The Jersey City news. (Jersey City [N.J.]) 1889-1906, 1899-05-12
Subject Of Afternoon Session
State Federation 70
Rutherford Yes
terday.a
PROFESSOR GRlGGS, ADDRESS
Taboos Sunday School Books
That Teach Impossible
Morals - Atlantic
City Next Time.

Federation Of Women's Clubs, held in
Rutherford yesterday, there was an even
larger audience han attended the morn
ing session. The ladies were called from
the lunch room, where an excellent col
lation had been served by Morrow and
Day, by an organ prelude. Then when
they were all seated in the prettily decor
ated church, the Presbyterian, one of the
club members, rendered a piano solo.
The programme was well arranged n
should have opened, according to sched-
ule. with "A Dream" by Mrs. Shrady of
Passaic, but as that, lady la not yet ar
rived the dream. was too good to be true,
and the final piece in the programme,
wherein the audience was bid REST
thee on this messy pillow" was rendered
by the Double Quartette of the Ruther-
ford Club in connection with IF a Body
Meet q. Body
Professor Edward Howard Griggs, of
the Leland Stanford University, made
the address of the afternoon, taking for
his subject, "The Child and the Race"
He is a young man of perhaps even
younger appearance, but he managed to
give mothers some good practical advice
go - cS L Atiii6 tlCbl VI SOluC ldS~o
about their children and their children's
brains that the maternal parents had
probably never thought of.
w are today" said he, Gin a period
of civilization which is very young and
full of promise for the future. Each
child takes us pack to the fundamental
principles of primitive life:' He then
wen on to explain this primitive life, as
it existed today among savage tribes
where there was no intellectual develop
ment to govern the animal instincts. So
it was he said with the child. If it was
hungry or in pain it cried. In connection
wit this thought he gave a beautiful idea
of the so-called cruelty of children, say
ing, Children are not cruel because they
do not realize that they are causing an
other PAIN" and gave as an example the
small boy III ties a tin kettle TO the
dogs tail. The boy, he said, does not
realize that the dog suffers, only tina he,
the boy, is enjoying the joke. This idea
of causing others pain, he said. should
be early taught the child that he might
avoid it.
1.-THE race child and the Individual
child" continued the speaker, "are mag
NATIVE and emotional. To children the
world is a personal world. Children can
deal with the whole before they can deal
with the parts. The concrete comes be-
fore the abstract. life comes before theory
and creation comes before criticism in
the individual and the race alike"
Professor Griggs then spoke of the
primitive ages through which man has
passed, saying-'"The individual goes
through in a few hours what it took the
race ages to go through. The individual
is a summing up of the race, and those
elements of the primitive ages are all in
the child.
1.-THE fact that the imaginative and
emotional life of a child begins before the
intellectual, is full of hints for his educa-
ton. Children who have abnormal
imaginations nave not had enough myth
cal food. Give the children all the true
fairy tales that they Of I may use the
expression) can eat"
In speaking of nature study the Pro-
fessor said:-'The problem of nature
study is not a study of science. We make
the sciences. Children know nothing of
science, and they want to know nothing.
I should as soon teach a child of six
vivisection as teach him to pick a flower
to pieces before he knows it as a WHOLE
(Applause.'o
"Children," continued the speaker,
SHOULD be awakened to good morals by
contact with primitive mythology, but it
must be well selected. To put Ibsen and
Goethe in the hands of children is to in
vite corruption. Give them those tales
which present the simple difference be-
tween good and evil and the owe of
good over evil. Do not make them little
moral prigs by giving them Sunday-school
books with impossible morals. Children
should be taught that good in this world
should conquer, and if it must go down
1t should go down heroically. Primitive
mythology teaches that it is most I'M
fortunate to have to learn mythology
through the dictionary"
The Professors address was most
heartily a%pplauded and he was allowed
to leave the platform only after a rising
vote of thanks.
A discussion followed, led by Mrs.
Joseph A.. MacClary. She began her re-
marks by saying, when you want to
make a moral diagnosis of YOU child's
case, call in a specialist like Professor
Griggs. (Applause.) Children, she fur
Their said. suffered from being misiudged,
hence the Importance of parents studying
their offspring. Eve studied Cain as well
as she was able, and she certainly had
original ground to work on (Applause.)
After this the ladies asked Professor
Griggs questions On the subject, which
kept him busy answering for ten or ff-
teen minutes.
Mrs Francis W. Kitchell then rendered
most beautifully Robert Browning's
italian in England first giving a lit
tie sketch of the circumstances under
which the poem was written, n as
Mrs. Shrady had not yet arrived, the
Double Quartette again sans Last
Night" Before the Might" was cons
cluded, however, Mrs. shrady appeared
and gave her Dream She sang beau
tifully, even under the disadvantage OF