Also, the work of those who seek to educate our later youth, and of those who are forever pouring out their lives to lead the world a little higher, is rendered million-fold more difficult by this same gulf, this terrible line of cleavage which strikes so deep to the roots of life, and leaves our beautiful feelings and wise thoughts to mount sky-high in magnificent culture, while our action, which is life's real test, grovels slowly along, scarce moved by all our fine ideas.
A more general discourager of our racial advancement than this method of brain-training we could hardly have invented. It is universal in its application, and grinds down steadily on all our people during the most impressionable years of life. That we grow as we do in spite of it is splendid proof of the beneficent forces of our unconscious life, always stronger than our conscious efforts; and that our American children grow more freely, and so have more powerof initiative and self-government, is the best work of our democracy.
"But what else can we do?" will ask the appalled parents. Without authority they feel no grip upon the child, and see themselves exposed to infant tyranny, and the infant growing up neglected and untrained. This shows how little progress we have made in child-culture, how little grasp we have of the real processes of education. Any parent, no matter how ignorant, is wiser than a baby and larger. Therefore, any parent can direct a child's action and enforce it, to some extent. But to understand how to modify the child's action by such processes as shall keep it still his own, to alter his act by first altering his feeling and thought and so keeping the healthy sequence unbroken, that is a far more subtle and difficult task. A typical instance of this difference in method may be illustrated in that common and always difficult task, teaching a child table manners. Here is a case in which there is no instinct in the child to be appealed to. The noise, clumsiness, and carelessness to which we objectare not at all unpleasant to him. In what way can we reach the child's range of reasoning, and convince him of the desirability of this artificial code of ours? We can, of course, state that it displeases us, and appeal to his good will not to give us pain. This is rational enough; but consideration for others, based on a mere statement of distaste,—a distaste he cannot sympathise with,—is a rather weak force with most children. It is a pity to over-strain this delicate feeling. It should be softly tested from time to time, and used enough to encourage a healthy growth; but to continually appeal to a sympathy none too strong is often to strain and weaken it. In table manners it seldom works well. The alleged distress of the parent requires too much imagination, the desired self-control has too slight a basis.
But there is a far safer and better way. Carefully work out in your own mind the real reason why you wish the child to conform to this particular code of table ethics. It is not wholly on the ground of displeasing you by the immediate acts. The main reason why they displease you, and why youare so concerned about the matter, is that this is the accepted standard among the people with whom you associate and with whom you expect the child to associate; and, if he does not conform to this code, he will be excluded from desirable society.
Reasons why table manners exist at all, or are what they are, require further study; but the point at issue is not why it is customary to eat with the fork instead of the knife, but why your child should do so. When he gets to the point of analysing these details, and asks why he should fold his napkin in one case and leave it crumpled in another, you will of course be prepared with the real reasons. Meanwhile the real reason why the child should learn not to do these undesirable things is that such manners, if pursued, will deprive him of desirable society.
We usually content ourselves with an oral statement to this effect: "Nobody will want to eat with you if you do so!" Right here let a word be said to those who are afraid of over-stimulating a child's brain by a more rational method of training. Training byobservation and deduction is far easier to a young brain than training by oral statements. To take into the mind by ear a statement of fact, and to hold that statement in memory and preserve its force to check a natural action, is a difficult feat for an adult. But to see that such a thing has such a consequence, and "take warning" by that, is the "early method," the natural method, the quickest, easiest, surest way. So, instead of saying to the child, "If you behave so, people will not want to eat with you," we should let him see that this is the case, and feel the lack.
His most desirable society is usually that of his parents; and his first entrance upon that plane should be fairly conditioned upon his learning to play the game as they do. No compulsion, no penalties, no thought of "naughtiness," merely that, if he wants to eat with them, why, that is the way they eat, and he must do so, too. If he will not, exit the desirable society. By very gradual steps,—not by long, tiresome grown-up meals, but by a graduated series of exercises that should recognise the physical difficultyof co-ordinating the young faculties on this elaborate "manual of arms,"—a child could learn the whole performance in a reasonable time, and lose neither nervous force nor clearness of perception in the process.
As we do these things now, pulling this string and that, appealing to feelings half developed, urging reasons which find no recognition, using compulsion which to the child's mind is arbitrary and unjust, we may superinduce a tolerable system of table manners, but we have more or less injured the instrument in so doing. A typewriter could, perhaps, be worked with a hammer; but it would not improve the machine. We have had far more consideration for "the machinery of the household" than for the machinery of a child's mind, and yet the real foundation claim of the home is that it is necessary to rear children in. If the ordinary conditions of household life are unsuitable to convey the instruction we desire, it is for us to so arrange those conditions as to make them suitable.
There are cases, many cases, in a child-time, where we cannot command the conditionsnecessary for this method of instruction, where the child must act from our suggestion with no previous or accompanying reasoning. This makes it all the more necessary that such reasoning should be open to him when we can command it. Moreover, the ordinary events in a young life are not surprises to the parent. We know in advance the things that are so unexpected to the child. Why should we not be at some pains to prepare him for these experiences? The given acts of each day are not the crucial points we make of them. What is important is that the child shall gradually establish a rational and connected scheme of life and method of action, his young faculties improving as he uses them, life growing easier and plainer to him from year to year. It is for the parent, the educator, the brain-trainer, to study out details of method and delicate applications. The main purpose is that the child's conduct shall be his own,—his own chosen course of action, adopted by him through the use of his own faculties, not forced upon him by immediate external pressure.
It is our business to make plain to him the desirability of the behaviour we wish produced, carefully establishing from day to day his perceptions of the use and beauty of life, and his proven confidence in us as interpreters. The young brain should be regularly practised in the first easy steps of sequential reasoning, arguing from the interesting causes we so carefully provide to the pleasant or not too painful effects we so honestly let it feel, always putting two and two together as it advances in the art and practice of human conduct. Then it will grow into a strong, clear, active, mature brain, capable of relating the facts of life with a wider and juster vision than has been ours, and acting unflinchingly from its own best judgment, as we have striven to do in vain these many years.
The question of discipline is a serious one to every young mother; and most mothers are young to begin with. She feels the weight of maternal responsibility and the necessity for bringing up her child properly, but has studied nothing whatever on the subject.
What methods of discipline are in general use in the rearing of children? The oldest and commonest of all is that of meeting an error in the child's behaviour with physical pain. We simply hurt the child when he does wrong, in order that he may so learn not to do wrong. A method so common and so old as this ought to be clearly justified or as clearly condemned by its results.
