Parenting

“ The grand Obligations of Parents to their Children consist in teaching them a Knowledge of themselves, a Love of Duty, and a Love of Virtue. Whence it is evident, that the Attention of Parents to conduct their Children as they ought, is indispensably necessary, even to the third Stage of Life; but it is doubly so at the Beginning. It is a judicious Observation, that he who sets out wrong is half undone; and tho’ this holds good in the general Concerns of Life, yet it is no where more applicable than in the false Steps taken in the initiating our Children. ”

“ My remarks will be to parents as well as to children. I will commence by saying that if each and every one of us who are parents will reflect upon the responsibilities devolving upon us we shall come to the conclusion that we should never permit ourselves to do anything that we are not willing to see our children do. We should set them an example that we wish them to imitate. Do we realize this? How often we see parents demand obedience, good behavior, kind words, pleasant looks, a sweet voice and a bright eye from a child or children when they themselves are full of bitterness and scolding! ”

“ Here is a great secret of power, to treat these, lapsed and restored, like children; for what is the object of family discipline, of that obedience which has been described as the whole duty of a child? Is it not to ease the way of the child, while will is weak and conscience immature, by getting it on the habits of the good life where it is as easy to go right as for a locomotive to run on its lines? ”

“ Putting into practice this first principle of education through the suggestive power of a parental example characterised by correctness of speech, soundness of thought, and the moral qualities of cheerfulness, unselfishness, kindness, politeness, industriousness, and the other virtues, the greatest care must also be taken to “fertilise” the child’s mind through proper adjustment of his physical surroundings. Nothing is more certain—and least appreciated by the average parent—than the fact that every detail in the child’s material environment is of suggestive significance to him. ”

“ So the duty of the parent is to "look as deeply as possible into the life of the child to see what he requires for his present stage of development," and then to "scrutinise the environment to see what it offers ... to utilise all possibilities of meeting normal needs," to remove what is hurtful, or at least to "admit its defects" if they cannot give the child what his nature requires. "If parents offer what the child does not need," he says, "they will destroy the child's faith in their sympathetic understanding." ”

“ Duty Of Parents To Children. Great are the responsibilities of the husband. Great are the responsibilities of the wife, but greater are the responsibilities of parents. Father and mother, God lays a responsibility upon you as you receive your new-born child. A precious little immortal soul, whose eternal destiny depends largely upon you. The proper training of children is attended with many difficulties, and every parent certainly needs instruction from God. ”

“ The parent's duties to the child are maintenance in his own condition in life, care for his education and his moral and religious culture, advice, restraint when needed, punishment when both deserved and needed, pure example and wholesome influence, aid in the formation of habits and aptitudes suited to his probable calling or estate in his adult years, and provision for his favorable entrance on his future career. ”

“ Reverence and respect go hand in hand. “As ye measure to others, so in like manner shall it be measured to you again.”
359 DUTIES OF CHILDREN TO THEIR PARENTS CHILDREN SHOULD SHARE IN DUTIES Let the children share in the duties of the home. Even while very young there are many steps that a child may save the mother. Let them do the little things, such as bringing mother’s work basket or having something ready for father’s comfort when he comes home from the day’s work and care. Gradually, as they grow, let the tasks gently shift over to the young shoulders. ”

“ But to awaken Parents still farther, I must observe, that teaching their Children all the moral Duties is not only their Province, but more or less their Obligation. A learned and ingenious French Author says, that Parents are the best Instructors, if they themselves are well instructed. For, says he, “A Father who has but two or three accustom’d to respect him, finds no Difficulty in keeping them to their Duty. He has them constantly at home with him; he can take the Hours when they are most docible; he knows their Capacity, their Genius, and their Inclinations. ”

“ How can children repay parents for their watchings, anxieties, labors, toils, trials, patience, and love? Think of the utter helplessness of the long years of infancy, of the entire dependence of succeeding childhood, of the necessities and wants of youth, of the burning solicitude of parents, and their deep and inexhaustible love ”

“ The last chapter introduced the thought of parents in their highest function—as revealers of God to their children. To bring the human race, family by family, child by child, out of the savage and inhuman desolation where He is not, into the light and warmth and comfort of the presence of God, is, no doubt, the chief thing we have to do in the world. And this individual work with each child, being the most momentous work in the world, is put into the hands of the wisest, most loving, disciplined, and divinely instructed of human beings. ”

“ The greatest favor, privilege, and luxury that parents can confer upon children is that of health, and the next greatest is that of healthy parents, neither ill-tempered with care nor morbid and dull with overwork, but alert to perceive and ready to sympathize in all their trials and aspirations, and endowed with sufficient leisure to give some attention to that quite as important duty as child-bearing—the character-training of children. ”

“ The parents’ chief care is, that that which they supply shall be wholesome and nourishing, whether in the way of picture-books, lessons, playmates, bread and milk, or mother’s love. This is education as most parents understand it, with more of meat, more of love, more of culture, according to their kind and degree. They let their children alone, allowing human nature to develop on its own lines, modified by facts of environment and descent. ”

“ Answer child’s questions regarding origin of life reverently, seriously, honestly, with emphasis upon nurturing and on social coöperation of mother and father; give a bias toward the social and spiritual relations of family life, and a suggestion of the future parental responsibilities of the child. ”

