Northwest enterprise. [volume] (Anacortes, Wash. Ter.) 1882-1887, 1884-01-26
Kiss the Children Good Night.

Send the little ones TO bed in happy frame
Of mind. 1t requires some discipline and
self-denial on the part OF n weary parent to
answer all the foolish questions and attend
to the many wants that multiply so fast rs
the hour of bed time draws near, but 1t is a
labor Of love that will bring a large recon-
pense. Children never forget. They will
carry with them through life's long and
weary pilgrimage the remembrance of the
face that bent over them at night, and that
was associated in their immature minds with
heaven and God. And the little tiresome
last questions mean so much to them. What
if we should not answer them and they never
awakened herel Unanswered questions and
unanswered problems have followed men
and women through life with narrowing per-
sistence.
And never give thoughtless answer to a
child's question. Never tell the little ones
that the thunder is the voice OF God. Think
what an idea they must form of such a God.
Do not tell them petty vague stories that will
mislcad them into tangled paths Hood says
pathetically of his own childhood:
~ remember, remember
The fir trees dark and high.
used to think their slender tops
Were close against the sky.
"It was childish ignorance,
But now tits little joy
To know I'm further off from heaven
Than when was boy"
No one can so gently and kindly prepare
the little ones for the perplexities and disap-
pointments Of life, which are inevitable, as
the fathers and mothers to whom their edu-
cation should be first consideration. The
moral lessons taught at the mothers knee or
by the bedside can never be forgotten, nor
can the father shirk all responsibility in the
matter of home tutelage. That rs child to
be pitied who Is afraid to ask its father any
question which arises in its young mind; who
dare not climb to the parental knee and
challenge the world to dislodge IL. DIR. Hol-
land in his fine poem Of Daniel Grey, which
is said TO typify his own father, says:
He had some notions that did not improve
him,
He never kissed his children, SO they sayn
We feel sorry for the children of a father
SO austere, but we can afford to pity one who
lost so much beauty and value out of his own
life. Then kiss the children good night and
good morning and answer all their questions,
and you will find that in such work two are
blessed-one In giving, the other in receiving
Good sense About Chiidrcn's Clothes.
There is very likely no conservatism more
difficult to deal with than that displayed by
the young boy in regard to any change in his
apparel. "If must wear these cuffs" said
an S-year-old boy, on Sunday morning, ~
am not going to church." The cuffs in ques-
ton were entirely unobiectionable in the eye
of man or woman They were probably un.
noticeable, also; but the boy discovered a
morbid dread Of appearing in them, as they
were not usual addition to his toilet He
confessed in confidence to his mother, as
they walked along, that he dreaded the re-
marks his Sunday school class would make
upon them. How little consideration is shown.
for the feelings Of children.
How few parents realize that the child's
world, only, as John Brown, Of Edinburg,
says, .'about three feet high" has its TRACE
dies and comedies, its fear of blighting, ad-
verse criticism. So many times, when gar
ments are chosen, when the question is not
Of expenditure, but of taste, the children
themselves might be allowed to choose, within
certain limits, what they will have.
Who has not seen this sight; when all
the happy boys in the neighborhood are
wearing knee-pants, one small and weary
soul appearing in pantaloons the exact coun.
terpart of his fathers and reaching to the
heels of his shoesl This life is made burden
to him, and then and there is begotten an un-
easy consciousness of self that will require
years Of thought and experience and Of reso-
Lutte care to overcome.
The consciousness Of being well and suita-
bly, dressed, SO dear to the heart of woman
and SO conducive to her ease, is just as con-
soling to child, aud is no more likely to lead
to morbid fondness for dress than is the
discomfort occasioned by the consciousness
that there Is something wrong about his
clothes.