Twelve lectures to young men : on various important subjects

Front matter

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Preface

XVll home. My present English publishers are Messrs. Thomas Nelson and Sons of Edinburgh and London, whose rights I trust may be courteously observed by the trade there, which I regret to say has not been the case with others of my books in their hands.

HENRY WARD BEEOHER.

Preface To The First Edition

Having watched the courses of those who seduce the young, — their arts, their blandishments, their pretences ; having witnessed the beginning and consummation of ruin, almost in the same year, of many young men, naturally well disposed, whose downfall began with the appearances of innocence, — I felt an earnest desire, if I could, to raise the suspicion of the young, and to direct their reason to the arts by which they are with such facility destroyed.

I ask every young man who may read this book not to submit his judgment to mine, not to hate because I denounce, nor blindly to follow me ; but to weigh my reasons, that he may form his own judgment. I only claim the place of a companion ; and that I may gain his ear, I have sought to present truth in those forms which best please the young ; and though I am not without hope of satisfying the aged and the wise, my whole thought has been to carry ivith me the intelligent sympathy of young men.

Indianapolis. 1845.

PEEFACE TO THE SECOND EDITION.

It is proper to remark, that many of the statements in these Lectures, which may seem severe or overdrawn in New England, are literally true in the West. Insensibility to public indebtedness, gambling among the members of the bar, the ignoble arts of politicians, — I know not if such things are found at the East ; but within one year past an edition of three thousand copies of these Lectures has been distributed through the West, and it has been generally noticed in the papers, and I have never heard objections from any quarter that the canvas has been too strongly colored.

Indianapolis, 1846.