fidence has been early invited by endearing affability, and established by prudence, reserve in the child will seldom have place in maturer years.

When children are accustomed freely to unbosom themselves, and unreservedly to reveal their wishes to the parental friend, who is most interested in their welfare, what advantages must result to them, and what 'pleasure to the mind of an affectionate parent! When parents thus become to their children, the fa miliar friends, the unreserved confidants, the sympathising partners in their joys and sorrows, hopes and disappointments; a hold on the mind is obtained which will continue when authority ceases; and will prove a safeguard through the most critical periods of life.

Young people who are treated as companions by judicious parents, are seldom addicted to degrading practices. They will even forego many indulgences to avoid displeasing them, or giving them pain.

And there are few young people who would not gladly avail themselves of parental advice and experience, if not discouraged by want of freedom in the parent. Therefore, if we would have children unbosom their thoughts to us, their confidence must be invited by kindness and condescension. Not a condescension to improper indulgences, but a condescension that increases parental authority in right government. There is no fear of losing respect or right authority, by freedom and familiarity: It is by that we gain their confidence, and thus learn to know, and to correct their faults.

Pure affection is so directed to the happiness of the child, that while it endeavours, by kindness and love, to prevent any thing like forced obedience, it also guards against that kind of liberty by which it loses its authority

RESERVEDNESS AND SEVERITY.

That respect to a parent, which is obtained by uniting gentleness with firmness, differs widely from the slavish fear produced by severe treatment. For where the dread of punishment predominates, the disposition is generally artful. Fear, which is the effect of severity, prompts children, not so much to avoid faults, as to elude detection.

Indeed timid children can hardly resist the temptation which terror holds out to them, of endeavouring to hide offences if possible. And though severity should extort confession, and promise of strict obedience, it is not calculated to produce sincere repentance, or awaken virtuous thoughts; nor does it implant any principle to hinder the child from committing a similar fault in our absence. Its self-will may indeed be made sullenly to submit to superior strength, but it will remain unsubjected. And the odious spirit of revenge, by this kind of treatment, is often generated.

One among the many disadvantages attending severe measures, is, that parents generally trust to the effects of chastisement, and are deficient in that uniform superintendence, advice and caution, on which the forming right habits, almost entirely depends. Children, when subjected to severity, often obtain more indulgences, and take more dangerous liberties, than those who are moderately curbed and gently instructed. The keen temper that transports the parent to blows and harsh treatment, is often accompanied by strong affections; and when anger has subsided, he is sorry for having gone so far; then too much liberty succeeds, till another fault, originating in parental indulgence or negligence, draws on the child another unprofitable punishment. And thus the continued crossing of the humours that have been indulged, can hardly fail to call forth resentment

anger, sullenness, or obstinate perverseness: unless severity has broken the spirits, and the child sinks under discouragement. And, as the frequent recurrence of anger and resentment, tends to beget hatred and ill-will, the disposition to benevolence is destroyed, and malevolence is introduced in its room.

"Many children possess quick feelings of honour and disgrace and in children the most promising, these feelings are often the most acute. They have a keen sensibility to shame, whereof a good use may be made by prudent management; but if this sensibility be put to hard proof, and that frequently, it becomes blunted, and their minds grow callous. And a child that is lost to shame, is in peculiar danger of being a lost child.”

Again: "Many parents of good sense, and great moral worth, fearful of failing in their duty by not governing enough, run into the opposite extreme. They maintain such reservedness, distance, and stateliness toward their children, that they hardly dare to speak in their presence. They incumber them with a multitude of regulations; they tire them with long lessons of stern monitions; they disgust and alienate them with a superabundance of sharp reproof; they treat their little levities as if they were heinous crimes. Instead of drawing them with 'cords of love,' they bind them fast with cords that are galling and painful."*

Again, there are some parents whose manner towards their children varies in exact proportion to the variations of their own fickle tempers. When in a pleasant humour themselves, they indulge them in every thing when displeased or angry, they will punish for almost nothing. This sort of government, if government it may be called, tends alike to discourage, and to produce contempt.

Children that are trained up under severe disci

pline, however much they fear their parents, do rarely love them much; and they must needs possess more than a common share of native amiableness, if, in the end, they turn out sweet tempered, humane, and of nice sense of honour.

To show children that we are deeply afflicted, not enraged at their misconduct, tends more to awaken their feelings, bring into action their reason, and reclaim them from evil, than the severity of the rod, which irritates the disposition, but rarely convinces the judgment.

IMPROPER INDULGENCE.

Gratification of will, is encouraged in children by frequent indulgence of their improper desires; with which every notion of happiness becomes thus connected; and the idea of misery with that of disappointment. Thus, an over-regard for personal ease, and personal gratification, is implanted in the mind, and selfishness and pride too frequently become the most prominent features in the character; for, by improper indulgence, self-will is so fostered, that a capricious humour is its unavoidable consequence. The passions so act and react upon each other, that the frequent gratification of will engenders pride, and pride augments the desire of gratifying the will, till it becomes insatiable. Many are the tyrannical husbands and fathers, and turbulent wives and mothers, that have been formed by an education in which the will has never known subjection. For, as too great indulgence increases selfishness; so does the spirit of selfishness occasion miseries in domestic life.

RULES AND INJUNCTIONS.

"A few rules are necessary for the government of children, and but a few. These should be too plain

to be misunderstood, too reasonable to admit of dis. pute, and too important to be violated or neglected. They should be engraven early upon the memories of children, and enforced, when need requires it, with steady, but mild firmness. And by and by they will grow into habits; and submission and obedience will become natural" and easy.

"When children are managed in this manner from infancy, by parents, whose example comports with their injunctions, and whose exercise of authority carries along with it evident marks of tender affection, they feel the yoke to be easy, and are withheld from acts of disobedience, more by filial love, than the dread of chastisement. Hence it is, that, in some houses, family government goes on with singular regularity, though so silent as to be scarcely perceived. There is no violent scolding; no boisterous threats; no fierce looks. Both the father and the mother are so mild and even in temper and good behaviour, that they seem scarcely to display any authority at all; and yet their children are orderly, submissive, and dutiful, in a very uncommon degree. A single word, or a mere glance of the eye, from either the one or the other, they mind more than the children of some families do pelting and hard blows."

"Thus mildly treated, children are led to delight in the company and conversation of their parents, and to receive counsel readily from their lips: and when they come of age to act for themselves, they do not feel like emancipated slaves; but are still looking back, with mixed emotions of respect and love, to the salutary discipline they had been under, still accustoming themselves to consult their parents and to receive their advice with deference;"* being thus prepared to maintain similar discipline in their own families.