its extraordinariness. Parental authority should, therefore, be 

 sparingly used, like the salt put in sweet dishes — just enough to 

 bring out the flavour — or as the onion in a salad, which, as 

 Sidney Smith tells us should only 



" * * * * lurk within the bowl 

 And, half suspected, animate the whole." 



More spoils all, and in the limit, we have our pie all salt, our 

 salad all onion, and our method like that of the Irishwoman who, 

 as the story goes, says to her little girl — " Run, Bridget, darlin', 

 an' see what yer brother Patrick is doin', and fwhatever it is, 

 tell him to sthap at wanst ! " 



This kind of treatment seems often to arise from an as- 

 sumption that children are born bad ; with a natural tendency 

 to evil, and that continually, unless either forced or cajoled into 

 an uncertain and quite temporary and merely apparent or skin- 

 deep morality, so far as that term is nnderstood by the parent- 

 A good deal of what is often anathematized as original sin 

 may be simply original ignorance. It is difficult to imagine a 

 wrong which would be committed if the perpetrator could fully 

 realize the whole of its evil results, but his original ignorance 

 prevents him. Clear away this completely, and that " best he 

 can," which he will do in any case according to his lights, 

 increases as his light grows — his evil tendency vanishing con- 

 versely. 



In consequence of this frequent adoption of the opposite 

 view children are commonly supposed to lie naturally. 

 A priori one would not think so because truth is the 

 simpler and obvious course. To invent lying requires a strong 

 incentive, such as fear, and a certain amount of design and 

 reasoning power, in which young children are deficient. But 

 they may be taught deceit by example, under the foolish though 

 common error that they have not the wit to distinguish truth 

 from falsehood, and so it is forgotten that an example of truest, 

 purest honour must be set children by taking care that not the 

 faintest falsity of dealing with them is ever permitted. Of the 

 methods which involve an example of deceit may be mentioned 

 the trying to cure a child's little troubles by directing his atten 



