The Indiana State sentinel. [volume] (Indianapolis) 1868-1895, 1877-02-21
For the Sunday SentineIl
THE UNIVERSAL LAW OF LOVE
Kindness Versus Love.



Parents and educators who, aware of the
vast responsibility placed in their hands,
endeavor to study fully the demands and
needs of their charges agreeing that the
Law of kindness is the universal rule by
which to strengthen and encourage the love
OF honor and purity in children. No longer
is the whip, the lash and the ferule en-
ployed as the great agents in the work of
training the young, grasping mind. No
more the plastic will and reason moulded
with an iron hand that will not relax, no
matter what the exigences of the pupils
condition may be. The great motor power
in the world is love; constant, unceasing
wise love, the abiding affection that draws
the heart of the innocent child to its father
and mother. and the souls of men and
women to a merciful God. The sweetest
memories that ever come to us are those of
home; the old home of our childhood; the
place where our childish faults where for
given, our sorrow comforted and our joys
intensified. There is not man living
though he may stand now in the valley after
a life journey of three score and ten,
who is not better and purer if he eau
look back to the scenes of his boyhood and
find there the love and kindness that though
unappreciated and uncared for then, have
saved him from much evil. and elevated and
ennobed him as age and experience have
taught him their value.
The children, the little prattling girls and
boys, full of the over1owing life and happi-
ness OF the spring time of their youth, are
looking TO us day by day for strength, for
training, for education, and we have the
power to nurture the pure and the divine in
their hearts, or to embitter and sour them
forever against the world and its duties and
pleasures. They come to us in perfect conf
dence; to them we are infallible oracles
and they rely upon our words for their ac-
tions. They have as yet no disposition to
err wilfully; they make mistakes, they stray
away a step or two from the straight path we
mark out before them; they forget our, per-
chance, hastily given instructions. and we
punish them The child is easily touched
by loving reproof; his heart is tender, and
yet neglecting the many opportunities for
checking any ordinations to sin, we brutal
ize the whole nature by whipping. We
scourge the tender, shrinking flesh, and
promote hatred and evil in the infant mind,
that as yet can not grasp the idea of punish
ing the body for the mistakes OF the head or
heart. How often, when heated by anger
when vexed By other causes, the unresisting
child is forced to bear our wrath, and by
venting our displeasures in lashing the
trembling form, we crush out something
gOdlike and divine in the soul with every
blow. Fathers and mothers need to learn
lessons Of self control and discipline ere
they seek to correct the mistakes of their
children. They need to learn that that
which to their eyes may appear grieyous
oaense, to the child may be but an error of
ignorance or a mistake of judgment l
have seen children who hated their homes,
who would rather be anywhere else in the
world, for whom the hours spent with their
parents were the most dreary and miserable,
and have pitied them with yearning ten
derness, for childhood comes but once to
them, and these memories of bitterness
will haunt them TO their latest breath.
/ have seen children shrink from
their homes as criminals from prison
cells. They knew too well that every room
was an apartment of torture, that every wall
had heard their cries of psin, and every day
brought moments of anguish. They were
whipped for every trivial offense, for every
mistake, for every hasty word or act, and
dreading the father and mother as the cruel
ones who | ficted the punishment they
shrank from the presence OF the parent. If
they. forgetful OF time. with memory and
prudence lost in the interest of their game
played too late they were whipped. no allow
ance being made for the childish delight in
the passing moment. II they soiled their