A mother’s love ought to be attuned to the very note of the love
divine,—to be, in fact, its echo from the deep cave of her heart.
But, with super-earthly love to light her way what does she see before
her? There is, first, the duty of conducing to her child’s moral
welfare, the highest of all her duties; secondly, of securing his
bodily health; thirdly, of giving him that intellectual training which
will enlarge his being and make his moral nature itself more robust and
capable of fulfilling his duties in life; and lastly, of making him as
happy as she may. These are each and all most complicated problems to
many a good mother, working perhaps against wind and tide, with feeble
health or limited means, or possibly with a husband who thwarts and
opposes her endeavors. It would require not half a lecture, but a whole
treatise, to deal with such a subject fitly, even if I possessed the
experience or insight needful for the task. There is only one point on
which I think ethical science may be of some utility. That point is the
problem of _obedience_. How far ought it to be enforced?