Year: 1863

you ever. happen to think that it came from


aeaVen, and that it was more Your brother


.nsn Your ehild' Never, l venture to say.


i0u never dreamed that your children were


your younger biothers and sisters, intrusted


to you by your common father, for the pur-


pose OF protection and education; and YOU


certainly never treated them as if they were.


You have not child in the world whose mar


don you should not ask for the :mpudent and


most unbrotherly assumptions which YOU


have practiced upon him. All, if you could


have looked upon your SONS as your younger


brothers ard your daughters as your younger


sisters, and patiently borne with them and


instructed them in the use of life and liberty,


and built them up into a selfregulated man.


hood ard womanhood, you would not be


alone and eomfortless. A child is moi hors


or dog, to be controlled by walking stick


or whip, under all circumstances. There
are some children that, like some dogs and


horses, have vicious tendencies that can only


De rePressed by the intiietion of pain, but a
child is not brute, and is not to be govern


I'd like brute. A child is young man OF
a young woman, possessing mans or wo-
mans faculties in miniature, and is Just as
sensitive to insult and injury and injustice
as in after years. You have insulted Your
children. You have treated them unreasona-
bly,. and You ought not to complain if they
hold you in dislike and revengeful contempt.


You never did anything to make your
children love you, and you cannot but be
aware that the moment they were removed
from your authority, you lost all influence
over them. Why could you not reclaim that
boy of yours, who madly became a debau-
chez, and disgraced your home, and tortured
your heart? Because you had never made
him love yO1, or given him better motives for
self-restraint than your own arbitrary viii.
He had been governed from the outside and
never from the inside; and when the outside
authority was gone, there was nothing left
upon which YOU had power to lay your hand
Why Id your daughter elope with one who
was not worthy of her? She did If simply
because she found man who loved her, aid
gave her the consideration due her as a wo-
man "a love and consideration which she
had never found a. home, where she was re-
garded By You as the dependent servant of
your viii. She was nothing at home; and
badly as she married she is a better and a
freer and happier woman than she would
have been had she continued with YOU. /
wish to impress upon YOU the conviction that
these children of yours went astray not in
spite of your mode of family training but in
consequence of il. If should wish to ruin
nv family, | would pursue your policy, and
be measurably sure of the desired result.


Ii is not pleasant for me 10 tell you these
things, but am writing for the public, and
can have no choice. tell you. and all who
read these words. that, if you do not get the
hearts of your children, and build them up
in the right use of liberty which is no more
theirs after they leave your roof than II is
before, YOU viii be to them forever as hea-
then mea and publicans. If they take the
determination 10 go 10 destruction, they will
60, and you cannot save them. A child
must have freedom, within limits which va
rlrty OF Circumstances must define, and be
Taught how TO use il, and made responsible
Tor the rish: use of il. 1t is in this way that
Sel;- government is taught, and in this thing
that selt-gorernment consists Al children,
On arriving at manhood and womanhood,
should be lite sslf-governed companions and
friends o! their parents, and on going out in
% the world, Or losing parental control, should
lot feel the transition in tie slightest degree.
No child Is trainel. in the right way who
eelS, shen he steps forth from the family
independent aetor-any less
restraiLi than he felt The hour before. If he
ioes h, is in danger of falling before the
first template. that assails him.