7) If your heart is kind, you will learn to talk interestingly, and to listen intelligently.
8) Try, increasingly, to fit your word to your thought, and your thought to the fact. Being accurate does not mean being dull. Effective speech has much need for imagination, but very little for common slang. You understand and enjoy,—
These growing feathers plucked from Caesar's wing Will make him fly an ordinary pitch.
If, however, in slang phrase, a person spoke of "swiping Caesar's dope"; or of making Caesar "come off his perch," you would see that something fine in the thought had vanished. Practise expressing your ideas as attractively as possible.
9) Don't make cutting remarks about those who are absent; your wit may win a laugh, but its unkindness will cause others to like you the less. They will feel uncomfortable about what you may say of them in their absence.
10) Whenever you are curious about the wonderful experience which we call "birth," think of it reverently, and go at once for information to your father or mother; if you lack these, to some high-minded friend much older than you. Otherwise, inclose a stamped envelope addressed to yourself in a letter to the Y.M.C.A. or the Y.W.C.A. or the Federal Bureau of Information, Washington, D.C., asking the title of the best book for a boy or a girl of your age, about the Beginnings of Life.
11) Never listen to explanations from the ignorant or the vulgar. Impure thoughts on this subject lead to the ruin of both body and spirit. Pure thoughts lead to the most precious possessions the world can give: father, mother, sister, brother, friend, husband, wife, children, home, country.
12) Be dependable. If any quality is most desirable, it is that of dependableness. In school you have wonderful opportunities for cultivating it.
13) Every one of you should aim to become economically independent. To that end, decide on a vocation and plan your studies accordingly. If you wish to change later, very well; but always work towards a definite goal.
14) Avoid showing your displeasure with an acquaintance by not bowing. To do so is crude. A formal bow should be bestowed even on an enemy. "Cut" an acquaintance only when you have reason to believe him an utterly unfit companion.