Decatur Catholic High School - Tattler Yearbook (Decatur, IN)

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Elf 'l I l..F. efforts and he is anxiously abiding the time when his Hrst installment of this serial debt comes due. This may be consoling to his indolence, but none too promising of realization. The conduct of such a student offers 110 line of research for the psychol- ogist his failure is the logical product of his mental dulluess. But why such pessimistic allegations? Has not even the indoleut student passed his examinations, received his diploma? A diploma has no intrinsic valueg it has a relative value. It is like our gold and silver certificates whose inherent value does not exceed their weight in ordinary paper, but become valuable by virtue of their nume.'rcal equivalent of actual gold and silver deposited in the U. S. treasury. So, too. a diploma means nothing unless it be a bona tide indorsement of honest and con- scientous efforts of the students enti1'e course. It, therefore, means much or abso- lutely nothing. It means much when it expresses the sum total of honest energy: it means little, or nothing mo1'e than a distorted view of merit if it represents less. The student's success in the world is determined by the mental responsiveness he devoted to his studies and not by his diploma. The merely get-by attitude of the student evinced in school will tenaciously assert itself in all of his after efforts. His inaptitude will soon be discovered, and he will be catalogued as belonging to the category ot mis- tits. He will have to stand by and beat time while the parade of progress is advancing. When then, you are told by the commencement speaker that you are the hope of the future. the leaders of the nation, pause momentarily to ascertain if you can consciou- tiously apply the words to yourself: whether your school work will warrant the exercise of leadership. And when your diploma is handed to you try to sensitize what it means to you individually. Can you find any contentment, any satisfaction in re- ceiving your diploma in its general accepted sense that you have simply completed your high school course? If you have nursed no higher ambition during your high school course than merely making the passing grades, you have courted the just dues that await your initial embaikment in the affairs of the world-Failure. He who would succeed in life must have a detinite plan. His life must be purpose- ful, well ordered. Too many students enter high school with no detinite plan' for the future whatever. Their facillating mind consequently settles on no specific purpose of life and thus they enter upon worldly pursuits, shifting from pillar to post, with the marked indifference that characterized their school work. They get nowhere. The present history of our American youth, I believe, fully warrants my pessimistic views of the man suffering from mental rheumatism. Our young men are not thinking pri- marily of the hard-earned dollar, but imbued with the previously mentioned slogan, they trust to luck, which. when it fails them. as it usually does, they resort to other means which can not be catalogued as legitimate pursuits. They are unhappy for time and eternity. Happiness is a state of mind attained by thoughts that are radiated from within rather than experience that comes from without. Real happiness. therefore, is based primarily upon service and sacrifice. -REV. J. A. SEIMETZ. A A L A A. A A.A.A AML A A Jr..-Al1.L A.tA. .- ,, , .cle , AA , , ,.--., l-,,.--.,.-,.-..,,-V.,,--.,..-,...,.--,.-.,..,.--.,.-., -., -- ,,...f..,f.,,,,. 0 ...T .Af .pf ,I .7 7 1 ,7 A 'l'hir'teE-11.

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a torture chair, obsessed with the idea that they are sentenced to scholastic contine- ment to fill a period of time legally ordained for no other purpose than to discipline them in the virtue of submission. The 1'esult of this misconception responds too readily to the feeling of the animal who is anxiously abiding the time ot his release. He takes no interest in his occupation: his one supreme thought is freedom from the shackles that bind him. And thus the student who labors under the impression that his freedom is mischievonsly curtailed. takes no interest in his studies but is longing for his acquital, that he may engage in the pursuits of his elders, Neglecting the essential qualifications that contribute to success, he establishes in his lethargic mind the con- tention that the world is holding out to him her choicest morsels. But experience will soon divert his aspirations into less-promising channels. Like others of similar con- duct, he must pay the price of his stupidity. His mental rheumatism developed in school will assert itself in maturity. He has evolved a malignant case of mental rheumatisni and the baneful influence of his intellectual ailments now exact their just dues. To guard off an evil, one must be constantly alert to its perceptible symptons. XVhat are the symptons of mental rheumatism? They are many and various. too many. in fact. to accord them space in this article. so we will designate them under the one generic head-voluntary distractions: mentioning a few, however, to elucidate their specific results. The most dangerous of these symptons is insubordinantion. This sympton closes the mind of the student to all pedagogical infiuences. His refusal to submit to constituted authority leaves his mutinous mind to cavort amid its own dis- torted caprices. His vagrant disposition cannot settle upon a definite object other than nurse his own pride. Athletics. most commendable, when they do not interfer with the school work, are a wholesome recreation to the mind. but a sympton of mental rheumatism when they harass the mind which, should be otherwise occupied. Smok- ing of cigarettes, an eminently successful means of beclouding the brain cells of tha young pupil, is an advanced sympton of mental rheumatism, Other very prevalent symptons are boyritis and girlritis, respectively. To emphasize their perniciousness, I borrow from the medical phraseology by adding the suffix ritis. No boy or girl can successfully rivet his or her mind on their books while their mental vision is scanning the screen of dazzling shieks and flappers demonstrating the Terpsichorean art. Then, finally, there is another sympton which bears the infamous name of down-right-laziness. This however, can not justly be called a sympton but rather a fully developed stage of mental rhenmatisni. These diversities of the mind detract from the proper school functioning of the brain and can not successfully be associated with school work. The period of life devoted to higher education is so crowded with the constituent principles of knowledge that it can not admit of any interference from other sources: The student who divides his attention with these deflections, invites incalculable harm to his school workg he belongs in the category of misguided individuals whose notion of natural rights is typical of the slogan The world owes me a living and it is the indolent habits of such that grant such phrases long life, and once this phrase has clicked into his receptive mind. it is hard to dislodge it. Thisuphrase serves to economize his school Ak, -,.:.s.4.AA1.AAfAx.+.A.AAA.:.A ' l 4 u I l'i I 't lf'-I 1 I- 4 '-I '-U I- -l '-l- '4 '+t t -I I Twelve. -. , V. .-, . -.--. -, .--.- V,

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A TRIBUTE TO OUR TEACHERS How little we realize the moulding influence a teacher exerts until the students have left the sheltered school room. The teacher has a vision, imparts it to her pupils and they carry it on. How many pupils. except for the guidance of a teacher would have not progressed. How many teachers have held up the light for the ambitious student's blundering feet. What we are, we owe to our teachers. And it would be diflicult to find such teachers as we have here at D. C. H. S. They have labored, planned, struggled to make us the Senior Class we are todayg have tirelessly given of their energy dur- ing the past four years, that we might have social enjoyments, partake of dramatic activities, and have provided for us a curriculum of studies and advantages that can have but the highest cultural affect if we have cooperated. We can do so little to repay them, it is trueg but we can do this-we can so govern our lives in the years following graduation, that they remember our school days with pleasure, and seeing our progress in the world, feel that the teachings they instilled, have not been in vain. A . 4- A .5 .Ld 1 V1 u u o u' '-0'0 -0 -l '-I I 1 4 4 Fourteen.