 
 I give no special space here to the Epworth League 
 and the other societies, imitative of Christian En- 
 deavor, since what I have said of one applies largely 
 to all. 
 
 Now to the Brotherhoodsf of St. Andrew, and of 
 Andrew and Philip. The strength of these brother- 
 hoods is loyalty. The gregarious spirit of boys has 
 in it a great capacity for affection, as is seen in the 
 strength of college secret societies among youths not 
 out of the adolescent period. That spirit is beautiful 
 and ennobling. The Church is an institution as 
 worthy of passionate devotions and of "team-work" 
 as the college. The Brotherhoods seize this roman- 
 tic affection and fasten it. Tliere is a disadvantage 
 , in that, in either case, the Boys' Brotherhood was an 
 ^afterthought, and too often the work is modeled after 
 that for men, instead of appealing directly to boys. 
 / There is sometimes, too, but not always, the impres- 
 sion given that the play-element is for the sake of 
 wanning those who are not Christians, instead of be- 
 ing the legitimate employment of the Christian boys 
 
Organisations Formed for Boys by Adults 95 
 
 themselves. I have been surprised at the slow 
 growth of the Brotherhood in some regions which are 
 usually hospitable to new idqas. I can explain this 
 only by the fact that too much reliance has been 
 placed upon the Rules of Prayer and Service, which 
 are rather too narrowly phrased to excite and hold 
 interest. I consider the Brotherhood idea to be act- 
 ually more adaptable to boys than to men. The 
 evangelizing of boys by other boys is in the idea of 
 the order, and the word "Brotherhood" expresses 
 ,what every boy covets. I value the Brotherhoods 
 very highly as opportunities afforded boys to develop 
 their early Christian characters in each other's fellow- 
 ship under mature, manly leaders. Almost every 
 men's league in a church needs a boy branch to pre- 
 vent it from becoming selfish. This adopting of the 
 boys by the men in a church, in a godfatherly sense, 
 is a magnificent mission. 
 
 I have been rather favorably impressed with the \ 
 ideas of a young organization called the Boys' Broth:^ • 
 erhood of Philadelphia. It has the advantage of hav- | 
 ing never been the tail to a men's movement and of j 
 combining from the start the boys of several strong j 
 churches in a large city. The plan is to form chap- 
 ters of the brotherhood of the boys of separate Sun- 
 day-schools, thus giving the dynamic and esprit de 
 corps of numbers while retaining church loyalty. 
 The activities are mostly athletic. The result desired 
 is to make a "gang" of the better class of boys so 
 strong as to compel respect and imitation for their 
 
96 The Boy Problem 
 
 muscular style of Christianity. By some such plan a 
 number of churches could pool issues in furnishing 
 the attractions that boys like and yet each retain the 
 privilege of furnishing its own boys the special relig- 
 ious instruction which it deemed wise. It is toward 
 this plan that I hope the Y. M. C. A. is tending. 
 
 The most interesting church work that I know of 
 anywhere among boys is that exhibited in an organ- 
 ization known as the Captains of Ten, originated and 
 conducted by Miss A. B. Mackintire of Dr. Alexan- 
 der McKenzie's church in Cambridge. We have here 
 a successful boys' club conducted by a woman. Here 
 is a woman who, without fad or publicity, has worked 
 out during a dozen years a plan which fits the best 
 theories. The basis^is hand-work. The Captains of 
 Ten are boys from 8 to 14, who are captains of their 
 ten fingers. Cardboard work, weaving, whittling, 
 sloyd, carving and other activities are followed by 
 graded groups. Miss Mackintire is a trained sloyd 
 worker and has a remarkable ingenuity and patience 
 in originating elaborate and dignified annual enter- 
 tainments by the boys, each of which is a surprise and 
 wonder. The interest is missions, which are taught 
 graphically, chiefly at the monthly business meeting. 
 The boys learn to like to make generous gifts from 
 the proceeds of their festivals and sales of handiwork 
 for the benevolent causes which they know about and 
 care for. At the entertainments the dramatic instinct 
 is fully recognized and the constructive faculties are 
 utilized in designing costumes and scenery. Loyalty 
 
Organisations Formed for Boys by Adults 97 
 
 and self-government are taught incidentally. The 
 older boys become volunteer workers to help begin- 
 ners, and are graduated into the Order of the Knights 
 of King Arthur. A personality that has been devoted 
 to boys with such earnestness and fideUty becomes a 
 masterful influence on character. To walk down the 
 room on the walls of which are placed the photo- 
 graphs of the grouped Captains for successive years — 
 there have been over 200 boys in all — and see the 
 growth in maturity thus visibly portrayed is an im- 
 pressive vision. These boys seem to ripen into Chris- 
 tian life naturally, although they represent two quite 
 different levels of society, and usually come into the 
 church. There is no Junior Endeavor Society, or 
 other religious society for children, here. This illus- 
 tation suggests the power of broader methods 
 wielded by sense and consecration to assist in the 
 actual religious development of boyhood. V:,^ 
 
 Jhe Knights of King Arthur, devised by the author, ! 
 is an order of Christian knighthood for boys, which, 
 because it differs from any other plan that we have 
 mentioned, may deserve description. It is based upon 
 the romantic, hero-loving, play, constructive and im- 
 aginative instincts which ripen at about 14, but it has 
 been found possible and desirable to prepare the boys 
 for the special features of the order by preliminary 
 organization and by holding up these special features 
 as something to look forward to, at 12. Its purpose 1 
 is to bring back to the world, and especially to its|\ 
 youthTThe spirit of chivalry, courtesy, deference toU 
 
98 The Boy Problem 
 
 womaiihoodi, recognition of the noblesse oblige, and 
 Christian daring, and ideal of that kingdom of knight- 
 hness which King Arthur promised he would bring 
 back when he returns from Avilion. In this order he 
 appears again. Unlike many means of helping boys, 
 this one does not claim to be complete in itself. It is 
 only a skeleton organization, attracting instant pleas- 
 ure, affording wholesome recreation and instruction 
 and serving as the framework upon which to build 
 instrumentalities that may particularly fit local needs. 
 It is formed upon the model of a college Greek-letter 
 fraternity rather than upon that of a secret lodge, al- 
 though it is beUeved that the satisfaction of the love 
 of ritual, mystery and parade in this way in adoles- 
 cence will often prevent the lodge-room craze which 
 might later become extravagant and destructive of 
 \ domestic felicity. It is not secret. The boys when 
 they gather for a "conclave" march into their hall and 
 seat themselves in a circle in imitation of the Round 
 Table, with a King at the head, the Merlin or adult 
 leader at his side, and the various functionaries of 
 their "Castle" in their places. In order to avoid jeal- 
 ousy there is constant rotation in office. Each boy 
 bears the name of a hero, either an ancient knight or 
 a modern man of noble life, and is known by that 
 name in the castle and is supposed to be familiar with 
 the history of the one for whom he is named and to 
 emulate his virtues. The ritual is short but impres- 
 sive. Its preparation and the arranging of the initia- 
 tions, which embody the grades of page, esquire and 
 
Organizations Formed for Boys by Adults 99 
 
 knight, and which teach lessons important to boy- 
 hood, give room for the constructive instinct in the 
 making of regaHa, banners, swords and spears, throne,, 
 etc. These initiations exercise the play instinct with-r' 
 out giving opportunity for physical violence. Hero- 
 worship is developed by a Roll of Noble Deeds, a 
 castle album of portraits of heroes, the reading to- 
 gether of heroic books, and the offering of ranks in 
 **the peerage" and the sacred honor of "the Siege 
 Perilous" for athletic, scholarly or self-sacrificing at- 
 tainments. Those honors which involve mere physi- 
 cal effort are rewards for wholesome emulation, while 
 the recognition of actual heroism is conferred, not to 
 the boaster, but by the spontaneous tribute of his 
 fellows. The ranks of esquire and knight in the castle 
 are planned to be occupied by those who shall volun- 
 tarily, after a term of probation, accept a simple, self- 
 originated covenant of purity, temperance and rever- 
 ence or enter the manliness of actual Christian confes- 
 sion by church membership. For definite activity 
 and in satisfying the instinct for roaming and adven- 
 ture, "quests" are suggested in the way of walks to 
 historic sites and cooperative deeds of kindness. The 
 local Merlin is urged to develop the resources of the 
 boys in his own, way, as upon the manner in which he 
 does this the life of the castle will ultimately depend. 
 Those who use nothing but the material furnished do 
 not make much with the plan. Almost everything 
 can be clad in imagination) with the knightly charac- 
 ter. The summer camp will become the literal castle 
 
lOO The Boy Problem 
 
 and its environs the country of the paynims, who are 
 to be protected, not ravaged. The ball team will be 
 the castle armed band and its victories the occasion 
 of mild ''wassail." The boys will often elaborate 
 further rituals of their own, andj patriotism and mis- 
 sions can be taught under this disguise. Often the 
 members show a touching tenderness toward a group 
 of younger boys who are under instruction prepara- 
 tory to being admitted and refer in later days to their 
 memories of the order with something of the same 
 feeling that the graduate does to his college days. 
 There is in some such approach to the best in the boy 
 the possibility of great good. In a successful castle 
 loyalty, chivalry and service — the three watchwords 
 of the order — are actually developed in very pleasing 
 ways. The plan is thoroughly Christian and is more 
 often found in churches than elsewhere, although 
 adapted to a union group in the community. Its 
 elasticity makes it popular to lise with other formal 
 agencies. But it requires considerable preparatory 
 reading and planning by the leader, and, to reach the 
 best results, as in all other work that amounts to any- 
 thing, much care and patience all the way along. 
 
 The Sunday-school is the greatest educational in- 
 stitute of the church. Despite the abundant criticisms 
 with which it is favored, the character of its leaders 
 and membership, the authorization and labor which 
 it has received and its genuine value and unique op- 
 portunity will cause it to continue to be the place 
 where the church does most of its teaching, and puts 
 
Organizations Formed fm;Boys\hy 'AMl^ ; ipi 
 
 forth its best work. I do not need to point out its 
 excellences. I have no desire to carp at its defects. 
 Neither will I describe the recent outlines proposed 
 for the perfect school of the future. These are re- 
 ferred to in the Bibliography. Each proposition must 
 be interpreted by its maker's ideal of the Sunday- 
 school. I will briefly state my own, and in the light 
 of it the suggestions that follow will get their mean- 
 ing. 
 
 The Sunday-school has three functions. First and 
 chiefly, it is the agency, supplemental to the home, 
 where children and young people are taught the 
 Christian religion of love and service. Second, it is 
 a place where older persons may study the higher 
 problems of religious thought and duty. Third, it is 
 the place where people are trained to teach rehgion to 
 others. These three functions suggest as the divi- 
 sions of the Sunday-school, the primary and adoles- 
 cent grades, the adult classes, the normal department. 
 I shall speak almost entirely of the first division. 
 
 Ideally, the Sunday-school for children is not a 
 school at all. In an Edenic condition it is an exten- 
 sion of the home. It is a place where a wise and good 
 man or woman gathers a group of young people to 
 whom he is in the truest sense a god-parent in order 
 to help and supplement the home in teaching the way 
 of life and encouraging children to walk in it. There 
 are of course pedagogic laws to be appHed in Sunday- 
 school instruction, but the aim should not be to imi- 
 tate the public school. At present the trend seems 
 
10^ : The Boy Problem 
 
 to be in the direction of such imitation, both on the 
 part of the conservative leaders of the International 
 System who have a passion for uniformity and on the 
 part of the religious pedagogists who naturally and 
 properly wish to learn all that the public school has to 
 teach. The model of the Sunday-school should be 
 rather the social settlement classes and clubs, where 
 the teacher and scholars are simply friends who meet 
 because of interest in the same subject. The Sunday- 
 school class is the proper unit for all the organized 
 work of the church among young people. I look for- 
 ward to the day when, instead of having a Sunday- 
 school where a great many children come for only an 
 hour on Sunday and several forlorn Endeavor socie- 
 ties, mission bands and clubs of boys and girls which 
 struggle to hold the interest of but a small fraction on 
 week days, each class or group of classes shall have its 
 week-day session which shall be an authorized and 
 fully attended meeting of the school. Here the secu- 
 lar mass-club idea of esprit de corps and the group-club 
 intensive and personal work would both be exempli- 
 fied. 
 
 The first essential for an improved school is a 
 trained superintendent. Behind even the homely 
 group-class idea must be the man of ideal and knowl- 
 edge. In the larger churches such men are being set 
 apart to this as a life-work. There is a great demand 
 in the smaller churches for ministers who are teachers 
 as well as pastors. 
 
 Then we must have good teachers. We naturally 
 
Organizations Formed for Boys by Adults 103 
 
 turn to our public schools. But President Hyde tells 
 our public school teachers to treat one who would 
 have them teach Sundays "as a murderer who seeks 
 your life." Still many of them do teach, and they are 
 a blessing to our schools. I believe the mid-week 
 meeting of the church is to become more and more a 
 place where the pastor-teacher shall confer with the 
 laymen-teachers as to the principles and methods of 
 Bible teaching. Fathers and mothers and other peo- 
 ple who have retained their childhood may thus be- 
 come competent and efficient teachers. 
 
 In regard to the system of instruction much prog- 
 ress may be expected, for much has. already been se- 
 cured. While I feel that we are much indebted to. all 
 who are at work upon new systems I am convinced 
 that — for the Main school at least — the International 
 Lesson System will, in an improved form, continue to 
 command the allegiance of the great majority. The 
 committee is surely desirous to give what is wanteid 
 just as soon as the want is manifest. The ideal course 
 toward which I believe they are moving is a perma- 
 nent, not a changing one. The recognition has al- 
 ready been made that the infant department and the 
 adult classes need different lesson material from the 
 main school. What I hope will be granted is that 
 there are ways of approach to the Bible natural to 
 each advancing age. When this has been allowed 
 and the sketch of a permanent system for the various 
 ages has been m*ade, their splendid work will be ac- 
 complished. 
 
I04 The Boy Problem 
 
 The next important thing is the way of instruc- 
 tion. Two vicious methods are now in vogue : the 
 Lancastrian or catechetical and the homiletic. The 
 first is obselete in all other education. The second, 
 confined to religious instruction and old-fashioned 
 school "grammar" work, is based on the idea that the 
 Spirit of God and of common sense is so absent from 
 the child that he will never see the good nor do it un- 
 less a moral is tagged to every verse in the lesson. 
 The school of the future will give the little children 
 story-talks on the heavenly Father in nature and 
 providence, and the child's relation to Him as illus- 
 trated by the childhood of Jesus and of other charac- 
 ters and by familiar objects and events. The myth- 
 ologic, the sensuous, the dramatic and the egoistic 
 will be recognized in the stories that follow, taken 
 from the heroes, myths and miracles of the Bible and 
 other literatures. In general the Old Testament 
 ideals and narratives wall precede the New, but not in- 
 variably. Adolescence seems to need the life of 
 Jesus studied as vitally as possible. Here the story- 
 methods yield to frank conversation. The restless- 
 ness and doubts and moral cravings of the period re- 
 quire also a first-hand dealing with pressing ethical 
 problems. Here, too, comes the pressure for spirit- 
 ual decision. In later years the facts of Biblical criti- 
 cism and the literature of the Bible become appro- 
 priate topics. 
 
 I am inclined to prophesy an end to 'the lesson 
 quarterlies, at least to the almanac style. The young 
 
Organizations Formed for Boys by Adults 105 
 
 children will carry home pictures and' occasional il- 
 lustrative material, and will do some little handicraft 
 or "laboratory" work. Those a little older will have 
 lap-boards and pencils and paper and do some water- 
 color or paper-pulp or whittling work, largely outside 
 the class. The young men and women will use note- 
 books. If the quarterly departs, then the teacher's 
 manual will be magnified. Its "helps" will not be ex- 
 pository or homiletic, but they will consist in instruc- 
 tion to broaden and enlighten the mind of the teacher, 
 which is the only way to get better teaching. 
 
 As to the boys, who, at the age of greatest ap- 
 proachability, are being lost to the school in greatest 
 numbers, I think the courses should be shorter — say, 
 three complete courses, each on a great Hfe or topic, 
 in a year. They should be undated, so that a lesson 
 may be postponed if something more important — 
 such as a matter of personal ethics — takes the hour. 
 I favor the use of pencils, crayons, and elven water- 
 colors and jack-knives, if the time and room permit. 
 If not, the proposed week-day session may give the 
 opportunity. The constant endeavor with boys must 
 be to keep the point ^of contact in real life, in school, 
 playground, current events, within reach. The novel 
 methods suggested would be thought 'by some to 
 make the getting of teachers harder, but it ought not 
 tO|be so. Why should not people' prepare each year 
 for a twelve weeks' course, as a professor does for his 
 laboratory course, who aannot teach all the year? 
 The methods I propose make the question of order so 
 
\ 
 
 1 06 The Boy Problem 
 
 simple that it often removes the terror of teaching 
 boys. 
 
 Very few classes of older boys can be held unless 
 their "gang-spirit" is recognized by a week-day or- 
 ganization. I think teachers of such boys should 
 plan, not for a yearly feed, but for a regular if only 
 occasional group-club of their classes, separately or 
 together. These will constitute the Boys' Endeavor 
 Society of the church. Among boys, especially, the 
 three things for which Professor Peabody pleads as 
 demanded for the religion of a college student are 
 needed in Sunday-school work : reality, rationality 
 and personal service. A teacher of genuine character, 
 a teaching that neither skulks nor dodges, and a gen- 
 erous class-life — these make the successful boys' class. 
 
 The most adequate lesson material now published 
 by any denomination is furnished by the Unitarians. 
 They have several admirable biographical courses 
 which, nominally intended for adults, are fine for boys. 
 Mr. W. H. Davis' graphic lessons are commended 
 for hand-work. The best complete graded school 
 system of which I know is that in use in the Taber- 
 nacle school connected with Chicago Commons. In 
 outline it is as follows : 
 
 "The Graded Bible School. There are twelve 
 grades in the Graded Bible School, corresponding to 
 the grades in the public schools and covering the pe- 
 riod from six to eighteen years in the scholar's life. The 
 school is divided into Primary, Junior and Senior De- 
 partments, each including four grades. The Primary 
 
Organizations Formed for Boys by Adults 107 
 
 and Junior equal the period of grammar school and 
 the Senior that of high school in our public school 
 system. In arranging the curriculum the aim has 
 been tq adapt the work to the needs of the children 
 and young people in the dififerent periods of their de- 
 velopment, in accordance with the results of the best 
 modern child study, and also to cover the Bible mate- 
 rial in a complete and orderly way. While the chief 
 subject of study is the Bible, attention is paid to 
 church history, missions, present day problems in 
 ethics. The course naturally falls into six divisions. 
 The first two cover the receptive period in the child's 
 life, the work being confined to Bible truths and Bible 
 stories, nature lessons, object-lessons and the memor- 
 izing of Scripture passages. The next two divisions 
 include the decision period in the child's life. The 
 work is in the New Testament, including a careful 
 study of the Life of Christ, the Early Church and sim- 
 ple Christian teaching. In the fifth division the Old 
 Testament is studied), and in the sixth division, when 
 the young person is in the reconstruction period of 
 life, the aim is to inculcate Christian duties and meet 
 the questionings and difficulties which arise in the 
 mind of a young person at this time." 
 
 The school of week-day scope, for which I plead, 
 must be a school of practice as well as instruction. 
 The sessions themselves give room for some ethical 
 applications. Recently I preached a sermon on steal- 
 ing up-stairs while a child was making away with 
 some of the contents of the primary teachers' cabinet 
 
io8 The Boy Problem 
 
 down-stairs. (This is an illustration by way of con- 
 trast). Disorder and ridicule of others are to be dealt 
 with sternly, not for the sake of the discipline of the 
 schools, but for the sake of the morals of the scholars. 
 Inattention and disrespect to teachers, which are so 
 common, are "serious not because those who offend do 
 not listen to the teaching, but because they are direct- 
 ly contradicting it by their conduct. 
 
 More than this, the school must stand for actual 
 religious activity. It may be even demoralizing con- 
 tinually to impress moral principles and arouse noble 
 emotions and offer no chance to exercise them. This 
 is the chief reason why I urge that the week-day so- 
 cieties of the church be affiliated with the Sunday- 
 school. It is not enough to give a missionary offer- 
 ing to a cause which no scholar may know much of 
 anything about, and to which many have contributed 
 nothing. The children must learn to do for others, 
 doing that really costs time and effort and skill. A 
 school that furnishes manly teachers, frank, honest 
 instruction, wholesome social fellowship and loving 
 service for others will hold a boy even through his 
 years of restlessness and doubt. 
 
