JUDGMENT AND REASONING.
It is a very unreasonable thing for parents to expect young children to be
reasonable. Being reasonable in one's conduct or wishes implies the taking
into account of those bearings and relations of an act which are more
remote and less obvious, in contradistinction from being governed
exclusively by those which are immediate and near. Now, it is not
reasonable to expect children to be influenced by these remote
considerations, simply because in them the faculties by which they are
brought forward into the mind and invested with the attributes of reality
are not yet developed. These faculties are all in a nascent or formative
state, and it is as idle to expect them, while thus immature, to fulfill
their functions for any practical purpose, as it would be to expect a baby
to expend the strength of its little arms in performing any useful labor.
_Progress of Mental Development_.
The mother sometimes, when she looks upon her infant lying in her arms, and
observes the intentness with which he seems to gaze upon objects in the
room--upon the bright light of the window or of the lamp, or upon the
pictures on the wall--wonders what he is thinking of. The truth probably is
that he is not thinking at all; he is simply _seeing_--that is to say, the
light from external objects is entering his eyes and producing images upon
his sensorium, and that is all. He _sees_ only. There might have been a
similar image of the light in his mind the day before, but the reproduction
of the former image which constitutes memory does not probably take place
at all in his case if he is very young, so that there is not present to his
mind, in connection with the present image, any reproduction of the former
one. Still less does he make any mental comparison between the two. The
mother, as she sees the light of to-day, may remember the one of yesterday,
and mentally compare the two; may have many _thoughts_ awakened in her mind
by the sensation and the recollection--such as, this is from a new kind of
oil, and gives a brighter light than the other; that she will use this kind
of oil in all her lamps, and will recommend it to her friends, and so on
indefinitely. But the child has none of these thoughts and can have none;
for neither have the faculties been developed within him by which they are
conceived, nor has he had the experience of the previous sensations to form
the materials for framing them. He is conscious of the present sensations,
and that is all.
As he advances, however, in his experience of sensations, and as his mental
powers gradually begin to be unfolded, what may be called _thoughts_ arise,
consisting at first, probably, of recollections of past sensations
entering into his consciousness in connection with the present ones. These
combinations, and the mental acts of various kinds which are excited by
them, multiply as he advances towards maturity; but the images produced by
present realities are infinitely more vivid and have a very much greater
power over him than those which memory brings up from the past, or that his
fancy can anticipate in the future.
This state of things, though there is, of course, a gradual advancement in
the relative influence of what the mind can conceive, as compared with that
which the senses make real, continues substantially the same through all
the period of childhood and youth. In other words, the organs of sense and
of those mental faculties which are directly occupied with the sensations,
are the earliest to be developed, as we might naturally suppose would be
the case; and, by consequence, the sensible properties of objects and
the direct and immediate effects of any action, are those which have a
controlling influence over the volitions of the mind during all the earlier
periods of its development. The _reason_, on the other hand, which, as
applied to the practical affairs of life, has for its function the bringing
in of the more remote bearings and relations of a fact, or the indirect
and less obvious results of an action, is very slowly developed. It is
precisely on this account that the period of immaturity in the human
species is so long protracted in comparison with that of the inferior
animals. The lives of these animals are regulated by the cognizance simply
of the sensible properties of objects, and by the immediate results of
their acts, and they accordingly become mature as soon as their senses and
their bodily organs are brought completely into action. But man, who is
to be governed by his reason--that is, by much more far-reaching and
comprehensive views of what concerns him--requires a much longer period to
fit him for independent action, since he must wait for the development of
those higher faculties which are necessary for the attainment of these
extended views; and during this period he must depend upon the reason of
his parents instead of being governed by his own.
_Practical Effect of these Truths_.
The true course, then, for parents to pursue is not to expect too much from
the ability of their children to see what is right and proper for them, but
to decide all important questions themselves, using their own experience
and their own power of foresight as their guide. They are, indeed, to
cultivate and train the reasoning and reflective powers of their children,
but are not to expect them in early life to be sufficiently developed and
strengthened to bear any heavy strain, or to justify the placing of any
serious reliance upon them. They must, in a word, treat the reason and the
judgment of their children as the farmer treats the strength of his colt,
which he exercises and, to a certain extent, employs, but never puts upon
it any serious burden.
