The Abbeville press and banner. [volume] (Abbeville, S.C.) 1869-1924, 1889-12-04
Training a Child to SeIf.ControI.

An inevitable struggle between the
individual and the several powers that
20 to make his individuality, begins in
every child at his very birth, and con.
tinues so long as his life in the flesh
continues. On the outcome of this
struggle depends the ultimate charac-
ter Of him who struggles. 1t is, to
him, bondage or mastery, defeat or tri-
umph, failure or success. as result of
the battling that cannot be evaded.
And, as a matter Of fact, the issue O.
the lifelong battle is ordinarily settled
in childhood.
A child who is trained to self-control
as child may be-is already true
man in his fitness for manly self-mas-
terry. A man who was not trained, in
childhood, to self-control, is hope. .essly
a child in his combat with himself;
and he can never regain the vantage
ground which his childhood gave to
him, in the battle which then opened
before him, and in the thick of which
he still finds himself. 1t is in child's
earlier struggles with himself that
help can easiest be given to him, and
that it is of greatest value for his own
developing Of character. Yet at that
time child has no such sense Of his
need in this direction as is sure to be
his in maturer years hence it is that it
rests with the parent to decide, while
the child is still child, whether the
child shall be slave to himself, or a
master of himself; whether his life, so
far, shall he worthy or unworthy of
his high possibilities of manhood.
A child's first struggle with himself
ought to be in the direction of controll-
ing his impulse to give full play to his
lungs and his muscles at the prompt
ing of his nerves. AS soon as the
nerves make themselves felt, they
prompt child to cry, to thrash his
arms, to kick, and to twist his body on
every side, at the slightest provocation
or at none. Unless this prompting
be checked, the child will exhaust
himself in aimless eXertion, and will
increase his own discomfort by the
very means of its exhibit. A control
of himself at this point is possible to a
child, at an age while he is yet unable
to speak, or to understand what is
spoken to him. If parent realizes
that the child must be Induced to con-
troll himself, and seeks in loving firm
ness to cause the child to realize that
same truth, the child will feel the pa
rents conviction, aud will yield to it,
even though he cannot comprehend
the meaning of his parents words as
words. To leave child to himself in
these earliest struggles with himself, is
to put him at sad disadvantage in all
the future combats Of his life's war
fare while to give him wise help in
these earliest struggles, is to give him
help for all the following struggles.
a parent ought TO help his child to
refrain from laughing when he ought
not to laugh; from crying when he
ought not to cry from speaking when
he ought not to speak /; from eating
that whicl, he ought not to eat, even
though the food he Immediately before
him; from running about when it is
better for him to remain quiet; and to
be ready to say and to do just that
which it is best for him to say and do,
at the time when it needs to be said
and done. Self-control in all these
things is possible to child. Wise
training on the parents part can secure
it. And by means of this self-control
the child is made happier, and is fitted
for his duties in active life, as other
wise he could not be. Many mans
life-course is saddened through his
hopeless lack of that selfcontrol to
which he could easily have been help
ed in childhood, if only his parents
had understood his needs and been
faithful accordingly.