Butler citizen. [volume] (Butler, Pa.) 1877-1922, 1905-02-09

ton they perceive that their work does
not interest simply themselves and the
child, but that they represent and ad-
minister impersonal powers and Inter
ests. The child should continually ap-
pear TO them as a future citizen. With
this ruling idea they will take thought
for two things that complement each
other - for the initial and personal
force which is terminating in the child
and for the social destination of this
force AT no moment of their direction
over him can they forget that this dit
tie being confided to their care must
become himself and brother. These
two conditions, far from excluding
each other, never exist apart. 1t Is i'm
possible to be brotherly, to love, to give
oneself. unless one is master of him
SELF and, reciprocally, none can possess
himself, comprehend his own individ-
ual being. until he has first made his
way through the outward accidents Of
his existence down to the profound
springs of life where man feels himself
one with other men In all that is most
intimately his own.
To aid a child 10 become himself
and a brother it Is necessary to protect
him against the violent and destructive
action of the forces of disorder. These
forces are exterior and interior. Every
child is menaced from without not
only by material dangers but by the
meddlesomeness of alien wills. and
from within by an exaggerated idea
of his own personality and all the fan
cies it breeds. There is great out
ward danger which may come from the
abuse of power In educators. The
right Of might finds itself a place in ed
ucation with extreme facility. To ed
ucate another one must have renounced
this right-that is to say, made abne-
CATION of the inferior sentiment Of per-
sonal Importance, which transforms us
into the enemies OF others, even Of our
own children. Our authority Is benef1-
cent only when it is inspired by one
higher than our own. In this case it
is not only salutary, but also indis-
pensable, and becomes in its turn the
best guarantee against the greater per-
II which threatens the child from with
in-that of exaggerating his own i'm
portance. At the beginning of life the
vividness of personal impressions is so
great that to establish an equilibrium
they must be submitted to the gentle
influence of calm and superior will.
The true quality OF the office of edu-
Gator Is to represent this will to the
child in q manner as continuous and
as disinterested as possible. Educators,
then, stand for all that Is to be re-
spected in the world. They give to the
child impressions Of that which pre-
eedes IL, outruns 1t, envelops it, but
they do not crush 1t. On the contrarv
their will and all the influence they
transmit become elements nutritive Of
its native energy. Such use Of au-
thority as this cultivates that fruitful
obedience out of which free souls are
born. The purely personal authority
of parents, masters and institutions Is
to the child like the brushwood be-
meath which the young plant wthers
and dies. Impersonal authority, the
authority of a man who has first sub
mitted himself to the time honored
realities before which he wishes the
individual fancy of the child to bend,
resembles pure and luminous air. True,
it has an activity and influences Us In
its manner, but 1t nourishes our indi-
viduality and gives 1t tirmness and sta
bility. Without this authority there is
no education. To watch, to guide, to
keep firm hand-such is the function
of the educator He should appear TO
the child not like q barrier OF whims,
which, If need be, one may clear, pro-
vided the leap be proportioned to the
height Of the obstacle, but like trans
parent wall through which may be
seen unchanging realities, laws, limits
and truths against which no action Is
possible, Thus arises respect, which Is
the faculty Of conceiving something
greater than ourselves-respect, which
broadens US and frees us by making us
more modest. This is the law OF edu-
cation for simplicity, 1t may be sum-
med up in these words: To make free
and reverential men, who shall be in
dividual and fraternal.
Let us draw from this principle some
practical applications,
From the very fact that the child is
the future he must be linked to the
past by piety. We owe it to him to
clothe tradition in the forms most prac-
teal and most fit to create a deen TIM
preston; whence the exceptional place
that should be given In education to the
ancients, to the cult of remembrance
Of the past and by extension to the
history Of the domestic rooftree. Above
all do we fulfill duty toward our chill
dren when we give the place of honor
to the grandparents, Nothing speaks
to a child with so much force or so
well develops his modesty as to see his
father and mother on all occasions pre-
serve toward an old grandfather. often
infirn, an attitude of respect 1t Is
perpetual object lesson that is irresist-
ible. That 1t may have it's full force
1t is necessary for tacit understanding
to obtain among all the grownup men,
they must all be in league, held to mu-
tual respect and understanding, under
penalty of compromising their educa-
tional authority, and in their number
must be counted the servants. Serv-
ants are big people, and the same SEN
timent Of respect Is injured In the
child's disregard of them as IN his dis
regard Of his father or grandfather.
The moment he addresses an impolite
or arrogant word to a person older than
himself he strays from the path that
a child ought never to quit, and If only
occasionally the parents neglect to
point this out they will soon perceive
by his conduct toward themselves that
the enemy has found entrance to his
heart.
We mistake If we .hink that child
is naturally alien to respect, basing this
opinion ON the very numerous examples
Of irreverence which he offers us. Re
spect is for the child a fundamental
need. His moral being feeds on 1t. The
child aspires confusedly to revere and
admire something, but when advan-
tage is not taken of this aspiration 1t
gets corrupted or lost. BY our lack Of
cohesion and mutual Difference we, the
grownups, discredit daily in the child's
eyes our own cause and that of every
thing worthy Of respect. We inoculate
In him q bad spirit whose effects then
turn against us.
This pitiful truth nowhere appears
with more force than In the relations
hetween uaasterS md servants as we