Have we succeeded yet in simplifying and making easy the training of children,—easy for the trainer and for the trained; and have we developed a race of beings with plain, strong, clear perceptions of right and wrong behaviour and an easy and accurate fulfilment of those perceptions?
It must be admitted that we have not; but two claims will be made in excuse: first, that, however unsuccessful, this method of discipline is better than any other; and, second, that the bad behaviour of humanity is due to our inherent depravity, and cannot be ameliorated much even by physical punishment. Some may go further, and say that whatever advance we have made is due to this particular system. Unfortunately, we have almost no exact data from which to compute the value of different methods of child-training.
In horse-training something definite is known. On one of the great stock ranches of the West, for instance, where some phenomenal racers have been bred, the trainers of colts not only forbid any rough handling of the sensitive young animals, but even rough speaking to them. It has been proven that the intelligent and affectionate horse is trained more easily and effectually by gentleness than by severity. But with horses the methods used are open to inspection, and also the results.
With children each family practises aloneon its own young ones, and no record is kept beyond the casual observation and hearsay reports of the neighbours. Yet, even so, there is a glimmer of light. The proverbial uncertainty as to "ministers' sons" indicates a tendency to reaction when a child has been too severely restrained; and the almost sure downfall of the "mamma's darling," the too-much-mothered and over-indulged boy, shows the tendency to foolish excesses when a child has not been restrained enough.
Again, our general uncertainty as to methods proves that even the currently accepted "rod" system is not infallible. If it were, we should have peace of mind and uncounted generations of good citizens. As it is, we have the mixed and spotty world we all know so well,—a heavy percentage of acknowledged criminals, a much larger grade of those who just do not break the law, but whose defections from honesty, courage, truth, and honour weigh heavily upon us all. Following that comes the vast mass of "good people," and their behaviour is sometimes more trying than that of the bad ones.
Humanity does gain, but not as fast as so intelligent a race should. In penology something has been learned. Here, dealing with the extreme criminal, we are slowly establishing the facts that arbitrary and severe punishment does not proportionately decrease crime; that crime has causes, which may be removed; and that the individual needs to be treated beforehand, preventively, rather than afterward, retributively. This would seem to throw some light on infant penology. If retributive punishment does not proportionately decrease crime in adult criminals, perhaps it does not decrease "naughtiness" among little children. If there is an arrangement of conditions and a treatment which may prevent the crime, perhaps there may be an arrangement of conditions and a treatment which will prevent the naughtiness.
One point may be clearly established, to begin with; and that is the need of an open court for our helpless little offenders. Whatever else we think of human nature, we know it to be fallible, and that a private individual cannot be expected to administer justice in secret and alone.
Suppose Mr. Jones steals a cow from Mr. Smith, is Mr. Smith capable of being himself both judge and executioner? Does not the very conception of justice involve a third party, some one to hold the scales, to balance, to decide? And, if circumstances compel much power to be invested in an individual for a season, should not that individual be previously instructed from some code of law which many have sanctioned, and afterward be held responsible to public judgment?
A ship captain, for instance, has absolute authority for a while; but his authority rests on law, and, if he breaks that law, he is liable to punishment. Moreover, if he goes too far while in command, he is liable to dangerous mutiny as well. But in domestic discipline the child is absolutely in the power of the parent. There is no appeal. There is no defence. There are no witnesses. The child offends against the parent, and the offended one is both judge and executioner. A number of children may commit exactly the same offence, as, for instance, if six boys all go swimming whenforbidden; yet they are liable to six several punishments at the hands of their six several mothers or fathers,—punishments bearing relation to the views, health, and temper of the parent at the time rather than to the nature of the misdeed. The only glimmer of protection which the child gets from an enlightened community is in the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children,—a small, feeble body, acting in few localities, and intervening only to save the child from the parent when gross physical cruelty is practised. That in many cases parents are even violently cruel to little children gives reason to believe that many others are a little cruel; and that still more, while not cruel, are unwise.
There is no society for the prevention of over-indulgence to children, for instance; yet this is a frequent injury to our young people. Whatever the views of the separate parents, and whatever their standard of justice, a great improvement would be made if there were some publicity and community of action in their methods. A hundred men together can decide upon and carry out ahigher course of action than they could be trusted to follow severally. Our beautiful growth in justice and equity (for grown people) has always required this openness and union. Many a mother, tired and cross with her housework, does things to her child which she would be ashamed to retail to a cool and unprejudiced circle of friends. And many another mother consistently and conscientiously inflicts punishments which she would learn to be ashamed of if she heard them discussed by her respected associates with a consensus of disapproval.
In the ordinary contact of neighbourly life, some little development of this sort goes on: a few sporadic Mothers' Clubs lead to more concerted discussions; and to-day the Mothers' Congress, lately become the Parents' Congress, and other bodies, together with a growing field of literature on the subject, is leading to far wider and deeper thought, and some experiment. But the field is as wide as the world, and very little is yet accomplished. We have swung wide from the stern severity of earlier times, so that American children are notoriously"indulged"; but merely to leave off a wrong method, without introducing a better one, is not all that can be hoped.
The discipline of life lies before us all. The more carefully and wisely we teach and train our children, the less they and others need suffer afterward. But there does seem to be some grave deficiency in our method of domestic discipline. Here is little Albert being educated. He is not going to school yet. He is "not old enough." That is, he is not old enough to be taught anything systematically by persons whose business it is to teach; but he is old enough to be learning the a, b, c of life at the hands of those with whom he chances to be. A child learns every day. That cannot be helped. What he learns, and how, we can largely dictate; but we cannot keep his brain shut until he gets to school, and then open it for three or four hours a day only. What does little Albert learn? Put yourself in his place for a little while. Here are new sensations coming to him momently, through the eager nerves of sense. Here is a new brain, fresh to receive impressions,store them, and act upon them. The pleasure of perceiving is keen, the pleasure of his limited but growing reflection is keen, and the pleasure of action is best of all. Life is full of interest. All the innumerable facts which form our smooth background of behaviour, in the knowledge of which we avoid the water and the fire and go down hill circumspectly, are to him fresh discoveries and revelations. He has to prove them and put them together, and see how they work. The feelings with which we have learned to associate certain facts and actions do not exist to him. He knows nothing of "should" or "should not," except as he learns it by personal trial or through the reaction of other persons upon him.
This open state of mind we early destroy by labelling certain acts as good and others as bad; and, since we do not see our way to exhibiting the goodness or badness to the baby brain in natural colours, we paint them in sharp black and white, with no shading. He has to gather his sense of relatively good and bad from the degree of our praise and punishment; and strange, indeed, are his impressions.
