very young children. Those trials which are sometimes prepared for pupils at a more advanced period of education, are not always more happy in their consequences. We make trifles appear important; and then we are surprised that they are thought so.

Lord Kames tells us that he was acquainted with a gentleman, who, though otherwise a man of good understanding, did not shew his good sense in the education of his daughters temper. "He had," says Lord Kames, "three comely daughters, between twelve and sixteen, "and to inure them to bear disappointments, he would propose to make a visit which he knew would delight "them. The coach was bespoke, and the young ladies, (6 completely armed for conquest, were ready to take their "seats. But, behold! their father had changed his mind. "This, indeed, was a disappointment; but as it appeared "to proceed from whim, or caprice, it might sour their "temper, instead of improving it."*

.

But why should a visit be made a matter of such mighty consequence to girls? Why should it be a disappointment to stay at home? And why should Lord Kames. advise that disappointments should be made to appear the effects of chance? This method of making things appear to be what they are not, we cannot too often reprobate; it will not have better success in the education of the temper, than in the management of the understanding; it would ruin the one or the other, or both: even when promises are made with perfect good faith to young people, the state of suspense which they create, is not serviceable to the temper, and it is extremely difficult to promise proper rewards. † The celebrated Serena surely established her reputation for good temper, without any very severe trials. Our standard of female excellence, is evidently

* Lord Kames, p. 109.

† V. Chapter on Rewards and Punishments.

dently changed since the days of Griselda; but we are inclined to think, that even in these degenerate days, public amusements would not fill the female imagination, if they were not early represented as such charming things, such great rewards to girls, by their imprudent friends.

The temper depends much upon the understanding; and whenever we give our pupils, whether male or female, false ideas of pleasure, we prepare for them innumerable causes of discontent. "You ought to be above such "things! You ought not to let yourself be vexed by such "trifles!" are common expressions, which do not immediately change the irritated person's feelings. You must alter the habits of thinking; you must change the view of the object, before you can alter the feelings. Suppose a girl has, from the conversation of all her acquaintance, learned to imagine that there is some vast pleasure in going to a masquerade; it is in vain to tell her, in the moment that she is disappointed about her masquerade dress, that "it is a trifle, and she ought to be above tri"fles." She cannot be above them at a moment's warning: but if she had never been inspired with a violent desire to go to a masquerade, the disappointment would really appear trifling. We may calculate the probability of any person's mortification, by observing the vehemence of their hopes; thus we are led to observe, that the imagination influences the temper. Upon this subject we shall speak more fully when we treat of Imagination and Judgment.

To measure the degree of indulgence which may be safe for any given pupils, we must attend to the effect produced by pleasure upon their imagination and temper. If a small diminution of their usual enjoyments disturbs them, they have been rendered not too happy, but too susceptible. Happy people, who have resources in their own power, do not feel every slight variation in external circumstances.

We

We may safely allow children to be as happy as they possibly can be without sacrificing the future to the present. Such prosperity will not enervate their minds.

We make this assertion with some confidence, because experience has in many instances confirmed our opinion. Amongst a large family of children, who have never been tormented with artificial trials of temper, and who have been made as happy as it was in the power of their parents to make them, there is not one ill tempered child. We have examples every day before us of different ages from three years old to fifteen.

Before parents adopt either Epicurean or Stoical doctrines in the education of the temper, it may be prudent to calculate the probabilities of the good and evil, which their pupils are likely to meet with in life. The Sybarite, whose night's rest was disturbed by a doubled rose leaf, deserves to be pitied almost as much as the young man who, when he was benighted in the snow, was reproached by his severe father for having collected a heap of snow to make himself a pillow. Unless we could forever insure the bed of roses to our pupils, we should do very imprudently to make it early necessary to their repose: unless the pillow of snow is likely to be their lot, we need not inure them to it from their infancy.

CHAPTER

not R.

CHAPTER VII,

ON OBEDIENCE.

OBEDIENCE has been often called the virtue of childhood.
How far it is entitled to the name of virtue, we need not at
present stop to examine. Obedience is expected from chil-
dren long before they can reason upon the justice of our
commands; consequently it must be taught as a habit. By
associating pleasure with those things which we first de-
sire children to do, we should make them necessarily like
to obey; on the contrary, if we begin by ordering them to
do what is difficult and disagreeable to them, they must
dislike obedience. The poet seems to understand this
subject when he says,

"Or bid her wear your necklace rowed with pearl,
"You'll find your Fanny an obedient girl."*

The taste for a necklace rowed with pearl, is not the first
taste, even in girls, that we should wish to cultivate; but
the poet's principle is good, notwithstanding. Bid your
child do things that are agreeable to him, and you may be
sure of his obedience. Bid a hungry boy eat apple pye;
order a shivering urchin to warm himself at a good fire;
desire him to go to bed when
you see him
yawn with fa-
tigue, and by such seasonable commands you will soon
form associations of pleasure in his mind, with the voice
and tone of authority. This tone should never be threat-
ening, or alarming; it should be gentle, but decided.
Whenever

* Elegy on an old Beauty. PARNELL.

Whenever it becomes necessary that a child should do what he feels disagreeable, it is better to make him submit at once to necessity, than to create any doubt and struggle in his mind, by leaving him a possibility of resistance. Suppose a little boy wishes to sit up later than the hour at which you think proper that he should go to bed; it is most prudent to take him to bed at the appointed time, without saying one word to him, either in the way of entreaty or command. If you entreat, you give the child an idea that he has it in his power to refuse you: if you command, and he does not instantly obey, you hazard your authority, and you teach him that he can successfully set his will in opposition to yours. The boy wishes

to sit up; he sees no reason, in the moral fitness of things,

why he should go to bed at one hour more than at another; all he perceives is, that such is your will. What does he gain by obeying you? Nothing: he loses the pleasure of sitting up half an hour longer. How can you then expect that he should, in consequence of these reasonings, give up his obvious immediate interest, and march off to bed heroically at the word of command? Let him not be put to the trial; when he has for some time been regularly taken to bed at a fixed hour, he will acquire the habit of thinking that he must go at that hour: association will make him expect it; and if his experience has been uniform, he will, without knowing why, think it necessary that he should do as he has been used to do. When the habit of obedience to customary necessity is thus formed, we may, without much risk, engraft upon it obedience to the voice of authority. For instance, when the boy hears the clock strike, the usual signal for his departure, you may, you see that he is habitually ready to obey this signal, associate your commands with that to which he has already learned to pay attention. "Go; it is time that you should go to bed now," will only seem to the child a confirma