If youth could see but a little with the eyes of their seniors, some pleasures would seem less alluring, and they would avoid doing some things which they will regret all their lives. Now and then some young eye will glance at a page of bygone lore and see a gleam of inspiration, like a torch in a forest, which reveals a bear in a bush which he had chosen for a picnic, or discovers a bog which he had taken to be solid ground. Proverbs come around the young observer, so fair seeming he trusts them on sight, and does not know they are only in part guiding and in part elusive, and have limitations which may betray him into confident and futile extremes. Even professors will beguile him with statements which he doubts not are true, and finds, all too late, that they are false. He will hear forebodings which fill him with alarm at some new undertaking, not knowing that they are but the sounds of the footfalls of Progress, which every generation has heard, the ignorant with terror, and the wise with gladness. Only the relation of bygone experiences can save the young from perilous illusions. Of course, youth is always asked to look at things with the eyes of age, but they never do. They never can do it, because the eyes of the old look at things with the light of experience which, in the nature of things, youth is without. Nevertheless, the experience of others may be good reading for them. If in the generous eagerness of youth the heart inclines to a forlorn hope, take it up notwithstanding its difficulties, for if youth does not, older people are not likely to attempt it. The older are mostly too prudent to do any good in the way of new enterprise. This is where youth has its uses and its priceless advantage. However, it is well not to let enthusiasm, noble as it may be, blind the devotee. Take care that the cause espoused is sound. Take heed of the Japanese maxim, "The lid, if the pot be broken, It is no use mending." CHAPTER XLVI. EXPERIENCES ON THE WARPATH The late Archbishop of Canterbury spoke derisively of agitators. The Rev. Stewart Headlam asked whether "Paul, and even our Lord Himself, were not agitators." Mr. Headlam might have asked, where would the Archbishop be but for that superb, irrepressible agitator Luther? The agitator is a public advocate who speaks when others are silent. Mr. C. D. Collet, of whom I here write, was an agitator who understood his business. Agitation for the public welfare is a feature of civilisation. In a despotic land it works by what means it can. In a free country it seeks its ends by agencies within the limits of law. The mastery of the means left open for procuring needful change, the right use, and the full use of these facilities, constitute the business of an agitator.