Evening Republican, Volume 20, Number 270, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 10 November 1916 — TRAINING TODAY’S BOYS AND GIRLS [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

TRAINING TODAY’S BOYS AND GIRLS

Children. Are Neither Angels Nor the Opposite. THEIR IS IMITATIVE At First, Whatever They Do Is Quite Without Any Moral Blflnlflcanco ' and Often Results From Purely Instinctive Impulses. By SIDONIE M. GRUENBERQ. DONALD and Louise, cousins sevt eral times removed, were becoming acquainted for the first time while Donald was visiting the city with his mother. They were getting along beautifully, Louise’s mother observed. They were playing railroad with the chairs and hassocks. “Don’t move that!” shouted Donald, “You’ll get right in front of the train I” Louise continued to push the chair against which she was leaning. "Don’t do that!” repeated Donald, with a little more warmth. The chair moved over about half a yard. Bang! Louise rolled over as if struck by an automobile. She had been struck by Donald Instead. Up jumped the mothers. “You naughty boy!” came from both, as though they had rehearsed for the chorus. Louise did not make a demonstration of severe, suffering, so they were able to give all of their attention to the naughty boy. “Who would ever have thought it of him?” asked the girl’s mother, not expecting any one to answer her. And Donald really did not look very vicious, with his pale hair and eyes, and soft voice and shrinking manner. Certainly his mother had never thought him capable of so violent and so ungallant a deed. But there could be no mistake; he had pushed Louise over very roughly, very unkindly, almost -cruelly, And Louise, standing by her mother’s side, a picture of injured innocence, was absorbing the warm sympathy of The elders and gloating in the discomfiture of the naughty boy. Her mother already knew how angelic she was, and now Donald’s mother w’as finding out.

Donald’s mother had always supposed that her child was an angel too, and she could not understand what had happened to change him. A prestige of primitive superstition popped into her head, and she reflected that having been “too good” for so long, he was about to even things up by giving the devil the upper hand for a while. Louise’s mother did not seem to wonder at all. She knew that her child was one of the angelic kind, and now she saw that Donald was

tl}e other kind. The fact is that Donald was just as angelic as Louise, and just as angelic as he had ever been. Louise explained that she had only moved the chair; yet Donald had not only told her —at least twice—not to do So, but he had very good reason on his side. “She put that pile of wood right in front of where the train was coming, and it would have been wrecked and all the people killed.” Any boy who would

Goes Through the Motions of Lighting a Pipe and Puffing Clouds of Smoke. hesitate to use violence In such an emergency is not quite enough of a boy for the practical affairs of life. When all the facts in the case are ‘considered one is tempted to suspect that Louise was actuated by the imp of perversity and that Donald was moved by a finer spirit. However, his conduct was unbecoming a gentleman, and Louise had only moved the chair. It is still the usual thing to look upon children as embodiments of one or the other of the two conflicting spirit of right and wrong. Too many of us think that a child is either an angel or a devil, and that our chief concern in life is to adore these of the second. One thing that modern studies In child nature has taught us is that young children are neither virtuous nor wicked; they are not moral, and they are *pot “immoral.” They do many things that are quite acceptable to older people, and even pleasing. And they do many things that are decidedly objectionable. But whatever they do is—at least at first —without any moral significance. / Much of the young child’s conduct is Imitative. When a boy goes through the motion of lighting a pipe and puffing clouds of smoke toward the gelling you cannot believe that he has

begun his descent to perdition, no mat* ter what you think of smoking in gate* eral or of your curtains in particular. On the other hand, when a little girt begs for pennies -to give to the blind to the grind-organ man you have n'o warrant for assuming that site Is a natural-born philanthropist, no matter what your views on charity. Much of the young child's conduct results frdm purely instinctive impulses. “So every child will He under suitable provocation, without thereby indicating a streak of untruthfulnes*; or Louise may do just what she is told not to do without yielding altogether to the demon of unrighteousness. A woman recently asked: "Do you believe In the spiritual Interpretation of child nature, or In the scientific interpretation?” This question assumes that there is a conflict between scientific truth and spiritual truth. It is a mistake to assume that the lack of certain “spiritual” qualities is a “spiritual” explanation of a child’s conduct. The scientists have shown that the ability to choose one’s actions, and the consciousness of purpose and of consequences, develop very slowly in the child’s mind. Until there is consciousness of right and wrong, and until the child is quite able to choose what he does and what he does not do, it useless to speak of the moral qualit of his acts, no matter what their ao-

When a Little Girl Beg* Pennies for the Grind-Organ Man, ft Does Not Mean She Is a Natural-Bom Philanthropist. tual consequences maybeorhow they harmonize with our notion of what ought to be done. To say that a child’s conduct is unmoral does not take from him the possibility of spiritual development On the contrary, the assumption that the child is a moral being would seem to leave nothing for growth. The sense of righteousness and the feeling of guilt are not born in the child; they have to be achieved through trial and suffering.