798 PROCEEDINGS OF SECTION J. 
civil and moral law. It is essential that this manly and 
self-respecting spirit of obedience should be evoked in child- 
hood. “It is quite a mistake to adopt the modern system 
of allowing children to treat their fathers and mothers on 
terms of equality, to let them express an opinion whenever 
they please, and ask the reason of everything. There is no 
equality between a man and a child, between a father and 
his son. Any apparent equality allowed to exist is one 
wholly unfounded on truth.” Children are much more 
observant and discriminating than is commonly supposed, 
and do not resent a firm and consistent but affectionate dis- 
cipline. The present Archbishop of Canterbury is fond of 
recalling how, when he was a master at one of our large 
public schools, he overheard one of his pupils confide to a 
friend hisopinion that Temple was “‘abeast, buta just beast.”’ 
If you wish to make a child selfish, petulant, discontented, 
and miserable, indulge all his whims, humour all his weak- 
nesses, and deny him nothing. In every way, und in all 
cases, there is no worse rule than a weak one. Above all 
things, should the parent and teacher aim at being con- 
sistent ; avoid coercive measures so long as it is possible 
rightly to do so; do not treat the same offence at one time 
with leniency and at another with severity. Be sparing of 
commands, but when once given see that they are carried 
out to the letter. Again, to quote Herbert Spencer, ‘ Con- 
sider well beforehand what you are going to do; weigh all 
the consequences; think whether your firmness of purpose 
will be sufficient; and then, if you finally make the law, 
enforce it uniformly at all costs. Let your penalties be 
like the penalties inflicted by inanimate Nature—in- 
evitable.” Carry this out in the very smallest matters ; 
train your children to be regular in rising and in going to 
bed, punctual to meals, tidy and clean in their person and 
dress, polite to friends and acquaintances, simple and easy 
in deportment; thus, by kindly, firm, and consistent treat- 
ment, they will become thoroughly well-governed creatures, 
no longer swayed by their own whims and fancies. 
Children know nothing about the transcendental distinc- 
tion between right and wrong; and very little good, and 
possibly much harm, will arise from an attempt to inculcate 
in a young child the necessity of truthfulness on definite 
religious or moral grounds. Just as in the history of the 
race conscience and the ethical idea was one of the latest of 
human attributes to be evolved, so in the individual history 
of each child the idea of moral obligation is one of compara- 
tively late growth. The idea of morality is altogether too 
