The Tupelo journal., 1906-03-16
BY MARGARET E. sANGsTER.

BY MARGARET E. SANGSTER.
Copyright. 1905, by Joseph b. Bowles.)
During the years when children are
growing up, under the watchful care Of
father n mother, a great deal of dis
elimination must be used as to their
associations, their daily reading and
their amusements. To the observer
Who looks on from the outside and
sometimes sees a good deal more Of
family life than the family itself no
tices, nothing is more extraordinary
than the fact that parents often know
very little about their children. Eacn
generation in a certain sense fights its
own battles, solves its own problems
and has it's W atmosphere. The point
OF view of the father approaching mid
die age is so different from that of his
boy of Is or Is that the two have little
in common and are not in sympathy
one with the other.
Parents make so much of authority
during their children's earlier years
that he children sometimes cease to
trust them, reserve their confidence
AZ A&fC tuCi1 llltlE LIVES IL d WOllu
alien to that Of the adult. Even moth
ers, who are the natural confidantes
OF their sons and daughters, do not al
ways know very much about the inner
lives OF these young creatures who
have the world before them. One often
hears a girl say. Il could not ask my
mother about this or that, she would
not understand" A boy is very often
much more influenced by the fellow he
meets at the corner or at the post office
than by his own father. This is not
because his father does not love him,
but simply because he and his father
do not stand on the same plane; they
are too far apart in years, pursuits and
sympathy to speak the same language.
Fathers fall into a habit of snub-
bling their growing boys. They forget
that they were boys themselves, or
they do the thing, so to speak, on
principle, feeling that they are sub
mitting their boys early to a hardening
process, which will make life easier
for them by and by.
Boys do furtively man things in
which there would be little harm it
they were done openly. For example,
the unwise parent Eliminates a decree
that his son shall % play cards. The
boy apparently obeys. Nevertheless, he
is entirely familiar with knaves and
trumps and aces and all the nomencla-
ture of cards; he plays whist and
euchre, and whatever other game there
may be, but he plays it in the barn or
away from home, or in some house of
which his father does not know the
existence. When boys go wrong, nine
times out of ten the reason is that they
have been living a double life. They
have been deceiving their parents in
the Ways open to boys, small ways, Il
is true, but nevertheless ways that
lead downward. Deceit furnishes a
life, as it necessarily undermines good
morals and lowers a boys whole ideal.
Ii cards attract a lad, do not hedge
them with a prohibition, but let him
play openly at home. They will be less
charming if not forbidden.
luC ulSL ACtCSolly - tHdC pal Cuto
and children should be mutually con-
fidential and responsive. President
Roosevelt has uttered many wise coun-
sells to this nation. but no spoken, word
of his has been more potential than
the example he has set of living with
his children as fully as he can, shar-
ing their pleasures and their sports
and being one with them in their
various undertakings. Probably the
president is the busiest man in the
land. What he does other fathers in
some measure may do.
In deciding what books a boy Or
girl may read, the question arises
whether SO much care may not be
taken that they will read nothing at
all. Instead of resolving that the
children shall read no books which
have not been previously read by their
parents. why not make selections on
broader lines? Provide literally that
which is good. Set aside a certain
sum, even if it cost you self-denial.
for subscriptions to interesting papers
and magazines. Keep sensational stuff
and gross fiction out Of the house. 1t
is chaff and life is too short to be
choaed with chaff. Your growing
child, intellectually and spiritually,
should be fed on wheat. There are
weekly papers and monthly magazines
for the young, which have sustained
the highest reputation and maintained
the highest standards for 80 years or
more. You read them yourselves in
childhood and they are not less fas-
chatting to the children of to-day. Let
the boy have his own weekly paper,
coming to him through the mail, the
girl her own magazine with ner name
on it's cover. If there is no good free
library near you, pay for a ticket in
your boys name in the nearest town
library, and feel certain that the usual
good censorship is keeping out the
chaff.
Encourage talk about what is read
in the family and at the table.
If you value the highest development
possible for your son and daughter,
see that they devote some time to the
daily reading Of our English Bible.
The Bible is too much overlooked In
this day. 1t is a fountain OF beautiful
English. a guide to pure ethics, and
the one Book which no n can afford
to neglect.
The question is somewhat more COM