St. Landry clarion. (Opelousas, La.) 1890-1921, 1914-05-30
HALF BAKED

AS between a mother who is so far for
getful Of her duties in the premises, as to
neglect a child, whether an infant or a
school child, for the sake OF society, Wheth-
err that means a church sociable, a quilting
bee. a five o'clock tea, a s~ufragette caucus,
a tango Joint or a fashionable aggregation
of possipers. and leave that child to the
neglect of an ignorant servant; or one so
STEPPED in selfshness and vanity as to
squander money on a gown or Easter hat,
when the child perhaps is in need OF cloth
ing to cover it's nakedness and shield it's
tender pelt from the weather changes would
AZ q matter of course be voted a human
brute in any civilized community. 1t is
equally apparent that the o~ver-indulgent
mother who %squanders everything on a
child, money, time, attention, affection.
who is proud of the smartness Of the child,
its cute and cunning ways, its precocity and
bends every effort to pamper and to please.
until she becomes a veritable slave to its
every within, is doing infinitely more harm
to the child. than is done by the neglect of
the former; while that neglect may and has
frequently resulted in the premature death
of the child, il it survives the inhuman ne
eject, it does not necessarily follow that it's
morals are ruined; some of the best and
most affectionate children have sprung
such a compost heap; but the petted and
spoiled and pampered darling, if it survives,
rarely becomes a credit to the household,
for every mean and selfish trait has been
a~ssiduously cultivated and with the fight of
years and the growth of the child becomes
crystalized into excrescences that mar, dis
figure, pollute and cannot be removed; so in
the last analysis there is very little differ
ence between the cold-blooded selfishness
OF the one who neglects and the equally
great selfshness of the one who pampers,
the latter may lay the fattering JUNCTION to
her soul that she is not selfish, because she
knowingly becomes a slave to the object Of
her devotion, but the self deception does
not deceive others. Every commonsense
Individual must recognize that the mother
who sternly disciplines the child for its W
good even though she might lacerate her
heart strings while doing it exhibits a high
err and more unselfish sense of duty than
the one who yields to its whim; with every
yielding there is a severer tax levied on the
patience and it is marvellous the percep-
ton of a child until absolutely blunted in
its perception by constantly yielding to it's
whims.
1t is a terrible heritage that a mother
endows the child with until rude contact
with the outer world dispels the illusion that
it is the only 1T" the inevitable result is
the generating of a profound contempt. No
amount of natural human affection of child
towards its mother unaccompanied by re-
spect can take the place of that reverential
affection which properly reared children
bear towards their parents. las the twig is
bent the trees Inclined" it may be grow
ing in the back lot of the humble cottager
or on the lawn of the millionaire, the rule
holds good.
AS between half baked mothers of the land
and their name is legion in America, those
who neglect, and those who pamper, the
latter do infinitely more harm to the rising
generation and the pity is that the state
can not in some way step in and save the
children of both from the insane folly and
a~ssinine selfshness of Americas half baked
mothers.
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