At present I look to the young. As preparatory to the senate, I should
like to see a society of novices, such as the world has never yet
seen, bound by no oath, wearing no badge, In place of an oath, they
should have a religious faith in the capacity of Man for virtue;
instead of a badge, should wear in the heart a firm resolve not to
stop short of the destiny promised him as a son of God. Their service
should be action and conservatism, not of old habits, but of a better
nature, enlightened by hopes that daily grow brighter.
If sin was to remain in the world, it should not be by their
connivance at its stay, or one moment's concession to its claims.
They should succor the oppressed, and pay to the upright the reverence
due in hero-worship by seeking to emulate them. They would not
denounce the willingly bad, but they could not be with them, for the
two classes could not breathe the same atmosphere.
They would heed no detention from the time-serving, the worldly and
the timid.
They could love no pleasures that were not innocent and capable of
good fruit,
I saw, in a foreign paper, the title now given to a party abroad, "Los
Exaltados." Such would be the title now given these children by the
world: Los Exaltados, Las Exaltadas; but the world would not sneer
always, for from them would issue a virtue by which it would, at last,
be exalted too.
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