The loving and cuddling which delight his baby soul are associated with so many different acts, and in such varying proportion, that he does not clearly gather whether it is more virtuous to kiss mamma or to pull grandpa's whiskers; and it takes him some time to learn which dress he must not hug. But, if the good things confuse him, the bad ones are far more complex and uncertain.
Little Albert is, we will say, investigating his mother's work-basket. A tall object stands before him. He just bumped his head against it, and it wiggled. He felt it wiggle. He reaches forth an inquiring hand, and finds graspable wicker legs within reach. To grasp and to pull are natural to the human hand and arm. To shake was early taught him. Things were put in his hands, the shaking of which produced an agreeable noise and admiration from the beloved ones. So he shakes this new object; and, to his delight, something rattles. He puts forth his strength, and, lo! the tall, shakable object falls prostrate before him, and scatters into a sprawling shower oflittle things that clink and roll. Excellent! Lovely! Have not persons built up tall creations of vari-colored blocks, and taught baby to knock them down and rejoice in their scattering!
But mamma, to whom this group of surfaces, textures, colours, movements, and sounds, means much besides infantile instruction, asserts that he is "naughty," and treats him with severity. "If you do that again," says irate mamma, "I'll whip you!" If Albert has not already been whipped, the new word means nothing. How is an unwhipped child to know what whipping means? She might save her breath. The lesson is not taught by words. But if she promptly whips him, and does so inevitably when he repeats the offence, he does learn a definite lesson; namely, that the act of pulling over a work-basket results in a species of physical pain,viamamma.
Then the unprejudiced young brain makes its deduction,—"The pulling over of things causes physical pain, named whipping." This much being established, he acts on the information. Presently helearns, with some little confusion, that going out of the gate without leave is also productive of whipping,—dissimilar acts, but the same result,—and lays this up with the other,—"Pulling over things and going out of gates are two causes with the same result,—whipping."
Then comes another case. He begins to investigate that endless wonder and attraction, the fire. If ever cause and effect were neatly and forcibly related, it is in this useful and dangerous element. So simple and sure is its instructive and deterrent action that we have built a proverb on it,—"The burnt child dreads the fire."
But the mother of Albert has a better plan than mother Nature. She interposes with her usual arbitrary consequence,—"If you play with fire, I will whip you," and Albert learns anew that this third cause still produces the same unpleasant result; and he makes his record,—"Pulling things over, going out of gates, playing with fire, result in whipping." And he acts accordingly. Then one day he makes a new and startling discovery. Led by some specialtemptation, he slips out of the gate and safely back again, unseen of any. No whipping follows. Then his astonished but accurate brain hastily revises the previous information, and adds a glaring new clause,—"It is not just going out of gates that makes a whipping come: it is being seen!" This is covertly tried on the other deeds with the same result. "Aha! Aha!" clicks the little recording machine inside. "Now I know! Whipping does not come from those things: it comes from mamma; and, if she doesn't see me, it doesn't come! Whipping is the result of being seen!" Of course, a little child does not actually say this to himself in so many words; but he does get this impression very clearly, as may be seen from his ensuing behaviour.
The principle in question, in considering this usual method of discipline, is whether it is better to associate a child's idea of consequences with the act itself or with an individual, and conditioned upon the chance of discovery. Our general habit is to make the result of the child's deed contingent upon the parental knowledge and displeasurerather than upon the deed itself. As in this hackneyed instance of the fire, instead of teaching the child by mild and cautious experiment that fire burns, we teach him that fire whips. The baby who is taught not to play with fire by the application of a rearward slipper does not understand the nature of the glittering attraction any better than before; and, as soon as he learns that whippings are contingent upon personal observation, he fondly imagines that, if he can play with fire without being seen, no pain will follow.
Thus the danger we seek to avert is not averted. He is still liable to be burned through ignorance. We have denied the true lesson as to the nature of fire, and taught a false one of arbitrary but uncertain punishment. Even if the child is preternaturally obedient and never does the things we tell him not to do, he does not learn the lesson. He is no wiser than before. We have saved him from danger and also from knowledge. If he is disobedient, he runs the same risk as if we had told him nothing, with the added danger of acting alone andnervously. Whereas, if he were taught the simple lesson that fire burns, under our careful supervision to see that the burn was not serious, then he would know the actual nature of fire, and dread it with sure reason, far more than he dreads the uncertain slipper.
This has been dwelt upon so fully by previous writers that there would seem small need of further mention; but still our mothers do not read or do not understand, and still our babies are confronted with arbitrary punishment instead of natural consequence. The worst result of this system is in its effect on the moral sense. We have a world full of people who are partially restrained from evil by the fear of arbitrary punishment, and who do evil when they imagine they can do so without discovery. Never having been taught to attach the evil consequence to the evil act, but instead to find it a remote contingency hinging on another person's observation, we grow up in the same attitude of mind, afraid not of stealing, but of the policeman.
If there is no slipper, why not tip overthe work-basket: if there is no policeman, why not steal? Back of slipper and police we hold up to the infant mind a still more remote contingency of eternal punishment; but this has to be wholly imagined, and is so distant, to a child's mind, as to have little weight. It has little weight with grown persons even, and, necessarily, less with a child.
The mental processes involved in receiving by ear an image of a thing never seen, of visualising it by imagination and then remembering the vision, and finally of bringing forward that remembered vision to act as check to a present and actual temptation, are most difficult. But where a consequence is instant and clear,—when baby tries to grab the parrot, and the parrot bites,—that baby, without being promised a whipping or being whipped, will thereafter religiously avoid all parrots.
A baby soon learns to shun certain things for reasons of his own. What he dislikes and fears he will not touch. It is no effort for the young mind to observe and remember a prompt natural consequence. We do makesome clumsy attempts in this direction, as when we tie up, in an ill-tasting rag, the thumb too often sucked. If thumb-sucking is a really bad habit and a general one, we should long since have invented a neat and harmless wash, purchasable in small bottles at the drug store, of which a few applications would sicken the unhappy suckling of that thumb most effectually. But thumb-sucking we do not consider as wrong, merely as undesirable. When the child does what we call wrong, we think he should be "punished." Our ideas of domestic discipline are still of the crudely savage era; while in social discipline, in penology, we have become tolerably civilised.
