Spirit of the age. [volume] (Woodstock, Vt.) 1845-1913, 1873-09-25
FauIt-Finding.

most lamentable forgetfulness. There
is no need of the heart growing old.
Gray hairs may be the glory of old
age, but freshness of heart and soul
are its beauties.
What a dear, precious old man is
that Father E. as you call him y
exclaimed lively young girl, after
my "dear, precious elderly friend had
bid us good night she seems to
know just how young folks feel, and
don't "pooh" and look nonsense at
our ambitions and likes. I'd like to
have him for my father, would; he
isn't always finding fault about every
thing, Iknow."
How many young men and women
do you suppose are annually driven
from the parental roof by the fault
finding OF father or mother.or both ?
We know of no statistics to resort
to to ascertain the number, but using
our own personal observation as a
basis, the number is large. More
boys leave than girls, because they
are boys. 1t is not uncommon for
girls to marry because they can have
no peace at home. That is one outlet
to them. 1t may give only "change'
of cultivation, however. Only a few
mornings ago. we had a young girl
committing suicide, because Of the
eternal wrangling and fault finding of
her parents.
If we wanted to make child de-
ceitlul OF liar, we should find fault
with him about great as well as small
things. If he broke, or lost, Or de-
stroyed anything, we should give
him such a lingual castigation that if
a similar accident befel him again, he
would rather lie, steal or run away,
than to encounter the parental or deal
the second time.
When a child, we had a great num-
Der of very prominent ''traits" that
were catalogued off as 'iaults. As
we had a propensity for climbing trees
and scaling fences, we naturally made
considerable havoc with our calico
dresses. But being deft with the
needle, we usually managed to make
the rents keep ''mumm" until ironing
day came, when the quick eye of
mother or Bridget would ferret out
the mischief. SO ironing day be
came sort of Day Of Judgment to us.
We never could get used to being
found fault with, and were often put
to our wits end how to escape the
wrath we knew would surely oveltake
us. 1t didn't make us a bit more
careful, and all the fault-fnding in the
world never made any child more
careful. There are words that acIl
make them more careful and thought
ful, but they are not words of fault
finding"
Another one of our Distinguishing
''traits" was what seemed propensity
for breaking crockery. We had t(
clear away the table, and wash dishes
when it took stool to make us tai
enough to get our hands well into the
dish pan; so we received severa
castigations both of a physical as wei
as spiritual nature for breaking dishes
And until this day, the sight ola cir
carrying or lifting dishes makes IL
actually nervous for fear she will le
them fall, and father or mother vii
give her such an "awful scolding,
when she feels badly enough about i
already.
No child, in q normal condition
feels anything but sorrow at misfol
tune or losses which accrue from mis-
haps. But generous amount o
fault-finding will harden some youn!
hearts ipto sort of don't-care-ism
Sensitive natures will be so over
wEelmed with the dread of the eterna
tault-finding, as to look out for al
escape-valve, rather than how to avoi'
another similar occurance in the fiji
ture.
Fault-finding never cured us of teal
ing our dresses or breaking dishes
for we do both unto this day, whe1
we have chance. We haven't travel
ed so far into womanhood as to forge
how very, very miserable we used t.
be from much fault-fndng-so YER
miserable that we thought even CO.
was ugly for allowing us to suffer SC
and wishing, Oh, so earnestly, for tn
time to come when we should be
woman and would break q whole stor
of dishes, and not then be made t.
feel Just as bad as if our little siste