We have to-day, in the girl in her teens, who in large numbers is still in our Sunday-schools, a tremendous mental force. Were it awakened and developed, helped to see and interpret life according to the principles of Jesus, in fifty years the church would find most of its present problems solved. For hard to realize as it is when looking into the faces and training the minds of the girls in their teens of to-day, still it is true that we are looking at and training the women of to-morrow, yes, those who a few years hence holding their children in their arms, shall decide all unknowing what the next generation of men and women shall be and do. To encourage the girl in her teens to use her mental powers to the utmost, to help her gain knowledge and self-control, to guide her in her thinking, is the task of every parent and teacher, and it is a task tremendously worth while. CHAPTER IV—THE SPIRITUAL SIDE All civilization begins in sensation and feeling. The most abstruse and abstract thought of to-day is possible because ages and ages ago men living in caves were hungry and sought food, were cold and sought warmth, felt fear and sought protection. They conquered in battle with fierce animals and neighboring tribes, and felt the joy of victory and the satisfaction of possession. The “self” sensations and feelings are at the foot of the ladder of civilization by which man, with almost infinite patience has climbed thus far. But self is not all. As the ages passed, man’s pleasure of protection included his neighbor in his feeling and thought. Misfortune evoked pity, and suffering called forth sympathy, the desire for fair play for self grew until it became a sense of justice which included the other man, and the moral sense developed and was strengthened by experience through the succeeding ages. From the beginning “the _spirit_ of man sought ever to speak.” At first he would propitiate the spirits of air and fire, the rulers of earth and sea, the harvest and the battle,—please them and buy their favor that he might be happy. In weird chants and dances, in feast days and fast days, by sacrifice and penance, he endeavored to appease the spirits of his gods and insure happiness for himself. Great multitudes of the human race have gone no farther. After all the progress of thought their prayers are still intense appeals for blessing upon self and self-interests, and they still keep the feasts and fasts, and bring offerings with hope of personal reward. But every century brings an increasing number so filled with the sense of another’s need that in some measure at least they forget self. Their prayers are petitions for others,—their gifts are poured out without thought of recompense; the spiritual nature within them, awakened and developed, triumphs and manifests itself in a thousand varying deeds that bless mankind.