 The catechetical revival is attaining considerable re- 
 cent prominence and is assuming some dignity on 
 account of its antiquity. If the movement be one for 
 doctrinal instruction, as, in the Presbyterian, Protes- 
 tant Episcopal, Lutheran, Reformed and Methodist 
 churches, which have catechisms prescribed by church 
 law, it presumably is, we have, on the one hand, the 
 
Organisations Formed for Boys by Adults 109 
 
 opposition of the psychologists, as Professor C. R. 
 Henderson of the University of Chicago, who says, 
 "I know no catechism which seems to me suitable for 
 any person, young or old, to commit to memory ;" 
 Pres. G. Stanley Hall of Clark University, who says, 
 "The teacher should shun all catechetical methods, 
 most of all those that require yes or no for an answer, 
 and next those that insist upon a form of words, which 
 always tend to become a substitute for thought. Al- 
 though catechisms may have their place, they are not 
 for children ;" Professor H. C. King of OberHn, who 
 declares that "Christ's own method, in bringing his 
 disciples to the confession of his Messiahship, was one 
 of punctilious avoidance of all dogmatic statements 
 upon the matter;" Professor George A. Coe, who in 
 his "Spiritual Life," quotes a young teacher as saying, 
 "Oh, why, why did my parents try to equip me with a 
 doctrinal system in childhood? . . . When I be- 
 gan to doubt some points, I felt obliged to throw lall 
 overboard," and who adds himself: "It is simply im- 
 possible to supply a child with real solutions of the 
 problems of life. . . . We should include a great 
 deal of religious activity, but very little religious 
 theory. . . . What he wants most, after all, is 
 room;" and Sir Joshua Fitch, who says of them: "I 
 attach small value to catechisms. We never employ 
 them in teacihing any other subject than religion. 
 And the reasons are obvious. They are stereotyped 
 questions and stereotyped answers. They leave no 
 room for the play of intelligence upon and around the 
 
no The Boy Problem 
 
 subject. They stand between the giver and receiver 
 of knowledge, and do not help either of them much. . 
 . . I appeal to your own experience. Do you find 
 that the fragmentary answers which you learned* in 
 the catechism help you much in your religious life? 
 When I look back on the work of my religious in- 
 structors, do I find that I learned most from their 
 formal lessons, or from the influence of their charac- 
 ter and sympathy?" On the other hand, the theo- 
 logians are not very encouraging, as witness Professor 
 W. N. Clarke, who approves the catechism theoreti- 
 cally but succinctly suggests that *'at present there 
 exists the deepest interest in Christian doctrine, but it 
 takes the form of question rather than of answer." 
 Professor A. W. Anthony remarks : **Alas ! it has been 
 only in religion that men have thought it needful to 
 inquire into devotion by means of the catechism. . . . 
 . The personality of the Christ is far above all mere 
 formulae of religion and creed statements. It is to a 
 Person that Christianity has ever invited its follow- 
 ers." 
 
 Even the experiment of giving answers in Scripture 
 language does not solve this difficulty, since there is 
 no more supple and subtle form of theological bias 
 than a proof text, while the plan of throwing upon 
 the children the burden of framing answers upon 
 which the theologians have failed to agree is still less 
 satisfactory. 
 
 But in the Congregational church, at least, there 
 is coming to the front a group of young men with 
 
Organisations Formed for Boys by Adults iii 
 
 catechisms of other than doctrinal purpose. Dr. 
 Doremus Scudder, who is one o£ them, broadly de- 
 lines catechetics as a conference between teacher and 
 pupils, whose aim is vital rather than doctrinal, whose 
 method is to start from a booklet of question and an- 
 swers, proceed with memorizing- at home, mostly of 
 Scripture, and culminate in free conversation in the 
 class, and whose chief value is the contact of children 
 with the consecrated personality of a wise Christian 
 teacher. Catechetics is unconsciously, I believe, partly 
 a protest against some of the imperfections of the 
 present lesson system and Junior Endeavor move- 
 ment, for it is the leaders of the Sunday-school and 
 Endeavor movement who are most heartily urging its 
 addition to their equipment. One distinct boon is 
 being conferred by this revival, in that it remands the 
 responsibility for the moral and spiritual equipment 
 of the boys and girls for life to their chief spiritual 
 teacher, their pastor. 
 
 Many of the new manuals omit answers and some 
 omit questions, many drop the word catechism, and 
 close inquiry shows that to the pastor-teacher the 
 manual is simply the solution book, like what the 
 school-teacher surreptitiously used when teaching 
 Wentworth's Geometry, while personality and free 
 fellowship between teacher and pupils are really every- 
 thing. There are at least four dangers which might 
 beset a person who was a mere imitator and used the 
 manual of another. One danger is that we forget 
 that while early adolescence, say the age of twelve, is 
 
112 The Boy Problem 
 
 the right time to be looking after the child, his age for 
 formulating systems does not come for five or six 
 years later. Another danger is that we should expect 
 to be able to teach life out of a booklet as w.e teach the 
 exact sciences and the dead languages. The labora- 
 tory method and not the recitation method, learning 
 by doing, is needed; A third danger is that in em- 
 phasizing memory, which we may properly do since 
 the school neglects that faculty, we teach proof texts, 
 the dried figs of theology, instead of the great inspir- 
 ing passages of truth and faith. A ready made an- 
 swer paralyzes, not stimulates the mind. The last 
 danger is to find thus the point of contact. Here is a 
 bounding, bursting boy, with his heroisms and enthu- 
 siasms, and a new sexual, social and moral nature that 
 almost overpowers him, full of moods, doubts and ob- 
 stinacies. Does the quiet, logical, sweetly reasonable 
 catechetical method really come to where that boy 
 lives and find him at home? 
 
 In the Episcopal church, where the method is not 
 a recent experiment or a thing by itself, most of these 
 objections are met because of its place in a larger sys- 
 tem. It is but one wheel of an ecclesiastical machine. 
 The baptized child is accepted as a member of the 
 ecclesiastical family, potentially regenerate ; the cate- 
 chism is not a matter of special class instruction, but 
 it is taught in the Sunday-school; it is the tradition 
 and so the expectation that the child will come for- 
 ward in adolescence to prove his knowledge of the 
 catechism in the confirmation class ; instead of wait- 
 
Organizations Formed for Boys by Adults 113 
 
 ing for a cataclysmal conversion and a Christian ex- 
 perience before admitting the child into full com- 
 munion, the child is admitted upon attaining a fitting 
 age and knowledge of the catechism, and it is believed 
 that in the solemn intei-im between confirmation and 
 the first communion, in the activities that follow or in 
 the fold of the church with maturing character, spirit- 
 ual Hfe will actually appear. As far as the influence 
 of this plan can be thrown about children, what could 
 be more admirably planned to secure a quiet, normal 
 Christian development and a minimum of loss of chil- 
 dren in their growth from one period to another of 
 life? 
 
 In the non-liturgical churches there must be some 
 theory and scheme of the relation of children to the 
 Church which shall make it natural and expected that 
 children should enter full communion. At present 
 the theory, if there be one, seems to be that it is not 
 natural but is rather surprising if this takes place. 
 
 In some such churches children who have been bap- 
 tized or christened in infancy are enrolled as infant 
 members, brought at a certain age for instruction 
 and then asked practically, not, "Will you come into 
 the church?" but, "Must you go out of the church?'* 
 
 In many churches, principally I think where the 
 children are largely those of church members, tact- 
 ful pastors form annually these classes which they in- 
 struct in the Christian way, the use of the Bible, 
 prayer and service, solving doubts and encouraging 
 good ideals and practical living, and as the result thev 
 
114 'The Boy frohlem 
 
 bring almost the entire company each season into 
 membership. 
 
 The Guild of Bible Illuminators is a modest move- 
 ment which seems destined to throw important light 
 upon the matter of studying the Bible graphically. 
 The purposes of the Guild are these: 
 
 1. To revive the old art of letter-illuminating for 
 the adorning of Bibles and devotional books. 
 
 2. To encourage the extra illustrating of Bibles 
 with reproductions of sacred art. 
 
 3. To help the enrichment of Bibles with margi- 
 nal quotations and comments. 
 
 4. To discover and disseminate methods of study- 
 ing the Bible graphically, by means of handiwork, 
 among young people. 
 
 The pioneer of this sort of work is Mr. W. H. Davis 
 of Brooklyn, who has made careful and successful ex- 
 periment with the boys of the Young Men's Christian 
 Association. He describes his work as follows: 
 
 "For many years there have been Bible-reading 
 courses intended for boys, but it is a very unusual 
 boy who will devote time each day to reading a por- 
 tion of the Bible. These reading courses are seldom 
 of any value for the classroom study. 
 
 "Boys younger than ten years will seldom do any 
 work. The teacher must do the most of it. For boys 
 eleven years and upwards the following courses have 
 proved very interesting and profitable: — 
 
 "i. 'Men of the Bible,' published by the Interna- 
 tional Committee, Young Men's Christian Associa- 
 
Organizations Formed for Boys by Adults 115 
 
 tion. A short course of studies of Bible heroes, one 
 lesson devoted to each hero. In this course each boy 
 makes a relief map of paper pulp. He has been given, 
 a week beforehand, a list of models which he makes 
 at home. After his map is painted] with water-colors, 
 the models of tents, altars,- sheep, horses, city walls, 
 swords, etc., are put in the proper places on the map. 
 Fires are made on the map to illustrate the burning 
 of cities or the sacrifice on an altar. All this can be 
 done in forty-five minutes, and it is decidedly fun. 
 During the map-making the teacher draws out the 
 story of the hero's life, and puts on the blackboard 
 the lessons suggested by the boys themselves. Their 
 memory readily holds the story connected with the 
 models. 
 
 "2. The 'Life of Christ,' published by the Inter 
 national Committee, Young Men's Christian Associa 
 tion, is another short course in which a public-school ^j 
 method is adopted. Blackboard sketches are made ' 
 which suggest the various incidents in Christ's life. 
 
 "The boys like to draw pictures when the copy has 
 first been given them. By making their drawings 
 which are, of course, simple, the story is quickly re- 
 membered. For instance, the fact of Jesus working 
 as a carpenter, during his young manhood, is happily 
 illustrated by sketching a ham/mer, jack-knife, saw, or 
 Dther carpenter's tools. 
 
 "The purpose of this course is to teach the main his- 
 torical facts of Christ's life on earth, so that a boy 
 may have them fixed in his mind as permanently as he 
 
ii6 The Boy Problem 
 
 does the facts in the lives of Washington and Lincohi. 
 
 "During many years' teaching, 1 have seldom found 
 a boy who could tell in what year and at what place 
 Jesus was born. 
 
 "3. 'Paul, the Missionary' is another course which 
 offers much interest to boys, as relief maps with mod- 
 els can be made and pictures gathered to illustrate 
 the cities and events of his life. Grecian and Roman 
 histories may be freely drawn from to illustrate this 
 study. " . - . 
 
 "4. 'Missionary Heroes' is a course following 
 'Paul the Missionary,' and offers great attractions, 
 because it uses as its text-books the biographies of 
 the greatest heroes of the world. Relief maps, globes, 
 pictures, photographs are of great help in this study. 
 
 "5. 'The Books of the Bible' is a course that can 
 be taught where a teacher with some knowledge of 
 art can be secured either to teach the whole or to 
 supplement the work of another. 
 
 "Bibles can be secured which have never been 
 bound. Then they are sliced into sections, and for 
 each section a cover is designed by each boy. Be- 
 sides designing a cover the student makes an inside 
 title-page, which is a copy of the lesson taught, and 
 gives a statement of the contents. On the cover, 
 which may be made of water-color paper or other ma- 
 terial, the boy makes a design which will suggest 
 something of the character or story of the contents. 
 For instance, the books of Samuel, Kings and Chron- 
 icles naturally are kept together as one book, because 
 
Organisations Formed for Boys by Adults 117 
 
 they tell the story of the kings. On the inside title- 
 page is an outline of the story of Saul, David, Solo- 
 mon, and the other eighteen kings of Judah and nine- 
 teen kings of Israel, the names of the great prophets 
 of that period, and a few other important historical 
 persons, such as Jonathan. The cover designed by 
 one boy is very suggestive. An all-over design is 
 formed by small golden scepters at the intersection 
 of diagonal lines. In the center is a golden crown 
 with jewels of various colors. Inside the border, 
 which is painted royal purple, is the title, The Story 
 of the Kings.' The boys will do this work at home 
 with great delight if the material is provided." 
 
 I h'ave already indicated that I regard this sort of 
 work as most helpful. I have made trial of it myself 
 with a very lively lot of boys and girls and have found 
 that among young people of fourteen it won instant 
 interest, which grew rather than diminished, and that 
 it leads into attractive channels of work, almost infinite 
 'n variety. Some of the formal courses might not 
 seem to attract those who are conscious of possessing 
 no manual or artistic skill, yet as the aim is not art, 
 but knowledge of the Bible, I find that a little judi- 
 cious help makes it possible for even these to produce 
 verv fair work. In the study of the books of the 
 TJible one can approach a boy who thinks he cares 
 nothine for the Bible as a book, entirely upon the side 
 of his interest in colors and brush work, with the 
 ndded attraction of sociability. Several books may be 
 summarized and several covers designed or all the 
 
Ii8 The Boy Problem 
 
 work may be done upon one book, for which a "Con- 
 tents" or "List of Characters" or "The Story of the 
 Book" may be executed by the boys, small marginal 
 pictures inserted and Perry pictures as illustrations 
 included. - Formal didactics is unnecessary, for the 
 books will be read and mastered almost unconsciously. 
 The courses should be short, and can be conducted 
 an hour after school, with the accompaniment of con- 
 siderable freedom and social intercourse. 
 
 The Guild desires to learn of experiments and im- 
 provements in this direction. 
 
 The Church has other means of helping boys which 
 are not everywhere recognized. The church service 
 itself, the boy choir, the liturgy where it is used, the 
 sacraments, are used with wonderful power in the 
 Roman and Episcopal churches as an appeal to the 
 imaginative and dramatic instincts. They may rightly 
 be so used in other communions. Preaching to chil- 
 dren, especially to adolescents, is the most beautiful 
 art and the most rewarding task of the Christian min- 
 ister. The spectacle of a church full of adults, who 
 have passed the era of crisis and most of whom have 
 been converted, engaging the efforts of a preacher is 
 one of the most unsatisfying sights on earth. It is a 
 mistake to think one has to "preach down to" adoles- 
 i cents.. The most virile, noble and splendid truth is 
 ithe best food for them. The emphasis upon Sunday- 
 \school attendance as a substitute for children is most 
 unfortunate, since so manv children leave the Sunday- 
 school at the age of greatest danger, and, having 
 
Organisations Formed for Boys by Adults 119 
 
 never formed the habit of church attendance, pass 
 from all church influence. The Bible Normal College, 
 when at Springfield, in its interesting experiment of 
 the care of a mission church in that city, literally put 
 "the child in the midst" by making the Sunday morn- 
 ing service one for children. My own experience is 
 that if we give the children something to come for, 
 and encourage their presence by simple rewards and 
 attentions, we can secure and sustain the habit. In 
 my own church, one year, 49 received such rewards, 
 of whom 22 were boys. In response to many inquiries 
 as to the method I will say that the annual recogni- 
 tion which I give to all the children who care to try 
 for it is only a simple diploma with a five cent Perry 
 picture on the back. To encourage such attendance 
 among children just beginning to form the habit I re- 
 quire attendance only for a quarter at a time. They 
 are given cards dated for each Sunday with a space 
 for the text, which are punched as they enter the 
 church. Those who reach a certain standard are the 
 pastor's guests for an evening at the close of the 
 quarter. 
 
 The revival appeals especially to adolescence. It 
 satisfies the emotional nature. It is a simple appeal 
 to the heart. Take away the late hours, the long 
 services, the untrained and fanatic exhorters — feat- 
 ures which are incidental — and reduce it to a "chil- 
 dren's crusade," in which the social and emotional 
 element is retained, where the ideal of the heroic and 
 loving Christ and his grand and strenuous service 
 
120 The Boy Problem 
 
 are held up by the pastor or a wise speciaHst with 
 children, and we have an instrument of historic dig- 
 nity and perpetual value. The danger is the forcing of 
 the nature before it has come to its day of choice and 
 the neglect to follow up the decision by careful train- 
 ing. 
 
 A plan which is being very strongly pressed in Sun- 
 day-school circles is that of Decision Day, a set day 
 for securing or registering decisions of the adolescent 
 children to follow Christ. A desire for "results," nat- 
 ural and often proper, seeks definite harvests after a 
 long season of toil. The appointing of a State De- 
 cision Day and tabulating the totals from the day 
 smacks, however, of loving children statistically. A 
 person wonders if year books did not exist if the plan 
 would ever have been thought of. The ease with 
 which great numbers are secured starts the natural 
 inquiry whether this is not another "short cut" which 
 will prove disappointing in the end. Does this new 
 method, which works so uniformly that it ought al- 
 most to be patented, produce other than mechanical 
 "results"? 
 
 I have tried the plan very carefully for three con- 
 secutive years and have sought earnestly to learn in 
 my own and other fields what is the real outcome. 
 The method used at its best seems to me to be this: 
 The aim is not to get great accessions to the church 
 but to give to those who are passing through the 
 psychical crisis the gentle shock that shall discover 
 the child-soul to itself and help it into the kingdom. 
 
Organizations Formed for Boys by Adults 121 
 
 The time to try the plan is just when this shock seems 
 needed, and not in order to "swing into Hne" nor to 
 be simultaneous with anybody else. It may be done 
 yearly or once in three years or twice a year, accord- 
 ing to the spiritual atmosphere. The plan should not 
 be announced to the scholars much beforehand, but 
 should be carefully prepared for with the teachers and 
 parents. The present purpose is to secure the quiet 
 committal of a group of scholars to Christ with the 
 immediate enrolment of them in a pastor's class. In 
 some schools the call is so framed as to secure a state- 
 ment of the religious attitude of every member of the 
 school, thus making a complete religious census. 
 Usually, however, the plan involves a card to be 
 signed stating a purpose, for example "to live the 
 Christian life of love and service." I used a card to be 
 signed in dupHcate and witnessed by the parent, one- 
 half being retained by the child and half by the pas- 
 tor. I also required, to avoid thoughtless action, that 
 the signing be done at home and in ink. The best 
 way to secure wise signing is to make the teachers 
 evangelists in their own little parishes. The whole- 
 sale signing of refusing to sign by a class is a symp- 
 tom so common that it was what first led me to dis- 
 count the method. 
 
 The way the plan works is this :— A startlingly large 
 number always sign, invariably nearly a third. Chil- 
 dren like to sign papers. It is a disease nowadays. 
 Many adults have it. The first occasion is always im- 
 pressive. The minister probably sends word the fol- 
 
122 The Boy Problem 
 
 lowing Monday to his denominational weekly that he 
 has 75 "converts." He has no such thing. What he 
 really has is hard to state. Sometimes a good many 
 join the pastor's class, oftener, I think, but few. The 
 church roll is not materially affected unless these are 
 very carelessly rushed into the church. In one warmly 
 evangelistic church two years ago 115 cards were 
 signed. Of these 20 have since joined the church. 
 In another out of 74 three years ago there are 4. In 
 another out of 131 there are 36. These "results" con- 
 vince me that the numbers should never be announced. 
 
 It would be a mistake to suppose, on tTie other 
 hand, that nothing has been accompHshed. The ma- 
 jority mean what they say. The Endeavor Society 
 shows the impulse at once. Some clear cases of new 
 moral motive are seen. This advantage is seen at 
 once: a large number, among them some hitherto un- 
 suspected of religious feeling, make a committal 
 which opens the way for personal conversation. Some 
 other facts are noteworthy. Parents are apt to be 
 incredulous of the plan. They think their child "is 
 not quite ready yet." This may betoken ignorance or 
 an instinctive protection of a sensitive, immature soul 
 from rough hands. The second and third trials are 
 not as impressive or fruitful as the first. 
 
 The important ones to regard are really not those 
 who sign but those who refrain. What of them? 
 There are certain temperaments who refuse to ex- 
 press themselves. They may be obstinate or timid. 
 This is true : boys and girls will sign freely up to a cer- 
 
Organisations Formed for Boys by Adults 123 
 
 tain year — about 14 — and then they will abruptly drop 
 off. After 18 or so the signing is resumed. Those 
 seem to be the~ years of reserve. Then there is the 
 leakage, the waste, the possible alienation. When 
 115 signed over 300 refused to sign. Is it not possible 
 that these 300 believe that they have thus disowned 
 Christ? It seemed a daring act — but the heavens did 
 not fall nor the lightning strike — next year it becomes 
 easier to refrain. Is it wholesome thus to lead young 
 souls up to the great alternative and let the will fail, 
 and do it year after year? One pastor aVoids this by 
 providing no cards and making the call only a great 
 w^elcome. Others carefully explain that it is hoped 
 and believed that all desire to belong to Christ and 
 that the day is simply the opportunity for those who 
 are ready to make the gift (the Easter gift, if it is that 
 season) of themselves to God. 
 
