I was speaking to the freshman class at Wabash College, a small all-male college in Crawfordsville, Indiana. “What does it mean to be a gentleman?” I asked. “Raise your hand if you’d like to share your definition of a gentleman.”
One young man offered: “A gentleman is someone who goes to gentlemen’s clubs and watches girls strip.” There were a few laughs.
“That’s very amusing,” I replied. “Would anyone like to venture a more serious answer?”
A few others raised their hands. A gentleman wears a three-piece suit, one said. A gentleman opens doors for women, said another. We discussed the origin of the term gentleman, which originally simply meant a member of the aristocracy who didn’t have to work for a living. As C. S. Lewis observed, in an earlier era one might have said of a particular man, “John is a liar and a gentleman,” meaning that although he might be an aristocrat, he is not truthful. But over time, the term came to mean something different….