Child Training

Review and Herald Publishing Association · Washington, D. C. · Feb 9, 1911

LUTHER BURBANK, the plant wizard, thinks most of the lawlessness and corruption start with the early experiences of the child. He says: “Be dishonest with a child in word or look or deed, and you have started a grafter. Grafting, or stealing,—for that is the better word,—will never be taken up by a man whose formative years have been spent in an atmosphere of absolute honesty. A child knows instinctively whether you are true or dishonest with it in thought as well as in deed; you can not escape. It may not always show its knowledge, but its judgment of you is unerring. Its life is stainless, open to receive all impressions, just as is the life of the plant, only far more pliant and responsive to influences. Upon the child before the age of ten we have an unparalleled opportunity to work; for nowhere else is there material so plastic.”