 I trust that this discussion will lead to thoughtful 
 study as to whether the plan is applicable in each 
 one's own place, for that is the real criterion. Let the 
 values be balanced, the conditions studied, the way 
 life really grows be traced, the plan used with care, if 
 at all, and the returns made simply a guidance to lov- 
 ing personal work. 
 
SOME SUGGESTIONS AS TO HOW TO 
 HELP BOYS 
 
 The preceding chapters may be summarized in the 
 following statement of principles for work with boys : 
 
 1. Importance of the Period. The last nascencies 
 of the instincts, the completion of the habits, the psy- 
 chical crisis, the infancy of the wdll, the birth of the 
 social nature, the disparity between the passions and 
 appetites and the judgment and self-control, and the 
 fact that, for normal and abnormal boys alike, this 
 is the close of the plastic age, make this the most 
 critical period of life, and one which should converge 
 upon itself the wisest and strongest social and moral 
 influences. 
 
 2. Necessity of Study of Adolesence. The change- 
 ableness, secretiveness and infinite variety of boys at 
 this period makes necessary not only a study of the 
 generalizations of psychology but -an; intimate knowl- 
 edge of the antecedents, surroundings and influences 
 of each boy who is under care and guidance. 
 
 3. What Boys Like. Social companionship of 
 neighborhood groups of boys of their own age chiefly 
 for physical activities. 
 
 4. What Boys Need. Nutrition, exercise, whole- 
 some environment, guarded organization, arousement 
 of self-activity, teaching by interest, will-training by 
 
Suggestions as to Hozv to Help Boys 125 
 
 self-originative muscular activity, and handiwork, 
 something to love, something to know, something to 
 do constantly, "reUgion of a physical nature if that is 
 possible." As to organization, the esprit de corps of 
 numbers, but the personal dealing with smaller 
 groups, where possible. As to teaching, keeping a 
 little in advance of the boy, without becoming unnat- 
 ural. The chief requirements of the leader: powers 
 of observation, collation and reasoning, persistence, 
 firmness, justice, self-mastery and self-adjustment, 
 lar^e-mindedness and large-heartedness, and above 
 all childlikeness ('It is harder to become a child than 
 to be one" — William Newton Clarke). 
 
 These statements lead to an inquiry as to the in- 
 strumentalities at our service. 
 
 The greatest means of helping the boy is the Home. 
 I have not emphasized this because we have been 
 talking of other things. But the one thing that dis- 
 courages the social worker for boys is the recognition 
 that the divinely appointed institution, which has the 
 most of the boy's time, interest and loyalty and every 
 needed inspiration and appliance for his nurture, is 
 untrue to its duty, and that nothing else -can possibly 
 take its place. Not only are children God's ambassa- 
 dors to earth's homes, but it is the personality of the 
 mother that originates in the child the earliest and the 
 most prominent ideas of God. When a boy arrives 
 at adolescence he turns from his mother to his father. 
 That law-giving deity of the early years is now a peer, 
 a companion and a sympathizer. The boyhood of the 
 
126 The Boy Problem 
 
 father is the hero of the son, and it is almost impossi- 
 ble, as it seems ungracious, to provide substitutes for 
 the ethical teaching and practice of the home. "In 
 Sparta when a boy committed a crime his father was 
 punished." The influences that disrupt the home and 
 prevent its members from ever being together are 
 most dangerous, not in their influence upon the pa- 
 rents, but upon the child. It is the evening lamp that 
 is home's Hghthouse. A home without a good even- 
 time is a home without hope, and the way a boy's day 
 ends at home is a prophecy of the way his life will 
 end. The hour after sunset is the Sabbath of the day. 
 It seems, too, as if the very years of crisis were those 
 most neglected. Many parents to-day are like 
 cuckoos, willing to leave their young in anybody 
 else's nest. Professor F. G. Peabody has pointed out 
 that the modern boarding-school and summer-camp 
 system for well-to-do boys is really a **placing-out 
 system," analogous to that applied to poor orphan 
 and neglected children. Especially do parents seem 
 willing to trust their religious nurture to those who 
 may be willing to take up the task of saving other 
 people's children. 
 
 While it is doubtful whether any home can fully 
 express all of a boy's vitality and interests beyond a 
 certain age, many boys could be carried through the 
 age of unrest without resort to outside agencies. 
 When the "gang" spirit appears,the parent can coop- 
 erate with it, rather than obstruct it. Jacob Riis tells 
 how his wife met such a case of apparently dangerous 
 conniving : 
 
Suggestions as to How to Help Boys 127 
 
 ''My wife discovered the conspiracy, and, with 
 woman's wit, defeated it by joining the gang. She 
 'gave in wood' to the election bonfires, and pulled the 
 safety-valve upon all the other plots by entering into 
 the true spirit of them, — which was adventure rather 
 than mischief, — and so keeping them within safe lines. 
 She was elected an honorary member, and became the 
 counsellor of the gang in all their little scrapes. I 
 can yet see her dear brow wrinkled in the study of 
 some knotty gang problem which we discussed when 
 the boys had been long asleep. They did not dream 
 of it, and the village never knew what small tragedies 
 it escaped, nor who it was that so skilfully averted 
 them." 
 
 The happiest memory of my own boyhood — in a 
 place where the neighborhood spirit was yet warm — 
 was of the weekly evening gatherings in the various 
 homes in turn, with the elders conversing at one end of 
 the room and we youngsters playing games and act- 
 ing plays and charades at the other. I do not remem- 
 ber that any of usi ever cared to be anywhere else at; 
 night. The story of the Alcott family is another en-| 
 trancing illustration of what I mean. No doubt the/ 
 boys' club that meets in a home attic or kitchen is the 
 best type in the world. The curfew ordinance has 
 at least the advantage of making it necessary for the 
 parent to keep the child in the home evenings. 
 
 Next to the evenings, Sundays are the times of the 
 greatest opportunity in the home. I know how hard 
 it is to abbreviate the afternoon nap for the sake of 
 
128 The Boy Problem 
 
 the boy, but it will be better to do so now than to be 
 aw^ake with anxiety later. ^ This day is in many a home 
 the only opportunity ever open for what I conceive to 
 be essential to an adolescent boy, a walk with his 
 father alone, j The Junior Endeavor movement has 
 kindly taken the burden of Sunday afternoon from 
 many a parent, and has thereby done a wrong to nat- 
 ure, to the home, to the Sabbath and to both parent 
 and child. The dumping of children into Sunday- , 
 schools that their parents may go off Sundays is 1 
 heathenish and abominable. It is also a question how ^ 
 far any outsider has the right to encourage religious 
 feehng in a child without the knowledge of its pa- 
 rents. The extent to which parents have abdicated 
 their priestly office is seen in the testimony of several 
 pastors that when they sent invitations to their com- 
 munion classes to the children, through the parents, 
 as was proper, the children would not come because 
 they were not invited directly and the parents made 
 no response at all ! 
 
 If the period of habit-making has been passed 
 wisely in a simple, consistent, pious home life the 
 period of will-training will present fewer difficulties, i 
 I cannot emphasize too much in the matter of v/ill- 
 training the advantages of the country home. The 
 good will is there more easily fostered because the 
 boy is from the start an active member of the firm. 
 City households that are able to emigrate bodily to 
 the country solve half the difficulties of restless child- 
 hood and store up material for w'inter nourishment 
 
Suggestions as to How to Help Boys 129 
 
 and exercise. The country week and the vacation 
 school and the summer camp do the same thing in a 
 lesser degree. 
 
 With all the space I have given to the description 
 of social agencies I am in heartiest agreement with 
 the Rev. Parris T. Farwell, when, speaking of church 
 organizations for children, he says: "We need to-day, 
 not more work in the church for children, more infant 
 classes, catechetical classes and Junior Endeavor so-/ 
 cieties, but more work for the homes of our people.| 
 We need a deeper, holier, sublimer conception of the 
 family, its relationships, duties and opportunities. We 
 need more faithful parents. In this respect we are 
 growing worse rather than better. And it is to be 
 feared that our church organizations for children are 
 helping this downward movement. More and more 
 the home is handing over its function as a school for 
 the child to outside institutions which are absolutely 
 incapable of doing the work as it should be done. 
 These institutions are better than none for children 
 who come from unchristian homes, but they never 
 can fill the place which the father and mother should 
 fill in training their children for Christ. I know of no 
 weightier problem for the Church to solve than that 
 of restoring to the home, in the face of the material- 
 ism of the age and the industrial system under which 
 we live, the religious life which belongs to the home 
 and which alone can keep it sacred. This I consider 
 to be the indispensable factor in true preparation of 
 children for Christ's service. Other things which we 
 
130 TJic Boy Problem 
 
 are undertaking, and which it is wise to undertake, in 
 children's organizations, should be supplementary. 
 At present they are too often makeshifts, taking the 
 place which does not belong to them." 
 
 Next to the home we must place instrumentalities 
 that are homelike. Celia Thaxter told of 
 
 "The gracious hollow that God made 
 In every human shoulder, where he meant 
 Some tired heart for comfort should be laid." 
 
 God destined some people to'be parents. Others he 
 left for god-parents. That old chrismal idea needs 
 to be revived. Many an empty heart could be filled 
 with lad's-love. There are great houses which are 
 silent that could be filled with wondering children; 
 and unsatisfied cultured lives that could be poured 
 out in no finer crusade than to give a few boys a place 
 that has the home-touch once or twice a week. Some 
 Sunday-school teachers have thus brought the school 
 into that contact with life whose lack we mourned in 
 our last chapter. Many a college graduate — like the 
 boys' athletic hero, Evart Jansen Wendell, or some 
 girl from Smith or Vassar — has done the same. 
 Among the well planned ways of helping children and 
 \ helping their homes at the same time I think the best 
 1 is the Home Library System with its circulating game 
 j and picture adjuncts. 
 
 Next we have the public school. I cannot speak 
 
 of this at length. Its progressiveness is the admira- 
 
 \ tion of us all. Once there was no training but liter- 
 
Suggestions as to How to Help Boys 131 
 
 ary training. To-day five kinds of instruction are 
 recognized: training of the body, training of the 
 senses, training of the mind, training of the will, and 
 training of the moral nature. Of all advances in edu- 
 cation I look with most hope upon manual training, 
 for educational rather than industrial ends, especially 
 for its influence in will-training and moral training. 
 "Manual Training," says Professor C. H. Henderson, 
 "is not practically or theoretically a school to merely 
 train the hands, to make boys useful about the house, 
 to supply the world with artisans, to take the place of 
 a dead apprentice system, or to meet in education the 
 demands of an industrial age. Its true end is thei 
 major end, the attainment of the complete life, the un-| 
 folding and perfecting of the human spirit." Manual! 
 training arouses the latent interests, and if the scheme 
 be humanized rather than mechanical, teaches pa- 
 tience, accuracy and honesty, dignifies the hand, de- 
 velops the self-originative powers and discovers the 
 life mission. There are evidently to be Very soon in 
 our schools some very radical rearrangements of our 
 curriculum and a postponement and curtailment of 
 seat work and home work. But the point which most 
 interests us is as to what part the school of the future 
 is to play in moral training. Miss Margaret J. Evans, 
 Dean of Carleton College, has been speaking earnest- 
 ly upon this matter. She points out that while "the 
 standard of honesty and truthfulness is much higher 
 among pupils than among those not attending 
 school," "pupils who go from the schools to business 
 
132 The Boy Problem 
 
 are not established in the moral principles which they - 
 especially need, and there is little hope of their ac- 
 quiring these principles in business." She says that 
 the means for moral training in our schools are four: 
 
 "i. Systematic, required instruction. 
 
 "2. The personal influence of the teacher, with in- 
 cidental teaching in connection with the ordinary les- 
 son. 
 
 *'3. School discipline in general. 
 
 "4. Public sentiment within and without the 
 school." 
 
 She states that moral instruction is required in but 
 four or five states, and this not regularly or definitely. 
 "A subject which is not in the curriculum, which has 
 no time set or allowed for it, which no one asks about, 
 and which has no methods of teaching prescribed, 
 cannot secure from too busy, always hurried teachers, 
 much attention." About the only formal teaching ^, 
 that is ethical is about temperance, a minor virtue, ) 
 taught usually as a prohibition. She makes hearty 
 acknowledgment to the character of teachers and the 
 excellence of school discipline as far as it goes. The 
 emphasis upon patriotic days and heroic national fig- 
 ures, so elaborate as almost to create a religion of 
 country-worship, fine literature, the moral effect of 
 doing one's work well, the enlarging influence of the 
 subjects of study, the impress of Wonder upon the 
 child's life, constant association with a refined per- 
 sonality in cheerful, orderly, stimulating and inform- 
 ing employment — these are truly moral forces of 
 
Suggestions as to How to Help Boys 133 
 
 great power. But outside the school are their oppo- 
 sites, disorder, bad associates, vile literature, and a 
 public sentiment which, whether expressed in litera- 
 ture or life, is neither reliable nor uniformly uplift- 
 ing. It is Miss Evans' beHef that we must fight the 
 real battle for honesty and morality in the schools. 
 By the training of the will and by systematic, required 
 -instruction in the first laws of morals, "based on the 
 'ought,' whose authority all acknowledge, even when 
 opinions differ as to its origin," together with added 
 emphasis upon all other instrumentalities which we 
 have at present, it is her conviction that this desired 
 end must be attained. 
 
 A clipping has come to my attention which de- 
 scribes the first graded attempt in this direction of 
 which I have learned. 
 
 "Ethical teaching has been made systematic in the 
 schools of Anderson, Ind., where the school board has 
 adopted a course reaching from the primary grade to 
 the high school. Children in the first grade are ad- 
 monished to be obedient to parents and teachers, to 
 be kind to their playmates, and to be willing to share 
 their toys with others. Truthfulness is inculcated in 
 the second grade, as also love of home, kindness to 
 animals, cleanliness in person and dress, and the culti- 
 vation of a pleasant manner. In a step higher cheer- 
 fulness and honesty are emphasized, as also good 
 habits, love of the flag, and respect for parents, teach- 
 ers, strangers and old people. Self-respect, as also 
 respect for the rights and privileges of others, and po- 
 
134 The Boy Problem 
 
 liteness are the ethical subjects in the fourth grade. 
 Here, also, the children are instructed as to some of 
 their rights and privileges. Industry, its necessity, 
 its benefits and its rewards; promptness, economy, 
 justice and mercy are the subjects in the fifth grade. 
 These are elaborated in the sixth grade, where also 
 the children are admonished to be unselfish, and to 
 have a proper reverence for God, for those in author- 
 ity and for the aged. 
 
 "These ethical teachings broaden in the seventh 
 grade, where instruction is given in the practical 
 duties of citizenship. There the children are taught 
 respect for and obedience to law; property rights, in- 
 cluding, of course, regard for the property of others; 
 the duty of the strong to the weak, and temperance. 
 In the eighth grade talks are given on political and re- 
 ligious freedom, on how patriotism should be ex- 
 hibited, on true manhood and true womanhood, and 
 on the ideal family. The system fitly closes in the 
 high school with lectures on duty — duty to the family, 
 to society, to the State, to self and to God. These va- 
 rious topics throughout the school course are illus- 
 trated by examples from life, and are made interesting 
 by appropriate literary selections. This is thought to 
 be the first attempt at a complete system of ethical 
 teaching for the public schools." It is in this same 
 wide-awake community that educational summer pil- 
 grimages of teachers and pupils to distant historic 
 sites, after the custom common on the Continent, 
 ^vere inaugurated. The Cleveland Y. M. C. A. has 
 
Suggestions as to How to Help Boys 135 
 
 for several seasons done the same thing in its boys' 
 department. 
 
 Some recent evidences of the way the public school 
 is invading personal and home life are suggesting that 
 the life of the community, both social and moral, is to 
 center more and more in the schoolhouse. We al- 
 ready have ''home work," reception days to parents 
 and parents' conferences, school dances and excur- 
 sions. Now efforts are making to use schoolhouses 
 in great cities for workingmen's clubs as they are al- 
 ready being opened in New York City for clubs for 
 street boys. In Boston they are asking that licenses 
 for newsboys be granted by the school board instead 
 of by the aldermen. To some this tendency may seem 
 secularizing and institutionalizing and likely to sup- 
 plant the Church. To others it will seem hopeful as 
 bringing to pass things by support of pubHc funds and 
 under trained management which would otherwise be 
 feebly and poorly accomplished. 
 
 The purpose of this chapter is to name and discuss 
 briefly some of the more important of the many spe- 
 cial methods which, in community and church clubs,' 
 have been found helpful with boys. The individual 
 worker may be hampered by circumstances from us- 
 ing them all, but so rich and impressible is boy-nature 
 that it seems wise to utilize as many asr possible. 
 ' Games and Play. In my first chapter I made strong 
 emphasis upon the place of play in child-life. I even 
 intimated that it was what childhood was made for. 
 This was the idea of Groos who said that it is not 
 
^. 
 
 136 The Boy Problem 
 
 true that animals and children play because they are 
 young; they are young because they need to play. 
 Jean Paul said: "Play is the first poetry of the human 
 being." "The essence of ' play," says Hamilton 
 Wright Mabie, "is the conscious overflow of life that 
 escapes in perfect self-forgetfulness." Another says 
 that "play is joyous because it satisfies the highest 
 function of which the child is capable." A different 
 statement of the same thought is made by John M. 
 Pierce when he says, "What gives zest to a game is 
 the story in it." This relation of the imagination to 
 the physical expenditures is so close that it is not a 
 joke but an actual fact that a boy becomes more tired 
 sawing wood than in the much more violent exercise 
 of playing ball. Naturally, the importance of play in 
 education is being studied. It is remembered that 
 he Greeks made the games and play of their children 
 an integral part of their education. It is remembered 
 that a thousand years ago our Norse ancestors taught 
 every child of noble birth to do eight things: to ride, 
 to swim, to steer, to skate, to throw the javelin, to 
 play chess, to play the harp, to compose verses. Dr. 
 D. G. Brinton is thus led to say: "The measure of 
 value of work is the amount of play there is in it, and 
 the measure of value of play is the amount of work 
 there is in it." 
 
 Mr. George E. Johnson is the one who has made 
 the most careful study of and practice with play in 
 education. He urges that "for school children should 
 be chosen, as far as possible, the games which are 
 
Suggestions as to How to Help Boys 1^7 
 
 1 based) oa-iDLStinctive tendencies. On the hunting in- 
 stinct may be based games of chase, games of search- 
 ing or hunting, games of hurhng or throwing; on the 
 fighting instinct, games of contest, as wrestUng, box- 
 ing, triak of strength; on emulation, as jumping, rac- 
 ing, trials of skill ; on curiosity, parlor magic, riddles ; 
 on sociability, the social games; on acquisitiveness, 
 collections; on constructiveness, wood-work, sewing, 
 making toys, doll-dresses; on the caring instinct, 
 dolls, pets." 
 
 The purpose of choosing games should be, he says : 
 
 "i. To stimulate a healthy play interest and edu- 
 cate it. 
 
 "2. To play games adapted to exercise certain fac- 
 ulties of the mind and body. 
 
 "3. To teach games which may be played at 
 home." 
 
 On pages 143 and 144 I describe Professor Burr's 
 plan for coordinating stories with play. 
 
 While it is a matter of experience that games teach- 
 ing observation, memory, attention, and furnishing 
 physical activity are quite numerous, indoor social 
 games which can engage a large social group are very 
 few. He would be a benefactor to childhood who 
 would present even one good one. This is especially 
 true of games enjoyable by older boys and girls. 
 
 Gymnasiums. The gymnasium is instanctly attrac- 
 
 /^ive to a boy. He sees in the ropes and bars and chest 
 
 / weights the vision of himself as an athlete and a vic- 
 
 \ tor. I do not think the gymnasium as mere physical 
 
138 The Boy Problem 
 
 exercise appeals to a boy. It gives him nothing to 
 anticipate or to remember. I think it is to th e comr 
 
 ■^ bative^aiui^mukitivje. nature that it appeals. For 
 these reasons the gymnasium should be controlled by 
 the play interest. And as it is this interest that domi- 
 
 " nates, those boy-leaders who have no gymnasium can 
 get along without it if the play-interest in physical 
 activity can fmd some other room for exercise. 
 
