CHAPTER IV. Be Choice of Language

Be Choice of Language

INTRODUCTION TO CHAPTER IV

BY GENERAL O. O. HOWARD

“Maintain your rank, vulgarity despise, To swear is neither brave, polite nor wise; You would not swear upon a bed of death; Reflect—your Maker now may stop your breath.” Anonymous.

One moonlight night I was passing near a sentinel’s post. It was during the winter of 1861–2, in front of Alexandria, Virginia, at Camp California. The sentinel, in some trouble, used rough, coarse language, closing with an oath. Approaching him, till I could see his face, think of my astonishment to find him, instead of a burly man of low life, a handsome boy of seventeen. I said to him pleasantly: “How could your mother have taught you to swear?” Dropping his head with a sudden shame, he answered, “She didn’t, General. I learned it here.” And indeed, it came from the influence of his associates.

One’s language always gauges him.