Guide to the Kindergarten and Intermediate Class; and Moral Culture of Infancy.

by Mary Tyler Peabody Mann; Elizabeth Palmer Peabody

In every way I could think of, I thus tried to show him how his particular tendencies would lead him into falsehood, which I assumed to be the greatest of faults.

After three years' continuance in my school, I assure you there was not a child in it that I would more readily trust, and though he always annoyed me with his playfulness, it ceased to be tricky. I had frequent occasions to notice his candor and to refer to his improvement. I never spoke to him again before the school upon the subject of his mean fault, but I kept it fresh in his own mind, and long after, when I reproved another child for symptoms of the same fault, I remarked that one of my scholars had once given me the same cause to fear for his integrity, but he had watched himself, and I was glad to say he had resisted temptation and grown honorable and trustworthy. I saw that he knew who I meant, but the others had forgotten who it could be. I did not gratify their curiosity, of course.

I do not know that this boy is above temptation, but I have had many proofs of his power to resist it; occasions that brought him no glory, some of which I have recognized by such a remark as "how respectable honesty is," or "how I like to see moral courage that fears nothing but doing wrong." Sometimes I took no visible notice, for we need not always praise well-doing. It is often both unnecessary and unwise, for where goodness is not wholly spontaneous, it may be vitiated by love of approbation. It is only perfect goodness, or such measure of that as mortals may attain, that can always bear praise and grow only more fervent for it.

Sometimes I leave one scholar to keep school while I go into another room to hear a lesson, and then I require an account of their stewardship. I am always careful to select one whom all will concur in respecting and of whom they will feel no jealousy when they are censured. I once left this boy in charge, but after a short time he came and requested to be released, because he felt as if it was like tale-bearing to tell of his companions, and he did not feel sure that they would be willing. I saw by this that he meant to be faithful; indeed, it was not till after I had full confidence in him that I ventured on so important a step. I presume he did not feel as if I could say, as I had said of some others, "You know —— would not find fault with you if he could help it, or if his conscience did not require it of him." There is no point that must be managed with such delicacy as this of discriminating between truth and falsehood. Children live so long in their ideal worlds, and are so much talked to in symbols, that when they begin to deal more with realities they must often be reminded to be accurate. I would lead them gently out of the creations of their imaginations when this time comes, constantly reminding them that they must tell things just as they are; and when they embellish their statements, I go over them quietly, re-stating for them, and leaving out all the marvellous additions. Little children will often quote their absent mothers' authority, when it is impossible that the circumstances can have been anticipated. I always reply to this very decidedly, "Oh! no; mother did not say so. She does not know anything about it; you must not tell me so; that is saying what is not true, which is very wrong." If they persist, I say, "Very well; I will write a little note to mother when you go home, and tell her I am afraid her little child has said what is not true, shall I?" This will generally bring out a confession. I do not punish on such occasions, for there is no surer way of producing falsehood than by inspiring fear, but I try to produce a little agony in the conscience and make a child very unhappy for the moment. This suffering can be referred to afterwards, in private, and the danger pointed out of growing wicked, which I find the greatest instrument of awakening the inward monitor.