 Handnvork. This is the reason why hand-training 
 is commended. It gives the boy more than the gym- 
 nasium and it appeals to more instincts. The trained 
 hand opens the door of shop and laboratory. It not 
 only is the chief means of will-training but it leads to 
 the discovery of adaptabilities of life, it opens the way 
 to specific usefulness, it solves the question of the Hfe 
 tendencies, it develops the expressing man, and the in- 
 terest it excites leaves no room for crime, sdf-indul- 
 gence or mischief. 
 
 Wood-work would naturally suggest itself as the 
 easiest and least expensive form of handiwork, as well 
 as the most varied in result. Elaborate equipment or 
 salaried teachers are not indispensable. With a good 
 old carpenter and the boys' own jack-knives I kept 
 thirty of them happy one winter. It is very easy to 
 let the hobby of utilitarianism and the desire to make 
 pretty things to photograph for the annual report run 
 away with the handiwork method. The purpose! 
 
 \ should be, I take it, not to make artisans but man-' 
 
 \ hood, not hand-agility but will-power. For this pur- 
 pose I know nothing better than to plan some co- 
 
Suggestions as to How to Help Boys 139 
 
 operative task, such as the beautiful achievement of 
 Miss Mackintire's ''Captains" in making an "Inas- 
 much" motto for the Labrador hospital, or an enter- 
 tainment, Hke "Hiawatha," for which weapons and 
 costumes shall be contrived by the boys themselves. 
 What is done should be worth doing and be well done. 
 This faculty for mechanical and individual efficiency 
 has been almost lost to-day in the differentiation of 
 labor. 
 
 Collections. Dr. G. Stanley Hall found some years 
 ago that of 229 Boston schoolboys only 19 had no col- 
 lections. A recent study of children's collecting 
 shows that the fever begins at about 6, rages from 8 
 to II, is at its height at 10, and, among boys, lessens 
 after 14. Of things collected the following general 
 classes exist : 
 
 Cigar pictures, and stamps, 34 per cent. 
 
 Objects from nature, 32 per cent. 
 
 Playthings, 1 1 per cent. 
 
 Miscellaneous, mostly trivial, 8 per cent. 
 
 Pictures, 6 per cent. 
 
 Historical, 3 per cent. 
 
 Literary, 2 per cent. 
 
 The rage for stamps is from 9 to 1 1 and for cigar 
 and cigarette pictures from 11 to 12. Among the 
 prominent single objects gathered, besides those al- 
 ready mentioned, are : marbles, advertising cards, 
 books, rocks, shells, war relics, buttons, badges. 
 
 While local opportunities vary, these facts would 
 furnish suggestion as to the directions of probable in- 
 
140 The Boy Problem 
 
 terest. It will add much to the value of the.proqess 
 if the apparatus used, such as aquaria, cages, ^ower- 
 presses, scrap-books, be made by the boys themselves. 
 Camps, tours and vacation philanthropies. Great as 
 are the advantages to health and recuperation of giv- 
 ing city boys country air, the chief advantage seems 
 to be that the country is a boy's own home-land. 
 Here only are the instincts of his life satisfied, and 
 here only can he rightly develop the more elementary 
 virtues which we call the "savage" ones. Mr. E. M. 
 Robinson in , his excellent study of boys' camps says: 
 "The rowing, the swimming, the games and athletics, 
 the plain food and fresh air, the freedom of dress and 
 action, the enduring of trifling inconvenience, and the 
 running of trifling risks, the touch with nature in 
 storm and calm, the looking out for one's self, the ex- 
 ercise of one's judgment, the following of the leading 
 spirits of the camp, and the leading of the following 
 spirits, and a hundred and one other things, all tend 
 jito make the camp a place where the boy will develop 
 i those savage virtues which are the admiration of boy- 
 j> hood. . . . Every tendency of the camp is to de- 
 f Velop the manly side of his nature, and to make him 
 [i despise and rise above all that is weak and effeminate." 
 The enjoyment of uncomfortableness, the desire to be 
 on the water and in the water and close to a body of 
 water, to be in the sand, to stay out all night, to sleep 
 on the ground, to bury one's self in the sand, to watch 
 the camp-fire, to brood over the waves and the stars, 
 the devotion to the camp leader, the passionate friend- 
 
Suggestions as to How to Help Boys 141 
 
 ships to camp comrades, the peculiar tenderness to 
 manly religious impression at night when the fire 
 burns low — these seem to be reversions to a more 
 primitive state and opportunities for the most inti- 
 m.ate and enduring and uplifting influence upon the 
 lives of boys. It has been my regret that I have not 
 yet been able to test these means personally, although 
 I have studied them at first hand,, but I am so con- 
 vinced of their value that I count the summer rather 
 than the winter the time of opportunity, in church or 
 community, for helping boys. It is pathetic to notice 
 how uneasy the city boy is at first in the country, how 
 its loneliness and discomforts oppress him, but after 
 he has found ^himself, as he will in a few days, if the 
 right stufif is in him, nature's silent evangelism almost 
 transfigures him with its welcome and wonder. A 
 
 Saving. In this connection it seems necessary only \ 
 to comm;eaid highly the plan of the Stamp Savings | 
 Society and the pass-book system of the boys' clubs. 
 
 Music. Believing in the power of music to soothe 
 the savage breast, several clubs have organized 
 choruses. Churches organize boy-choirs as much to \ 
 help the boys, as to help the church music. Some 
 clubs print the better popular ballads of the day, 
 mingled with patriotic songs, on sheets, for singing in 
 unison. Contrast the sunset hour in a college town 
 with hundreds of boys singing on the campus with the 
 same unmusical or uproarious hour in a large village 
 or small city, and you will see something of what 
 music will do. 
 
> 
 
 ^ 
 
 142 The Boy Problem 
 
 Nature Study. I have already spoken sufficiently 
 of collections, of vacation schools, of summer camps 
 and of winter groups for nature study. I commend 
 the Agassiz Association. The garden-plots for boys 
 at Dayton, Ohio, and the exhibitions and prizes con- 
 nected therewith are interesting both socially and in- 
 dustrially. 
 
 Drarna. This instinct is much neglected. It is as 
 legitimate as any, and craves expression. Mr. Wil- 
 liam A. Clark speaks of "the boys' mind, cursed with 
 melodrama." He is referring to the street boy and 
 his interest in sensational news, prize fights and the 
 plays of the South End playhouse. Some substitute 
 for these evils must exist. The charade, the dialogue, 
 the missionary and Sunday-school concert, and the 
 desire of boys and girls to "get up an entertainment," 
 are manifestations of the same instinct in our church 
 life. I am watching for light on this matter with much 
 interest. In this age, when open church opposition 
 to the theater is becoming silent, our children will be 
 kept from the real temptations of the modern theater 
 by giving them their own opportunities for express- 
 ing this instinct for personifying character and action. 
 In adolescence dramatics are helpful in enforcing un- 
 consciousness of self, accuracy in memory and action, 
 and" some degree of grace of demeanor. The number 
 of published dramas suitable for boys is few. Re- 
 membering their unwillingness to memorize or pre- 
 pare at length, the most usable things seem to be 
 poems acted in pantomime, and such entertainments 
 
Suggestions as to How to Help Boys 143 
 
 as "Hiawatha," "The Husking," "The District 
 School," etc. The novel-readingi craze is a kindred 
 one, and may be similarly met. A sedate Congrega- 
 tional women's home missionary paper contained re- 
 cently a most stirring little play of western missionary 
 adventure to be performed, by boys, which was called 
 "a missionary concert exercise." I don't care what 
 you call it. It was a good thing. 
 
 The Knights of King Arthur helps the dramatic in- 
 stinct without, including the theatrical element. 
 
 Socials. I have advocated the organizing of boys 
 and girls separately. In organizations for sitting still 
 and talking in. meeting I insist on this, for those two 
 things are specialties of little girls. But in societies 
 of the more active sort it does not make so much dif- 
 ftTence, for the boys and girls before they are thirteen 
 will not, pay any attention to each other. It is desir- 
 able, when children are maturing, that they should be 
 brought together under adult auspices for mutual ac- 
 Tjuaintance and development. The things that do 
 take place at church socials and unchaperoned chil- 
 dren's parties, if written out would make a chapter of 
 horrors. Is there such a thing as a sensible church 
 social for boys and girls? It is a fact that some pa- 
 rents think a dancing school is a better place for their 
 children than the church vestry. No doubt it does 
 pay some attention to manners. In the age of physi- 
 cal exuberance these socials need special attention. 
 They should be small. The children should come in 
 sections, if there are too many to come at once. There 
 
144 ^^^ Boy Problem 
 
 should be one head, who should have a definite plan 
 for the entertainment to be provided, and a sufficient 
 body of adult assistants. The pleasure should be 
 spontaneous and much of it provided by the children 
 themselves, but it should be refining, of continuous 
 interest, inclusive of all, and governed in its length by 
 the bed times of the children. It should also be re- 
 membered that when well meaning people ask chil- 
 dren to come from their homes in the. evening, 
 whether to play or to pray, they are responsible that 
 those children shall arrive home early and in good 
 company. Personally I am through with affairs that 
 send young girls forth on city streets at nine o'clock 
 with accidental or self-chosen chaperonage. 
 
 Stories. Not only is .the story the chief way of 
 teaching in both the secular and the Sunday-school 
 until the child is well along in^adolescence, but it is a 
 method of universal interest. It was the primitive 
 form of history and the first means of perpetuating 
 crude scientific discovery and religious tradition. It 
 is the material of the Old Testament and the, charm 
 of the New. It is a perpetual interpretation of life. 
 Fairy stories not only appeal to but are the actual 
 translation of child-life, which is fairy life, in its, won- 
 der, credulity and ignorance of boundaries and limita-r 
 tions. Stories of courage and adventure also reflecj 
 that era of hero-worship and out-of-door in whicH 
 the adolescent lives. Miss Vostrovsky in an exami- 
 nation of children's own stories found that they told 
 stories about children rather than older persons in the 
 
Suggestions as to How to Help Boys 145 
 
 proportion of 40 to i, true rather than imaginary 
 stories, as 49 to 7, and of unusual rather than ordinary 
 subjects as 45 to 11. She also gives a chart of the 
 elements of boys' interest in stories, which I reduce 
 to per cents, as follows : action, 36 ; name, 24 ; appear- 
 ance, 10 ; possession, 7 ; speech, 5 ; place, 5 ; time, 3 ; 
 feeling, 2 ; dress, 2 ; esthetic details, i^ ; sentiment, i ; 
 moral qualities, i ; miscellaneous, 2J^. 
 
 Believing that the boy reproduces successively the 
 ideals of the race. Prof. Burr has applied to the boys 
 in the federated clubs conducted by students of the 
 Y. M. C. A. Training School at Springfield, a graded 
 course in stories, as follows : 
 
 1. Race stories, especially Teutonic myths, leg- 
 ends, and folklore. Stories appealing to the imagina- 
 tion and illustrating the attempts of the child race to 
 explain the wonders of the world in which he lives. 
 
 2. Stories of nature ; animal and plant stories. 
 
 3. Stories of individual prowess; hero tales, — • 
 Samson, I Hercules, etc. Stories of early inventions. 
 
 4. Stories of great leaders and patriots. Social 
 heroes from Moses to Washington. 
 
 5. Stories of love ; altruism ; love of woman ; love 
 of country and home ; love of beauty, truth and God. 
 
 He suggests also the possibility of associating with 
 these stories, as appropriate means of expression, ac- 
 tivities as follows: 
 
 With nature stories, myths and legends would be 
 associated: tramps in the woods, and every variety 
 of nature study ; care of animals, plants, etc. 
 
146 The Boy Problem 
 
 With stories of individual prowess would be asso- 
 ciated the individualistic games, athletic and gymnas- 
 tic work for the development of individual strength 
 and ability, also, constructive work of the more ele- 
 mentary type, — work with clay, knife work, basket 
 weaving, etc. 
 
 With the stories of great leaders and patriots 
 would be associated games which involve team play, 
 leadership, obedience. to leader, and subordination of 
 self to the group. 
 
 With the altruistic stories would be associated al- 
 truistic activities adapted to boy nature, — the doing 
 of something for other boys. less fortunate. 
 
 The story, not the homily, is with children the su- 
 preme teaching agency for moral impression. The 
 moral, by the way, is better not at the end of the story, 
 but in sly touches in the middle and as produced by 
 the narrative itself. He who can look into a circle of 
 shining children's eyes and tell a good tale knows one 
 of earth's finest luxuries. Oh, for more shamans, 
 minnesingers, troubadours, bards, jongleurs ,or Pied 
 Pipers ! 
 
 Pictures. I need not, speak of the many uses of the 
 Perry Pictures, the Elson Prints, etc., in creating an 
 interest in art, history, collecting, etc. To require a 
 group to invent a story to fit a picture is good drill 
 for the imagination. I have found three pictures of 
 Holman Hunt's especially helpful in the religious in- 
 struction of adolescents. There is something in their 
 opulence of detail and mystic beauty which makes 
 
Suggestions as to How to Help Boys 147 
 
 them singularly effective. They may be used for im- 
 pressing the soleimn lesson of the importance of ado- 
 lescence as the time of choice and opportunity. First, 
 I use "The Child in the Temple." I point out the 
 many details : the inscription on the door, the doves, 
 the rejected stone in the court, the blind beggar, the 
 lamplighter, the babe brought to circumcision. 
 Then the characters appear: the doctors with their 
 scrolls and phylacteries — one is blind — Mary with her 
 look of amazement and love, Joseph with his protect- 
 ing hand, and the boys in the picture — the musicians, 
 the slave and the Boy Jesus. It is his hour of awak- 
 ening to life's meaning, God's will and his hour of 
 choice. I use the "Light of the World" to lead to the 
 thought of the life-door at which the Christ knocks, 
 which can be opened only from zuithin. And "The 
 Shadow of the Cross" suggests the manliness of the 
 young Christ and his choice of the cross rather than 
 the jewels over which his mother lingers. 
 
 Questions. The true leader will be often Socratic. 
 He will not furnish categorical catechetical answers, 
 . but, finding that the one thing humanity and especially 
 child-humanity is unwilling to do is to think, he will 
 constantly in private and in public suggest haunting 
 and leading questions of ideal and practical ethics 
 which must and will be answered. -..., 
 
 Sex-instruction. I believe that sex-perversions are 
 the most common, subtle and dangerous foes that 
 threaten our American life. Intemperance is fright- 
 ful, but it is a perpetual object of attacks, some of 
 
 \ 
 
148- ^ The Boy Problem 
 
 » 
 which are successful. The appetite which excites it 
 is unnatural and has to be acquired. The sex-appe- 
 tite is universal, it partakes of the extreme selfishness 
 of a most selfish period, and its sins are so hidden, so 
 general and reach such personal and intimatei rela- 
 tions that it is difficult to crusade against them. 
 These perversions usually have their root and, acquire 
 their dominion in adolescence, when passion is most 
 active, ignorance most , great and self-control most 
 weak. 
 
 The (topic has been handled with so much senti- 
 ^ mentality, morbidness and downright devilishness 
 Uthat I will make a strenuous effort to treat it with 
 ^^! sober common sense. The three sex-temptations to 
 which boys are subject are, I take it, impure thoughts 
 and conversation, self-abuse and fornication. The 
 first temptation is the result of knowledge of sex mat- 
 ters gained from impure and imperfect sources and is 
 stimulated by a desire to complete this knowledge, by 
 the impression that such knowledge is esoteric and is 
 to be regarded as a sort of stolen sweets, and by the 
 development of sexual appetite with maturity. This 
 temptation is to be met in the home by stripping the 
 subject of a mystery which it. does not possess, by re- 
 vealing frankly and simply, as curiosity arises, the 
 facts of sex as a part of general physiology, and by 
 such an emphasis upon the holiness of the function, 
 the sacrifices of maternity and the necessity of a sound 
 body as the antecedent of future parenthood as shall 
 give the moral cleanness and the ideals to lift 
 
Suggestions as to How to Help Boys 149 
 
 the child above brooding, unenHghtened, morbid 
 thoughts and passion-feeding conversation. The 
 matter of self-abuse is to be dealt with physiologically 
 also, a fair statement of its effect upon the nerves, en- 
 durance and energy of the growing boy explained, 
 and contempt ^expressed for it as a nasty habit rather 
 than the implication that it is physically or spiritually 
 damning. I think we may as well face the fact that 
 the practice is, for at least a short period in life, well- 
 nigh universal. To teach physical horrors which may 
 not follow is not to deter those to whom they do not 
 follow and is to put others under the control of the 
 quack practitioner, while to preach that this vice is 
 the unpardonable sin is to dishearten those who 
 struggle against it in vain, but who may, if they are 
 dealt with indirectly, outgrow it or be weaned away 
 from it. This habit is much a matter of nutrition, 
 clothing, hygiene, association and physical exercise. 
 Fornication when it occurs with boys may be |^e re- 
 sult of an abnormal sexual nature,' but it is niojp apt 
 to be the result of information gained surreptmously 
 and curiosity unduly aroused and of evil companion- 
 ship or unusual temptation. It is important to con- 
 tradict the impression given by much of our literature 
 that this sin is romantic and semi-heroic, and to 
 show its essential cruelty, selfishness and beastliness. 
 The method of treatment for all these evils is, in 
 general, to delay and temper sexuality by plain food, 
 early rising, thorough bathing, a watchful care of 
 reading, companionship and causes of excitement, 
 
150 The Boy Problem ' 
 
 plenty of exdrcise and the full occupation of time, 
 ^he close and mysterious connection between the rise 
 of the religious and the sexual instincts makes it seem 
 possible to make one govern the other. It is upon 
 these two matters, which come so near to the soul, 
 that one can draw closest to a boy's life. Ideals are, 
 I believe, the final and, supreme safeguard of purity. 
 I agree with Professor H. M. Burr that ''the posses- 
 sion of high ideals of bodily strength, of the essential 
 elements of strong manhood and a high ideal of wo- 
 man" are the things that hold when all else fails. 
 
 The place for doing this work is the home. It is 
 strange that parents should be willing that stable- 
 boys, quacks and villains should become the instruc- 
 tors and guides in those matters which have so much 
 to do with personal purity, the morality of the com- 
 monwealth and the future of the race. 
 
 Where the parents are not doing their duty it must 
 be done by others. But when others take this up the 
 best way to use first is to try to persuade fathers to 
 perform their tasks. "Purity talks" should be given 
 to fathers rather than to boys. Books may be sug- 
 gested to fathers for wise information. A few are 
 commended in the Bibliography. If boys must be in- 
 structed by anybody outside their home they should 
 \ be- dealt with individually and by conversation. No 
 I book has been written or can be written which is suit- 
 jable to put in a boy's hand. If it tells too Httle it will 
 larouse his curiosity. If it tells too much it will in- 
 \fiame his imagination. The effort is to be not to 
 
Suggestions as to How to Help Boys 151 
 
 make him think about this subject, but to satisfy his v^ 
 legitimate curiosity and get him to thinking about 
 other things. This is why I object to "purity talks" 
 to boys. The subject is for them not .social but indi- 
 vidual. They are not to go out and exchange words 
 about it and brood over it. The strongest force forj 
 purity in the boys' club is that it is a time-filler andj 
 energy-expender for boys and a means of transform- 
 ing an abnormal appetite into healthful physical exer- 
 cise. The thing which we want to get our boys to do 
 is to realize that it is a noble and knightly thing, as 
 well as a necessity to many, as Professor Burt G. 
 Wilder has said, ''to go into training" for a manly 
 struggle with the sensual side of his nature. 
 
 An encouraging illustration of the way this wiser 
 treatment works is seen in its results at the Good Will 
 Home for Boys in Maine. As each boy enters the 
 school he is during some informal conversation in- 
 formed by the principal regarding the wise regulation 
 of his body with especial reference to the dangers of 
 puberty. No further reference is ever made to the 
 matter, unless the boy makes it himself, as he often 
 does, when he comes across some alarming bit of mis- 
 information, but among all the teachers and in all the 
 life of the school it is insisted that the sexual organs 
 are simply a commonplace and not a shameful or mys- 
 terious portion of the human body. Before the close 
 of his course each boy receives in the same way from 
 the principal such information as will help him meet 
 further temptation and prepare him for married life. 
 
152 The Boy Problem 
 
 The result is this : young men who have associated 
 with these boys most intimately for a considerable 
 period during the summer find that the conversation 
 of all is free from obscenity, and that the moral life of 
 the school is pure. 
 
