For example, the fact that the boy becomes a thief, or burglar, indicates in any or many things that disregard for the rights of others which is destructive to all law and order. Properly handled in the home he would have been amenable to all of these conditions.
Raise the child like a plant, care for it as you do for the rarest specimen of vegetation, bring it up in an atmosphere of love. Child raising and plant development are akin.
If the child has but the smallest trace of some characteristic you desire to develop, take hold of it, care for it, surround it with proper conditions and it will change more certainly and readily than any plant quality.
Child Like a Plant.
The child in nature and processes of growth is essentially the same as the plant, only the child has a thousand strings instead of but a few, as has the plant.
Where one can produce one change for the betterment of the plant one can produce a thousand changes for the betterment of the child.
Surround the child with the proper environment to bring out certain qualities and the result is inevitable.
Working in the same way as one does with the plant, the development of the individual is practically unlimited.
Take the common daisy and train it and cultivate it by proper selection and environment until it has been increased in size, beauty and productiveness at least four hundred fold.
Do our educational methods do as much for our children? If not, where is the weakness?