Consider for a moment--Who are we, and what do we mean by
_Ourselves_? When I meet a ragged, shuffling tramp on the road
(and I meet a good many of them in my lonely walks) I often find
myself asking the question, "How did that shambling vagabond come to
his present condition? Did his father turn him out of doors? Did his
mother drink? Did he learn nothing but lying and swearing and
thieving when he was a child? Was his grandfather hanged for some
crime, or was his great-grandfather a ruffian killed in a fight?" And
I say to myself, "Though I do not know the truth, yet I am sure that
man was helped towards his vagabondism, helped to become an outcast
as he is, by the neglect or the wickedness, the crimes or the bad
example of his fathers and forefathers on one side or the other; for
if he had come of decent people on both sides, people who had been
honestly and soberly brought up themselves, as they tried to bring up
their children, yonder dirty tramp would not and could not have sunk
to his present self, for we and ourselves are what we come to, partly
by our own sins and vices, but partly (and much more than some like
to believe) by the sins, negligences, and ignorances of those whose
blood is in our veins.
My friends, it surely must be worth our while to know much more than
most of us do know about _Ourselves_.
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