 I am glad to note that the boys' departments of our 
 Christian Associations and many religious workers 
 with boys are taking this up, but I wish they would 
 first take lessons from Mr. Hinckley in the art of how 
 to do it. 
 
 There are other boys' club methods which I could 
 mention. Some of them Were suggested in the de- 
 scriptions of the various organizations in the last 
 chapter. The use of humor will not be forgotten, 
 a trait which is universal in boyhood. What we call 
 noisiness, teasing, hoodlumism, practical joking and 
 even irreverence is what some one styles ''joint hu- 
 mor." Remembering that this is so, the best way to 
 attack those nuisances is by the expression of hu- 
 mor in better ways. Conundrums, puzzles, "sells," 
 "yarns," and newspaper jokes are good bait for boys, 
 who are usually as well provided- as their leader with 
 material and quite as quick to take advantage of their 
 opportunity. The illustrating of the personal habits 
 of cleanliness, temperance, reverence, good taste, is a 
 constant privilege. Anything of the other sort in a 
 leader is a complete disqualification. To encourage a 
 boy to have a pet of some kind is far better than to 
 get him to join a society for rescuing stray cats' and 
 then bragging about it. Indeed, doing for others is 
 
Suggestions as to How to Help Boys 153 
 
 the strongest ethical force which the boy can feel. 
 We are told truly that "girls are trained to give up, 
 boys to demand." Often the boys' club exaggerates 
 this tendency. Talks on practical questions by men 
 whom the boys may justly admire are also an ethical 
 influence of great importance. The introduction of 
 recognitions and special privileges will have a stimu- 
 lating effect, if they are made accessible to a fair grade 
 of effort rather than exclusive .to a first and second. 
 The last method which I name is the most important. 
 Personality. The three curses of humanitarian 
 v.'ork are utilitarianism, uniformity and numbers. 
 And the greatest of these is numbers. It takes per- 
 petual vigilance to do church or social work without 
 becoming a slave to the addition table. All work for 
 men that amounts to anything is in the end the in- 
 fluence of personality on personaHty. So in boys' 
 v/ork we have two things of importance to consider: 
 the personality of the leader and that of the boy. Mr. 
 Mason suggests as the easier qualifications for such a 
 leader that "he must necessarily have the magnetism 
 of Moses, the patience of Job and the wisdom of Solo- 
 mon." It would be unfortunate to place the standard 
 so high that everybody would shrink from the work. 
 The boy is influenced by his leader in two ways: 
 through his imitativeness and through his affections. 
 He idealizes his leader and tries to become like him. 
 ./^Teaching is really a matter of contagion rather than 
 of instruction." His leader must therefore be a per- 
 son of character and self-control. He loves his leader 
 
154 ^^^ Boy Problem 
 
 and wants to do for him. His leader must be a per- 
 son of ideals who can offer him good and true things 
 to do. 
 
 The personality of the boy must never be forgotten. 
 We must forget our addition table and stop seeing 
 our boys as flocks. The most important thing any 
 one can do for a boy. is to love him. We must know 
 each one in his school, his home, his playing and 
 gathering places as well as at the club or our own 
 home. There are so many different kinds of boy un- 
 der one hat and/ boys differ so much in their individ- 
 ual interests and the interests of one boy change so 
 fast that it takes a watchful and encyclopedic mind to 
 keep track of them. 
 
 In every group of boys there is at least a third who 
 cannot be reached by any group method. They may 
 be unsocial, they do not like what other boys care for, 
 they have not the leisure or the permission to join 
 a club. They are worth just as much as the rest. 
 These must be won by personal approach. 
 
 The way to help boys by the methods we have men- 
 tioned, as Lancaster says, is to "inspire enthusiastic 
 activity." **You can do anything with boys. You 
 can do nothing for boys." ''Oh," says one, "you give 
 the boys something easy all the time." The things 
 that inspire enthusiastic activity in a boy are not easy 
 things. Is baseball easy? Is football easy? Is 
 swimming a mile easy? Are wood- work or parallel 
 bars or punching bags easy? Interest is not ease but 
 it iiiakes things easy. In that marvelous study in the 
 
Suggestions as to How io Help Boys 155 
 
 New Testament of Jesusi and the Rich Young Man, 
 we have a study of Jesus and adolescence, and the ap- 
 peal that the Master made which aroused that sloth- 
 ful idler almost out of a lifetime of languor, was an 
 appeal to the difficult, with this inspiration, his own 
 passionately declared love for him. 
 , We should use as many methods as we can thor- 
 oughly, letting each get its effect and coordinating 
 also, so as to feed the boy with as many interests as 
 possible. We cannot tell which one may determine 
 his life-work or mould his character. It is inspiring 
 to remember that the little group club of boys is often 
 a lad's first entrance to the social institutions of his 
 race and that in the self-originating exercises of the 
 boys' club one may do what the school does not ac- 
 complish — help the boy to decide what he shall be. 
 
 We should give each boy something to know, 
 something to love and something to do. That is, we 
 must train his mind, his heart and his hand, and while 
 doing these three we train his will. 
 
 It is a curious fact that the boys most in need of suc- 
 cor are of two classes, the children of the rich and the 
 children of the very poor. Here, as elsewhere, the 
 Hfe and activities of the common people are the sound 
 core of the nation's strength. The boys of the rich 
 are debauched by luxury and the free use of money. 
 The boys of the very poor are degenerated by the op- 
 posite causes, lack of nutrition, instruction and good 
 example. Another fact which shapes the whole prob- 
 lem is that most boys are living to-day in what is for 
 
156 The Boy Problem 
 
 them an artificial environment. They live in cities. 
 No one who has dealt with boys successively in rural 
 regions, large towns and the city could have failed to 
 notice how much less potent in grasp, attention and 
 efficiency are city boys, living between walls and pave- 
 ments and among a thousand distractions and allure- 
 ments, than country boys, with their freedom, contact 
 with nature and wild life and opportunity for origina- 
 tion in work and play in woodland, pasture, and car- 
 penter shop in the barn. 
 
 The problem is by no means, then, a missionary 
 one, in the sense that it consists in providing clubs 
 for slum boys alone. Tlie extravagances, immorality, 
 intemperance and general good-for-nothingness of 
 wealthy boys are often an alarming factor in our sub- 
 urban life. 
 
 The difficulty of restoring natural conditions among 
 unnatural surroundings is tremendous. It means the 
 
 -^^ >H:reation of an artificial country atmosphere. The in- 
 stitutions and instrumentalities which are striving to 
 do this by their shops and playrooms and their vaca- 
 tion philanthropies are, though informally, among the 
 great benevolences and educational institutes of the 
 city, and need and demand a fuller recognition and a 
 heartier support by consecration of money and life. 
 
 The needs and possibilities of work with adoles- 
 cents can scarcely be exaggerated. One third of life, 
 "the submerged third," as Dr. Stanley Hall calls it, is 
 1 in the adolescent period. One third of the people in 
 
 -TX^merica are adolescents. Three million of the human 
 
Suggestions as to How to Help Boys 157 
 
 beings in America are boys between twelve and six- 
 teen years of age. The so-called heathen peoples are, 
 whatever their age, all in the adolescent period of life. 
 We send missionaries to inculcate among these dis- 
 tant peoples morals and religion, which we seem to 
 think our own little folks can possess by some innate 
 providential instinct. Work among men has been em- 
 phasized as of prime importance, but as compared 
 with work among boys it is as salvage to salvation. 
 
 The attention of the Qiurch during the lat^t twenty 
 years has so turned toward the young that'it takes no 
 prophet to foretell that this is to be the central work 
 of the Church in the new century. Jesus, who ap- 
 peared before the world at the beginning of his ad- 
 olescence and left it at its close, set the child in the 
 midst and said, "Of such is the kingdom of heaven." 
 The psychologist and the Christian are both listening 
 to this word of the Master. "Save the world in ad- 
 olescence" will be the new war cry of missions. 
 
 In the development of the boys' department of the 
 Y. M. C. A., and in the growth of the big city boys' 
 clubs, in the founding of such institutions as the Bible 
 Normal College, whose motto is Horace Mann's 
 "Wherever anything is growing one former is worth 
 a thousand reformers," in the opening of a new pro- 
 fession, that of the teaching ministry, in lay work in 
 the Church, we have abundant intimations that the 
 field of work for boys is soon to oflPer many oppor- 
 tunities for many men's life-work. In the smaller 
 groups of those engaged in social service, in the 
 
158 The Boy Problem- 
 
 Sunday-school and the other forms of church nurture, 
 the harvest is already white for splendid consecrations 
 of volunteer helpers. 
 
 This volunteer movement will be as truly one for 
 the devotion of young people as the famous student 
 movement which was born at Northfield in 1886, and 
 it will be both for home and foreign work. Foreign 
 missionary work, already conducted with a breadth 
 and scope which is a lesson to home church work, will 
 be enriched and made fruitful by the application of 
 pedagogical methods to the adolescent races. In the 
 home churches here is the beckoning opportunity for 
 the younger ministry, fresh from its own adolescent 
 days. But it is not a priestly service alone, though 
 the calling is a sacred one. Many college students, 
 like the one at Harvard who told Professor Peabody 
 that "he wanted to make Harvard something more 
 than a winter watering place," have done work for 
 boys during and after college days, and have some- 
 times found the religion in service, which they had 
 lost in study. Joseph Lee suggests that as the young 
 page was placed in charge of an esquire but a few 
 years older to learn knightly habits and then sent to 
 the young knight's castle to learn knightly ideals, so 
 the boys of to-day need the contact of chivalrous 
 young men to make them courtly and noble men. 
 
VI 
 THE BOY PROBLEM IN THE CHURCH 
 
 The boy problem in the Church is not different^ 
 from that in the home, the school and the community. 
 It is the same boy everywhere. He may step a little 
 more quietly, wear a different suit of clothes and have 
 a whiter looking face and hands than elsewhere, but 
 he is the same after all: physically alert and restless, 
 emotionally eager, socially friendly though shy, men- 
 tally absorptive and curious, volitionally independent 
 and stubborn, and with a spiritual nature which is se- 
 cretly but honestly feeling for foundations and devel- 
 opment. 
 
 Here, as elsewhere, it will be impossible to separate 
 one portion of this complex being from another and 
 train it by itself, just it would be impossible to act 
 toward the boy in school as if he were all intellect and 
 no body or in the gymnasium as if he were all body 
 and no intellect. To the Church as elsewhere the i 
 whole boy comes and in it as elsewhere he must be 
 symmetrically trained. 
 
 The methods of training boys in the Church, then, 
 will not essentially differ from those used elsewhere. 
 The Church desires as much as does the gymnasium 
 that the boy should have a sound body and as much 
 as the school that he should have a sound mind and 
 as much as either that he should have a sound heart 
 
i6o The Boy Problem 
 
 to govern both. In short, with other philanthropies 
 that work for boys, the Church stands for character, 
 developed in mind, body and spirit. 
 
 It may be true that the Church seeks more than 
 any other institution does. In seeking Christian char- 
 acter it seeks character moved by the Christ-motive 
 as a motive higher than any others possible. But as 
 elements of that character it must recognize, with 
 others, the interdependence of mind and body and 
 the essentials of will-training and moral training by 
 self activity which have already been emphasized. 
 
 When we come to ask what the Church has found 
 out about the training of the religious nature, we are 
 at once impressed that both the oldest and the newest 
 study have been little more than statistical analy- 
 sis. You can catalogue a date or an event, but it is 
 hard to catalogue a boy. Whether it be in the annals 
 of some ancient revival or in the charts of Starbuck 
 we have learned little more than this: that at certain 
 ages is conversion most to be expected, that it is 
 brought about by a certain number of immediate mo- 
 tives which are scheduled and by a much larger num- 
 ber of distant motives, equally efficient, which are 
 forgotten and are not scheduled, and that in addition 
 to those youths gained by certain methods testimony 
 is completely silent as to how many are actually alien- 
 ated by the same methods. 
 
 Without claiming to have gt)ne deeper than others 
 into these depths of the soul-life, let me state the 
 things which T belieVe the Church is trying to do and 
 
/■ \- < i-- r\ /^ 
 
 Or 
 
 UM;u 
 
 th.< 
 
 The Boy Problem in the Church i6i 
 
 show what seems to be the probable means of success 
 in these directions: 
 
 First, the Church is trying to hold the boys. 
 
 Recognizing that its methods in the past have failed 
 to keep their grasp upon boys at their age of greatest 
 need and danger, it is trying to learn how to retain 
 the boys through the adolescent period. In thus 
 seeking to fit its methods to the growth of the boy 
 the Church is doing one of the best things for future 
 Christian development, since habits of church-going 
 and loyalty grow stronger and more influential upon 
 character with each year they are continued. I have 
 already indicated that, in trying to hold boys, the 
 churches must use freer, more varied and more un- 
 conventional means than in the past. If some pious 
 heart tremulously inquires of a given plan, "Is there 
 enough of Christ in it?" my straightforward rejoinder 
 shall be, "Is there enough boy it it?" 
 
 But this itself is not enough. Boys must be won 
 to church membership. I have commended the plan 
 of the Episcopal Church by which the boy is never 
 allowed to think of himself as anything but a prospec- 
 tive communicant. The plan alone might seem 
 mechanical were it not supplemented in so many 
 churches of that denomination by graded boys' clubs, 
 which make a traditional loyalty actual. My own en- 
 deavor has been so to make the activities of the boys' 
 club work toward loyalty to pastor and church and so 
 to create the realization among boys fourteen years of 
 age and over of the naturalness of confessing Christ 
 
1 62 The Boy Problem 
 
 that it shall become a current anticipation. We must 
 so adapt our help to their conscious needs and so de- 
 velop that "team-work" and fraternity spirit, which 
 mean so much ii;i sports and in college, in and for the 
 Church, that the distressing loss of adolescent life shall 
 be checked. 
 
 Second, the Church is trying to teach boys. 
 
 Ev/ery boys' club, every church society for boys, is 
 in reality a school. Formal school methods need not 
 be used, better not be used, but sound pedagogical 
 axioms must be applied and there must be the peda- 
 gogic aim. 
 
 As to the subjects of teaching, there are the great 
 landmarks of religion taught in the Bible and which 
 I outlined when I spoke of the Sunday-school curricu- 
 lum. Hardly less important are the applications in 
 conduct, the emphasis of the fact that character, as 
 President Hyde tells us, "is chiefly to do one's work 
 well," and intelligence of and interest in the activities 
 of the Church and the world-wide social and mission- 
 ary work of the kingdom of God. To boys in the city 
 and those who have few advantages there are many 
 things supplementary to school life which may well be 
 taught, especially those constructive crafts and plays 
 which arouse the energies, focus the attention, train 
 the will, make the child creative, keep him from mor- 
 bid introspection and direct to his life mission. 
 / Third, the Church is trying to win boys to the re- 
 ligious life. 
 
 While we may not fully know the entire philosophy 
 
The Boy Problem in the Church 163 
 
 of the entrance into the reUgious Ufe, there are some 
 things which seem to be assured. Such are these: 
 the boy is not irreUgious, he is rather in the lower 
 stages of the rehgious Ufe, the imitative, habituated, 
 ethical stages. Conversion is the human act of turn- 
 ing to God, not a special cataclysmal kind of experi- 
 ence during that act. Mr. E. M. Robinson has put 
 the various ways in which boys seem tO' enter the re- 
 ligious Hfe in a homely but vivid statement: 
 
 "Boys enter the religious life in at least as many 
 ways as they enter the water for swimming: (a) Some 
 plunge in — a definite decision which settles once for 
 all what their attitude toward right and wrong shall 
 be, what their relation to their God shall be. (b) Some 
 wade in — deliberately, cautiously, step by step, each 
 step revealing that another step is desirable, (c) Some 
 run in a little way and then come out again, but con- 
 tinue to run in a little further each time, till at last 
 they swim ofT — a number of changes of mind, (d) 
 Some are forced in. They may, finding themselves in, 
 decide to remain, or they may make frantic struggles 
 to get out. (e) Some sit down on the beach and sim- 
 ply let the tide come up about them, till it floats them 
 oflf — by not resisting the tide about them, they prac- 
 tically accept the situation. A boy enters the relig- 
 ious life by deliberate, comprehensive decision, by an 
 accumulation of little decisions, by non-resistance to 
 influence about him, which is a decision. In all cases, 
 by his own choice accepting, or "decision." 
 
 These differences seem to be temperamental, where 
 
164 The Boy Problem 
 
 they are not partly artificial. The kind of crisis will 
 be of the kind that is sought for. In one church the 
 child is taught to belieVe that he is by the covenant 
 a child of God. At adolescence the confirmation class 
 awaits him and his crisis is likely to be one of forming 
 fresh ideals only. In another communion boys are 
 told that they are children of the world and the flesh, 
 if not of the devil, and they expect, strive after and 
 very often attain a very sharp crisis of definite relig- 
 ious purpose. 
 
 I have analyzed carefully the different organiza- 
 tions which are trying to help boys in our churches. 
 I had better, as a sort of summary, speak of several 
 dangers and difficulties in dealing with boys which are 
 inherent to all these methods and are besetments in 
 any other. One of these is tradition. The fad of 
 to-day becomes to-morrow the traditional way of do- 
 ing things, and before we know it we haVe no other. 
 
 Another difficulty is uniformity. Tradition is the 
 mortmain of yesterday, but uniformity is the iron 
 grasp of to-day. Wherever it is it throttles conviction 
 and strangles individualism, progress and soul- 
 freedom. 
 
 There is also the temptation of numbers. As long 
 as people love to roll on their tongues the facit that 
 there are fifteen millions of people in America's Sun- 
 day-schools and read with awe the quarterly accounts 
 of the growth in figures of the Endeavor movement, 
 they will cease to try to find out that things need to 
 be measured ?.nd v/eighed as well as counted and that 
 
The Boy Problem in the Church 165 
 
 the other milHons, whom our thoughtless and careless 
 methods alienate, cry up to God continually, in the 
 face of our complacency. 
 
 But in dealing with boys there is often quite an op- 
 posite tendency. It is the danger of coddling. Sup- 
 posing the leader has few boys instead of many and 
 is using many thoughtful methods, he may awake 
 some day to find that he has done so much for them 
 that they have become paupers upon his charge for 
 recreation, incentive and material for character. 
 
 To avoid the danger of coddHng I would see that 
 the boy had something to do for the church as well as 
 the church something for him. The "church messen- 
 ger service of boys" is a recent attractive device to 
 this end. In the boy choir, the giving of entertain- 
 ments, the sharing of good times with others and in 
 missionary instruction and activity also this can be ac- 
 complished. If you are seeking spiritual aims I think 
 the essential thing is to find and group together the 
 Christian boys and make them the personal, active 
 force for evangelizing the others. They are worth 
 more than all sermons, methods and other efforts put 
 together. 
 
 But the greatest danger is unnaturalness. It is safe / 
 to say that when one talks with a boy in the Sunday- / 
 school class upon rehgious matters the teacher and / 
 the boy are almost never their real selves. One of/ 
 the axioms of social effort is never to create a con-' 
 dition among those whom you try to help which you 
 cannot make a permanent one. This is the immo- 
 
i66 The Boy Problem 
 
 rality of an ordinary revival. It creates in the hot 
 night atmosphere of a church, in the presence of a 
 crowd and with the accompaniment of fervid elo- 
 quence and exciting music, a social and sense condi- 
 tion which cannot be carried out into the daylight 
 and the home and business. So the Sunday-school 
 teacher must be natural. It is a cowardly thing to 
 say personal things and ask searching questions of a 
 boy in the midst of his fellows which you would not 
 dare to ask that boy privately in ordinary conversa- 
 tion. It is to protect these reserves thus rudely as- 
 saulted that a boy puts on with his Sunday suit a dis- 
 guise which he carries to the hand-to-hand encoun- 
 ters of the Sunday-school and Junior society. The 
 teaching which merely touches that artificial boyhood 
 will be easily slipped off when the disguise is removed 
 Sunday evening and the boy goes forth to the sport 
 and freedom of Monday. 
 
 We are unnatural in method often because we ex- 
 pect unnatural results. I have already spoken of the 
 danger of making prigs. Dr. William J. Mutch sen- 
 sibly points out that results which are purely religious 
 when produced in young children are always to be re- 
 garded with suspicion. The boy is living on the ethi- 
 cal rather than the spiritual level until he is well along 
 in adolescence. He needs homely virtues more than 
 spiritual graces. We are to try not to make little 
 men, manikins, but to produce the promise of manli- 
 ness. "Even a child is known" — not by his praying, 
 testifying, ecstacies but — "by his doing." 
 
