致青年公开课.docVIP

A WORD TO YOUTH 致青年 By Andre Maurois A questionnaire is, generally speaking either a nuisance or a bore. But once in a while one comes along that inspires thinking. At such times the interrogated blesses his examiner. This is what I felt one morning recently when I was asked to answer the following: 1. What is the most valuable lesson life has taught you? 2. To a young person in whom you were interested, what advice would you give which would help him to keep his balance in the most difficult experiences of his life? There we have two beautiful problems. Let us give them a little thought.? Adolescence is the most difficult period of life, because then every defeat seems final. Let the youth live but a little longer and he will learn life’s first, most valuable lesson—that nothing is final. “Things adjust themselves, more or less badly,” Disraeli used to say dolefully. Not a very consoling thought, put that way. For it is quite as true that things turn out well. More often still, many actions have no results—they come to naught. A few weeks slip into a few months; and of a situation that seemed at the time to have no possible solution nothing remains but a faint memory, a confused picture, a regret. The man or woman who has lived through the experience of an unendurable present transformed into a blurred past has more power to face affliction. “A wretched power,” the romantic youth will say, “a power made up of indifference and skepticism. Rather than that, gave me my weakness and my suffering.” The youth is mistaken. Men and women who have reached maturity have not become indifferent. If even in love they know the passion is fleeting, that every thought makes the experiences acute,more ardent. “Nothing is sadder than a second love,”Goethe said. “But a third comes and soothes the other two.” I speak here not only of personal problems and private sorrows. In political life it is especially true that long-faced prophets of misfortune unsettle inexperienced young