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Christian Temperance and Bible Hygiene - Ellen G. White

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Young persons who are thrown into one<br />

another’s society, may make their association a<br />

blessing or a curse. They may edify <strong>and</strong> strengthen<br />

one another, improving in deportment, in<br />

disposition, in knowledge; or, by permitting<br />

themselves to become careless <strong>and</strong> unfaithful, they<br />

may exert only a demoralizing influence.<br />

Many of the young are eager for books. They<br />

read everything they can obtain. Exciting love<br />

stories <strong>and</strong> the specimens of nude art displayed in<br />

art galleries, have a corrupting influence. The<br />

imagination becomes defiled. Then follow sins <strong>and</strong><br />

crimes which drag beings formed in the image of<br />

God down below the level of the brutes, <strong>and</strong> sink<br />

them at last in perdition. Avoid reading <strong>and</strong> seeing<br />

things which will suggest impure thoughts.<br />

Cultivate a love for high moral <strong>and</strong> intellectual<br />

themes. Let not the noble powers of the mind<br />

become enfeebled <strong>and</strong> perverted by much reading<br />

of even story-books. I know of strong minds that<br />

have been unbalanced <strong>and</strong> almost paralyzed, by<br />

intemperate <strong>and</strong> indiscriminate reading.<br />

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