SONS 267 



a great deal about their children, is the conviction that 

 they know them so well. After a child grows up and his 

 nature develops, his one idea is to go forth and make his 

 own friends and start his own life ; and when he comes back 

 to the home, however much his heart warms to it when he 

 is away, he re-enters it with different eyes, and often with 

 a critical spirit. This seems very hard to the parents, who 

 have changed but little. The best way of making their love 

 appreciated is not to exact more than they get. The real 

 time of trial to parents is when their children are between 

 seventeen and twenty-one. They would do well to realise 

 how little they know of the change that is going on in their 

 sons. They can only cultivate them, humour them, and, 

 if possible, win them. Till this has been done, it is 

 absolutely useless to expect their confidence or to resent 

 the fact that it is withheld. The more openly a child has 

 been brought up and encouraged to speak his mind, the 

 more odious and critical his language will appear at this 

 age to outsiders who do not realise how far better it is that 

 he should express his views without reserve at home than 

 that he should disguise his feelings there and speak openly 

 abroad. It should only be impressed upon children that it 

 is in better taste and more according to the rules of society 

 to keep their criticisms for the privacy of family life. 



The judicious management of parents by good sons 

 and daughters often makes a home seem happy for a 

 time ; but I think a few open and even angry discussions 

 are wholesomer for the characters of the young than a 

 trained duplicity implying peace where there is no peace. 

 In our present civilisation, no one being can rule the 

 destiny of another by force, not even in the case of a 

 father and his children. I think it well to remember in 

 our homes Swift's saying that ' Government without the 

 consent of the governed is the very definition of slavery, 

 though eleven men well armed will certainly subdue one 



