Part 20 (1/2)

”But,” exclaims the up-to-date woman, of enlightened intellect, ”what kind of old-fas.h.i.+oned, benighted mother are you prating about! This is the era of woman's rights and woman's emanc.i.p.ation! What time would a woman have for her own affairs--for the exercise of her rights, which have been won with so much effort--if she had to keep bothering her head with that sort of thing?”

That is true. It would seem as if we had forgotten about the self-interest and selfishness of the modern movement, which is there on all sides to poke its tongue at a mother's devotion to her sacred cause.

Indeed, we have no answer to give to that kind of selfishness. The essence of our thought is love and faith in the love of motherhood.

There is no selfishness in it and the language it uses is not translatable into terms which the rule of reason can hope to understand.

But to those mothers whose hearts are still in the right place, even if their heads have become more or less confused by the shouting and example of intellectual leaders, there is a very simple observation to suggest, as an answer to such objections.

Is it of much importance or benefit to you, yourself, or to anybody, or any thing, that you should spend so much of your time in gambling at the bridge table? Or gossiping at an afternoon tea? Or attending a meeting at the woman's club? Or at the hair-dresser's and manicure's? Or in intellectual pursuits of any kind? Is it not more important to you and to your family and to the future of your race and kind, to devote a considerable amount of your time and energy to the children, who love you and need you and can profit greatly by your help?

Is not that ent.i.tled to the best you can give, not only because it is the most important of all earthly occupations, but because by doing it you set the blessed example of thinking first and most of others, and last and least of self?

After the children are tucked in their beds, peaceful and happy in the land of dreams, then it is time enough for you to turn your thoughts to personal distractions and pleasures, which are proper and wholesome for a human being when the daily work of life is done. n.o.body will begrudge it to you, and you need not begrudge it to yourself. It is what distractions are for. It is also what the great majority of husbands and fathers and grandfathers have been doing since the beginning of time--working to the best of their ability for the good of home and family--content with their recreation, after the work is done?

How can any true mother in her heart and soul be so disturbed and misguided by intellectual enlightenment that she could be led to desert her eternal responsibility for the pursuit of selfishness--or the agitation of _isms_?

It ought to be reasonably clear that if a mother does desert her responsibility, and leaves to the care of a hired employee the development of her child's moral and spiritual feelings, the results are liable to be very unsatisfactory. It is the same story over again, which we took account of in connection with the heart feelings. Nagging, scolding, lack of sympathy, false standards, superst.i.tions, threats, deceptions, bug-a-boos--are all apt to take a hand in forcing a necessity for discipline and deforming character. The tangles of temper, fear, deception, resentment, will never be unravelled and patiently straightened out. In their wake, are pretty sure to come, sooner or later, scenes with mother and father--hypocritical or defiant, cajoling, whining, or tempestuous--in which harsh and ugly words will sometimes play a part.

And one fine day, the mother will probably vouchsafe the remark, as so many modern mothers have done in my presence, that when certain boys, or girls, reach a certain age, they get so that it is quite impossible to do anything with them at home and the only sensible way is to s.h.i.+p them off to a boarding-school.

How much of a mother's time is required for the right kind of care for her children? Who can judge of each case, but the right kind of mother?

Whatever the child has need of, that is for her to watch over and give, to the fullest of her capacity.

And what of the role of a father in this most vital of responsibilities?

It is essentially that of a help-mate--to bring cheer and comfort and courage, and the tenderest of protection and support. ”The hand that rocks the cradle is the hand that rules the world”--so says the old adage. In any case, it is upon the sanct.i.ty and devotion of mother love that the future of our race depends--and the deepest feeling of a manly man has never doubted it.

There is much, much more that might be said about the relations.h.i.+p of a father to a mother, and of a mother to a father. The right foundation for it should be the deepest of moral and spiritual feelings. The true significance of it cannot help being eternal, not temporary. In no department of life, has the scientific principle of self-interest and the rule of reason had a more confusing, corrupting, and destructive influence. To attempt to translate the meaning of a marriage into terms of a business partners.h.i.+p is a ghastly mockery.

This subject is too big and the discussion of it would carry us too far afield, to be undertaken in the present connection. Our attention has been confined, for the time being, to mother love and the formation of character for the next generation.

And the next question which confronts mother love is the question of schools and school education--one of the most perplexing and troubling of all, and yet unavoidable.

Let us suppose that our mother is an ideal one--that she has gladly responded with the best that is in her to her love and responsibility--that she has cherished and nourished every tender little bud in the heart and soul of her boy--that the twig of character is rising up straight and beautiful, in every respect.

Then comes the day when Master Bob must go off to school--a day school, or a boarding school, or first one and then the other.

Why does he have to do this? In the first place because it is the custom every boy is supposed to do it, when he arrives at a certain age--and then, to receive proper instruction, his brain must be taught, his mind enlightened.

So off to school he must go, and when he gets there, a new and different atmosphere surrounds him, a new influence is brought to bear on the little character, so tenderly forming, and in the main the nature of this influence is two-fold. First, there is the school-room and the school books and the teaching of teachers--and second, there is the companions.h.i.+p, intimacy, teaching, of the other boys with whom he is thrown into contact.

As the action of this latter influence is usually the more immediate, direct, and compelling, we may as well give it the foremost place in our consideration. And let us be careful to state frankly and bear constantly in mind that all cases are by no means alike. The conditions to be met with may be largely accidental and differ materially in degree or kind. And the consequences, for any particular boy, may depend very largely upon accidental circ.u.mstances, or inherited tendencies. A boy, who is naturally warm-blooded and very impulsive, may not react in the same way as another boy, who is inclined to be reserved and reflective.

If I am led by my observations to make use of extreme or exceptional examples it is not my intention to imply that they are the rule, but merely to bring out clearly a point, or meaning, which, in less degree, may have a more general application.

We have already had occasion to refer repeatedly to the force of example in shaping the conduct and ideas of a vast majority of people. Nowhere is this force more rapidly effective, than in the case of growing children. It is their instinct to absorb and imitate, consciously or unconsciously, and so adapt themselves to new conditions of development.

And this instinct is sure to be very much alive, more than ever alive, when boys and girls find themselves removed from the family influence, amid new conditions and new companions of the school.

Before we follow our boy, Bob, so far, let us pause for a moment and consider this question of companions.h.i.+p with other boys and the influence of example, as it may have applied to him, while mother was still at hand to watch over him. Any boy or boys that Bob might come into contact with, or make companions of, would also come under mother's eye. Not only that, but Bob would repeat to her, spontaneously and gus.h.i.+ngly, every new thing that they said, or did. And if Bob still had a nurse hanging about, she would have an eye and an ear and something to say to mother, too. If one of these boys happened to be tricky and deceitful, resentful and cruel, mother would be sure to know about it very quickly. She could straighten out Bob's feelings with regard to any of those things before real damage occurred; and she could see to it that such contamination was kept away from him. As long as a boy remains under the home influence, it is part of mother's responsibility to guard against just such things.

As soon as he goes away to school, and gets under the new influence, it is no longer possible for her to do so. Of all the various kinds of boys to be found at any school, which ones Bobby is destined to have as closest companions, to exchange confidences with constantly, and have set him the example, is largely a matter of luck, or accident. It may come about through adjoining seats in cla.s.s, or though proficiency in the same games, or a common interest in collecting bird's eggs, or postage stamps, or through being room-mates, or sleeping in the same corridor at boarding-school, or one of a dozen other haphazard reasons.