The Renewal of Life; How and When to Tell the Story to the Young

by Margaret Warner Morley

The young fish, like the young plant, inherits characteristics from both parents. From its father it may acquire a certain shape, certain markings, a certain disposition. Since the father's part in the creation of his offspring is less obvious and apparently less intimate than that of the mother, the child can be helped to put a certain value on the thought of fatherhood which later will strengthen the bond of union between himself and his own father, deepening his love for his father and his confidence in him. That the boy love his father is as necessary to his welfare as that he love his mother, and the mother should, in all the early years in which the sex instruction may fall most heavily on her, impress upon the young heart the beauty and glory of paternity. The sacrifice of the father who gives all his strength and time, scarce allowing himself a moment of relaxation or absence from business that he may provide for the needs of the family, is as great as the sacrifice of the mother who devotes her time and strength to caring for the home and the children. The tendency in teaching young people is to lay all the stress on motherhood and mother love, which is a manifest injustice to the human father, who deserves not only the natural love of his children, but the deeper, more consecrated love which comes from a pure and perfect knowledge of fatherhood.

Perhaps nothing will help a young man at the most critical age of his life so much as his love and faith in his father. And perhaps nothing will tend to lift the whole subject of paternity in the popular mind to the plane where it belongs, as will this love and knowledge, when it is bred in the child from his early years. Many difficulties in handling this subject that become insuperable might never even exist if the knowledge of fatherhood, if love and respect for it and for the father as the giver of life, were bred into the boy at an early age. Moreover a certain shyness, which often makes it more difficult for fathers to talk to their sons on these matters than for the mothers to do so, would not have existed if they themselves as children and youth had been educated to a complete knowledge of the sex-life by one or both parents. The cause of this shyness is in many cases ignorance of how to present the facts, and a misconception of the difficulties of speaking to a pure-minded child about them. Nothing surprises the parent more than the way difficulties vanish when once the course of instruction to the youth has been entered upon.

In the lower life the father seldom cares for his offspring; and this is true among the fishes, where neither parent as a rule assumes any other responsibility than properly disposing of and fertilizing the eggs. Where, however, any care is taken, it not infrequently devolves upon the father instead of the mother. This is true of the fresh-water black bass and of the stickleback, where the father protects the eggs until they are hatched, and protects and cares for the young fish. In the case of the stickleback, the father even makes a nest to contain the eggs.

Thus far, the process of the renewal of life is, so to speak, impersonal. The eggs are laid by one fish and fertilized by the other, this being necessary to the development of the young. The parents are endowed with an instinct which informs them when the time is at hand; and the male fish guided by this instinct applies the fertilizing material where it is needed,—that is, over the surface of the fresh-laid eggs. The number of eggs laid by fishes should be noticed, as it is a fact which will be useful later. Several millions of eggs have been counted in the ovaries of one fish. The number of fertilizing cells in one testicle would be incalculable. Fish eggs and young fishes are liable to many fatalities; they are destroyed in immense numbers. Consequently, if the race is to survive, there must be an almost inexhaustible supply.

Fishes kept in confinement will not as a rule multiply. Nothing is so sensitive as the reproductive system. Lacking certain stimuli which it finds in its natural surroundings, it will not become active. The goldfish in the globe will, if a female, have the ovary containing undeveloped ova, the male will have the testicles containing the fertilizing cells, but these will not mature. It is as though the whole system of the fish missed the freedom of space, the changes of season, the variety of substances at the bottom of the water,—all that goes to make "home" for it, and so languished in body as well as spirits.

The child who, in connection with a multitude of other interesting facts concerning fish life, learns those concerning its multiplication, will look upon them as perfectly natural and matter-of-fact.

But, some one objects, will not the child at this point guess the whole truth? Suppose he does? Is not that just what we want him to do? Is it not a sign that he has a good reasoning mind? He may arrive at the right general conclusion, but he has a conception that is very general, vague, not at all personal, and entirely lacking in any material for malodorous thoughts and feelings. By constantly turning his thoughts to the wonders and truths of heredity and to the marvel of the development of living things from such insignificant yet momentous beginnings, and by telling him interesting facts of animals and plants along these lines, his thought can be kept general and on a high plane. Where details are demanded, the parent ought to be thankful that these are presented to him for elucidation instead of to some incapable outsider, and he can meet the demand according to circumstances,—all of which will be discussed more fully presently.

If the parent keeps ever in mind the fact that the child must know some time, and ought to gain a high conception of the subject before being exposed to degrading influences, if he asks himself in all honesty, "Unless I answer this, who will? and how?" he will be helped to do what in his own heart he knows to be his duty.

Moreover, there is a great gain to many a child in learning the main facts at an age where they do not appeal powerfully to his imagination nor move his senses. Later, when any reference to the subject may have this effect, and when there is enough to understand and meet without going back to the rudiments, it will be much less difficult to give the needed aid with this background, which causes the child to feel that he has "always known." To have always known a thing robs it of any great special interest. We pay no attention to the sun that shines upon us, but if this were a phenomenon of very rare occurrence we should be thrilled by it and aroused to curiosity and special observation and interest.

The child's knowledge of the sexuality of nature should be as much a matter of fact as any other knowledge, and the mystery of it should be presented to him as a sublime and beautiful mystery, creating an impression he cannot wholly escape from when he finds himself caught in the vortex of his own adulthood.