The Boy Problem in the Church 167 
 
 President G. Stanley Hall has lately said: ''There 
 are the best of psycho-physiological reasons for hold- 
 ing conversion, or change of heart, before pubescence 
 to be a dwarfing precocity. The age at which the 
 child Jesus entered the temple is as early as any child 
 ought to go about his heavenly Father's business, if 
 not too early with our climate, temperament and life. 
 To prescribe a set of strong feelings at this age may 
 introvert attention on physical states, increase pas- 
 sional activities, and issue in a sort of self-flirtation or 
 abnormal self-consciousness." The Rev. Parris T. 
 Farwell, who makes this quotation, adds: ''The ob- 
 servation of many of us will approve these words of 
 warning. It is not evidence of the wisdom of a course 
 of treatment of children that it brings many of them 
 into the Church. The real question is. What kind of 
 Christians does it make? It is comparatively easy to 
 lead children to assent, at a very early age, to our 
 ideas. It is possible to lead their imaginative minds . 
 to a conception of their own sinfulness, such as they, 
 ought not to have at their age. It is even possible to: 
 lead them to an imaginative affection for Christ which- 
 is good so far as it goes, and should be cultivated, but • 
 which needs to be supplemented before it can be the • 
 power to hold and mould and save which character- . 
 izes thef loyalty, of real discipleship." 
 
 The ultimate aim of our effort is to have not only 
 boyhood but also manhood in the Church. By win- 
 ning and holding boys and nurturing them in a natu- 
 ral and growing faith is the shortest road to this 
 happy goal. 
 
1 68 The Boy Problem 
 
 In general, methods should apply to nearly all the 
 boys as fast as they come to the age for approach. 
 Since the Sunday-school is the instrumentality 
 through which pass nearly all the children of the com- 
 munity, it is this agency which I would exalt and im- 
 prove and enlarge rather than those which have fol- 
 lowed it. 
 
 It is of the greatest importance that whatever work 
 for boys is undertaken in a local church should have 
 an authorization that shall make it continuous. Too 
 often when a pastor leaves a church all the social or- 
 ganizations which he has built fall like card houses 
 behind him, and his successor either disregards his 
 work or, with little apparent reason, builds up another 
 entirely different set of amateur and puny organiza- 
 tions. In the Episcopal church this mistake is not 
 often met with. Any guild or society is authorized by 
 the church and the responsibility of its continuance 
 is placed in each successive rector's hands. 
 
 The need for continuity and permanence, by the 
 way, is an argument for long pastorates. In the kind 
 of work I am advocating, where personality is of so 
 much more importance than method, time is needed 
 for influence to be extended and do its perfect work. 
 
 Methods should be natural in order and application, 
 elastic and rich in variety and adapted to interest and 
 en^use /those whom we reach. More and more I 
 think we may be careless whether our own plan is 
 named after or affiliated with any larger movement, 
 since there are so many to draw help from and such 
 
The Boy Problem in the Church 169 
 
 variety of means is necessary and since the purpose 
 of us who have the work to do is not to glorify any 
 society or movement but to make manhood out of its 
 stuff, boys. 
 
 The deepest thing I have heard said lately was by 
 the Rev,. Charles E. McKinley: "Ever.y method or 
 agency used in Christian work must give account to 
 God not only for the souls whom it wins and saves, 
 but also for all whom it alienates and destroys." We 
 are not to be satisfied with our success among little 
 children, big girls and old women, if in trying to reach 
 live boys by the same methods we find that we cannot 
 touch their nature or needs. 
 
 My own experience and study in a variety of ex- 
 periments with boys in the church for a period of over 
 nine years lead me to condense my advice into the 
 following suggestions : 
 
 I. The church must place "the child in the midst." 
 It must organize around the child. Its architecture 
 and fittings, its services and activities must make the 
 adolescent the first thought and not an afterthought. 
 
 II. There must be in the church, either pastor or 
 another, at least one person who is equipped for work 
 with boys and girls. In the larger churches we must 
 differentiate once more the two functions of the min- 
 istry and have again "the pastor" and "the teacher." 
 In smaller churches and in family churches I think the 
 second service will yield to a Sunday evening with the \ 
 young people. \ 
 
 III. The first thing to do is to develop in the pri- 
 
170 The Boy Problem 
 
 mary and principal human institution, the home, in- 
 telligent and active care of growing boys and girls. 
 The chief object of pastoral calling is to confer about 
 the welfare of the children. The chief normal work 
 to be done is to train teachers for boys and girls. The 
 imperative themes for the midweek meeting of the 
 chu;:ch are such as relate to childhood, its training, 
 temptations and local environment. One of the most 
 important practical activities of the Church is to fight 
 home-destroying institutions. Each sermon should 
 have a bearing upon the home. 
 
 IV. It is desirable to visit, study and coordinate 
 with the Church all the other local means of educa- 
 tion, such as the home, the school, playgrounds, va- 
 cations, libraries, museums, social settlements, local 
 historical sites, etc., before defining the special boys' 
 work in a single church, in order that the work done 
 may be supplementary and may take such advantage 
 as is possible from these others. 
 
 V. The following church instrumentalities are to 
 be relied upon,- in the order of their importance, in 
 work with boys: 
 
 The Sunday morning service and sermon. 
 The Sunday-school. 
 
 A week-day institute for boys affiliated with the 
 Sunday-school. 
 
 Home visitation and consultation. 
 
 VI. The following is a practicable scheme for the 
 church education of boys, which requires only the in- 
 strumentalities and workers possessed by an average 
 church : 
 
The Boy Problem in the Church 171 
 
 1. Religious training: , 
 
 The Sermon. 
 
 Sunday-school instruction. 
 
 The Pastor's Class. 
 
 Seeking opportunities for service for chil- 
 dren: choir, errands, entertainments, indi- 
 ; vidual activity, systematic giving, helping 
 
 at home, keeping the Ten Commandments 
 and living the old-fashioned virtues. 
 
 The evangelizing of boys by boys. 
 
 Personal and individual care. 
 
 2. Will-training : 
 
 Such as by wood-work, cooperative con- 
 struction, making of games, designing of 
 Bible book-covers, games and play. 
 
 Recognitions for church attendance. 
 
 3. Heart-training : 
 
 Such as by liturgy, music, stories and pic- 
 tures, drama, pets, the Knights of King 
 Arthur, Bible and hymn-learning, person- 
 ality of leaders. 
 
 4. Mind-training: 
 
 By collections, printing, saving, missionary 
 and general information, talks and tours, 
 superintended reading. 
 
 5. Physical training: 
 
 Marches and drills, tramps and camps, 
 wood- work. 
 
 6. Social training: 
 
 Socials, entertaining others, social service, 
 missionary giving. 
 
172 The Boy Problem 
 
 I have been led more and more to exalt the Sunday 
 morning church service as the chief religious influ- 
 ence upon boys. I have received encouraging results 
 from the offering of simple recognitions for attend- 
 ance and from a boy choir. I have also been im- 
 pressed that by ''the foolishness of preaching" much 
 can be done. Mr. McKinley, whom I have quoted 
 before, exalts this as the divinely appointed agency 
 for the redemption of boys. He calls attention to it as 
 the opportunity "where, all unquestioned and all un- 
 observed, he may lift up his heart to God, where, 
 without being hastened or pressed, he may think out 
 his long thoughts until they settle his character for 
 life." A rich, expressive service, thoughtful and gen- 
 erous prayer and fervid, luminous preaching — surely 
 these are bread of life to the age of wonder and awak- 
 ening. 
 
 I used to spend considerable labor in that difficult 
 task of preparing five-minute "sermonettes." They 
 require as much work as a sermon. Somehow they 
 interrupt the continuity of the service. Recently I 
 give the entire time at one morning service a month 
 to a sermon to children and young people. I am con- 
 sciously addressing children from ten to fourteen. 
 The theme, the language and the treatment are solely 
 for them. I find that no sermons are more popular. 
 There are many younger children who understand 
 most of what is said and there are a great many 
 adults of adolescent minds and hearts who are over- 
 shot by conventional, abstruse and scholastic dis- 
 courses, who are refreshed. 
 
The Boy Problem in the Church 173 
 
 Two or three points are impressed upon me as 
 those upon which present day emphasis is needed. 
 The occasion for the need is in every case a neglect 
 in the practice of the home or in the common ideals 
 of the church. One of these emphases should be 
 upon the Bible. The traditionalism of our older 
 thinking made the Bible a remote and unnatural 
 book, while the newer treatment has not become the 
 possession of the layman sufficiently to be used in the 
 teaching of children. For reasons aside from these 
 the Bible is neglected. I do not hnd that boys often 
 think of it as an attractive book or an every-day 
 book. Sometimes they seem to think it is rather to 
 be ashamed of if one is found carrying it or reading 
 it. Without diminishing its sacredness we ought to 
 show that it is truly interesting reading and contin- 
 ually practical. To adorn its pages and to own a re- 
 spectable copy of it will make a boy feel differently 
 about it. He should see it as a varied literature, as 
 sixty-six books rather than as one, as story-book and 
 daily hand-book. He should know it in the modern 
 language of *'the Twentieth Century New Testa- 
 ment." He should be taught to test it by modern 
 biography and daily practice in ethics. It should be- 
 come more vital that Jesus may be more vital to him. 
 No more crying need exists in the Church than 
 that of missionary instruction for children. I con- 
 sider that the whole future of its home and foreign 
 departments depends upon its relation to childhood. 
 The whole problem of missions consists in training 
 
174 T^he Boy Problem 
 
 up future givers. We are worrying about the consoli- 
 dation of our too-many societies, our "Twentieth 
 Century Funds" and our "Forward Movements/' and 
 especially about our depleted treasuries, the occasion 
 of all the rest, when the real lack is the fundamental 
 one of interest. We have by each mail some new 
 form of literature intended to increase interesf, but its 
 statements and appeals are not calculated to arouse 
 interest where it did not always exist, and it goes to 
 the same place where the literature of similar appear- 
 ance and illustration, the patent medicine circular, 
 goes — the waste basket. We have missionary secre- 
 taries, who may either bore us with their annals and 
 figures or melt us to sentimental tears with their 
 touching tales, touching to the pocket-book, pruden- 
 tially emptied beforehand of all but lesser coin, but 
 so little touching the intelligence that we often forget 
 to what cause we have been giving. Now this arous- 
 ing of interest should be all done before adolescence 
 closes, for at that time closes our keenest; memory 
 for facts, the most permanent impression made upon 
 the emotions and the formation of the ideals. It is a 
 dreary country through which one travels who seeks 
 to find a missionary literature that children will read, 
 manuals of instruction that are practicable and other 
 methods of exciting attention that are interesting. We 
 need in our Sunday-schools and in our lesson system 
 so to incorporate missionary teaching that it shall 
 take the dignity and importance of the revealed 
 Word itself. When I speak of "missionary teaching" 
 
The Boy Problem in the Church 175 
 
 1 include social progress. It is a narrow, jealous 
 church that gives information only of its own little 
 denominational "boards" when all modern social 
 movements and even current history are equally por- 
 tions of the kingdom of God. We want in our week- 
 day organizations dramatic and pictorial methods 
 that sfiall enthuse and inspire the early love and gen- 
 erosity of boys and girls for the great world-causes. 
 Our greatest need here of course is that the home 
 should originate this enthusiasm. Perhaps if we be- 
 gin with the children now — not in mournful little mis- 
 sionary societies presided over by forlorn and lonely 
 workers, but in the central educational institute of 
 the church and with an adequate literature to take 
 the place of the literature wasted upon adults — per- 
 haps we shall have fathers and mothers some day 
 who will do more of this themselves. 
 
 We need, too, to emphasize that rehgion is service. 
 To gather children when they ought to be helping 
 their mothers or studying their lessons is unchristian. 
 To foster a desire to be good without being good for 
 something is mischievous. To create a committee 
 tor the purpose of watching its chairman do its work 
 is an American fau^t not confined to children's so- 
 cieties. It is also paralyzing to a child to be set to do 
 \ work that he knows very well is not worth doing. It 
 is the supreme duty and privilege of the helper of 
 boys to give him the very highest inspirations pos- 
 sible to the soul and then to do the difficult thing of 
 making them applicable to that hodden, gray, hofne- 
 spun stuff called Duty. 
 
176 The Boy Problem 
 
 It is my own habit, as a pastor, to enrol my Sun- 
 day-school in divisions in the order of maturity, and 
 to endeavlor that none shall pass into or through ad- 
 olescence without my personal attention. The num- 
 ber in that period at once may not be very large, but 
 it embraces in a very few years all the children in the 
 church at their most susceptible age. I visit the 
 homes and schools of these cli51dren for conference 
 and information as often as possible. As soon as cold 
 weather approaches I gather them in informal groups 
 after school or Saturdays, for activities, not pre- 
 viously announced, varying each year, in short 
 courses and conducted as much as possible out-of- 
 doors and at home. I hav^ been doing the only 
 strictly religious work, outside of the preaching and 
 securing for them the best teachers in the Sunday- 
 school, just before Easter in the form of free Sunday- 
 afternoon conferences. I rely almost entirely upon 
 real friendships thus created, a mutual enjoyment of 
 the society of each other, coordination with the 
 home, carefully cherished loyalty to the church and 
 salvation by displacement. I believe it to be impor- 
 tant to gain this friendship early in adolescence and to 
 regain it by earnest tact in that trying period of inde- 
 pendence and change which precedes reconstruction, 
 at 16 to 18. It is at this latter time that the pastor 
 needs to give most personal care to his young peo- 
 ple's societies, which, conducted by others and by 
 methods possibly not adaptable to boys of that age, 
 sadly lose those who most need to be held. At 12 
 
The Boy Problem in the Church 177 
 
 and at 16 are the points for personal work, the for- 
 mer for acquaintance and association, the latter for 
 meeting restlessness and doubt. This latter is the 
 "Emigration Period" of life, corresponding perhaps 
 in the race-life to the fruitful years of the discoverers 
 and pioneers. In general, I try to enrich the lives of 
 the boys as much as possible, to be of real service to 
 them and to know and love them. I become so 
 much interested in studying them and in learning 
 from them, the only true friends that one in maturity 
 is ever sure of, that I scarcely ever think of myself 
 as their teacher, except in the pulpit, where I always 
 find before me many eager, boyish faces. 
 
 As for results, I give no figures. I find that a con- 
 siderable group of young people always offer them- 
 selves to the church as fast as they mature, coming 
 spontaneously and together. I have had mothers 
 come to me and tell me with emotion that their boys 
 were changed in their conduct at home, and this was 
 testimony of the most satisfying character. I have 
 seen some of these changes with my own eyes and 
 have watched young men go out into life feeling that 
 my touch had been in their moulding. 
 
 It is intensive work. Sometimes it seems to be 
 small in its reach and grasp. One holds but a few 
 among so many. Yet another Teacher was content 
 to have twelve disciples. And in every group, in 
 Sunday-school, Y. M. C. A. or boys' club, there are ^ 
 always a few key-boys. If you master them you have 
 mastered all. It takes but a few years of this kind 
 
-- / 
 
 178 The Boy Problem 
 
 of work to make a man unwilling to do any other. To 
 become an artist in spirit-building is to write poems 
 and paint pictures not for dusty libraries or quiet gal- 
 leries but for millenniums of benediction. 
 
 My message is really this: We must rely less upon 
 scheming and method and cease to look for the 
 prophet of a miracle movement that shall solve our 
 problem. In home and community and church we 
 shall save our boys as Jesus did the world, by incar- 
 nation. For them we must go down into the Galilee 
 of simple-heartedness and the Samaria of common- 
 place and dwell at the Nazareth of childish toil and 
 struggle and kneel in the Gethsemane of intercession, 
 yea, and climb the sacrificial mound of Calvary, as 
 did the fathers and mothers and saints of old, to bring 
 them to God and to form in them the eternal life of a 
 new creation. 
 
A DIRECTORY OF SOCIAL ORGANIZA- 
 TIONS FOR BOYS 
 
 This is not a list of all the kinds of boys' clubs in 
 America, but of the typical ones. It is more than a 
 list of boys' clubs, for it includes many social instru- 
 mentaHties that are not exactly clubs or for boys 
 alone. An effort is made in each case to describe the 
 literature and give the address of some one to whom 
 to send for further information. A rough classifica- 
 tion is made for convenience, although many forms 
 of work really fall into several of the classes. 
 
 CIVIC AND PATRIOTIC SOCIETIES 
 
 The Boys' Orderly and The Hale House Republic, 
 Hale House, Boston. See Annual Report and The 
 Hale House Log. 
 
 The City History Clubs, founded by Mrs. Robert 
 Abbe, President. Normal Teacher, Frank Bergen 
 Kelle(y, Ph.D., 23 W. 44th St., N. Y. City, from 
 whom various pamphlets may be obtained. 
 
 The Gill School City, founded by Wilson L. Gill, 
 230 W. 13th St., N. Y. City. 
 
 The George Junior Republic, William R. George, 
 founder, Freeville, N. Y. Report, 25 cents. 
 
 The Junior League for Street Cleaning. David 
 Willard, Children's House, New York City, and Mrs. 
 A. Emmagene Paul, Chicago. 
 
i8o The Boy Problem 
 
 The Junior Americans, H. Howard Pepper, Jack- 
 son Ave. Chapel, Providence, R. I. 
 
 The Miniature Election System of the Boys' Free 
 Reading Room, 112-114 University Place, N. Y. 
 City. Write George Hamilton Dean, Chairman. 
 
 The Children of the Revolution and the various 
 genealogical and patriotic societies and clubs. 
 
 The Boys' U. S. A. William Byron Forbush, Win- 
 throp Church, Boston. 
 
 COUNTRY CLUBS 
 
 The Andover Play School, Geo, E. Johnson, Uni- 
 versity School, Cleveland, O., founder and superin- 
 tendent. See his articles in the Bibliography. 
 
 ETHICAL SOCIETIES 
 
 Mercy. The Bands of Mercy. George T. Angell, 
 19 Milk St., Boston, President. Condensed informa- 
 tion, 8 pp., free. A large list of literature. 
 
 Our Animal Protective League. Write to Arthur 
 Westcott, Official Lecturer, United Charities Build- 
 ing, N. Y. City, for free circular. 
 
 Purity. The Knights of the Silver Cross, auxiliary 
 to the White Cross Society, 224 Waverley Place, N.. 
 Y. City. 
 
 The Order of the Silver Cross of Our Master and 
 Geanness, Rev. W. W. Moir, Lake Placid, N. Y. 
 "Some Things That Trouble Young Manhood" is a 
 book of sensible addresses delivered to the Order, to 
 be had of Mr. Moir. 
 
 Temperance. The Band of Hope. Write the Na- 
 
Directory of Organizations i8i 
 
 tional Temperance Society, 58 Reade St., N. Y. City, 
 for catalogue and samples. 
 
 The Juvenile Good Templars, Sons of Temperance, 
 Temple of Honor, Royal Templars of Temperance all 
 have their literature, but are best studied from their 
 local branches. 
 
 The Loyal Temperance Legion. Send 25 cents to 
 Woman's Temperance PubUshing Association, The 
 Temple, La Salle St., Chicago, for "Questions An- 
 swered." Organizer's outiit, 89 cents. 
 
 The Church Temperance Legion, consisting of 
 The Order of the Knights of Temperance, for boys 
 14 to 21, and the Order of Young Crusaders, Rev. 
 Melville K. Bailey, Secretary. Handbook of the 
 Church (P. E.) Temperance Society, Church Missions 
 House, N. Y. City. 
 
 Savings. The Stamp Saving Society, 5 Park Sq., 
 Boston, have a free circular and will send a sample 
 stamp book. The mass clubs use pass-books. 
 
 GROUP CLUBS 
 
 (Intensive work, primarily in Social Settlements) 
 The Qubs at Lincoln House, 1 18-122 Shawmut 
 Ave., and South End House, 6 Rollins St., Boston, 
 Chicago Commons and Hull House, Chicago, Neigh- 
 borhood Guild, 26 Delancey St., N. Y. City, and 
 Kingsley House, Pittsburg, Pa., are commended. 
 Their annual reports may be sent for. Mr. William 
 A. Clark, Gordon House, New York, is authority, 
 and his Social Monographs will be text-books of the 
 work. 
 
i82 The Boy Problem 
 
 HANDIWORK CLUBS 
 
 The Captains of Ten, Miss A. B. Mackintire, 51 
 Avon Hill St., No. Cambridge, Mass., founder. Miss 
 Mackintire has a handbook in preparation. 
 
 The Andover Play School. 
 
 The Lincoln House Play- Work Guild. 
 
