Home Discipline by G. E. Reilly

Review and Herald Publishing Association · Takoma Park Station, Washington, D. C. · Jul 12, 1906

Home Discipline

By G. E. Reilly

All human actions may be referred to two motives — love or fear. Some natures seem wholly devoid of fear. But with the first dawn of intelligence all show love in some form — if only love of self.

But children are quick to detect injustice, and soon take advantage of the weakness of the parent who commands and indulges them, irrespective of their behavior.

They will obey, through fear, the over-severe parent only until their fear has been outgrown, then cast to the winds his advice. The flight of years, however, will only enhance their admiration for that parent who can inflict just punishment when needed, as well as overlook slight faults, and who is quicker to see the good deed than the evil.

Much of a mother's police duty could be avoided if she would provide legitimate work for each child, a lawful playroom in which each should have his separate shelf or box, and foster among them the spirit of honor.

To develop this, and a sense of responsibility for the welfare of the home, mothers should early train each child to work about the house. Manual labor and skill in all its branches ought to be glorified, not despised. Children naturally love to work. It is our own fault if our sons and daughters grow up prouder of idleness and white, soft hands than of honest labor.

Let the children sweep and dust, and feed the chickens, and tinker at the hencoops. Teach them to sew on buttons and do simple cooking. Let each know his own job, and if he does it well, pay him for it, as you would pay any other servant.

Do not pauperize your child by gifts of pennies. There is no money so sweet to spend as your own earnings. And within reasonable bounds, a child should buy what he likes with such wages.

Children ought to have pets, but it is immoral to let a creature suffer from neglect and abuse at the hands of careless little ones. Compel each pet owner to attend to his own creature's needs.

Punish all cruelty, of course, but talk to the children about the pets, their habits and feelings, their likes and dislikes.

There is no more effective way of teaching love of nature, kindness, and a gradual, normal development of some of the deepest lessons of human life.

Then comes the playtime. We ought to study a child most closely then, for in this he reveals his inmost soul far more than in the imitations of older minds which we call “lessons.” . . .

One will be domineering, another tricky, in play, and the mother should be ever watchful to repress the bad traits and train the good ones as they show themselves,—ready always with sympathy and comradeship, and above all, praising every little honest effort.

A wise mother will praise and reward far oftener than punish. One may very often be wisely blind to little faults, but there will come crises which require punishment, swift, sure, and exactly fitted to the offense of the moment.

I believe that there are some difficult natures which at times need a whipping — as a last resort, when milder measures fail; but whipping as a punishment for all offenses hardens the child as well as the parent, and soon loses all moral effect. . . .

Perhaps my favorite punishment (which allows of an infinite number of applications) is the writing of “order lessons.” Sometimes I require a certain arithmetical table to be copied neatly a certain number of times; sometimes the word “behavior” or “disorder” must be written five, ten, or twenty-five times. For displays of jealousy, anger, selfishness, etc., I have a certain number of copies of texts made, such as: “The love of thyself doth hurt thee more than anything else;” “He who ruleth his own spirit is better than he that taketh a city;” “The tongue is an unruly evil, full of deadly poison,” etc.

I try to make the child fully understand why he is punished; to punish when perfectly cool myself; to fit the punishment to the offense, and to vary its form as often as possible. And I try to treat my children as courteously as I expect them to treat me.

If I make a child a promise, I am very careful to keep it. I have told them always the exact truth, and have no trouble with their deceiving me or in their not trusting my word.

I have always taught them to come to me with any question which puzzles them, and as far as possible, I answer them. But I am not afraid to say, sometimes, “I do not know,” and at other times, “When you are older, I will tell you that.”—G. E. Reilly, in The Interior.