temper seems too boisterous, so that he is always ready to quarrel, and loves fighting for fighting's sake, keeping him among the female part of the family, is the likeliest mechanical means I know for softening his manners.

If he shows too much self conceit, it will be necessary to mortify him from time to time, by showing him his defects, and how much he is exceeded by others. If he is bashful and timorous, he must be encouraged and commended for whatever he does well.

If a child seems inclined to sauntering and idleness, emulation is the proper cure to be administered. If he sees others of his equals honoured and caressed for using a little diligence, he must be of a temper uncommonly insensible, and of a spirit uncommonly abject, if he is not moved to emulate their improvements.

Lying abed in a morning, or passing, at any time, a whole day, without doing somewhat, towards his improvement, if in health, ought by no means to be allowed in a child who is come to the age of learning to spell. And if he is from his infancy, accustomed to hear schools and places of education spoke of as scenes of happiness; and has books (not sweetmeats, playthings, or fine clothes,) given him as the most valuable presents and the richest rewards, he can hardly fail to be moved to exert himself. But all this is directly contrary to the common practice of threatening a child with school whenever he does amiss; of setting him a task as a punishment, and of sending for him from school, from time to time, as a gratification.

A tendency to prodigality, in a child, is to be curbed as early as possible. For he who will in his youth lavish away half-pence, when he comes to manhood, will be apt to squander away guineas. The best methods I know for correcting this bias in a child, are such as these: Encouraging him to save a piece of money some little time, on the promise of doubling it, and, which is to the same purpose, lessening his allowance (but not by any means depriving him wholly of pocket money) in case of misconduct obliging him to give an exact account of his manner of laying out his money, by memory at first, and afterwards in a written account, regularly kept; putting in a purse by itself a penny, or sixpence, for every penny or

sixpence given him, and showing him, from time to time, the sum; and so forth.

There is no error more fatal, than imagining, that pinching a youth in his pocket money, will teach him frugality. On the contrary, it will only occasion his running into extravagance with so much the more eagerness, whenever he comes to have money in his own hands; as pinching him in his diet will make his appetite only the more rapacious. In the same manner, confining him too much from diversions and company, will heighten his desire after them: And overloading and fatiguing him with study, or with religious exercises, will disgust him against learning and devotion. For human nature is like a stream of water, which, if too much opposed in its course, will swell, and at length overflow all bounds; but, carefully kept within its banks, will enrich and beautify the places it visits in its course.

If you put into the hands of your child, more money than is suitable to his age and discretion, expect to find that he has thrown it away upon what is not only idle, but hurtful. A certain small regular income any child above six years of age ought to have, but I should think no extraordinary advance proper upon any account. When he comes to be capable of keeping an account, he ought to be obliged to it. He will thereby acquire a habit of frugality, attention, and prudence, that will be of service to him through his whole life. On the contrary, giving a young person money to spend at will, without requiring any account of it, is leading, or rather forcing him upon extravagance and folly.

As a turn to covetousness and hoarding, it is in a child a frightful temper, indicating a natural inclination to sordid selfishness. This being a disposition which strengthens with years, and holds to the last, when it begins to appar so early, it is to be expected it will come to an excessive degree in time. A lad ought to be broke of this happy turn, by showing him the odiousness of it in the judgment of all openhearted people, and by exposing his churlishness to the ridicule of his equals. Children ought to be accustomed from their earliest years, to bring themselves with ease to quit what they may have a right to; to give away part of their fruits or sweetmeats, and

to bestow, out of their pocket money, for the relief of

the poor.

A natural perverseness and obstinacy in the temper of a child, it is hardly possible to break, after seven or eight years of age, till reason and experience do it, which may never happen. And even before that early period, it is not in some, to be conquered but by severe means; though severity may be used without violence, as by confinement and dieting. When a parent finds himself obliged to come to extremities, the mildest way of proceeding, is to resolve to go through with it at once. It is likewise a more effectual method, to punish once with some severity, than a great many times in a superficial manner. For when once a child, of sturdy spirit and constitution, becomes accustomed to punishment, he grows hardened against it, till at length it loses its effects, and becomes no punishment. I need not add, that correction, when things come to the extremity which renders it absolutely necessary, ought always to be administered with coolness and deliberation, and not without visible reluctance, that the child may plainly see it is not passion in the parent, but a regard to his good, and absolute necessity that brings it upon him. And as nothing but a visible pravity of mind is sufficient to make so rough a remedy necessary, so whenever the perverseness, or wickedness of disposition which occasioned it, seems perfectly conquered, it ought by all means to be given over, and a quite contrary behaviour to be assumed by the parent. For the danger of hardening the temper of a child, by making him too familiar with punishment, is almost as bad as any fault intended to be corrected by it. Confinement, dieting, restraint from the amusements allowed to others, his equals, the loss of his father's or mother's favour, and, above all, disgrace, are much the most ingenuous punishments to be inflicted on young gentlemen.

