Literature in the Home by A. W. Spaulding

Review and Herald Publishing Association · Washington, D.C. · Dec 22, 1904

Literature in the Home

By A. W. Spaulding

How many parents are worried with the fear that their sons and daughters will become addicted to novel reading and romancing! There is danger, indeed, through the child's associations in the school and in the homes of the worldly, of his becoming imbued with a love for fiction. It seems to some that it is almost impossible to prevent it, when the public libraries and the book shelves of many homes are filled with this light literature, and when almost every magazine and youth's paper displays these evil wares. So might we also say of the danger of inebriety: there are rum shops everywhere, and the poison creeps into the soda-fountains and the lemonade stands, even into the confectioner's. Yet we know that there is security against this evil by a correct training in the home. And it is not the less possible for the home to guard against the habit that causes mental drunkenness. The home has the power of so educating the literary taste and invigorating the mental powers, that this food will not be craved nor relished. We know that if we give the child a stimulating physical diet, we are inviting him to lie in a drunkard's grave. Do we realize that there is often offered in our homes mental food that tends directly to induce and confirm the habit of mental inebriety? If we would have ease of mind and heart in regard to our children's reading, we must make not merely negative, but positive movements; and we must not wait until the danger appears, ready to overwhelm us, but begin early to inculcate a love for the best literature, which will leave no room for the evil.

The teaching of literature begins in infancy. The songs we sing have their influence from the very first dawn of the child's comprehension of speech. As we

would have our children's minds directed to God and holy things, let us tell of them even before we think the child can comprehend. The cradle song that hushes in sleep, the lullaby that calms and soothes the tired or frightened baby mind,—let them tell of Jesus. Instead of Mother Goose jingles or pagan rhymes, let such cradle songs be sung as Martin Luther's:—

“Away in a manger, no crib for his bed, The little Lord Jesus laid down his sweet head.”

Human speech is opening its portals to baby feet. Let not the first glimpses within be of grinning heathen gods, but of the sweet and strong and patient face of the Lord our God.

As the child grows older, he learns to love stories. Here is the parent's opportunity. The golden storehouse of sacred literature should be opened wide for the little one. The Bible stories, suited in language to the baby's comprehension, and well told with tongue and eyes and fingers, will at once delight him and acquaint him with God. Let him early hear much of the story of Jesus, and especially of his coming again. The resurrection story, and descriptions of the beauties and pleasures of the new earth, will fill his mind with the message which he must later give. Thus did the early Christians, and their homes produce men and women who faced wild beasts and burning agonies rather than deny the cross, and who carried the glorious gospel to every part of the known world.

Beware of fables and fairy tales; shun fictitious stories. Are there not enough stories of men and children of the Bible and of later Christian history, that we must stoop to Aesop, Grimm, and Hans Christian Andersen? These myths are the seed that bear their fruit later in infatuation with Henty, Cooper, and Kipling.

As the child, older grown, sees the things of nature about him, fit to them their natural literature. Sun, clouds, stones of the brook, and all green growing things,—these are the messages of God written on sky and earth, which need to be interpreted to the child. What is the rainbow to him without the story of the flood and of the throne of God? Why should not the pretty stones he gathers suggest the garnishment of the holy city? Do not the trees clap their hands in praise of their Creator, and are there not fairer blossoms and more glorious fruit of which these are the promise? The care of God for the sleeping plants during the long, cold winter, tells of the love of that Father for his human children.

