Evening star., 1937-03-29
Photo by Frank Nothaft. n. Y. c.

| selves CO. They throw all restraint
to the winds and give full rein to their
tempers and their tongues without
realizing the harm they are doing and
that they are setting not only their
childrens pattern of life but that OF
their children's children.
WE DON'T hear much nowadays
about home influence, but never
theless, for good or ILL., it Is still the
most potent force in the world. 1t is
the one thing from which none of us
ever get away. 1t is what shapes us,
what sets our characters and colors
our thoughts; what forms our tastes
and habits and ideals.
No matter how far we may go, no
matter what veneer of sophistication
we may put on, deep down in our In
nermost beings We are still what our
homes made us. We still do things
the way we were taught to do them as
children; We still like home cooking
best In any crisis in our lives we
stand or fall according to the prin-
ciples we learned at our mothers
knees and whether our parents bred
strength or weakness in US.
Since children are by the nature Of
things copycats, nothing Is so vitality
important as that their parents should
give them a working model OF the vir-
tues they wish them to possess. It is
good theorizing with children. You
must, in the slang Of the day, show
them.
II. for instance, you desire your chill
dren to develop into outstanding men
and women who has the grit to fight
their way to success, you must give
homes of what Stevenson calls "the
brave attitude toward life" They
must have before their eyes the ex-
| ample of man and woman who had
the courage to carry on in the face of
difficulties and who had . contempt
for quitter; who are willing to work
and sacrifice for what they wanted;
who stood upon their own feet and
asked charity from none. and who set
. goal before them toward which they
drove despite every encouragement.
~
VOU will never hnd . child who
comes from that kind OF family
who Is lazy loafer and = parasite.
He will never give up when the sled
ding gets hard. He will just tighten
his belt and roll up his sleeves and
| put little more vim into his job.
The derelicts and failures are nearly
always the sons and daughters Of
| fathers who were forever complain
| ing that they never got any break,
and Of mothers who were winners and
self-pitiers and who made their poor
nerves" an alibi for their slovenly
housekeeping.
II you want your children to have
good manners, pleasing personality
and the good address that goes 80
far toward opening the door Of Sue
cess for . boy Or girl, you have to start
IN the cradle by showing them how It
u done. After they are grown it y
too late, no matter how many finish
ing schools you send them to. Good
manners to be effective must BE- in
stinctive. If they are acquired, they
always crack somewhere. The child
who has been reared by lady and
gentleman and seen the amenities OF
| society practiced in his own home
knows no more how to be rude and
boorish than he would how to prac-
| tice any foreign custom.
If you want your children to have
happy marriages, you must show them
by example how husbands and wives
should treat each other, for prac-
tically every boy Is the kind Of q hus-
band HIS father was and practically
every girl y the kind Of wife her
mother was. DOROTHY DIX.
Uoogyash3, 1o27J