Some will say that the child is like a savage, and is most open to the treatment current at that time in our history. It is true that the child passes through the same phases in personal development that the race passed long ago, and that he is open to the kind of instruction which would affect a primitive-minded adult. But this means (if we are seeking to benefit the child), not the behaviour of one savage to another, butsuch behaviour as would elevate the savage. One of the most simple and useful elements in primitive discipline is retaliation. It is Nature's law of reaction in conscious form.
To retaliate in kind is primitive justice. If we observe the code of ethics in use among children, it resolves itself into two simple principles: that of instant and equal retaliation; or, when that fails, the dread ultimatum which no child can resist,—"I won't play!" A child who is considered "mean" and disagreeable by his fellows meets the simple and effectual treatment of snubbing, neglect, ostracism.
These two principles may be applied in domestic discipline gently, accurately, fairly, and without ill-feeling; and their effect is admirable. "What is the difference between this and the other method?" will be asked. "Is not this also descending to the plane of childishness, of savagery, to which you were just now objecting?" Here is the difference.
To apply a brutal and arbitrary punishment to the person of the offender is whatsavages do, and what we do, to the child. To receive a just and accurate retaliation is what child and savage understand, are restrained and instructed by. We should treat the child in methods applicable by the savage, not with the behaviour of savages. For instance, you are playing with a little child. The little child is rude to you. You put him down, and go away. This is a gentle reaction, which, being repeated, he soon learns to associate with the behaviour you dislike. "When I do this," observes the infant mind, "the play stops. I like to play. Therefore, I will not do the thing that stops it."
This is simple observation, and involves no ill-feeling. He learns to modify his conduct to a desired end, which is the lesson of life. In this case you treat him by a method of retaliation quite perceptible to a savage, and appealing to the sense of justice without arousing antagonism. But, if you are playing with the little one, he is rude to you, and you spank him, he is conscious of a personal assault which does arouse antagonism. It is not only what a savage couldunderstand, but what a savage would have done. It arouses savage feelings, and helps keep the child a savage. Also, it helps keep the race a savage; for the child who grows up under the treatment common in that era finds it difficult to behave in a manner suitable to civilisation.
Discipline is part of life; and, if met early and accepted, all life becomes easier. But the discipline which the real world gives us is based on inexorable law, not on personal whim. We make the child's idea of right and wrong rest on some person's feeling, not on the nature of the act. He is trained to behave on a level of primitive despotism, and cannot successfully adjust himself to a free democracy. This is why our American children, who get less of the old-fashioned discipline, make better citizens than the more submissive races who were kept severely down in youth, and are unable to keep themselves down in later life.
There is a painful paucity of ideas on child-training in most families, as clearly shown in the too common confession, "I'm sure I don't know what to do with thatchild!" or, "What would you do with such a child as that?"
If we may not use the ever-ready slipper, the shrill, abusive voice, the dark closet, or threat of withheld meal, what remains to us in the line of discipline? What is to be done to the naughty child? We need here some knowledge of what naughtiness really is. The child is a growing group of faculties, the comparative development of which makes him a good or bad member of society. His behaviour has, first, the limitations of his age, and, second, of his personality.
A child is naturally more timid than a grown person, and a given child may be afflicted with more timidity than is natural to his age. Acts which indicate such a condition show need of training and discipline. A certain amount of selfishness is natural to childhood: acts indicating unusual selfishness call for correction.
So with the whole field of childish behaviour: whatever acts show evil tendencies need checking; but the acts natural to every child only show that he is a child,—which is not "naughty"! If we considered the fieldbeforehand, asked ourselves what we expected during this day or this year in the behaviour of such a child, and were not displeased when he behaved within those lines, much unnecessary pain and trouble would be saved to both parties. Then, when things really indicative of evil were done, we should carefully examine and test the character so manifested, and begin to apply the suitable discipline.
For example, it is natural to childhood to be inconsiderate of others. The intense little ego, full of strong new sensations, has small sympathy for the sensations of his associates. The baby may love the kitten, and yet hurt it cruelly because he does not know how kittens feel. This is not naughty, and needs only the positive training which shall hasten his natural growth in extension of sympathy. To show him the right methods of handling the pet, and especially of not handling it; to teach him to enjoy watching the kitten's natural activities and to respect its preferences,—all that is education, and needs no "discipline." But, if the child shows a pleasure in hurtingthe kitten after he knows it hurts, then you have real evil to deal with. A character is indicated which may grow to callous indifference to the feelings of others, and even to their actual injury. These acts are "wrong"; and wise, strong measures are necessary.
There are two main lines on which to work. One is to take extra measures to cultivate sympathy, using nature study, and to examine and care for such pronounced cases of suffering as must arouse even the most dominant interest. The too-callous child might be taken to a children's hospital, and helped to minister to the needs of the small sufferers. His pets, meanwhile, should be large and strong creatures, which he would depend on more or less, and his enjoying their company made absolutely contingent on right treatment. Special attention should also be paid to all such acts as showed consideration of others,—to encourage and reward them.
Again, if a child shows a too violent or sullen temper, or is distinctly sly and untrustworthy, these are serious indications, and need careful and thorough treatment.
But the great majority of acts for which children are punished are not at all evil. "Carelessness," for instance, is incident to the young brain,—essential to it. The power always to properly co-relate and remember is an adult power, and not always strong in the adult. We need, of course, to encourage a growing carefulness, but not to expect it nor punish its natural lack.
Clumsiness is also incidental to the young nerve connections. The baby drops things continually, the child frequently: the adult will hold an object even while the mind is otherwise engaged, the habit of the flexo-motor nerves being well established. Enterprising experiment is not only natural to childhood, but a positive virtue. That is the quality which leads the world onward, and the lack of it is a Chinese wall against progress. One enormous field of what we call naughtiness in our little ones lies in offences against things.
First and foremost, clothes. Wetting, soiling, and tearing clothes,—what a sea of tears have been shed, what wails and sobs, what heavy and useless punishments inflicted,because of injured clothing! Yet almost every accident to clothing comes from the interaction of two facts: first, the perfectly natural clumsiness and carelessness of childhood; and, second, our interminable folly in dressing a child in unchildish garments, and placing him in unchildish conditions. There is no naughtiness involved except in the parent, who shows a stupidity abnormal to her age. Children are frequently reproached for wearing out their shoes. What does the intelligent parent expect? Is the child to sit in a chair, lie down, or ride the bicycle continually? If the child is seen to cut his shoes with knives or grind them on a grindstone, that may be discouraged as malicious mischief; but the inevitable stubbing and scuffing of the eager, restless, ungoverned little feet should have been foreseen and allowed for. We do strive to buy the heaviest possible mass of iron-shod leather for our boys, and then we scold them for being noisy.