“ To say that the mother—and indeed both parents—ought to form a part of the playing circle of the youngest children, in order to watch their opening dispositions, to check what may be improper, and encourage what ought to be encouraged, would be only to repeat what has often been recommended by the best writers on education—but which must be repeated, again and again, till it leaves an impression, especially on CHRISTIAN parents. ”

“ I believe that reasonable parents create reasonable children. The children must feel their parents’ affection—not duty and responsibility, for which no child is grateful, but warm love, which feels delight in the child’s presence and ways. ”

“ Father and Son Properly enough, the responsibility for health and development of young children rests upon the mother, and in most families this care remains with her till the children are able to look out for themselves. ”

“ A matter of importance is that the parents or other persons responsible for the care and guidance of the child, should understand the psychical management of children; for example, that they should not fall into the common error of regarding the love-affairs of children as a joke, and that they should not, by this attitude, actually encourage the children in their course of conduct. ”

“ Where the conscience of the parent has only been awakened late in life to this high duty to the child, the attempt to approach the subject with the young adult is often deeply resented by both boy and girl. ”

“ The obligations you are under to your parents cannot be discharged, 76but by a uniform and cheerful obedience; an unreserved and ready compliance with their wishes, added to the most diligent attention to their ease and happiness. The virtuous and affectionate behaviour of children is the best compensation, in their power, for that unwearied care and solicitude which parents, only, know. Upon daughters, whose situation and employments lead them more frequently into scenes of domestic tenderness ”

“ I deem it to be your imperative duty to study the subjects well. The proper management of children is a vital question,—a mother’s question,—and the most important that can be brought under the consideration of a parent ”

“ Perhaps it was my chief misfortune that I had neither father nor mother alive; for parents have an instinctive sagacity in regard to the welfare of their children, and the child feels a confidence both in the wisdom and affection of his parents which he cannot transfer to any delegate of their duties, however conscientious. ”

“ Parents' standards may seem, and even be, exigent, but the attempt to modify their rigor may not be made by those lacking in fundamental reverence for a child, and in conscious hope for its wise, noble, self-reliant maturity. ”

“ The necessity of caring for the infants would prolong the period of maternal affection, and would tend to keep the father and mother and children together, but it would tend especially to keep the mother and children together. ”

“ The eugenic education of children is the real beginning. Parents can give to the little children in the home true ideals of parenthood, wholesome respect for maternity and paternity, training in the control of desires and appetites, a controlling sense of their personal and social responsibility, and true instruction regarding the origin and creation of life. ”

“ It is through the silent operation of example in their own well-regulated behaviour, and by accustoming their children early to the discipline of daily and hourly life, in such offices and employment as the situation of the family requires, and as are suitable to tender years, that parents become infinitely the most important tutors of their children, without appearing, or positively meaning to be so. ”

“ The care and management, and consequently the health and future well-doing of the child, principally devolve upon the mother, "for it is the mother after all that has most to do with the making or marring of the man." ”

“ These considerations are much more than enough to sweeten the toils and cares of parents, and to make them regard every additional child as an additional blessing. But, that children may be a blessing and not a curse, care must be taken of their education. ”

“ The avoidance of the evils consequent upon the insufficient Means of avoiding insufficient parental re-adjustment readjustment of the parents attitude towards their children is one of the most pressing tasks of an enlightened hygiene of family life. ”

“ The higher the type of life and the greater the future demands, the longer is the period of preparation and consequent period of parental care. This fact, coupled with man's power for lasting relationships through the organization of permanent sentiments, has made the, bond between parent and child an enduring one. ”

“ This has quickly become a widespread movement for education in parenthood. Pride of parenthood brings fathers and [Pg viii] mothers to the Better Babies Contests. Parental love holds them there to watch their babies examined by physicians and to learn how the condition of their children can be improved by intelligent care and feeding and sanitary environment. ”

“ Fathers and mothers are too absorbed in business and housekeeping to study their children, and cherish that sweet and natural confidence which is a child's surest safeguard, and a parent's subtlest power. So the young hearts hide trouble or temptation till the harm is done, and mutual regret comes too late. Happy the boys and girls who tell all things freely to father or mother, sure of pity, help, and pardon; and thrice happy the parents who, out of their own experience, and by their own virtues, can teach and uplift the souls for which they are responsible. ”

“ You can be frank, intelligent and human with your children. Let me tell you, if I may, some things you can do. Let us think of the daughter first, but not because she needs more protection than the son, for God knows they are both in need of all the protection loving, intelligent parents can give them. ”

“ In neither of these two ways can a deep and sound relation between children and parents be produced. [Pg 196]
We see on the one side a minority of conscientious mothers and fathers, who in a real sense live only for the children. They mould their whole life for the life of the children; and the children get the idea that they are the central point of existence. On the other side, we see children who take part in all the life and over-refinements of the home. ”

“ It is the duty of all parents, to provide for their families every temporal good which adds to their own comfort or usefulness in life. And it is no less the duty of parents to provide for the spiritual necessities of their own families. And first--we shall consider the duty of parents, to provide suitable training for their children. ”

“ In thus shaping your children’s future, we cannot but think that the father will be as richly blessed for instilling correct principles, or as surely condemned for wrong training and example, as the mother. ”