It results from this view of the case that it is not wise for a parent to
resort to arguing or reasoning with a child, as a substitute for authority,
or even as an aid to make up for a deficiency of authority, in regard to
what it is necessary that the child should do. No doubt it is a good plan
sometimes to let the child decide for himself, but when you pretend to
allow him to decide let him do it really. When you go out with him to take
a walk, if it is so nearly immaterial which way you go that you are willing
that he should determine the question, then lay the case before him, giving
him the advantages and disadvantages of the different ways, and let him
decide; and then act according to his decision. But if you have determined
in your own mind which way to go, simply announce your determination; and
if you give reasons at all, do not give them in such a way as to convey the
idea to his mind that his obligation to submit is to rest partly on his
seeing the force of them. For every parent will find that this principle is
a sound one and one of fundamental importance in the successful management
of children--namely, that it is much easier for a child to do what he does
not like to do as an act of simple submission to superior authority, than
for him to bring himself to an accordance with the decision by hearing and
considering the reasons. In other words, it is much easier for him to obey
your decision than to bring himself to the same decision against his own
will.
_In serious Cases no Reliance to be placed on the Reason of the Child_.
In all those cases, therefore, in which the parent can not safely allow the
children really to decide, such as the question of going to school, going
to church, taking medicine, remaining indoors on account of indisposition
or of the weather, making visits, choice of playmates and companions, and
a great many others which it would not be safe actually to allow them
to decide, it is true kindness to them to spare their minds the painful
perplexity of a conflict. Decide for them. Do not say, "Oh, I would not
do this or that"--whatever it may be--"because"--and then go on to assign
reasons thought of perhaps at the moment to meet the emergency, and indeed
generally false; but, "Yes, I don't wonder that you would like to do it.
I should like it if I were you. But it can not be done." When there is
medicine to be taken, do not put the child in misery for half an hour while
you resort to all sorts of arguments, and perhaps artifices, to bring him
to a willingness to take it; but simply present it to him, saying, "It is
something very disagreeable, I know, but it must be taken;" and if it is
refused, allow of no delay, but at once, though without any appearance of
displeasure, and in the gentlest-manner possible, force it down. Then,
after the excitement of the affair has passed away, and you have your
little patient in your lap, and he is in good-humor--this is all, of
course, on the supposition that he is not very sick--say to him, "You would
not take your medicine a little while ago, and we had to force it down: I
hope it did not hurt you much."
The child will probably make some fretful answer.
[Illustration: STORY OF THE HORSE.]
"It is not surprising that you did not like to take it. All children, while
they are too young to be reasonable, and all animals, such as horses and
cows, when they are sick, are very unwilling to take their medicine, and we
often have to force it down. You will, perhaps, refuse to take yours a good
many times yet before you are old enough to see that it is a great deal
easier to take it willingly than it is to have it forced down."
And then go on and tell him some amusing story of the difficulty some
people had in forcing medicine down the throat of a sick horse, who did not
know enough to take it like a man.
The idea is--for this case is only meant as an illustration of a general
principle--that the comfort and enjoyment of children, as well as the easy
and successful working of parental government, is greatly promoted by
deciding for the children at once, and placing their action on the simple
ground of obedience to authority in all those cases where the _decision can
not really and honestly be_ left to the children themselves.
To listen reluctantly to the persistent arguments of children in favor of
their being allowed to do what we are sure that we shall decide in the end
that it is not best for them to do, and to meet them with counter arguments
which, if they are not actually false, as they are very apt to be in such
a case, are utterly powerless, from the incapacity of the children to
appreciate them, on account of their being blinded by their wishes, is not
to strengthen the reasoning powers, but to confuse and bewilder them, and
impede their development.
_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.
_The Gentle Mode of Treatment_.
But let the mother first see and recognize those bearings and relations of
the question which the boy sees--that is, those which are the most direct
and immediate--and allow them their full force, and she establishes a
sympathy between his mind and hers, and prepares the way for his being led
by her to taking into the account other considerations which, though of
greater importance, are not so obvious, and which it would be wholly
unreasonable to expect that the boy would see himself, since they do not
come within the range of observation that could be reached spontaneously by
the unaided faculties of such a child. Suppose the mother says, in reply to
her boy's boastful declaration that he would shoot the robber,
"There would be a certain degree of justice in that, no doubt."
"Yes," rejoins the boy, "it would be no more than he deserved."
"When a man engages in the commission of a crime," adds the mother, "he
runs the risk of all the perils that he exposes himself to, from the
efforts of people to defend their property, and perhaps their lives; so
that, perhaps, _he_ would have no right to complain if people did shoot at
him."
"Not a bit of right," says the boy.
"But then there are some other things to be considered," says the mother,
"which, though they do not show that it would be unjust towards him, might
make it bad for _us_ to shoot him."
"What things?" asks the boy.
The mother having candidly admitted whatever there was of truth in the
boy's view of the subject, and thus placed herself, as it were, side by
side with him, he is prepared to see and admit what she is going to point
out to his observation--not as something directly antagonistic to what he
has said, but as something additional, something which is _also_ to be
taken into the account.
"In the first place," continues the mother, "there would be the body to be
disposed of, if you were to shoot him. How should we manage about that?"