To surround a growing creature with artificial difficulties, to fail to understand or allow for the natural difficulties of his age,and then to punish with arbitrary retribution the behaviour which is sure to appear, this is not the kind of discipline which makes wise, strong, self-governing citizens.
Our general knowledge of ethics is small and unreliable, and our practice in ethics even smaller and more unreliable. The good intentions of mankind are prominent; but our ideas of right behaviour are so contradictory and uncertain, our execution of such ideas as we hold so partial and irregular, that human behaviour continues to be most unsatisfactory. This condition we used to cheerfully attribute to the infirmity of human nature, taking ignominious consolation from the thought of our vicious tendencies and hopeless weakness.
The broad light of evolutionary study has removed this contemptible excuse. We now know human nature to be quite as good as the rest of nature, wherein everything is good after its kind; and that, furthermore, our human kind has made great improvement in conduct so far, and is capable of making a great deal more. We are not weak: we are strong. We are not wicked: we earnestly desire to be good. But we are stillvery ignorant of the science of ethics, and most inept in its practice.
We learn mathematics, and apply our knowledge with marvellous results. We learn physics, and use what we know therein to work miracles in the material world. Ethics is as plain a science as physics, and as easy of application. Ethics is the physics of social relation. The cause of our slow growth in ethics is this:—
The prominent importance of right action and constant need of some general standard to appeal to, strongly impress the human mind in its very earliest stage of development. Incapable as yet of scientific methods of study, ignorant, supremely credulous and timid, conservative and superstitious to a degree, primitive man promptly made "a religion" of his scant observations and deductions in ethics, and forbade all further study and experiment. Where other sciences have their recognised room for progress, a slowly accumulating and often changing knowledge behind, and a free field of uncertainty in front, ethics was promptly walled in with the absolute and the super-natural.The few lines of action then recognised as "moral" or "immoral" were defined in the most conclusive manner, and no room left for later study. It is most interesting to note the efforts of conscientious men in later ages to make an intelligible, consistent scheme of ethics out of these essentially incorrect early attempts. By these efforts a religion grew from a simple group of dogmas and rites to the complex ramifications of many commentators; and the occasional vigorous and progressive brain that saw more light has always had to suffer and struggle long to introduce new truth. We have forbidden, under awful penalties, all open-minded study in these lines; and this especially hindering mental attitude has kept the most general and simple of the sciences in a very backward condition, so that we go through school and college with no real enlightenment on the subject.
Thus a young man, quite proficient in languages, physics, and the higher mathematics, will be shamefully deficient in even the lowest ethics (right behaviour in regard to himself), and show no acquaintance whateverwith the higher branches of the subject. We err very commonly in right treatment of ourselves, more commonly in treatment of one another; and our confusion of idea and behaviour increases with the square of the distance, our behaviour to other nations or other kinds of animals being lowest of all. We have a common scheme of behaviour, coming from various influences and conditions, which we cannot ourselves account for by any ethical rules; and this every-day working ethics of ours shows how social evolution unconsciously developes needed conduct, even where our conscious intelligence fails to recognise or recommend such conduct as ethical. Thus we have developed many stalwart and timely virtues in spite of rather than because of religious approval, and many serious vices flourish without religious opposition.
A conspicuous instance of this is in the pious contentment of a wealthy church corporation, the income of which is derived from tenement houses which are hotbeds of evil; and in the often observed conduct of an irreligious man, who practises the commonplacenecessary virtues of daily business life. But this power of social evolution developes the immediate virtues essential to close personal intercourse more quickly than the higher range of virtue, needed in national and international affairs. Thus we often see "a good family man," friend, and perhaps even an honest business dealer, shamefully negligent or corrupt in political duty.
It would seem that the same brains which have brought us forward to such enormous knowledge in other lines might have made more progress in this. Some special cause must have operated, and be still operating, to prevent a normal growth in this deeply important field.
Much might be said here of the influence of religious custom; but the still closer and more invariable cause lies not in the church, but in the home.
Where in social relation our necessary enlargement and progress have forced upon us nobler characteristics, in the domestic relation small change has been made. The privacy and conservatism of the familygroup have made it a nursing ground of rudimentary survivals, long since outgrown in more open fields; and the ethical code of the family is patently behind that of the society in which it is located. The primitive instincts, affections, and passions are there; but justice, liberty, courtesy, and such later social sentiments are very weak.
New truth is seen by new brains. As the organ we think with grows from age to age, we are able to think farther and deeper; but, if the growing brain is especially injured in any one department in early youth, it will not grow as fast in that one line. As a general rule,—a rule with rare exceptions,—we do thus injure the baby brain in the line of ethical thought and action. In other sciences we teach what we know, when we teach at all, and practise fairly; but, in teaching a child ethics, we do not give even what we have of knowledge, and our practice with him and the practice we demand from him are not at all in accordance with our true views.
In glaring instance is the habit of lying to children. A woman who would not lieto a grown friend will lie freely to her own child. A man who would not be unjust to his brother or a stranger will be unjust to his little son. The common courtesy given any adult is not given to the child. That delicate consideration for another's feelings, which is part of our common practice among friends, is lacking in our dealings with children. From the treatment they receive, children cannot learn any rational and consistent scheme of ethics. Their healthy little brains make early inference from the conduct of their elders, and incite behaviour on the same plan; but they speedily find that these are poor rules, for they do not work both ways. The conduct we seek to enforce from them does not accord with our conduct, nor form any consistent whole by itself. It is not based on any simple group of principles which a child can understand, but rests very largely on the personal equation and the minor variations of circumstance.
Take lying again as an instance. 1. We lie to the child. He discovers it. No evil is apparently resultant. 2. He accuses us of it, and we punish him for impertinence.3. He lies to us, and meets severe penalties. 4. We accuse him of it, rightly or wrongly, and are not punished for impertinence. 5. He observes us lie to the visitor in the way of politeness with no evil result. 6. He lies to the visitor less skilfully, and is again made to suffer. 7. He lies to his more ignorant juniors, and nothing happens. 8. Meanwhile, if he receives any definite ethical instruction on the subject, he is probably told that God hates a liar, that to lie is a sin!
The elastic human brain can and does accommodate itself to this confusion, and grows up to complacently repeat the whole performance without any consciousness of inconsistency; but progress in ethics is hardly to be looked for under such conditions. It is pathetic to see this waste of power in each generation. We are born with the gentler and kinder impulses bred by long social interrelation. We have ever broader and subtler brains; but our good impulses are checked, twisted, tangled, weighed down with many artificial restrictions, and our restless questionings andsuggestions are snubbed or neglected. A child is temptingly open to instruction in ethics. His primitive mental attitude recognises the importance of the main principles as strongly as the early savage did. His simple and guarded life makes it easy for us to supply profuse and continuous illustrations of the working of these principles; and his strong, keen feelings enable us to impress with lasting power the relative rightness and wrongness of different lines of action.