Some people object to allegories and fairy stories for children, but I am never afraid of them if they are true to nature, truly imaginative, or if the impossible is occasionally caught a glimpse of. A fairy that comes out of a flower, is an imaginary being that will never disturb the dreams or deceive the intellect of a child. I always call such stories poetry, and sometimes ask what they teach. If a teaching use cannot be made of them, they are not written conscientiously and are not good food for the young. A child of well cultivated imagination will be likely to be more rather than less truthful than others. But I do not like ogres. I once had a scholar, a child of eleven years, that had never known the care of parents. She was a southern child, whose parents died in her infancy, and she was sent from one boarding-school to another, where she was made the tool of unscrupulous girls to obtain their ends against authority. She told untruths always, even upon the most trivial matters, as if she feared being circumvented, or giving any handle to others by whom she might be blamed. She was so subtle, that it was almost impossible to obtain a fact from her, although she lived in the family. Her relations had wholly neglected all personal care of her, and I found she knew nothing whatever about them. I learned that her parents were two very lovely young people, both of whom died early of consumption, and she had an uncle who was a bachelor and a very wealthy planter. He had been very fond of his sister, and meant to take home this child and make her his heiress as soon as she was old enough. She had the precocity of constitution and temperament common to the southerners, but had no interest in life at all except for present gratification. It was difficult to interest her in anything, and I determined to try the experiment of describing her parents and her uncle, and telling her of her future prospects. I saw when I was talking to her that she was much moved, but she did not wish me to know it. During the several months she had been under my care, I had never seen her off her guard, and she did not mean to be now. She said, "yes, I know," several times, but in her emotion she had forgotten that she had told me several times when I had asked her, that she had no relations. As I went on speaking of the lovely character of her mother, who died at her birth, I saw the color flash and her lips quiver, but she would express no interest in the matter in words, and I took no notice of her natural emotions. But when I went on to speak of the uncle and his beautiful home, his love for his sister, and for her, whom he had never seen since her babyhood, and of his wish that she should preside over his home when old enough, she fairly burst into tears; and when I drew her into my arms she put her head on my bosom and gave way to violent sobbing. But still she was cautious in speaking, and I did not convict her of having concealed the truth. She was naturally very timid, and I had divined the cause of her phase of falsehood. She had been treated very cruelly, and was afraid of human beings. After a while she proposed to write to her uncle and tell him what she was studying; but although I doubt not life had a new interest to her, I could not tell what was the characteristic of her interest, owing to her great reserve. It might have been sordid, for she was very selfish; but she was soon removed, and I had no opportunity of seeing her for many years. I then found her still in the family of her guardian, to one of whose sons she was engaged, but I was told there was no love, only speculation, at the foundation of the young man's views, and the seeds of consumption, inherited from her mother, had begun to ripen in her. She was brilliantly beautiful, and showed a great deal of feeling on seeing me, but died very soon after. The only evidence I ever had of the existence of the moral sentiment in her wronged soul, was her fondness for another child in my family, who was the soul of truth and love, and who had divine patience with this her little tormentor, whom she watched over and remonstrated with like a little mother. This companion, of just her own age, had had a very remarkable moral training, consecrated forever by the sufferings for conscience' sake of a very dear and gifted mother, whose persecutions were known to her child, and no one could know her, not even the most hardened or obtuse, without being affected by her. She was a little Christ among other children, and so regarded by them, and I always hoped that the poor little waif had through her a glimpse of the Heaven into which she seemed to have no passport. At the time, I rejoiced for my little angel, when her heart was relieved of such a charge, for certain natural graces as well as the condition of moral benightment of the little stranger had taken very deep hold of her; but I think a reform might have been effected with such an aid. The martyr's child lived long enough to fulfil her promise, and grew happy enough to blossom out into some buds of lovely promise, intellectual as well as moral, and then she went too, but could be no more an angel the other side of the veil than she was on this. How slight the barrier sometimes seems to be, yet how impervious! Was it the divine love in you which made you do that? was her mother's form of reproof, always remembered.

Is there any danger of inspiring a child with too great self-reliance, by directing it to the immutable law of God in its own breast as a guide of conduct? It has been wisely said that we know of the moral nature of God only what the moral sentiment teaches us, and that the visible world and revelation only confirm what this sentiment gives primarily. We know that the sentiment of reverence may be directed to objects unworthy the homage of the soul. In the fluctuations of human opinion there may be a higher or lower view of God's nature. He may be looked upon as all justice without mercy, or as mercy without justice, or as a union of both, according to the enlightenment of the intellect, but we can cultivate in every child a reverence for God's voice in conscience, an allegiance to God as goodness itself, or as a Father, ready to forgive us when we repent, and to help our efforts. The human being may by turns worship God as a Father, as a power, or as law; and salvation, or the redemption of the soul from evil, does not depend upon the form of belief, but upon the allegiance to that something higher which is a law to it. I do not say that it is not important what the form is, for we know that there is all the difference in the world between the savage's worship of his fetish, and the Christian's of his God, but the savage may be more loyal to the small glimmer of truth represented by his fetish, than many a so-called Christian is to his more advanced conception of Deity. Therefore it is loyalty of soul which is to be cultivated, and that is done through conscience.

I know no higher motive to be given to a child or to a man, than that the more he obeys the voice of conscience, the more tender it becomes; and the more he cultivates his intellect the greater will be its expansion; and no fear that either can entertain is so salutary as the fear of losing the delicacy of the conscience, or the power of increasing insight. Offer no secondary motives, but as high a view as we can give of the primal one, not judging for our fellow-man, or even child, what it is ready to receive, for either may be capable of receiving more than we can give.