 HERO-LOVE METHODS 
 
 The Knights of King Arthur. William Byron For- 
 bush, founder, and Mage Merlin. Handbook, 50 
 cents; Men of To-Morrow, $1 a year, its organ, Al- 
 bany, N. Y. Rev. Frank L. Masseck, National King 
 Arthur, Spencer, Mass., answers all questions and 
 supplies new^ Castles. 
 
 The Reord of Virtue Contest. Write Geo. Ham- 
 ilton Dean, as above. 
 
 Tlie Hero Scrap Book. Write E. L. Hunt, Bunk- 
 er Hill Boys' Club, Boston. 
 
 HOME METHODS 
 
 The Home Library System, Charles W. Birtwell, 
 Supt. of the Children's Aid Socidty, Boston, founder. 
 
 The Home Department of the Sunday-school, W. 
 A. Duncan, Ph. D., 14 Beacon St., Boston, President 
 of the International Society. 
 
 LITERARY METHODS 
 
 The Amateur Newspaper Leagues of Boys. 
 
 The Home Library System. 
 
 The League of Social Service, W, H. Tolman, sec- 
 retary, 287 Fourth Ave., N. Y. City, desires to en- 
 courage and federate debating clubs. 
 
Directory of Organisations 183 
 
 MASS CLUBS 
 
 (Extensive work: usually in large cities) 
 For typical examples send for the handbooks of the 
 following clubs: 
 
 The Good Will Club, Hartford, Conn., Miss Mary 
 
 Hall, founder and superintendent (the 1900 report is 
 
 elaborately illustrated). 
 
 The Fall River Boys' Club, Fall River, Mass., 
 
 Nk5^os. Chew, superintendent (1800 members; Mr. 
 
 /Chew is the authority on this kind of work). 
 
 The Bunker Hill Boys' Club, Charlestown, Bos- 
 ton, Frank S. Mason, founder and secretary (a fine 
 work with meager equipment). 
 
 PERIODICALS, CLUBS FOR SUBSCRIBERS TO 
 
 (The best of many good ones) 
 The Order of the American Boy, for subscribers to 
 The American Boy, William C. Sprague, Majestic 
 Building, Detroit, Mich. "The cultivation of manli- 
 ness in mind, manners and morals." 
 
 The St. Nicholas League, for subscribers to St. 
 Nicholas, Union Square, N. Y. City. "Live to learn 
 and learn to live." 
 
 The Success Qubs, for subscribers to Success, Uni- 
 versity Building, Washington Square, N. Y. City. 
 "Don't wait for your opportunity. Make it." 
 
 PHILANTHROPIC SOCIETIES 
 
 The Ten Times One Society (Lend a Hand Clubs), 
 Mrs. Bernard Whitman, i Beacon St., Boston, secre- 
 tary. The Lend a Hand Record, 50 cents a year, is 
 the organ. 
 
184 The Boy Problem 
 
 PHYSICAL TRAINING METHODS 
 
 The Boys' Brotherhood of Philadelphia, Dr. Edwin 
 J. Houston, 1809 Spring Garden St., Philadelphia, 
 founder and president. Circular and constitution 
 free. 
 
 The United Boys' Brigade of America, Lancaster, 
 Pa. The Brigade Boy, 50 cents a year, organ. 
 
 Boys' Camps. See articles by E. M. Robinson in 
 the Bibliography. 
 
 RELIGIOUS METHODS 
 
 The Boys' Department of the Y. M. C. A. E. M. 
 Robinson, 3 W. 29th St., N. Y. City, is International 
 Secretary for boys and will answer inquiries. Asso- 
 ciation Boys, 50 cents a year, the organ. 
 
 The Junior Brotherhood of St. Andrew, Hubert 
 Carleton, Carnegie Building, Pittsburg, Pa. St. An- 
 drew's Cross, the organ. 
 
 The Boys' and Junior Brotherhood of Andrew and 
 Phillip, Rev. J. Garland Hamner, Jr., secretary, New- 
 ark, N. J. The Brotherhood Star, the organ. Hand- 
 book, 5 cents. 
 
 The Knights of St. Paul, auxihary to the Brother- 
 hood of St. Paul, Rev. F. D. Leete, Rochester, N. Y., 
 founder and organizer. 
 
 The International Order of the Kings (Daughters 
 and) Sons, Mrs. I. C. Davis, 156 Fifth .Ave., N. Y, 
 City, secretary. Free sample literature; The Silver 
 Cross, the organ. 
 
 The Junior Bible Union of Bethany Church, R. S. 
 Murphy, teacher, 2313 St. Albans Place, Philadel- 
 
Directory of Organizations 185 
 
 phia, has suggestive plans and literature ; it is a big, 
 thoroughly organized Bible class for boys. 
 
 The Junior and Intermediate Christian Endeavbr 
 Societies, John Willis Baer, secretary, Tremont Tem- 
 ple, Boston. Free Information. "The Junior Man- 
 ual" by Amos R. Wells, 75 cents. The Junior C. E. 
 World, the organ. 
 
 The Junior Epworth League, Mrs. Annie E. 
 Smiley, Lowell, Mass., secretary. The handbook is 
 *'Work and Workers," 40 cents. 
 
 The Baptist Young People's Union, Rev. E. E. 
 Olivers, secretary, 324 Dearborn St., Chicago. The 
 Baptist Union, the organ. 
 
 The Luther League, headquarters. Box 133, Wash- 
 ington, D. C. The Luther League Review, the organ. 
 
 Young People's Christian Union (United Breth- 
 ren), Rev. H. F. Shupe, secretary. Handbook, 10 
 cents, of E. L. Shuey, Dayton, Ohio. 
 
 Young People's Christian Union (Universalist), 
 Rev. A. J. Cardall, secretary, 799 Broadway, South 
 Boston. Onward, the organ. 
 
 The Knights of King Arthur. 
 
 The Pauline Brotherhood (UniversaHst), Rev. O. 
 M. Hilton, Auburn, N. Y., secretary. 
 
 The Guild of Bible Illuminators, S. Brainerd Pratt, 
 president, Buckland, Mass. 
 
 Catcchctics. Rev. W. J. Mutch, Ph. D., New 
 Haven, Conn.; Rev. John L. Keedy, Walpole, Mass.; 
 Rev. Doremus Scudder, D. D., care of the American 
 Board, Boston, Mass.; Rev. A. W. Hitchcock, Wor- 
 
i86 The Boy Problem 
 
 cester, Mass. ; M. C. Hazard, Ph. D., Boston, Mass. ; 
 Rev. W. R. Campbell, Roxbury, Mass.; Rev. I. C. 
 Smart, Pittsfield, Mass.; Rev. J. W. Cooper, D. D., 
 New Britian, Corm.; Rev. Asher Anderson, Boston, 
 Mass.; Rev. Thos. Chalmers, Manchester, N. H.; 
 Rev. W. F. English, Ph. D., Windsor, Conn. ; Rev. 
 G. W. Fiske, So, Hadley Falls, Mass., are all Congre- 
 gationalists who have written manuals, which they 
 sell from 5 to 15 ceuts each. Dr. Scudder's has a 
 bibliography. 
 
 Missionary Societies. The Boys' and Girls' Home 
 Missionary Army (Congregational), Rev. J. B. Clark, 
 D. D., United Charities Building, N. Y. City, secre- 
 tary. 
 
 The Koo-Koo Circle, Mrs. J. C. Entwistle, Salem, 
 Mass. A unique combination of love for animals and 
 for missions. 
 
 The Captains of Ten combines missions with handi- 
 work. 
 
 The Sunday- School Handbooks. The Bible School 
 by Rev, A. H. McKinney, Ph. D., also the manuals 
 of Dunning, Foster, Schauffler and the compilation 
 published by The Sunday School Times. None but Mc- 
 Kinney's have the latest views. Of courses suitable 
 for boys the following are recommended: Heroes of 
 the Old Testament, published by the Bible Study 
 Union, Boston. The Life of Christ for Boys' Bible 
 Classes, and Men of the Bible, by W. H. Davis, with 
 blue print supplements, and Bailey on The Black- 
 board in the Sunday-school and Maltby on Map 
 
Directory of Organizations 187 
 
 Modeling are all furnished by the International Com- 
 mittee of the Y. M. C. A., 3 West 29th Street, New 
 York City. Moulton's Bible Stories in "The Modern 
 Reader's Bible." 
 
 Junior Bible Lessons (Old Testament Heroes) by 
 Rev. William J. Mutch, Ph. D., New Haven, Conn., 
 Christian Culture, publishers. 
 
 SCIENCE STUDY METHODS 
 
 The Agassiz Association, H. H. Ballard, founder 
 and president, Pittsfield, Mass. The handbook, 
 "Three Kingdoms," 75 cents. Total cost to form a 
 chapter is $1.75. The American Boy, organ. 
 
 The Order of the Rainbow, Hale House, Boston, 
 (includes other things also). 
 
 SECRET SOCIETIES 
 
 The author is unable to recommend any of the 
 secret orders for boys. 
 
 SOCIAL SOCIETIES 
 
 The Circulating Game Plan, devised by Charles 
 \V. Birtwell to accompany the Home Libraries. 
 
 The Play Work Guild and Play School. 
 
 The "Callings" Clubs of the Fall River Boys' Club. 
 See its Tenth Annual Report. 
 
 FELLOWSHIPS OF ADULTS TO HELP BOYS 
 
 The Men of To-morrow : The General Alliance of 
 Workers with Boys, WilHam Byron Forbush, presi- 
 dent, Winthrop Church, Boston; Frank S. Mason, 
 secretary, Charlestown, Boston; How to Help BoySj 
 $1 a year, its organ. 
 
1 88 The Boy Problem 
 
 The Association of Organized Work With Boys (oi 
 New York City). Luther Gulick, president, Pratt In- 
 stitute, Brooklyn; Geo. Hamilton Dean, secretary, 
 114 University Place, New York City. 
 
 The Eastern Alliance of Workers with Boys. Miss 
 Isabel A. Winslow, Hale House, Boston, chairman of 
 executive committee. 
 
 Also the Brotherhoods named above and the In- 
 ternational Boys' Work Committee of the Y. M. C. 
 A., J. H. Canfield, LL. D., Chairman. 
 
 SCHOOLS WHERE LEADERS OF WORK WITH BOYS ARE 
 TRAINED 
 
 Clark University, Worcester, trains specialists in 
 child-study. 
 
 The Bible Normal College, Hartford, Conn., has a 
 course for Boys' Club Directors. 
 
 The Y. M. C. A. Training School, Springfield, 
 Mass., trains secretaries of Boys' Departments of 
 the Y. M. C. A., physical instructors and superin- 
 tendents of camps and vacation schools. 
 
 The Teacher's College of Columbia University. 
 
 The Bible Teacher's College, N. Y. City. 
 
A BIBLIOGRAPHY OF BOOKS AND PAM- 
 PHLETS RELATING TO BOYS AND 
 SOCIAL WORK WITH THEM 
 
 This is not a bibliography of the whole subject, but 
 a list of one hundred and fifty works in English each 
 of which the author believes to be the most helpful 
 upon its own special topic. Behind this Hst lies the 
 whole literature of anthropology, psychology and 
 pedagogy. The standard bibliography of child study 
 is that by Louis N. Wilson, librarian of Clark Univer- 
 sity, published by G. E. Stechert, 9 East Sixteenth 
 Street, New York City, with annual supplements 
 published at the University. The literature of the 
 different societies and clubs for boys is referred to 
 under the name of each organization in the Directory 
 published herewith. 
 
 ON ADOLESCENT BOYHOOD 
 
 Baldwin, J. M. "Mental Development in the Child and the 
 Race." New York. 1895. 
 
 Barnes, Earl. "A Study of Children's Interests." 
 Studies in Education. {Stanford University.) Vol. I. Palo 
 Alto. 1896-97. 
 
 Bohannon. E. "A Study of Peculiar and Exceptional 
 Children." Pedagogical Seminary. Vol. IV. Worcester. 
 1896. 
 
 "The Only Child in a Family." Ibid. Vol. V. 
 
 1898. 
 
 Bryan, E. B. "Nascent Stages and their Pedagogical Sig- 
 nificance." Ibid. Vol. VII. No. 3. Oct., 1900. 
 
190 The Boy Problem 
 
 BuRK, F. "Teasing and Bullying." Ibid. Vol. IV. 
 1897. 
 ^ BuRNHAM, W. H. "The Study of Adolescence." Ibid. 
 Vol. I. 1891. 
 
 Chamberlain, A. F. "The Child." New York. 1900. 
 
 Chrisman, O. "Religious Periods of Child Growth." 
 Educational Reznew. Vol. XVI. New York. 1898. 
 
 CoE, George A. "Adolescence — The Religious Point of 
 View." Journal of Childhood and Adolescence. Vol. II. 
 No. I. January, 1902. Seattle. 
 
 Daniels, A. H. "The New Life: A Study of Regenera- 
 tion." American Journal of Psychology. Vol. VI. Wor- 
 cester. 1893. 
 
 Darrah, Estelle M. "A Study of Children's Ideals." 
 Popular Science Monthly. Vol. LIII. 1898. 
 
 Dawson, George E. "A Study in Youthful Degeneracy." 
 Pedagogical Seminary. Vol. IV. No. 2. 1896. 
 
 "Psychic Rudiments and Morality." Ameri- 
 can Journal of Psychology. Vol. IX. 1900. 
 
 "Children's Interest in the Bible." Pedagogical 
 
 Seminary. Vol. III. No. 2. 1900. These three papers 
 may be obtained, in reprints, of the author, Bible Normal 
 College, Hartford, Conn. 
 
 Gould, E. M. "Child Fetiches." Pedagogical Seminary. 
 Vol. V. 1898. 
 
 Gulick, Luther. "Sex and Religion." Association Out- 
 look. Springfield, Mass. 1897-98. 
 
 and Others. "The Religion of Boys." Ibid. 
 
 1898-99. The standard study of the topic. Now being 
 printed, revised, in Association Boys, 1902. 
 
 Hall, G. Stanley. "Adolescence." (Forthcoming, 1902.) 
 
 ^ "Boy Life in a Massachusetts Country Town a 
 
 Quarter of a Century Ago." Proceedings of the American 
 Antiquarian Society. Vol. VII. Worcester. 1891. 
 
 "Children's Collections." Pedagogical Semi- 
 nary. Vol. I. 1891. 
 
Bibliography 191 
 
 "A Study of Fears." American Journal of 
 
 Psychology. Vol. VIII. 1897. 
 
 »^ James, William. "The Principles of Psychology." New 
 York. 1899. The chapters on "Habit" and "Will" are fa- 
 mous. 
 
 Johnson, J. H. "The Savagery of Boyhood." Popular 
 Science Monthly. Vol, XXXI. 1887. 
 
 Kline, L. W. "Truancy as Related to the Migratory In- 
 stinct." Pedagogical Seminary, Vol. V. 1898. 
 
 RowE, S. H. "The Physical Nature of the Child." New 
 York. 1899. 
 
 Starbuck, E. D. "The Psychology of Religion." New 
 York. 1899. 
 
 Street, J. R. "The Religion of Childhood. Eton's Her- 
 ald. January 24, 1899. Gives the genetic view. 
 
 Tabor, Arthur O. "The Country Boy." How to Help 
 Boys. Vol. II. No. i. January, 1902. Boston. 
 
 VosTROVSKY, Clara. "A Study of Children's Superstitions." 
 Studies in Education. Vol. I. 1896-7. 
 
 YoDER, A. H. "A Study of the Boyhood of Great Men." 
 Pedagogical Seminary. Vol. IV. No. i. 1896. 
 
 "The Tncorrigibles'." Journal of Childhood 
 
 and Adolescence. Vol. II. No. i. January, 1902. 
 
 ON SPECIAL METHODS FOR WORK WITH 
 BOYS 
 
 Camps. — Alexander, Thornton S. "Camps for Boys." 
 Social Work Monographs. No. 2. Confined to a narrow 
 view of American camps. 
 
 Robinson, E. M. "Boys as Savages." Association Out- 
 look. July, 1899. 
 
 "Thinkerettes about Boys and Camps." Ibid. 
 
 August, 1899. 
 Shaw, Albert. "Vacation Camps and Boys' Republics." 
 Review of Rewiews. May, 1896,' 
 Child-Saving Work. — Fox, Hugh F. "Child-Saving 
 
192 The Boy Problem 
 
 Agencies." How to Help Boys. Vol. II. No. i. January, 
 1902. 
 
 Gardens. — Knight, Geo. H. "Gardens for School 
 Children." How to Help Boys. Vol. II. No. i. Jan- 
 uary, 1902. 
 
 Report of the Consuls of the United States on School Gar- 
 dens in Europe, issued by the Board of Foreign Commerce, 
 Department of State, Washington. Vol. XX. Part 2. 1900. 
 Mattox, a. H. "Boys' Garden School of the N. C. R. 
 Co." Social Service. Vol. V. No. 7. January, 1902. 
 Handicraft. — "Lincoln House Manual." 1900-1902, Bos- 
 ton, and "A Scheme of Handicraft" by William A. Clark, 
 Social Monographs, forthcoming, furnish an outline of 
 methods and a list of handbooks. 
 
 Institutions. — Reeder, R. R. "The Training of Children 
 
 in Institutions." Charities. Vol. VIII. No. 5. February i, 1902. 
 
 Outdoor Philanthropies. — "Outdoor Philanthropies" : a 
 
 symposium. How to Help Boys. Vol. II. No. i. January, 
 
 1902. 
 
 Leadership. — Mason, Frank S. "The Boys' Club Leader." 
 How to Help Boys. Vol. I. No. i. 1900. 
 
 Robinson, E. M. "The Present Need." Association 
 Men. June, 1900. 
 Pictures. — Bailey, Henry T. "The Blackboard in Sunday- 
 school." Boston. 1900. 
 Emery, M. S. "How to Enjoy Pictures." Boston. 1898. 
 Police Court Work. — Northrop, ':E. N. "Police Court 
 Work for Boys." How to Help Boysi- Vol. I. No. 2. Jan- 
 uary, 1901. 
 
 Rural Problem, The. — Pressey, Edward P. "Solution of 
 the Country Problem." Montague, Mass. 1901. 
 
 Savings. — Northrop, E. N. "Helping Boys to Save." How 
 to Help Boys. Vol. I. No. i. 1900. 
 
 Sex-Information. — Lyttleton, E. "The Instruction of the 
 Young in Sex-Knowledge." International Journal of Ethics. 
 July, 1899. 
 
Bibliography 193 
 
 Meyer, R B. "A Holy Temple." Philadelphia. 1901. 
 MoRLEY, Margaret W. "Life and Love." Chicago. 1895. 
 Wilder, Burt G. "What Young People Should Know." 
 
 Boston. 1875. 
 Wood-Allen, Mary. "Almost a Man." Ann Arbor. 1895. 
 "Sex-Instruction of Boys" : ten papers in How to Help 
 Boys. Vol. L No. 4. 1901. 
 Settlement Work. — Weeks, Nathan H. "The Settlement 
 Method with Boys." CongregationalisL January 11, 1902. 
 Socials. — Smiley, Annie E. "Fifty Social Evenings." Two 
 Series. New York. 1894-96. 
 
 Wells, Amos R. "Social Evenings." Boston. 1898. 
 
 "Social to Save." Boston. 1900. 
 
 Stories. — Vostrovsky, Clara. "A Study of Children's Own 
 Stories." Studies in Education. Vol. L 1896-97. 
 
 Wiltse, Sara E. "The Place of the Story in Education." 
 
 Boston. 1897. 
 Burr, Henry M. "The Boy as an Idealist." How to 
 Help Boys. January, 1902. 
 Vacation Schools. — Reports of the Committees of the 
 Board of Education, Boston, on Vacation Schools and Play- 
 grounds, 1901. 
 
 Reports of the Massachusetts Civic League for 1902. 
 Report of the Home Garden Association of the Public 
 Schools of Springfield, for 1900. 
 
 The Playground in Seward Park, by C. B. Stover, in Vol. 
 VI, No. 18, of Charities, May, 1901. 
 
 Articles on Preventive Work, by Joseph Lee, in Charities. 
 from November, 1900, to July 6, 1901. 
 Reports of the Outdoor Recreation League of New York. 
 Report of the Massachusetts Emergency and Hygiene As- 
 sociation for 1901. 
 
 Reports of the Board of Education of the City of New 
 York for 1901 : — On Vacation Schools and Playgrounds ; On 
 Gymnastics and Athletics ; on Courses of Study for Vacation 
 Schools; On Games and Songs for the Kindergarten Depart' 
 ment of the Summer Playgrounds. 
 
