The crude material of instinct is, in most respects, equally capable of leading to desirable and to undesirable actions. In the past, men did not understand the training of instinct, and therefore were compelled to resort to repression. Punishment and fear were the great incentives to what was called virtue. We now know that repression is a bad method, both because it is never really successful, and because it produces mental disorders. The training of instincts is a totally different method, involving a totally different technique. Habits and skill make, as it were, a channel for instinct, leading it to flow one way or another according to the direction of the channel. By creating the right habits and the right skill, we cause the child’s instincts themselves to prompt desirable actions. There is no sense of strain, because there is no need to resist temptation. There is no thwarting, and the child has a sense of unfettered spontaneity. I do not mean these statements to be taken in an absolute sense; there will always be unforeseen contingencies in which older methods may become necessary. But the more the science of child psychology is perfected, and the more experience we acquire in nursery-schools, the more perfectly the new methods can be applied.
I have tried to bring before the reader the wonderful possibilities which are now open to us. Think what it would mean: health, freedom, happiness, kindness, intelligence, all nearly universal. In one generation, if we chose, we could bring the millennium.
But none of this can come about without love. The knowledge exists; lack of love prevents it from being applied. Sometimes the lack of love towards children brings me near to despair—for example, when I find almost all our recognized moral leaders unwilling that anything should be done to prevent the birth of children with venereal disease. Nevertheless, there is a gradual liberation of love of children, which surely is one of our natural impulses. Ages of fierceness have overlaid what is naturally kindly in the dispositions of ordinary men and women. It is only lately that many Christians have ceased to teach the damnation of unbaptized infants. Nationalism is another doctrine which dries up the springs of humanity; during the war, we caused almost all German children to suffer from rickets. We must let loose our natural kindliness; if a doctrine demands that we should inflict misery upon children, let us reject it, however dear it may be to us. In almost all cases, the psychological source of cruel doctrines is fear; that is one reason why I have laid so much stress upon the elimination of fear in childhood. Let us root out the fears that lurk in the dark places of our own minds. The possibilities of a happy world that are opened up by modern education make it well worth while to run some personal risk, even if the risk were more real than it is.
When we have created young people freed from fear and inhibitions and rebellious or thwarted instincts, we shall be able to open to them the world of knowledge, freely and completely, without dark hidden corners; and if instruction is wisely given, it will be a joy rather than a task to those who receive it. It is not important to increase the amount of what is learnt above that now usually taught to the children of the professional classes. What is important is the spirit of adventure and liberty, the sense of setting out upon a voyage of discovery. If formal education is given in this spirit, all the more intelligent pupils will supplement it by their own efforts, for which every opportunity should be provided. Knowledge is the liberator from the empire of natural forces and destructive passions; without knowledge, the world of our hopes cannot be built. A generation educated in fearless freedom will have wider and bolder hopes than are possible to us, who still have to struggle with the superstitious fears that lie in wait for us below the level of consciousness. Not we, but the free men and women whom we shall create, must see the new world, first in their hopes, and then at last in the full splendour of reality.
The way is clear. Do we love our children enough to take it? Or shall we let them suffer as we have suffered? Shall we let them be twisted and stunted and terrified in youth, to be killed afterwards in futile wars which their intelligence was too cowed to prevent? A thousand ancient fears obstruct the road to happiness and freedom. But love can conquer fear, and if we love our children nothing can make us withhold the great gift which it is in our power to bestow.
THE END
FOOTNOTES:
[1] “The Child: His Nature and His Needs.” Prepared under the editorial supervision of M. V. O’Shea, Professor of Education, University of Wisconsin, 1924. I shall allude to this book as “O’Shea”.
[2] Probably many of Dr. Arnold’s pupils suffered from adenoids, for which medical men do not usually prescribe flogging, although they cause habitual idleness.
[3] On fear and anxiety in childhood, see e.g. William Stern, “Psychology of Early Childhood”, Chap. XXXV. (Henry Holt, 1924).