If, at the
age of eighteen, he does not exhibit some ability in this respect, the
school may justly be charged with dereliction.
Or, twenty years hence, this boy may be a physician. If so, he will find a
weeping mother clinging to him and imploring him to save her baby. He will
see a strong man broken with sobs and offering him a fortune to save his
wife from being engulfed in the dark shadows. His ears will be assailed
with delirious ravings that call to him for relief and life. He will be
importuned by the grief-crushed child not to let her mother go. He will be
called upon to grapple with plague, with pestilence, with death itself.
Unless he can give succor, hope departs and darkness enshrouds and
blights. He alone can hold disease and death at bay and bid darkness give
place to light and cause sorrow to vanish before the smile of joy. He
stands alone at the portal to do battle against the demons of devastation
and desolation. And, if he fails, the plaints of grief will penetrate the
innermost chambers of his soul. He must not fail. So he toils on through
the long night watches, disdaining food and rest, that the breaking day
may bring in gladness and crown the arts of healing. And the school that
does not share in the glory of such achievement misses a noble
opportunity.
Again, twenty years hence, the little girl who now sits at her desk,
crowned with golden ringlets, will be a wife and mother, and the mistress
of a well-conditioned home.
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