When it is found necessary to inflict disgrace, the utmost care ought to be taken, that the whole family appear to be of a mind. If the father chides, and the mother or any other person encourages, what effect can be expected to be worked upon the mind of the child? On the other hand, when he meets with coldness and discouragement

from every body, he will find himself under a necessity of amending his manners in his own defence.

To make the young mind the more susceptible of a sense of shame, and to inspire it with sentiments of true honour; youth should be very early taught to entertain worthy thoughts of the Dignity of Human Nature, and the reverence we owe ourselves, so that they may be made to stand in so much awe of themselves as not to do a mean action, though never to be known to any creature.

All methods of education ought in general to be directed to the improvement of some good tendency, or the correction of some wrong turn in the mind. And that parent, or tutor, who thinks of forming a rational creature, as he would break a hound or a colt, by severity alone, without endeavouring to rectify the judgment and bend the will, shows himself wholly ignorant of human nature, and of the work he has undertaken. From the time a child can speak, it is capable of being reasoned with, in a way suitable to its age, and of being convinced of the good or evil of its actions, and is never to be corrected without; otherwise you may conclude, that the effect will cease with the smart. A sense of honour and shame, and of the right and wrong of actions, are the proper handles of education, as they lead directly to virtue, and lay a restraint upon the mind itself. Punishment, if not managed with great judgment, and administered rather as a mark and attendant of that disgrace, into which a youth has brought himself by bad behaviour, may have no other effect, than that of persuading him, that the pain is a great evil, which he ought not to think, but be taught to despise it. Or it may tend, if overdone, to harden and brutalize his temper, and lead him to use others as he has been used. Paltry rewards, as fine clothes or playthings, ought likewise never to be bestowed without a caution, that they are given not as things valuable in themselves, but only as marks of favour and approbation. If this be not taken care of, a child may be led to look upon such baubles as the summum bonum of life, which will give him a quite wrong turn of mind.

In chiding or correcting, it will be necessary to take the utmost care not to represent to a young person his fault as unpardonable or his case as desperate; but to leave room for reformation; lest he think he has utterly

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lost his character and so become stupidly indifferent about recovering your favour, or amending his manners. Nor is the recovery of any person under thirty years of age to be wholly despaired of, where there is a fund of sense, and an ingenuous temper to work upon.

A turn to cruelty appearing in a child's delighting in teazing his equals, in pulling insects to pieces, and in torturing birds, frogs, cats, or other animals, ought by all means to be rooted out as soon as possible. Children

ought to be convinced of what they are not generally aware of, that an animal can feel, though it cannot complain, and that cruelty to a beast or insect, is as much cruelty, and as truly wicked, as when exercised upon our own species.

There are few children that may not be formed to tractableness and goodness, where a parent has the conscience to study carefully his duty in this respect, the steadiness to go through with it, and the sagacity to manage properly the natural tendencies of the mind, to play them against one another, to supply what may be defective, to correct what may be wrong, and to lop off what may be redundant.

Let only a parent consider with himself what temper he would have his son be of, when a man; and let him cultivate that in him, while a child. If he would not have him fierce, cruel, or revengeful, let him take care early to show his displeasure at every instance of surliness, or malice, against his playfellows, or cruelty to brutes or insects. If he would not wish him to prove of a fretful and peevish temper, ready to lose all patience at every little disappointment in life, let him take care from the first, not to humour him in all his childish freaks, not to show him that he can refuse him nothing, nor especially to give him what he asks, because he cries or is out of humour for it, but for that very reason to withhold what might otherwise be fit for him. If he would not have him a glutton, when he comes to be a man, let him not consult his appetite too. much in his childhood; and so of the rest.

It is a most fatal mistake, which many parents are in with respect to the important business of forming the moral character of their children, that the faults of children are of little consequence. Yet it is the very same