Yet this beautiful opportunity is not only neglected, but the fresh mind and its eager powers are blurred, confused, discouraged, by our senseless treatment. Our lack of knowledge does not excuse it. Our lingering religious restriction does not excuse it. We know something of ethics, and practise something, but treat the child as if he was a lower instead of a higher being. Surely, we can reduce our ethical knowledge into some simple and teachable shape, and take the same pains to teach this noblest, this most indispensable of sciences that we take to teach music or dancing. Physics is thescience of molecular relation,—how things work in relation to other things. Ethics is the science of social relation,—how people work in relation to other people. To the individual there is no ethics but of self-development and reproduction. The lonely animal's behaviour goes no farther. But gregarious animals have to relate their behaviour to one another,—a more complex problem; and in our intricate co-relation there is so wide a field of inter-relative behaviour that its working principles and laws form a science.
However complex our ultimate acts, they are open to classification, and resolve themselves into certain general principles which long since were recognised and named. Liberty, justice, love,—we all know these and others, and can promptly square a given act by some familiar principle. The sense of justice developes very early, and may be used as a basis for a large range of conduct. "To play fair" can be early taught. "That isn't fair!" is one of a child's earliest perceptions. "When I want to go somewhere, you say I'm too little; and, when Icry, you say I'm too big! It isn't fair!" protests the child.
In training a child in the perception and practice of justice, we should always remember that the standard must suit the child's mind, not ours. What to our longer, wider sweep of vision seems quite just, to him may seem bitterly unjust; and, if we punish a child in a way that seems to him unjust, he is unjustly punished. So the instructor in ethics must have an extended knowledge of the child's point of view,—that of children in general and of the child being instructed in particular, and the illustrations measured accordingly. It ought to be unnecessary to remark that no more passion should be used in teaching ethics than in teaching arithmetic. The child will make mistakes, of course. We know that beforehand, and can largely provide for them. It is for us to arrange his successive problems so that they are not too rapid or too difficult, and to be no more impatient or displeased at a natural slip in this line of development than in any other.
Unhappily, it is just here that we almostalways err. The child's slowly accumulating perceptions and increasing accuracy of expression are not only confused by our erroneous teaching, but greatly shocked and jarred by our manner, our evident excitement in cases of conduct which we call "matters of right and wrong." All conduct is right or wrong. A difference in praise or blame belongs to relative excellence of intention or of performance; but the formation of a delicate and accurate conscience is sadly interfered with by our violent feelings. It is this which renders ethical action so sensitive and morbid. Where in other lines we act calmly, according to our knowledge, or, if we err, calmly rectify the error, in ethics we are nervous, vacillating, unduly elated or depressed, because our early teachings in this field were so overweighted with intense feeling.
Self-control is one of the first essentials in the practice of ethics,—which is to say, in living. Self-control can be taught a child by gently graduated exercises, so that he shall come calmly into his first kingdom, and exercise this normal human power withoutself-consciousness. We do nothing actively to develope this power. We simply punish the lack of it when that lack happens to be disagreeable to us. A child who has "tantrums," for instance,—those helpless, prostrate passions of screaming and kicking,—is treated variously during the attack; but nothing is done during the placid interval to cultivate the desired power of control. Self-control is involved in all conscious acts. Therefore, it should not be hard to so arrange and relate those acts as to steadily develope the habit.
Games in varying degree require further exertion of self-control, and games are the child's daily lessons. The natural ethical sense of humanity is strongly and early shown in our games. It is a joy to us to learn "the rules" and play according to them, or to a maturer student to grasp the principles and work them out; and our quick condemnation of the poor player or the careless player, and our rage at him who "does not play fair," show how naturally we incline to right conduct. Life is a large game, with so many rules that it is veryhard to learn by them; but its principles can be taught to the youngest. When we rightly understand those principles, we can leave off many arbitrary rules, and greatly simplify the game. The recognition of the rights of others is justice, and comes easily to the child. The generosity which goes beyond justice is also natural to the child in some degree, and open to easy culture. It should, however, always rest on its natural precursor, justice; and the child be led on to generosity gradually, and by the visible example of the higher pleasure involved.
To divide the fruit evenly is the first step. To show that you enjoy giving up your share, that you take pleasure in his pleasure, and then, when this act is imitated, to show such delight and gratitude as shall make the baby mind feel your satisfaction,—that is a slow but simple process. We usually neglect the foundation of justice, and then find it hard to teach loving-kindness to the young mind. Demands on the child's personal surrender and generosity should be made very gradually, and always with a clearly visible cause. Where any dawningfaculty is overstrained in youth, it is hard and slow to re-establish the growth.
One simple ethical principle most needful in child-training, and usually most painfully lacking, is honesty. Aside from direct lying, we almost universally use concealment and evasion; and even earlier than that we assume an artificial manner with babies and young children which causes the dawning ethical sense strange perturbations.
It is a very common thing to demand from little children a show of affection without its natural prompting. Even between mother and child this playing at loving is often seen. "Come and kiss mamma! What! Don't you love mamma? Poor mamma! Mamma cry!" And mamma pretends to cry, in order to make baby pretend to love her. The adult visitor almost invariably simulates an interest and cordiality which is not felt, and does it in a palpably artificial manner. These may seem small matters. We pass them without notice daily, but they are important in the foundation impressions of the young brain. Children are usually very keen to detect the pretence."Oh, you don't mean that: you only say so!" they remark. We thus help to develope a loose, straggling sense of honesty and honour, a chronic ethical inaccuracy, like a bad "ear" for music.
The baby-educator should see to it that she show only real feelings to the child; and show them in large letters, as it were. Do not say, "Mamma is angry," or "Mamma is grieved," or "Mamma is ashamed," but be angry, grieved, or ashamed visibly. Let the child observe the effect of his act on you, not hear you say you feel thus and so, and see no signs of it. We depend far too much on oral statements, and neglect the simpler, stronger, surer means of conveying impressions. The delicacy of perception of a child should be preserved and tenderly used. We often blur and weaken it by giving false, irregular, and disproportionate impressions, and then are forced to use more and more violence to make any impression at all. All this sensitiveness is to ethics what the "musical ear" is to music. In injuring it, we make it harder for the growing soul to discriminate delicately in ethicalquestions,—a difficulty but too common among us.
