Bellows Falls times. [volume] (Bellows Falls, Vt.) 1856-1965, 1876-01-28
Children's Companions.

iSil ihS NHo diS yOuE ITltnus, anu
| will tell what you are" is an old Span
ish proyerb This saying should be. if
applied to children, " Tell me who are
your companions, and l will tell you
what you ,oiN be i; and there can be no
better test of the probable future of
boys and girls, than the character and
conduct of their ordinary associates.
Children can hardly be said to choose
their companions, for they generally ac-
cept such as the circumstances of their
position may offer
There is nothing so characteristic of
childhood as its ready fellowship. Soil
tude is its greatest aversion, and the
child will fly to the embrace of the first
companion, as refuge from his own
unsociable self Excluded from society
of his fellows, he shows his love of COM
panionship by at once personifying the
inanimate objects around him, and sur
rounding himself in Imagination with
the outward life so needful to his happi-
ness. The very sticks and stones are
vivified by his social fancies, and he
strides horse of stick, and with dag
ger of lath leads whole troops of i'm
aginary followers to the attack on ban
ditti Of trees and lurking robbers of
rock. When no longer the sport of illu-
sions, and he awakens, as he surely will
do, to the difference between fancy and
reality, his longings for the genuine
companionship of substantial flesh and
blood becomes SO intense that, if refused
what it desires, he will suffer by the
serious consequences of an unsatisfied
natural want, His body will not be more
certainly starved by Withholding from its
daily food, than will his mind and moral
nature by depriying them of the natural
sustenance supplied by the companion
ship of those of his own age.
The attempt, so common among over
fond and timid parents, to bring up their
children at home in manner by which
they are isolated almost entirely from
association with others, is an experiment
full of danger. 1t is, however, frequent
ly made, especially in the case where
the risk is the greatest, as when there
is an only child. If the family should
be large and the children many, they
may become, of course, to great degree
sufficient companions to each other, and
will be able to dispense, to some extent,
with the society of others but these
are ordinarily those upon whom less
restriction is imposed 1t is the single
child, upon whom the fondness of pa
rents is so concentrated that they must
keep him wholly to themselves, who is
the common victim of this pernicious
isolation. 1t is usual to attribute the
generally observed physical weakness of
such to excessive indulgence, especially
of their appetites, but it is not seldom
the effect Of pining for suitable CON-
panionship, depressing the strength
through the sympathetic influence of the
mind upon the body and the youngest
children are much more sensible to this
sympathy than is commonly suspected.
Children must have and will take
companions whenever and wherever they
can get them and since the influence
of their associates, especially during
their early years, is so great upon their
characters, it behooves parents TO be on
the constant watch to observe and scru-
tinize the conduct Of those whose COM
panionship may be sought Lace and
broadcloth are as often, if not oftener,
the drapery of vice, than homespun,
and we advise parents to serutinize the
surface less and the texture more, of
their children's society.
There is in the simple rule that no
child shall be permitted to have an as
sociate whom he is not willing to bring
to his home, great security for good
companionship. A parent, by the strict
enforcement of this rule and a kindly
encouragement of the visits Of the COM
panions of his children, will do a great
deal towards providing them with such
society as will best eonduce to their ad-
vantage Bazar