The first manner of correction, if it can be called that, drives your little one away from you, while the second holds him to you, as a traveller is bound to a trusted guide in a dangerous way.
Oh! the sorrow of the falsehoods told to little ones, under the guise of threats that are never realized. In my hearing only a few days ago, in the space of half an hour, a mother told her child—a bright but of course spoiled little boy, not more than three years old, at least a half dozen deliberate falsehoods. I say deliberate, because she knew they were false, and the saddest of all was the fact that the child recognized the untruths as well, and was not moved by them an iota.
Nowhere is there so much tactful wisdom needed as in the mother’s dealings with her little ones. How many times we fail by too great zeal, how many times for not enough. Often, not to notice the little naughtinesses is the wisest thing, when these little wrongs are not positively sinful. Not noticing such wrongs insures their being forgotten sooner, and oftentimes the children are simply imitating in a childish way what they have seen in their elders.
The following incident will illustrate the wisdom of not heeding. A little boy strutted up to his busy mother one day, and without a bit of prelude or postlude, said, “Gosh.” The wise mother took no notice, and again standing directly in front of her, and in a more emphatic tone, he repeated the coarse word. Still no rebuke from the mother and no reproving look even. As if bent on being heard and eliciting some rebuke which he evidently expected, he thrust his hands into his pockets, straightened up, and with a stamp of his tiny foot, said with double emphasis, “Gosh, mamma.” Then the undisturbed mother looked up with simply this, “Yes, my son, I heard.” He turned away crestfallen, but the coarse word was never repeated.
In contrast, another mother with less of wisdom and more of the overdone zeal, heard her little boy say, “Darn.” She called him to her and with a very solemn voice said, “What did I hear my little boy say? Didn’t I hear him say the naughty, NAUGHTY word, darn,” and her voice sank to an awesome whisper. “Yes,” said the little fellow, with an air of important badness, “I said it.”
“Come here and let me look in your mouth,” said the mother. He opened his mouth with very little concern, and really seeming to enjoy it. “Oh-h-hh,” said the unwise mamma, “I see two little black devils.” “My-e-e-e,” said the little fellow; “Darn, darn, darn,”—and then the mouth flew open wider still. “How many devils are there now, mamma?” The mother’s answer is not recorded, but we trust she learned wisdom.
I have been exceedingly interested in noting what an ignorant horse-trainer can teach a wild, high-mettled colt. How does he do it? Not by whipping, not by thwarting and fretting, but by patient, persistent effort, and much study of the particular training each colt needs. He goes farther than this. He studies the pedigree that he may better know how to correct the faults of his pupils. Is it not worth while for a mother to take as much pains and carefulness for the well-being of her precious charges? “Where is the flock that was given thee, thy beautiful flock?” will be a question that mothers must meet, and must answer sorrowfully in many cases. The answer might well be taken from the same book, “The Book,” in which the question is recorded. “As thy servant was busy here and there they were gone.”
Parents must keep in sympathy with their children to understand and lead them. The cares of business, the demands of society, clubs, etc., etc., will not excuse you. There can be no business, no demand upon your time that can begin to equal in importance the proper care of your children. They are your charge, and the responsibility can be relegated to none other.
I have read somewhere of a mother who by the rounds of social life, and all the cares incident to it, had given her children over to the care of a nurse, until she awoke one day to realize that she was almost a stranger to her own children, and that they seemed to care little for her, since they saw her so seldom. “This will never do,” said the thoroughly awakened mother. “These are my children, and as such, demand my care, and influence and love, which I shall henceforth give them without stint.” She began at once. Every engagement which interfered with the loving care of her little brood, was resolutely cancelled, while she gave herself to redeeming the time that she had wasted, and to regaining her place in her children’s hearts which she had nearly lost. Was she successful, I imagine I hear you ask. Did ever a mother put her hand and her heart to the accomplishment of a noble purpose, and fail? Never. And she never will. Delightful trips were planned and carried out, all-day excursions, long walks, with a luncheon in some quiet place, away from the crowd. Books were read, lessons taught that sank, freighted with their wealth of wisdom, into the mother’s, as well as into the children’s hearts. Oh the joy of that delightful season! Nothing in all her life could bear any comparison with it. Should she give it up and again enter society, whose demands gave her little time for the pure pleasure she had enjoyed with her children? She would leave it for her babies to decide. As they gathered about her, she said, “My darlings, mamma has something she wishes you to settle for her. Shall we go on as we have been doing for the past happy months, or shall mamma take again her place in society as she did before she knew her dear babies as she does now?” “Oh, mamma, we can’t get along without you now, and you know you belong to us,” said the oldest one, and the sweet silence of the baby as she hugged the dear lost and found mother, tightly about the neck, was all the answer she needed. “Now, mamma dear, would you have gone away from us again, if we had said so?” “No, darling, not even if you had said so, for then I should have seen all the greater need of staying with my own children until they loved me again. But I dared let you decide, for I knew what you would say. Bless my babies! These months have been the happiest of my life, and do you think I could leave you again? I can have as much as I need of society and still live with my babies.”
Every parent is bound to be interested in all that should legitimately interest their children. Books, games, little excursions, days off from business that the boys and girls may have their papas and mammas all to themselves, are important things which no wise father or mother will neglect to consider.