Bellows Falls times. [volume] (Bellows Falls, Vt.) 1856-1965, 1871-07-14
Home poIiteness in Little Folks.
"True wisdom, carly sought and gained.
In age will give the rest;
Oh then, improve the morn Of life,
To make It's evening blest.'

stant teach them courtesy, good man
ners, to use correct language, chaste, del
icate, refined, avoiding everything vul-
gar, uncouth, clownish, indelicate or un
grammatical.
Even baby lips can be taught refine
ment, courtesy, politeness OF manners,
things delicate, tasteful, beautiful, heav-
enly-the little words "please" and
"thank you" when favors are conferred; F;
and far easier will they learn them than
older children.
What is termed baby-talk, when ad-
dressed to children old enough to under
stand and initiate it, is detestable. The
parents must remember that when the
child can comprehend one word, Its edu-
cation is begun. The mother, especially,
is called to officate as professor of Ian
guages, in the domestic university. But
who, in teaching foreigner the English
language, would say to him that until
he becomes further advanced be must
call horse 'horsey," and dog a "bow-
wow" and that for the present he will
address his material parent as his mud
der?" This seems sufficiently ridicu-
lous but this is not all-it would be un-
lust to the learner; it would teach him
accommodations which he must unlearn
as laboriously as he learned them. You
would, thus, in fact, double his task.
The folly and injustice are the same
when you teach a little child to speak a
distorted, maugled, burlesque, of which
it becomes ashamed when older, and tries
to unlearn it,
We would advise all young people to
acquire in early life the habit OF using
good language, both III speaking and IN
writing, and to abandon forever the use
ofs,ang words and phrases, else the I'M
fortunate victim of neglected education
is very probably doomed to talk slang
/ for life.
The first infantile lisping should be
marked with critical precision. Every
thing vile, vulgar, clownish, impolite
uneouth. ungrammatical, immoral, and
all slang phrases, should be sedulously
avoided, and all things true, honest, just
pure, lovely, inculcated. All habits,
i once formed, are formed forever
! Fill first the bushel with the wheat,
| With the wisdom food for souls to eat;
Then ehafi, the fiction OF the day, ,
viii find place, and blow away.
Parents, the habits formed now in the
hearts of your offspring will be lifelong
twas principle with the old Jesuits-
that if they might have the first seven
years of child's life, they cared not
who had the after training.
In teaching your children these little
sweet courtesies of lite, you must repeat
over and over the same lessons for the
first few years. 1t requires line upon
line, and be not discouraged, even after
seventy times repetition. The reward
will come at length, and you rejoice tC
see the little child you have taught Sc
laboriously acting voluntarily on prlncl
pies you have instilled, requiring nc
prompting or correction, for courtesy
has become habit.
In no place is the distinction between
the refined and the ill-bred more marked
than at the table If your young child
ren are not early taught politeness here
you must prepare yourselves and then
for thousand notifications in future
life, an 1 must look to see them regarded
as annoying and disagreeable by thos'
whose goodwill you may most desire tC
secure. "a child left to himself bring
eth his mother 10 shame"
However humble your position in life
though your family gather about table
of pine instead of mahogany, your child
rem may and should be taught the same
lesson of respectful behavior. ltis du
ty which God requires of you, and H'
holds you responsible for every uncheck
ed manifestations Of disrespect or disc
bedience you allow in your presence
Let your children learn to sit quietly un
til all older than themselves are helped
and do not begin compromising the mat
ter with some littls insurgent by lump
from the sugar-bowl. 1t you do, it vii
by no meals be the beginning OF tn
end" As they advance in years, eneour
age them to join pleasantly, but alway
modestly, in the family conversation
around the table. Let the meal time b.
one of the most cheerful and heavenly
hours of the day. Come to the festiv'
board with something good to com
municate, edifYipg, administering grac'
to those present-that every thought
word and deed may be "apples of golC
in pictures of silver" The table spreat
with heavens choice bounties is the ap
propriate place to inculcate order, sobri
ETY., courtesy, politeness of manners, gen
tlemanly department, strict temperance