When the child has learned to read, get him books that tell truth, and especially those that tell of Bible characters, of Christian men and women of later times, of missionaries and reformers. Those books of travel and description that have to do with the lives of God's messengers, are the best, that a craze may not be engendered merely to travel for pleasure, but that rather a love for the souls who suffer there may be created. Books that tell of the birds, the squirrels, the fishes, that teach children to love and care for their pets of house and stable, books that teach them how to make useful and entertaining things, as wind- and water-wheels, kites, telephones, and simple machines,—these will aid in steadying the mind and taking it far away from mere romance. But beware of the common story-books that tell no true tales. Though they may have good morals to teach, they also inject a deadly virus; for they contain the poison of the lie. And there are so many which are true that it is indeed piteous to see parents buying for their children books containing stories which are not true, when we know that those children will never at home hear of many of the men and women of the Bible, nor of Polycarp, Perpetua and Felicitas, nor Huss, nor Pascal and Gianavello, nor Luther and Zwingle, Farel, Margaret of Valois, Latimer and Tyndale, Bunyan, Roger Williams, Carey, Joseph Wolff, Joseph Bates, Livingstone, Mackay, and Paton. Pages of names alone might be given which suggest stories of immortal lives of which few of our youth have ever heard, and yet which are contained in books many of which are entrancingly written, and all of which, to the sober mind, are full of thrilling interest.

Nor should our denominational literature be neglected. In this class there are books which in elegance of style and rhetorical finish hold a high place in literature; and in nearly all there is a dignity and a poise which only the consciousness of uttering truth can give. Their perusal, while being the means of gaining truth, will also give culture in literary matters, and strengthen and fortify the mind. Our books should early become the property of our children's minds. This may well be accomplished by having them read by different members of the family at the fireside, giving time for questions and discussions. If the conversation at home is permeated with the great truths which constitute our faith, there will be, on the part of the children, no reluctance, but rather an eagerness, to get and read these books.

The periodical literature should receive careful attention. Most youths' papers are too dangerous for our children to see. Without mentioning names, let it be said that those papers which are taken because of their charm as tellers of fictitious stories, are not to be countenanced. They may contain much that is good, but the evil they instil is too insidiously dangerous to allow of their being received into the home. Another evil to which many parents are blind, is that of the daily newspaper, and perhaps especially the Sunday extra. The flaring headlines, telling of battles, revolting crimes, sickening scandals, and sporting news, proclaim them as agencies of Satan for the debauching of our youth. Older people may be able to stand their evil influence, though almost none without damage to themselves, but our children and youth should be kept away from them. Some weekly periodical which gives an epitome of the news and the affairs of the week (such, for example, as the Literary Digest), will serve for all the needs of information to the youth, and, I may as well say, to adults also. As for the comic supplements that many newspapers publish upon Sunday, it is a matter for nauseous wonder that older people can spend time upon their puerilities. It is not so great wonder that children, whose tastes have not been formed, are attracted by the crude but gorgeously colored pictures, and their minds filled with the silly words accompanying them. The only remedy is to banish such papers from the house, and, if possible, from the neighborhood. The reading of our own papers, of missionary magazines, and of scientific periodicals may well engross what time children and parents may have for the reading of current literature.

There is indeed a wide difference in the natural dispositions of children and youth, in the selection of reading. A tendency to the reading of frothy literature may be inherited by a child, as much as the curse of drunkenness; but as the latter may be avoided and overcome by proper regimen and extra safeguards, so may the taste for fiction. Do not think, however, that the spice of untrue stories may be thrown into the mental food of children without its creating a thirst for stronger liquor. But furnish such literature as has been suggested, and take proper precautions against the introduction of evil books and papers, and with the normal child there need be little fear of his dropping into the slough of fiction, even at the most unsettled stage of adolescence.

We have a work to do which demands, in the education of our children, the greatest thoughtfulness and study, and we should not merely adopt repressive measures in dealing with the dangers that surround them in the literary world; but we should, with strong and patient efforts, with sacrifice of self-comfort and ease, and with earnest prayers for guidance, guard and lead our children's minds into channels of truth and sobriety. The home, above all other agencies, is responsible for the literature that the child loves and uses; and no parent can ever be held guiltless whose efforts to direct his child's mind were limited to forbidding certain books and papers, and to counseling him to read the Bible and study the doctrines. We parents must make of ourselves teachers, and tireless and intelligent students of our children's tendencies, desires, and needs. Thus only shall we be successful in saving them from the evil that is now in the world.

A. W. SPAULDING.