194 The Boy Problem 
 
 Report of the Board of Commissioners of the Department of 
 Parks, Boston, for 1901. 
 
 Report of the Committee on Vacation Schools and Play- 
 grounds, for 1901, published by the Boston Board of Educa- 
 tion. 
 Report of the Massachusetts Civic League, Boston, 1902. 
 Report of the Home Gardening Association of the Public 
 Schools, Cleveland, 1900. 
 
 Report of the New York Association for Improving the 
 Condition of the Poor, for 1896, on Vacation Schools. 
 
 Alexander, Thornton S. "Vacation Schools." Social 
 
 Monographs. No. 4. 
 American, Sadie. "The Movement for Vacation Schools." 
 The American Journal of Sociology. November, 1898. 
 Cardozo, F. L. Jr. "Vacation Schools." Education. No- 
 vember, 1901. 
 Jones, Katherine A. "Vacation Schools in the United 
 States." Review of Reviezvs. June, 1898. 
 We may include in this list, as they are promised imme- 
 diately, Mr. William A. Clark's series of Social Monographs, 
 of which the following titles are of interest "here: Boys* 
 Clubs, A Scheme of Handicraft, Play-Work for Clubs, 
 Theatricals for Clubs. 
 
 ON BOYS' ORGANIZATIONS ORIGINATED BY BOYS 
 
 Browne, T. J. "Boys' Gangs." Association Outlook. Feb- 
 ruary, 1899. 
 
 "The Clan or Gang Instinct in Boys." Ibid. 
 
 June, July and August, 1900. 
 
 CuLiN, S. "Street Games of Brooklyn." Journal of Amer- 
 ican Folk-Lore. Vol. IV. 1891. 
 
 Hall, G. Stanley. "The Story of a Sand Pile." Scrib- 
 ner's Magazine. Vol. III. 1888. 
 
 Johnson, J. H. "Rudimentary Society among Boys." 
 Johns Hopkins University Studies. No. 11. Second Series. 
 1884. 
 
Bibliography 195 
 
 Riis, Jacob A. "How the Other Half Lives," and "A Ten 
 Years' War." New York. 1892 and 1900. 
 
 Sheldon, Henry D. "The Institutional Activities of Amer- 
 ican Children." Reprint from American Journal of Psychol- 
 ogy. Vol. IX. No. 4. 1899. 
 
 ON BOYS' ORGANIZATIONS ORIGINATED 
 BY ADULTS 
 
 Bacon, Leonard Woolsey, and Northrop. Charles Addi- 
 son. "Young People's Societies." New York. 1900. 
 
 Birtwell, Charles W. "Home Libraries." Boston. 1899. 
 
 Brown, Lincoln E. "The Ideal Boys' Club," Scranton, 
 Pa., 1902, (order of Mr. Brown at Wilkesbarre.) 
 
 Chew, Thomas. "The Boys' Club Reaching the Entire 
 Family." How to Help Boys. 1900. 
 
 "The Large City Boys' Club." How to Help 
 
 Boys. No. 2. 1901. 
 
 Clark, Francis E. "The Children and the Church." Bos- 
 ton. 1887. 
 
 Clark, William A. "Helping Boys by the Social Settle- 
 nTgnt Plan." How to Help Boys. 1900. 
 
 "Lincoln House Bulletins." 1899-1901. 
 
 Forbush, William Byron. "The Boy Problem." Third 
 Edition. Boston. 1902. 
 
 "A Manual of Boys' Clubs." 1898. 
 
 Gladden, Washington. "The Christian Pastor and the 
 Working Church." New York. 1898. 
 
 GuLiCK, Luther. "The Future of the Association." As- 
 sociation Outlook. April, 1900. 
 
 Johnson, George E. "An Educational Experiment." Ped- 
 agogical Seminary. Vol. VI. No 4. 1899. 
 
 Mead, George W. "Modern Methods of Church ^Vork.'* 
 New York. 1897. 
 
 Morgan, George W. "Hebrew Boys' Clubs." Hozv to 
 Help Boys. No. 2. 1901. 
 
196 The Boy Problem 
 
 ON PLAY AND GAMES 
 
 Alexander, Thornton S. "School-yard Play-grounds," and 
 Allen, Fred'k B. "Summer Play-grounds." Social Work 
 Monographs. No. 3. 
 
 Blount, H. M. "The Sphere of the Play-ground." Journal 
 of Pedagogy. June, 1900. 
 
 ^Bradley, John E. "The Educational Value of Play." Re- 
 view of Reviews. January, 1902. 
 
 Chesley, a. M. "Manual of Gymnasium Games." New 
 York, 1901. 
 
 Croswell, T. R. "Amusements of Worcester School Chil- 
 dren." Pedagogical Seminary. Vol. VI. 1899. 
 
 Groos, Karl. "The Play of Man." New York. 1901. 
 \/ GuLicK, Luther. "Pyschological, Pedagogical, and Relig- 
 ious Aspects of Group Games." Association Outlook. Feb- 
 ruary, 1900. Pedagogical Seminary. Vol. VL No. 2. 
 J Johnson, George E. "Education by Plays and Games." 
 Reprint from the Pedagogical Seminary. Vol. IIL No. i. 
 1896. 
 
 "Games and Play," Social Work Monographs, 
 
 Boston. 1898. 
 
 "Play in Physical Training." Address before the 
 
 National Education Association. 1898. 
 
 "Play in Character-Building." How to Help 
 
 Boys. No. 3. April, 1901. 
 
 Lee, Joseph. "Playground Education." Educational Re- 
 view. December, 1901. 
 
 Newell, W. W. "Games and Songs of American Chil- 
 dren." New York. 1884. 
 
 "Free Play in Physical Education." Popular Science 
 Monthly. Vol. XLIL 1893. 
 
 "Group Games." How to Help Boys. No. 5. October, 1901. 
 
 Various handbooks of games mentioned in Johnson's works. 
 
 ON BOYS' READING 
 Class Room Libraries for Public Schools. Published by 
 
Bibliography 197 
 
 the Buffalo Public Library, February, 1902. The latest list. 
 
 Graded and Annotated Catalogue of Books in the Carnegie 
 Library of Pittsburg for the Public Schools, 1900. The full- 
 est list. 
 
 Books for Boys and Girls, compiled by Caroline M. 
 Hewins, Hartford, 1897. The best short list. 
 
 Boys' Reading. How to Help Boys. Vol. IL No. 3- July, 
 1902. The best guide. 
 
 ON MORAL AND RELIGIOUS TRAINING 
 
 Abler, Felix. "Moral Education." New York. 1896. 
 
 Blakeslee, E. " The Natural Line of Advance in Sun- 
 day School Lessons." Biblical World. January, 1902. 
 
 Brown, Marianna C. "Sunday School Movements in 
 America." Chicago. 1901. 
 
 Burton, Ernest D. "The Adaptation of Biblical Liter- 
 ature to the Development of the Child." Child Study Monthly. 
 November, 1900. 
 
 Butler, Nicholas M. "Five Evidences of An Education." 
 Revieiv of Education. December, 1901. 
 
 t^DAViES, Henry. 'The New Psychology and Moral Train- 
 ing." Int. Journal of Ethics. July, 1900. 
 
 Davis, Ozora S. "The Endeavor Movement and the Boy." 
 How to Help Boys. Vol. II. No. i. January, 1902. 
 
 Dewey, John. "The School and Society." Chicago. 1900. 
 
 Ellis, A. C. "Sunday-School Work and Bible Study in 
 the Light of Modern Pedagogy." Pedagogical Seminary. Vol. 
 IV. No. 3. 1896. Contains the best bibliography of relig- 
 ious pedagogy up to that date. 
 
 Fitch, Sir Joshua. "Educational Aims and Methods." 
 London, 1900. 
 
 FoRBUSH, William Byron. "The Boyhood of Jesus and 
 Its Bearings Upon Religious Pedagogy." (Forthcoming, 1902.) 
 
 Hall, G. Stanley. "Some Fundamental Priciples of Sun- 
 day-School and Bible Teaching." Pedagogical Seminary. Vol. 
 VIII. No. 4. December, 1901. 
 
198 The Boy Problem 
 
 J 
 
 "The Moral and Religious Training of Children 
 
 and Adolescents." Ihid. Vol. I. 189 1. 
 
 Henderson, C H. "The Philosophy of Manual Training." 
 
 opxilar Science Monthly. Vol. XLII. 1893. 
 
 Lancaster, E. G. "The Psychology and Pedagogy of Ado- 
 lescence." Pedagogical Seminary. Vol. V. 1897. 
 
 McKinney, a. H. "Bible School Pedagogy." New York. 
 1900. 
 
 Mutch, William J. Christian Nurture; a magazine. New 
 HaveiL 1 90 1. 
 
 Pease, George W. "A Suggestion Toward a Rational Bible 
 School Curriculum." Biblical World. August, 1900. 
 
 Sheldon, Walter L. "An Ethical Sunday-School." New 
 York. 1900. 
 
 Street, J. R. "A Study in Moral Education." Pedagogical 
 Seminary. Vol. V. 1897. 
 
 Walker, Francis A. "Discussions in Education." (Arti- 
 cles on Industrial Training, pp. 123-206, written 1884-87). 
 New York. 1899. 
 
 Winchester, B. S. "A Working Hypothesis for Relig- 
 ious Instruction." Biblical World. September, 1901. 
 
 "Religious Methods With Boys:" a symposium. How to 
 Help Boys. Vol. I. No. 5. 1901. 
 
 "The Use of a Doctrinal Catechism :" a symposium. Bib- 
 lical World. September, 1900. 
 
 "Principles of Religious Education," by several writers. 
 A strong series of practical papers. New York. 1900. 
 
 "The Sunday-School Outlook." New York. 1902. 
 
 "The Boy and the Home," by F. G. Peabody, Samuel W. 
 Dike, Jacob A. Riis, Endicott Peabody and others. How to 
 Help Boys. Vol. II. No. i. January, 1902. 
 
A READING COURSE ON THE BOY 
 PROBLEM 
 
 A bibliography of such a subject as this is an 
 exasperation to the ordinary reader, because some of 
 the most valuable matter referred to is in expensive 
 books and technical publications. A few practical 
 suggestions are often called for, and are hereby 
 given. 
 
 The first book to read on child study as related to 
 boy life, pending the appearance of Dr. Hall's long- 
 awaited book on "Adolescence," is "The Child," by 
 Chamberlain, ($1.50), which is a digest of the whole 
 subject, a book which cannot be read hastily, but 
 which is a mine of information. Concerning the ap- 
 plications of the facts of boy life to religious nurture, 
 the most popular books are those of Coe and Star- 
 buck. Coe's ($1.00) is the better book; it contains 
 about all of Starbuck and much more. 
 
 As soon as one wishes to go any deeper into the 
 matter or to take up any special topic thoroughly, the 
 files of the Pedagogical Seminary, the great scholarly 
 journal of adolescence, must be studied. The only 
 way to do this is to go to a large library, as the maga- 
 zine is expensive and some of the early numbers are 
 out of print. Those who desire President Hall's ma- 
 tured opinions upon the matter of religious instruc- 
 tion will, however, send for the number for Decem- 
 ber, 1901. 
 
200 The Boy Problem 
 
 One purpose of our own study has been not only 
 to discuss the philosophy and work with boys, but also 
 to condense this scattered material in handy form. 
 The best handbook of mass clubs is Mr. Lincoln 
 Brown's, 'The Ideal Boys' Club," (lo cts.). The 
 tenth report of the Good Will Club of Hartford (illus- 
 trated) gives the most vivid idea of the working of 
 such a club. The boys' clubs of the social settlement 
 type are best studied in the current number of "The 
 Commons" (50 cts. a year). McKinney's is the best 
 brief manual of reHgious pedagogy, (40 cts.). "How 
 to Help Boys" is a magazine which plans to take 
 up the entire field of work with boys as well as cur- 
 rent special movements. The back numbers sell at 25 
 cts. to $1 each. The subscription price is $1.00 a 
 year. 
 
 All these may be secured of the publishers of this 
 volume. 
 
 or THE 
 
 UNIVEr?SITY 
 
 OF 
 
INDEX 
 
 "Active" membership, 91 
 
 Adolescence, 18-41, 124 
 
 Agassiz Association, 142, 187 
 
 Ambitions of Boys, 20 
 
 Andover Play School, 74ff, 180 
 
 Animal Protective League, Our, 180 
 
 Anthony, A. W., no 
 
 Art for Boys, 35, 45 
 
 Art clubs. 45 
 
 Atavism, 38 
 
 Athletic clubs, 44, 184 
 
 Band of Hope, 180, chart 
 Band of Mercy, 180. chart 
 Bible, The, ii4ff, 173 
 Bible Illuminators, Guild of, ii4ff, 185 
 Bible Normal College, 119, 185 
 Boy-Life, 9-41, 124 
 Boys' Brigade, chart 
 , Boys' Brotherhood, 72, 95, 184 
 Boys' Orderly, 179 
 Boys' U. S. A., 180 
 Brinton, D. G., 136 
 
 Brotherhood of St. Andrew, Junior, 94, 184, chart 
 Brotherhood of Andrew and Philip, 94, 184, chart 
 Brown, Lincoln K, 72, 195, 200 
 Bunker Hill Boys' club, 183 
 Burr, Henry M., 20, 21, 145, 146, 150 
 By-Laws of Boy-Life, 29-41 
 
 Camps, 68, 71, 140, 191, chart 
 Candy Stores as Social Centers. 42 
 Captains of Ten, 96, 97, 139, 182 
 Catechetics, io8ff 
 
202 The Boy Problem 
 
 Chamberlain, A. R, 9, 30, 35 
 
 Chautauqua Boys* Club, 81 
 
 Chew, Thomas, 31, 59, 183 
 
 Childhood, 9, 10 
 
 Christian Endeavor Society, Junior and Intermediate, 
 
 82flF, 106, 128, 185, chart 
 Church, The, 56, 69, iii, 119, 120, i59ff 
 Church Temperance Legion, The, 181 
 City History Club, 179 
 Clan-ethics of "gang", 34, 47 
 Clark, Francis E., 92 
 Clark, William A., 57, 142, 181, 195 
 Clarke, William Newton, no, 125 
 Classes, Communion, iioff 
 "Clumsy age," 30 
 Coddling, 60, 165 
 
 Coe, George A., 22, 30, 86, 87, 109 
 Collections, 139 
 Collins, John C, 57 
 Colozza, 48 
 Commons, The, 200 
 Conversion, 21, 22, 119, 146, 147, i6off 
 Crane, William I., 26 
 Crisis, 21 
 
 Davis, Ozora S., 84, 197 
 Davis, W. H., 106, 114-117 
 Dawson, George E., 39 
 Decision Day, 120-123 
 Delay in Development, 29, 30 
 Drama, 142, 143 
 
 "Emigration period," 20, 21, 127, 177 
 Endeavor Society, 82ff, 106, 128, 185, chart 
 Episcopal Qiurch, The, 112, 118, 168 
 Epworth League, Junior, 185 
 
Index 203 
 
 Ethical clubs, 153 
 
 Ethical dualism, 33, 34 
 
 Ethical teaching in public schools, 131-135 
 
 Evans, Margaret J., 131-133 
 
 Fall River Boys' Club, 31, 32, 183 
 Farwell, Parris T., 129, 167 
 Fetishism, 13, 38 
 Fitch, Sir Joshua, 84, 109 
 French boys, 32 
 
 Games, 20, 21, 48, I35ff 
 
 "Gangs," 34, 42-51, 106, 124 
 
 Gardens, 76, 77, 192 
 
 George Junior Republic, 179, chart 
 
 Gill School City, 179 
 
 Girls' Societies, 45ff 
 
 Good Will Club, 183 
 
 Good Will Home, 151 
 
 Groos, K, 135 
 
 Groton School, 50 
 
 Group clubs, 59-62 
 
 Guild of Bible Illuminators, ii4ff 
 
 Gulick, Luther, 19, 70 
 
 Gymnasiums, 137 
 
 Habits, II, 23, 128 
 
 Hale House Republic, 178 
 
 Hall, G. Stanley, 21, 22, 27, 109, 139, 156, 167 
 
 Handiwork, 138 
 
 Harper, E. T., 106 
 
 Hebrew Boys, 32, 33 
 
 Henderson, C. H., 131 
 
 Henderson, C R., 109 
 
 Hero Scrap-Book, 182 
 
 Home, The, 42, 64, I25ff 
 
204 The Boy FroUem 
 
 Home Department of the Sunday-School, 182 
 Home Library System, 65, 130, 182 
 Hughlings-Jackson theory, 21 
 Hyde, William DeW., 103, 162 
 
 Ideals of Boys, 20, 21, 145 
 
 Independent, The, 14 
 
 Industrial clubs, 44 
 
 Infancy, 9 
 
 Instincts, 10, 23, 37, 47, 51 
 
 International Lesson System, I03ff 
 
 Irish boys, 32 
 
 James, William, 27, 191 
 
 Jesus, 90, 115, 173 
 
 Johnson, George E., 26, 40, 52, 74ff 
 
 Junior Americans, 180 
 
 Junior League for Street-Cleaning, 179 
 
 Junior Republic, 179, chart 
 
 Katabolism, 85, 90 
 
 King, H. C, 109 
 
 King's Sons, 184, chart 
 
 Knights of King Arthur, 97-100, 142, 171, 182, chart 
 
 Knights of St. Paul, 184 
 
 Knights of the Silver Cross, 180 
 
 Lancaster, E. G., 21, 27, 154 
 
 Lankester, E. Ray, 39 
 
 Lee, Joseph, 11, 34, 158 
 
 Lesshaft, E., 31 
 
 Lincoln House, 62, 63, 65, 181 
 
 Literary clubs, 44 
 
 Lombroso, Paolo, 12 
 
 Loyal Temperance Legion, 181 
 
 Lulls, 36, 86 
 
Index 
 
 205 
 
 Mabie, Hamilton W., 136 
 
 McKinley, Charles E., 169, 172 
 
 Mackintire, A. B., 96, 97 
 
 Manual training, I3iff 
 
 Mason, Frank S., 64, 153 
 
 Mass clubs, 57-61 
 
 Memory, Verbal, 12 
 
 Men of to-morrow, 6, 187 
 
 Men's leagues, 91, 95 
 
 Mercy, Band of, 180 
 
 Messenger service, 165 
 
 Miniature Election System, 180 
 
 Missionary instruction, 107, 108, 157, 173-175 
 
 Moral training, 130-134, I74. I75 
 
 Morgan, George W., 32 
 
 Mosso, A., 27 
 
 Music, 44, 141 
 
 Mutch, William J., 166, 187 
 
 Nature Study, 142 
 
 Old Testament, 13, 104, 144 
 Order of the Silver Cross, 180 
 Organizations, Boys' own, 42-51 
 
 "Pairing," 50 
 
 Parenthood, 12, 23, 24, I24ff 
 
 Pastoral calling, 170 
 
 Pastor's classes, 113 
 
 Pastor's work with Boys, 172!? 
 
 Peabody, Francis G., 106, 126, 158 
 
 Pedagogical Seminary, The, 74, 199 
 
 Personality, 36, 129, 153, 178 
 
 Pets, 152 
 
 Philanthropic clubs, 44 
 
 Pictures, 119, 146 
 
 Pierce, John M., 136 
 
206 . The Boy Problem 
 
 Play, II, 48, I25flf, 193, 194 
 
 Playgrounds, yyff, 1Q3, 194 
 
 Play School (Johnson's), 74ff, 180, chart 
 
 Play-Work Guild (Clark's), 62, 187, char. 
 
 Pledges, 84, 88 
 
 Preaching, 118, 171 ff 
 
 Precocity, 29, 30 
 
 Predatory clubs, 44 
 
 Pre-natal child. The, 9 
 
 Pressey, Edward P., 81 
 
 Questions, 147 
 
 Racial differences, 31 ff 
 Recognitions, 119, 153, 172 
 Record of Virtue Contests, 182 
 Religion of a boy, 13, 21, i6off 
 Religious clubs, 82ff, chart 
 Religious training, I59ff 
 "Reverberations," 34 
 Revivals, 119, 163 
 Riis, Jacob A., 126, 127 
 Robinson, E. M., 68, 140, 163 
 
 St. John, Edward P., 22 
 Savings, 65, 141, 181 
 School, The Public, i3off 
 Scudder, Doremus, in 
 Secret societies, 44 
 Sermon, The, 118, i7iff 
 Service of others, 165 
 Sex-Instruction, I47ff 
 Sexes, Separation of, 45ff, 87ff 
 Sheldon, H. D.. 13, 43ff, 83 
 Siegert, G., 31 
 Sloyd, 63 
 
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