It is just as wrong systematically to give a child everything he desires as to deny the child everything. When indulgent parents fancy that they are adding to the pleasure of their children's lives by giving to them whatever they wish, such parents are in fact destroying the capacity of their children to enjoy the gratification of desires weakened and perverted by over-indulgence. The ability to give to children wisely is indeed a rare attainment, and is acquired only by a thoughtful and prudent exercise of the highest sense of duty which parents can feel for their children. Duty is always preferable to indulgence.—Juvenile Instructor, p. 400, July 1, 1903.
DO NOT PLACE CHILDREN UNDER PLEDGES. We believe it is questionable wisdom to put children under a pledge of any kind. We ourselves do not put our children under pledges, and we see no reason why we should permit others to do it. Instructions can be given to children warning them against the use of strong drinks and tobacco just as well without their being pledged as by placing that responsibility upon them. No man or set of people should be permitted to call our children together for the purpose of joining a temperance society, without they first obtain the consent of the parents or guardians of those children; and we take it for granted that no such consent would be given. We also take it for granted that boards of education could not consistently, without such permission, allow such a thing to be done in the public schools.
It should be understood that we, the Latter-day Saints, teach temperance and morality as part of our religion, and that we ourselves are competent to do this kind of work among our own children without the aid of outside temperance societies.—Juvenile Instructor, Vol. 37, p. 720, Dec. 1, 1902.
CHILDREN HAVE EQUAL RIGHTS WITH ELDERS IN THE HOUSE OF THE LORD. Our children should be taught also that they have rights in the house of the Lord equal to their parents and equal to their neighbors or anybody else.—Oct. C. R., 1904, p. 88.
DON'T MORTGAGE YOUR HOUSES. My brethren, see to it that you do not put a mortgage upon the roof that covers the heads of your wives and your children. Don't do it. Don't plaster your farms with mortgages, because it is from your farms that you reap your food, and the means to provide your raiment and your other necessaries of life. Keep your possessions free from debt. Get out of debt as fast as you can, and keep out of debt, for that is the way in which the promise of God will be fulfilled to the people of his Church, that they will become the richest of all people in the world. But this will not happen while you mortgage your homes and your farms, or run into debt beyond your ability to meet your obligations; and thus, perhaps, your name and credit be dishonored because you over-reached yourselves. "Never reach further than you can gather," is a good motto.—Apr. C. R., 1915, p. 11.
NO SUBSTITUTE FOR THE HOME. The growing tendency throughout the country to abandon the home for the hotel and for the nomadic life with its ever-shifting and restless spirit, manifests itself here and there among the Latter-day Saints. A word of warning at this time may not be inappropriate to those who imagine that there is some charm as well as benefit in moving about the world in quest of pleasure and novelties that come from changing frequently one's habitation.
There is no substitute for the home. Its foundation is as ancient as the world, and its mission has been ordained of God from the earliest times. From Abraham sprang two ancient races represented in Isaac and Ishmael. The one built stable homes, and prized its land as a divine inheritance. The other became children of the desert, and as restless as its ever-shifting sands upon which their tents were pitched. From that day to the present, the home has been the chief characteristic of superior over inferior nations. The home then is more than a habitation, it is an institution which stands for stability and love in individuals as well as in nations.
There can be no genuine happiness separate and apart from the home, and every effort made to sanctify and preserve its influence is uplifting to those who toil and sacrifice for its establishment. Men and women often seek to substitute some other life for that of the home; they would make themselves believe that the home means restraint; that the highest liberty is the fullest opportunity to move about at will. There is no happiness without service, and there is no service greater than that which converts the home into a divine institution, and which promotes and preserves family life.
Those who shirk home responsibilities are wanting in an important element of social well-being. They may indulge themselves in social pleasures, but their pleasures are superficial and result in disappointment later in life. The occupations of men sometimes call them from their homes; but the thought of home-coming is always an inspiration to well doing and devotion. When women abandon the home and its duties, the case is a more deplorable one. The evil effects are not confined to the mother alone. The children are robbed of a sacred right, and their love is bereft of its rallying place around the hearthstone. The strongest attachments of childhood are those that cluster about the home, and the dearest memories of old age are those that call up the associations of youth and its happy surroundings.
The disposition among the Saints to be moving about ought to be discouraged. If communities must swarm, let the young go, and let the old homes be transmitted from generation to generation, and let the home be erected with the thought that it is to be a family abiding place from one generation to another, that it is to be a monument to its founder and an inheritance of all that is sacred and dear in home life. Let it be the Mecca to which an ever-increasing posterity may make its pilgrimage. The home, a stable and pure home, is the highest guaranty of social stability and permanence in government.