Chap. 5 - Proper Education of the Young.
The third angel is represented as flying in the midst of the heavens, showing that the message is
to go forth throughout the length and breadth of the earth. It is the most solemn message ever given
to mortals, and all who connect with the work should first feel their need of an education, and a most
thorough training process for the work, in reference to their future usefulness; and there should be
plans made and efforts adopted for the improvement of that class who anticipate connecting with any
branch of the work. Ministerial labor cannot and should not be intrusted to boys, neither should the
work of giving Bible readings be intrusted to inexperienced girls, because they offer their services,
and are willing to take responsible positions, but who are wanting in religious experience, without a
thorough education and training. They must be proved to see if they will bear the test; and unless there
is developed a firm, conscientious principle to be all that God would have them to be, they will not
correctly represent our cause and work for this time. There must be with our sisters engaged in the
work in every mission, a depth of experience, gained from those who have had an experience, and who
understand the manners and ways of working. The missionary operations are constantly embarrassed
for the want of workers of the right class of minds, and the devotion and piety that will correctly
represent our faith.
There are numbers that ought to become missionaries who never enter the field, because those who
are united with them in church capacity or in our colleges, do not feel the burden of labor with them,
to open before them the claims that God has upon all the powers, and do not pray with them and for
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them; and the eventful period which decides the plans and course of life passes, convictions, with them
are stifled, other influences and inducements attract them, and temptations to seek worldly positions
that will, they think, bring them money, take them into the worldly current. These young men might
have been saved to the ministry through well-organized plans. If the churches in the different places do
their duty, God will work with their efforts by his Spirit, and will supply faithful men to the ministry.
Our schools are to be educating schools and training schools; and if men and women come forth
from them fitted in any sense for the missionary field, they must have impressed upon them the
greatness of the work, and that practical godliness must be brought into their daily experience, to
be fitted for any place of usefulness in our world, or in the church, or in God’s great moral vineyard,
now calling for laborers in foreign lands.
The youth must be impressed with the idea that they are trusted. They have a sense of honor, and
they want to be respected, and it is their right. If pupils receive the impression that they cannot go out
or come in, sit at the table, or be anywhere, even in their rooms, except they are watched, a critical eye
is upon them, to criticise and report, it will have the influence to demoralize, and pastime will have
no pleasure in it. This knowledge of a continual oversight is more than a parental guardianship, and
far worse; for wise parents can, through tact, often discern beneath the surface and see the working of
the restless mind under the longings of youth, or under the forces of temptations, and set their plans
to work to counteract evils. But this constant watchfulness is not natural, and produces evils that it
is seeking to avoid. The healthfulness of youth requires exercise, ch