The basis of human ethics, being social, requires for its growth a growing perception of collective and inter-relative rights and duties. Our continual object with the child is to establish in his mind this common consciousness and an accurate measure in perception. It is at first a simple matter of arithmetic. Here is the group of little ones, and the equal number of cookies: palpably, each should have one. Here is one extra cookie. Who shall have it? Robby, because his is the smallest. Jamie cries that his is as small as Robby's. Is it? The fact is ascertained. Divide the extra cookie, then: that's fair. Or here is one who was not well yesterday and had no cookies. Give it to him. These things are not to be ostentatiously done nor too continually, but always with care and accuracy, as lessons more important than any others. The deeper and larger sense of social duty,—not the personal balancing of rights, which is easy to even the youngest mind, but the devotion to the service ofall, the recognition that the greater includes the less,—this must be shown by personal example long before it can be imitated.
Parents neglect this where it would help them most, and substitute, to meet the child's inquiries, only personal authority and compulsion. If the parent would constantly manifest a recognition of duty and performance of it even against desire, it would be a great help to the child. Most children imagine that grown persons do just as they want to; and that the stringent code of behaviour enforced upon them is requisite only in childhood, and enforceable only because of their weakness. Much of the parent's conduct can be used as an object-lesson to the child; but its skilful employment needs clear ethical perception and much educational ability. For instance, if the mother elaborately explains that she is obliged to do something which seems to the child absurd, or if she claims to have to do a certain thing which the child can see that she really enjoys, the impressions made are not correct ones. A recognition of the importance of right teaching of ethics to thechild would help adult conduct in most cases. And, if the child were receiving proper grounding in ethics from a special educator, he could come home and perplex his parents with problems, as a bright child often does now in other sciences.
This, of course, points to the need of accepted text-books on ethics, and will allow of disputes between authorities and disagreement on many points; but these conditions exist in all sciences. There are different authorities and "schools," much disagreement and dispute and varying conduct based on our various scientific beliefs. But out of the study, discussion, and ensuing behaviour comes the gradual proof of what is really true; and we establish certain generally accepted facts and principles, while still allowing a margin for divergence of opinion and further knowledge.
Our dread of studying ethics as a science on account of this divergence of opinion is a hereditary brain tendency, due to the long association of ethical values with one infallible religious text-book,—Koran or Bible or Talmud or Zend-Avesta.
"It is written" was the most conclusive of statements to the ancient mind. The modern mind ought by this time to have developed a wide and healthy distrust of that which is written. While our "written" ethics has remained at a standstill always until the upward sweep of social conduct demanded and produced a better religion, our unnoticed practice of ethics has worked out many common rules.
In the fearless study of this field of practical ethics lies our way to such simple text-books as may be used to teach children. There is no question as to whether we should or should not teach ethics to very little children. We do, we must, whether we will or not. The real question is what to teach and how. They learn from our daily walk and conversation; and they learn strange things. Most palpable of all among the wrong impressions given to our children is that of the pre-eminent importance of the primitive relations of life, and the utter unimportance of the great social relations of our time. Whatever ideas of right and wrong the child succeeds in gathering, theyare all of a closely personal nature, based on interpersonal conduct in the family relation, or in such restricted and shallow social relations as is covered by our code of "company manners."
The greatest need of better ethics to-day is in our true social relation,—the economic and political field of action in which lie our major activities, and in which we are still so grossly uncivilised. Not until he goes to school does the child begin to appreciate any general basis of conduct; and even there the ethics of the position are open to much clearer treatment.
As the mother is so prominent a factor in influencing the child's life, it is pre-eminently necessary that she should be grounded in this larger ethics, and able to teach it by example as well as by description. She needs a perception of the proportionate duties of mankind,—an understanding of their true basis, and a trained skill in imparting this knowledge to the child. If she cannot properly teach ethics, she should provide a teacher more competent. At present the only special ethical teaching forthe child outside the family is in the Sunday-school; and Sunday-school teachers are usually amiable young ladies who are besought on any terms—with no preparation whatever—to give this instruction. Once we boldly enter the field of ethical study, and reduce its simple principles to a teachable basis,—when we make clear to ourselves and our children the legitimate reasons of right conduct,—the same intelligence and ambition which carry us on so far in other sciences will lift the standard of behaviour of our race, both in theory and practice. Meanwhile, with such knowledge and practice as we have to-day, let us see to it that we give to little children our best ethics by precept and example, with hopes that they may go on to higher levels.
The one main cause of our unfairness to children is that we consider them wholly in a personal light. Justice and equity, the rights of humanity, require a broader basis than blood relationship. Children are part of humanity, and the largest part. Few of us realise their numbers, or think that they constitute the majority of human beings. The average family, as given in the census returns, consist of five persons,—two adults and three minors. Any population which increases has a majority of children, our own being three-fifths. This large proportion of human beings constitutes a permanent class,—another fact we fail to consider because of our personal point of view. One's own child and one's neighbour's child grow up and pass out of childhood, and with them goes one's interest in children. Of course, we intellectually know that there are others; but to the conscious mind of most persons children are evanescent personal incidents.
The permanence of childhood as a human status is proven by the survival among them of games and phrases of utmost antiquity, which are handed down, not from father to son, but from child to child. If an isolated family moves into a new country, and its children grow up alone, they do not know these games. We should bear in mind in studying children that we have before us a permanent class, larger than the adult population. So that in question of numerical justice they certainly have a right to at least equal attention. But, when we remember also that this large and permanent class of human beings is by far the most important, that on its right treatment rests the progress of the world, then, indeed, it behooves us to consider the attitude of the adult population toward the junior members of society.
As members of society, we find that they have received almost no attention. They are treated as members of the family by the family, but not even recognised as belonging to society. Only in modern history do we find even enough perception of the child's place in the State to provide some publiceducation; and to-day, in some more advanced cities, some provision for public protection and recreation. Children's playgrounds are beginning to appear at last among people who have long maintained public parks and gardens for adults. Also, in the general parks a children's quarter is often now provided, with facilities for their special care and entertainment. But except for these rare cases of special playgrounds, except for the quite generous array of school-houses and a few orphan asylums and kindred institutions, there are no indications in city or country that there are such people as children.
A visitor from another planet, examining our houses, streets, furniture, and machinery, would not gather much evidence of childhood as a large or an important factor in human life. The answer to this is prompt and loud: "Children belong at home! Look there, and you will see if they are considered or not."
