32(3 ANNUAL REPORT OF THE Off. Doc. 



1 may be taking the impopiilar side when 1 .say I fail to understand 

 why so much talk of the duty of the child in the abstract toward 

 a relation it had no voice or will in forming. Having thrust upon 

 it the requirement of devotion and care in instances where there is 

 little in nature to call it forth. So many writers speak of parents 

 sacrificing everything for their children as tho' its very birth was 

 a sacrifice for the child. Parenthood to my mind is not a sacrifice, 

 it is a relation willingly assumed and entails upon it the duties 

 of the parents because they chose it for more than it does upon the 

 child who was ignorant of its coming. 



This does not mean that the later care and tenderness given to 

 the child should not receive in turn from the child all the care and 

 devotion called forth by the parents in their relation as parents, 

 but let it be a loving willingness and not a forced duty. Let the 

 attitude of the parent be such as to absolutely' force by loving propa- 

 gation all the enlargement of the child's capacity for love — let it 

 fill, so far as possible, all the needs of the child nature through tJie 

 actual giving of the parent itself and there will be in the majority 

 of cases, no lack of the spontaneous giving of the child's full alle- 

 giance. 



I recall how, years ago, the burden was lifted from my heart 

 when, for the first time, I heard the last clause of the Biblical com- 

 mand, "Children obey your parents." From pulpit and from plat- 

 form we hear this thundered forth, striking terror ofttimes to the 

 child who feels the whole burden is his, but when softened by the 

 latter clause of, "Fathers, provoke not your children to anger," and 

 the duty is shown for the parents as well, the child feels relieved. 

 So, all through, it seems to me, the duty is two-fold — the child shall 

 give its obedience, but the commands of the parents are to be such 

 as the child can obey ! 



Mother's Day, which has thrice been lovingly observed, has ten- 

 dered many hearts and wakened many memories in the minds of 

 the man of bu.siness, the scientist, the scholar with whose childish 

 days the mother hovered as the beneficent factor. While fine as a 

 memorial, it fails to take the place of the loving thought here and 

 now — the caress, the deference, the devotion to one whose life was 

 lived for her child. 



The white carnation worn by loving, stalwart sons and matronly 

 daughters savors of the esthetic and the beautiful, yet more beauti- 

 ful still is the action toward those who have stood the storm and 

 stress of a busy, helpful life. The beautiful tribute of flowers laid 

 on a coffin-lid may testify of love, but better testimony is that of 

 flowers given in life, the kiss of appreciation and love given while 

 the eyes can brighten at the touch and the cheeks tinge with pleasure. 

 Let those of us who have the mother here, who, being a true mother 

 in all the term implies, deserves this honor, see to it that no lack 

 on our part shall embitter the parting hour or the sad, lonely ones 

 to follow. 



Edgar Allen Poe, whose pen has enabled us to know and love for 

 the aspirations he cherished but never realized:— and though his 

 life held mistakes it held many beautiful things as well — drew us 

 by an unmistakable cord when he called mother the "Name Incom- 

 parable," and said: 