It would make a great difference in such a case in respect to the danger
of putting the boy's mind into a state of antagonism against his mother's
presentation of the case, whether she says, "How shall _we_ manage about
that?" or, "How will _you_ manage about that?"
"Oh," replies the boy, "we would send to where he lives, and let his people
come and take him away; or, if he was in a city, we would call in the
police."
"That would be a good plan," says his mother. "We would call in the police,
if there were any police at hand. But then there would be the blood all
over the carpet and the floor."
"There would not be any carpet on the floor in a store-room," says the boy.
"True," replies the mother; "you are right there; so that there would not
be, after all, any great trouble about the blood. But the man might not be
killed outright, and it might be some time before the policemen would come,
and we should see him all that time writhing and struggling in dreadful
convulsions, which would fix horrid impressions upon our minds, that would
haunt us for a long time afterwards."
The mother could then go on to explain that, if the man had a wife and
children, any one who had killed the husband and father would pity them as
long as he lived, and could never see them or hear them spoken of without
feeling pain, and even some degree of self-reproach; although, so far as
the man himself was concerned, it might be that no injustice had been done.
After the excitement was over, too, he would begin to make excuses for the
man, thinking that perhaps he was poor, and his children were suffering for
bread, and it was on their account that he was tempted to steal, and this,
though it would not justify, might in some degree palliate the act for
which he was slain; or that he had been badly brought up, having never
received any proper instruction, but had been trained and taught from his
boyhood to pilfer and steal.
These and many analogous considerations might be presented to the child,
going to show that, whatever the rule of strict justice in respect to the
criminal may enjoin, it is not right to take the life of a wrong-doer
merely to prevent the commission of a minor offense. The law of the land
recognizes this principle, and does not justify the taking of life except
in extreme cases, such as those of imminent personal danger.
A friendly conversation of this kind, carried on, not in a spirit of
antagonism to what the boy has said, but in the form of presenting
information novel to him in respect to considerations which were to be
taken into the account in addition to those which he had himself perceived,
will have a great effect not only in modifying his opinion in this case,
but also in impressing him with the general idea that, before adopting a
decisive opinion on any subject, we must take care to acquaint ourselves
not merely with the most direct and obvious relations of it, but must look
farther into its bearings and results, so that our conclusion may have a
solid foundation by reposing upon as many as possible of the considerations
which ought really to affect it. Thus, by avoiding all appearance of
antagonism, we secure a ready reception for the truths we offer, and
cultivate the reasoning powers at the same time.
_General Principles_.
The principles, then, which are meant to be illustrated and enforced in
this chapter are these:
1. That the mental faculties of children on which the exercise of judgment
and of the power of reasoning depend are not among those which are the
earliest developed, and they do not attain, in the first years of life, to
such a degree of strength or maturity as to justify placing any serious
reliance upon them for the conduct of life.
2. Parents should, accordingly, not put them to any serious test, or impose
any heavy burden upon them; but should rely solely on their own authority,
as the expression of their own judgment, and not upon their ability to
convince the judgment of the child, in important cases, or in those where
its inclinations or its feelings are concerned.
3. But they may greatly promote the healthy development of these faculties
on the part of their children, by bringing to their view the less obvious
bearings and relations of various acts and occurrences on which judgment
is to be passed, in cases where their feelings and inclinations are not
specially concerned--doing this either in the form of explaining their own
parental principles of management, or practically, by intrusting them with
responsibility, and giving them a degree of actual power commensurate with
it, in cases where it is safe to do so; and,
4. They may enlarge the range of the children's ideas, and accustom them to
take wider views of the various subjects which occupy their attention, by
discussing with them the principles involved in the several cases; but such
discussions must be conducted in a calm, gentle, and considerate manner,
the parent looking always upon what the child says in the most favorable
light, putting the best construction upon it, and admitting its force,
and then presenting such additional views as ought also to be taken into
account, with moderate earnestness, and in an unobtrusive manner, thus
taking short and easy steps himself in order to accommodate his own rate of
progress to the still imperfectly developed capabilities of the child.
In a word, it is with the unfolding of the mental faculties of the young as
it is with the development of their muscles and the improvement of their
bodily powers; and just as the way to teach a child to walk is not to drag
him along hurriedly and forcibly by the arm faster than he can himself form
the necessary steps, but to go slowly, accommodating your movements to
those which are natural to him, and encouraging him by letting him perceive
that his own efforts produce appreciable and useful results--so, in
cultivating any of their thinking and reasoning powers, we must not put at
the outset too heavy a burden upon them, but must call them gently into
action, within the limits prescribed by the degree of maturity to which
they have attained, standing a little aside, as it were, in doing so, and
encouraging them to do the work themselves, instead of taking it out of
their hands and doing it for them.