This does not interfere with bringing the consequences of wrong-doing into immediate view, which is in fact all that we do when we punish judiciously. If a child is selfish he is thrust aside by those who have the power to do it. This is a direct natural consequence, quite as much so as that the selfishness grows by indulgence, but weak children in a school or in a family must not venture to thrust aside an offender. I must therefore come to their assistance.

I have one child in my school who has so little power of self-control, that I am obliged to be very peremptory with him every day. It would not be sufficient for me to say, "You trouble others so that they do not like to have you sit near them," and wait for that truth to influence him. I must put him in a seat by himself, and show him that he is not to approach others now, and that he must make an immediate effort to gain a better social position. If anything comes into his head, he seems utterly incapable of refraining from the utterance of it, even in the midst of a recitation, or be it ever so irrelevant to the matter in hand. He wishes to tell anecdotes of which he is reminded by something read or recited. If I tell him he must not take up the time, he is so earnest to go on, that often I cannot stop him without walking him out of the room. Then I tell him that since he has no power of self-control, he must stay there till I call him; or I allow him to return on condition that he does not open his mouth even to read or to recite. I impose this privation to teach him self-control, the want of which will make him annoying to every one. He pours forth many sensible remarks and more good feelings, but the law of adaptation seems wanting. He has sensibility and conscience, and a general desire to do right. If not approved, he is afflicted; if he does not succeed in his undertakings, he cries with grief, cries aloud often, though a huge boy of nine years old,—a little giant in form and strength. He generally seems to tell the truth, though he is weak, and yields easily to the temptation of gaining his ends. But if he cannot remember easily, he lashes himself into hysterics. He has quick perceptive powers, but little power of reasoning. My aim is to show him the connection between his faults and his sufferings; to let the latter be felt to be the whip that scourges his faults—not himself; for there is no fair proportion between the constant punishment he brings upon himself and his wilful wrong-doing. I am afraid he will always be a trial to his friends. He is one of my least hopeful cases, because not well gifted. I am afraid there is a germ somewhere that the sun has not yet shone upon—that some tile that is now weighing down his brain must be lifted before mortal man can help him. You remember the story of Descartes, who was an idiot till his skull was cracked, when suddenly the brain expanded, and the fissure never closing, he became a great man. Perhaps my obtuse boy will get some friendly blow, mental or physical, that will let in the light. His mother turned him out into the street to amuse himself, because she could not manage him. If she had not, perhaps I should already have turned him back upon her hands, for he really is the greatest trouble I have. My hope for him is that maturity and experience will teach him what others cannot. This is often the case.

Another little fellow appears to have no natural perception of the rights of others. He does not understand the sentiment of obedience, as many lively children do. If I keep my eye fixed upon him, he does not do the things I positively forbid him to do, but he is the very prince of mischief, and I am obliged to watch him narrowly lest he turn inkstands upside down, and go to such like extremes. In some cases I merely follow my instincts, and this is such an one. I feel as if I were to put principle into this child because I have it myself, much as the magnetist imposes his will upon his patient by exercising it forcibly. I find myself looking at him much more than I talk to him, not always reprovingly, never stealthily, but steadily and gravely. I do not like to govern, but I am not afraid of children, as some people are. My nerves can bear their crying, if they do not cry with pain, and they soon learn that they gain nothing from me by it. They do not put me out of temper, or exhaust my patience, or my perseverance; but the determined will, the ever-springing gayety, the wild spirits that tire most people, are a constant source of pleasure and exhilaration to me. It seems to me so unnatural that childhood should be naughty, that if they are obstinate I am very apt to think it the fault of some still more obstinate grown person, who has turned a stout heart into a wilful one by unwise opposition; and I love to set myself to disarming the stubborn will, leaving it only resolute. If they are false, I feel as if their faith had been broken, or their fears excited, and I love to show them the beauty of truth, or inspire them with moral courage. If they are passionate, I love to calm them down, and give them the pleasure of tranquillity, and the joys of self-conquest,—not "breaking their spirits," but sympathizing with their ardor while I check its excesses; for enthusiasm is a boon of which I would not deprive humanity. If they are phlegmatic, commonly called stupid, I love to find some subject or object of interest that will startle them into animation; if timid and easily discouraged, I can give them the pleasures of success by offering only practicable tasks; if self-conceited, I can point out to them the kingdoms of knowledge yet to be conquered. I often quote the words of Linnæus, who once said it would take him all his life to learn thoroughly what was under his own hand, and what was this compared with the universe!