Parents and children

by Charlotte M. Mason

Our thoughts like childhood’s thoughts are given,

When all our pulses beat in tune

With all the stars of heaven.”

—John Davidson.

In these levelling days we like to think that everybody has quite equal opportunities in some direction; but Christmas joy, for example, is not for every one in like measure. It is not only that those who are in need, sorrow, or any other adversity do not sit down to the Christmas feast of joy and thanksgiving; for, indeed, a Benjamin’s portion is often served to the sorrowful. But it takes the presence of children to help us to realise the idea of the Eternal Child. The Dayspring is with the children, and we think their thoughts and are glad in their joy; and every mother knows out of her own heart’s fulness what the Birth at Bethlehem means. Those of us who have not children catch echoes. We hear the wondrous story read in church, the waits chant the tale, the church-bells echo it, and the years that are no more come back to us, and our hearts are meek and mild, glad and gay, loving and tender, as those of little children; but, alas, only for the little while occupied by the passing thought. Too soon the dreariness of daily living settles down upon us again, and we become a little impatient, do we not, of the Christmas demand of joyousness.

But it is not so where there are children. The old, old story has all its first freshness as we tell it to the eager listeners; as we listen to it ourselves with their vivid interest it becomes as real and fresh to us as it is to them. Hard thoughts drop away like scales from our eyes; we are young once more with the children’s young life, which, we are mysteriously made aware, is the life eternal. What a mystery it is! Does not every mother, made wise unto salvation, who holds a babe in her arms, feel with tremulous awe that that deep saying is true for her also, “The same is my mother!” For the little child is the true St. Christopher, in him is the light and life of Christ; and every birth is a message of salvation, and a reminder that we, too, must humble ourselves and become as little children. This is, perhaps, the real secret of the world’s progress—that every babe comes into the world with an evangel, which witnesses of necessity to his parents’ hearts. That we, too, are children, the children of God, that He would have us be as children, is the message that the new-born child never fails to bear, however little we heed, or however soon we forget. It is well that parents should ponder these things, for the child’s estate is a holy one, and it is given to his parents to safeguard the little heir of blessedness.

It is not possible to enter fully into so large a subject, but it may be worth while to characterise two or three of the landmarks of this child’s estate; for how shall we safeguard that which we do not recognise, and how recognise that to which we have failed to give deliberate attention. The note of childhood is, before all things, humility. What we call innocence is probably resolvable into this grace—repellent to the nature of man until he shall embrace it, and then disclosing itself to him as divine. An old and saintly writer has a luminous thought on this subject of humility. “There never was, nor ever will be, but one humility in the whole world, and that is the one humility of Christ, which never any man, since the fall of Adam, had the least degree of but from Christ. Humility is one, in the same sense and truth as Christ is one, the Mediator is one, Redemption is one. There are not two Lambs of God that take away the sins of the world. But if there was any humility besides that of Christ, there would be something else besides Him that could take away the sins of the world.”[20] Now, if there be but one humility in the whole world, and that humility be the humility of Christ, and if our Lord pronounces the little child also to be humble, is it not because of the indwelling divinity, the glory in the child, which we call innocence?

Our common notion of humility is inaccurate. We regard it as a relative quality. We humble ourselves to this one and that, bow to the prince and lord it over the peasant. This is why the grace of humility does not commend itself to us even in our most sincere moods. We feel that this relative humility is hardly consistent with self-respect and due independence of character. We have been taught to recognise humility as a Christian grace, and therefore do not utter our protest; but this misconception confuses our thought on an important subject. For humility is absolute, not relative. It is by no means a taking of our place among our fellows according to a given scale, some being above us by many grades and others as far below. There is no reference to above or below in the humble soul, which is equally humble before an infant, a primrose, a worm, a beggar, a prince.

This, if we think of it, is the state natural to children. Every person and thing commands their interest; but the person or thing in action is deeply interesting. “May I go and make mud-pies with the boy in the gutter?” prays the little prince, discerning no difference at all; and the little boy in the gutter would meet him with equal frankness. What is the secret of this absolute humility, humble alike towards higher or lower, and unaware of distinctions? Our notion of a humble person is one who thinks rather slightingly of himself, who says, deprecatingly, “Oh, I can’t do this or that, you know, I’m not clever;” “I’m not cut out for public work of any sort, I’ve no power or influence;” “Ah! well, I hope he’ll be a better man than his father, I don’t think much of myself anyway;” “Your children have great advantages, I wish mine had such a mother, but I’m not a bit wise.” Such things are often said, in all sincerity, without the least soupçon of the “Uriah Heap” sentiment. The thing we quarrel with is, that the speakers are apt to feel that they have, anyway, the saving grace of humility. It is worth while to reflect that there are no such deprecatory utterances ascribed to the Example of that “great humility” which we are bound to follow; and if there is not the slightest evidence of humility in this kind in the divine life, which was all humility, we must re-cast our notions. Children, too, never make deprecatory remarks; that is because they are humble, and with the divine Example before us, and the example of our children, we may receive it that humility does not consist in thinking little of ourselves. It is a higher principle, a blessed state, only now and then attained by us elders, but in which the children perpetually dwell, and in which it is the will of God that we should keep them.

Humility does not think much or little of itself; it does not think of itself at all. It is a negative rather than a positive quality, being an absence of self-consciousness rather than the presence of any distinctive virtue. The person who is unaware of himself is capable of all lowly service, of all suffering for others, of bright cheerfulness under all the small crosses and worries of everyday life. This is the quality that makes heroes, and this is the quality that makes saints. We are able to pray, but we are hardly able to worship or to praise, to say, “My soul doth magnify the Lord,” so long as in the innermost chamber of our hearts we are self-occupied.