Mode of Dealing with the Reason of a Child.
The effect, however, will be excellent of calling into exercise the reason and the judgment of the child in cases where the conclusion which he arrives at can be safely allowed to determine his action. You can help him in such cases by giving him any information that he desires, but do not embarrass him, and interfere with his exercising his own judgment by obtruding advice. Allow him in this way to lay out his own garden, to plan the course of a walk or a ride, and to decide upon the expenditure of his own pocket-money, within certain restrictions in respect to such things as would be dangerous or hurtful to himself, or annoying to others. As he grows older you can give him the charge of the minor arrangements on a journey, such as taking care of a certain number of the parcels carried in the hand, choosing a seat in the car, selecting and engaging a hand on arriving at the place of destination. Commit such things to his charge only so fast as you can really intrust him with power to act, and then, with slight and not obtrusive supervision on your part, leave the responsibility with him, noticing encouragingly whatever of fidelity and success you observe, and taking little notice—generally in fact, none at all—of such errors and failures as result simply from inexperience and immaturity.
In a word, make no attempt to seek support from his judgment, or by convincing his reason, in important cases, where his feelings or wishes are involved, but in all such cases rest your decisions solely upon your own authority. But then, on the other hand, in unimportant cases, where no serious evil can result whichever of the various possible courses are taken, call his judgment into exercise, and abide by its decisions. Give him the responsibility if he likes to take it, but with the responsibility give him the power.
Substantially the same principles as explained above, in their application to the exercise of the judgment, apply to the cultivation of the reasoning powers—that is to say, in the act of arguing, or drawing conclusions from premises. Nothing can be more unprofitable and useless, to say nothing of its irritating and vexatious effect, than maintaining an argument with a child—or with any body else, in fact—to convince him against his will. Arguing very soon degenerates, in such a case, into an irritating and utterly useless dispute. The difference of opinion which gives occasion for such discussions arises generally from the fact that the child sees only certain of the more obvious and immediate relations and bearings of the subject in question, which is, in fact, all that can be reasonably expected of him, and forms his opinion from these alone. The parent, on the other hand, takes a wider view, and includes among the premises on which his conclusion is founded considerations which have never been brought to the attention of the child. The proper course, therefore, for him to pursue in order to bring the child's mind into harmony with his own, is not to ridicule the boy's reasoning, or chide him for taking so short-sighted a view of the subject, or to tell him it is very foolish for him to talk as he does, or silence him by a dogmatic decision, delivered in a dictatorial and overbearing manner, all of which is too often found to characterize the discussions between parents and children, but calmly and quietly to present to him the considerations bearing upon the question which he has not yet seen. To this end, and to bring the mind of the child into that listening and willing state without which all arguments and even all attempts at instruction are wasted, we must listen candidly to what he says himself, put the best construction upon it, give it its full force; see it, in a word, as nearly as possible as he sees it, and let him know that we do so. Then he will be much more ready to receive any additional considerations which we may present to his mind, as things that must also be taken into account in forming a final judgment on the question.
A boy, for example, who is full of health and increasing vigor, and in whom, of course, those organs on which the consciousness of strength and the impulses of courage depend are in the course of rapid and healthy development, in reading to his mother a story in which a thief that came into a back store-room of a house in the evening, with a bag, to steal meal, was detected by the owner and frightened away, looks up from his book and says, in a very valiant manner,
"If I had been there, and had a gun, I would have shot him on the spot."
The Rough Mode of Treatment.
Now, if the mother wishes to confuse and bewilder, and to crush down, so to speak, the reasoning faculties of her child, she may say,
"Nonsense, George! It is of no use for you to talk big in that way. You would not dare to fire a gun in such a case, still less, to shoot a man. The first thing you would do would be to run away and hide. And then, besides, it would be very wicked for you to kill a man in that way. You would be very likely to get yourself hung for murder. Besides, the Bible says that we must not resist evil; so you should not talk so coolly about shooting a man."
The poor boy would be overpowered by such a rebuke as this, and perhaps silenced. The incipient and half-formed ideas in his mind in respect to the right of self-defense, the virtue of courage, the sanctity of life, the nature and the limits of the doctrine of non-resistance, would be all thrown together into a jumble of hopeless confusion in his mind, and the only result would be his muttering to himself, after a moment of bewilderment and vexation, "I would shoot him, anyhow." Such treatment would not only fail to convince him that his idea was wrong, but would effectually close his heart against any such conviction.