Let us look there carefully. The average home is a house of, say, six rooms. This is a liberal allowance, applicable only toAmerica. Even with us, in our cities, the average home is in a crowded tenement,—only two or three rooms; and in wide stretches of country it is a small and crowded farm-house. Six rooms is liberal allowance,—kitchen, dining-room, and parlour, and three bedrooms. Gazing upon the home from the outside, we see a building of dimensions suited to adults. There is nothing to indicate children there. Examining it from the inside, we find the same proportionate dimensions, and nothing in the materials or arrangement of the internal furnishings to indicate children there. The stairs are measured to the adult tread, the windows to the adult eye, the chairs and table to the adult seat. Hold! In a bedroom we discover a cradle,—descended from who knows what inherited desire for swinging boughs!—and, in some cases, a crib. In the dining-room is often a high chair (made to accommodate the adult table), and sometimes in the parlour a low chair for the child. If people are wealthy and careful, there is, perhaps, a low table, too; but the utmost that can be claimed for the average child is acradle or crib, a high chair, and a "little rocker." There can be no reasonable objection to this, so long as the child is considered merely as a member of a family. The adult family precedes and outlasts the child, and it would be absurd to expect them to stoop and suffer in a house built and furnished for children.
So we build for the adult only, and small legs toil painfully up our stairs and fall more painfully down them.
But the moment we begin to address ourselves to the needs of children as a class, the result is different. In the school-house all the seats are for children, except "teacher's chair"; in the kindergarten the tiny chairs and tables are perfectly appropriate; in the playground all the appointments are child-size. "What do you expect!" protests the perplexed parent. "You say yourself, I cannot build my house child-size. Do you expect me to add a child-size house in the back yard? I cannot afford it."
No, the individual parent cannot afford to build a child-house for his own family, nor, for that matter, a school-house. We, collectively,whether through general taxation, as in the public school, or combination of personal funds, as in the private school, do manage to provide our children with school-houses, because we recognise their need of them. Similarly, we can provide for them suitable houses for a far more early and continuous education,—when we see the need of them. Here the untouched brain-spaces make no response. "What do you mean!" cries the parent. "Do you wish us to club together, and build a—a—public nursery for our children!" This seems sufficiently horrific to stop all further discussion. But is it? May we not gently pursue the theme?
We can and do cheerfully admit the advantages of a public school and a public school-teacher for our children. Some of us admit the advantages of a public kindergarten and a public kindergartner for our children. The step between child-garden and baby-garden is slight. Why not a public nursery and a public nurse? That, of course, for those classes who gladly provide and patronise the public school and kindergarten. The swarming neglected babies ofthe poor, now "underfoot" in dirty kitchen or dirtier street, part neglected and part abused, a tax on the toiling mother and a grievous injury to the older children who must care for them,—these would be far better off if every crowded block had its big, bright baby-garden on the roof, and their young lives were kept peaceful, clean, and well cared for by special nurses who knew their business. A public nursery is safer than the public street. One hot reply to this proposition is that "statistics prove that babies in institutions die faster than babies even in the poorest families." Perhaps this is so.
But consider the difference in the cases. Children in institutions are motherless, generally orphans. No one is proposing to remove the mothers of the babies in the baby-garden. "But they would be separated from their mothers!" Children who go to school are separated from their mothers. Children who go to the kindergarten are separated from their mothers. Children who play in the street are separated from their mothers. If the mothers of these childrenhad nothing else to do, they could give all their time to them. But they have other things to do; and, while they are busy, the baby would be better off in the baby-garden than in the street. To those who prefer to maintain the private school and the private kindergarten, a private baby-garden would be equally available. "But we do not want it. We prefer to care for our children at home," they reply. This means that they prefer to have their little ones in their own nursery, under the care of the mother,viathe nurse.
The question remains open as to which the children would prefer, and which would be better for them. Perhaps certain clear and positive assertions should be made here, to allay the anxiety and anger about "separating the child from the mother."
The mother of a young baby should be near enough to nurse it, as a matter of course. She should "take care of it"; that is, see that it has everything necessary to its health, comfort, and development. But that is no reason why she should administer to its every need with her own hands.The ignorant, low-class poor mother does this, and does not preserve the lives of her children thereby. The educated, high-class rich mother does not do this, but promptly hires a servant to do it for her. The nursery and the nurse are essential to the baby; but what kind of nursery and nurse are most desirable? The kind of servant hired by the ordinary well-to-do family is often not a suitable person to have the care of little children. A young child needs even more intelligent care than an older one.
A group of families, each paying for its children's schooling, can afford to give them a far higher class of teacher than each could afford to provide separately. So a group of families, each paying for its children's "nursing," could afford to provide a far superior class of "nurse" than each can provide separately.
Here again rises the protest that it is not good for small children—babies—to be "herded together,"—see infant mortality in institutions. Again, an unfair comparison is involved. The poorest kind of children, motherless and fatherless, are crowded inundue numbers in "charitable" or "public" institutions, and submitted to the perfunctory care of low-grade, ill-paid attendants, among accommodations by no means of the best. We are asked to compare this to small groups of healthy, well-bred children, placed for certain hours of the day only in carefully planned apartments, in all ways suitable, under the care of high-grade, well-paid expert attendants and instructors.
The care of little children is not servant's work. It is not "nurses'" work. A healthy child should have his physical needs all properly supplied, and, for the rest, be under the most gentle and exquisite "training." It is education, and education more valuable than that received in college, which our little ones need; and they do not get it from nurse-maids.
Then rises the mother. "I can teach my baby better than any teacher, however highly trained." If the mother can, by all means let her. But can she? We do not hear mothers protesting that they can teach their grown-up sons and daughters better than the college professors, nor their middle-agedchildren better than the school-teachers. Why, then, are they so certain that they can teach the babies better than trained baby-teachers? They are willing to consult a doctor if the baby is ill, and gladly submit to his dictation. "The doctor says baby must eat this and go there and do so." There is no wound to maternal pride in this case. If they have "defective" children, they are only too glad to place them under "expert care," not minding even "separation" for the good of the child.
Any one who knows of the marvellous results obtained by using specially trained intelligence in the care of defective children must wonder gravely if we might not grow up better with some specially trained intelligence used on our normal children. But this we cannot have till we make a place for children. No woman or man, with the intelligence and education suitable for this great task, would be willing to be a private servant in one family. We do not expect it of college-teacher or school-teacher. We could not expect it of baby-teacher. The very wealthy might of course command allthree; but that has no application to mankind in general, and is also open to grave question as to its relative value.