p. 764 | PROTECT THE CHILDREN by John W. Kirton, LL.D.

International Tract and Missionary Society · Oakland, California · Dec 16, 1889

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 15, No. 48.

PROTECT THE CHILDREN.

By John W. Kirton, LL.D.

MOTHERS, remember that a child's soul is more tender than the tenderest plant. See how carefully the gardener protects and shelters the young and tender plant from every biting wind and chilling influence. He knows full well that its future strength and beauty depend upon the manner with which it is thus guarded and watched over in its early days. If it is neglected then, no after care can supply the tone or vigor which has been wasted. If you pierce the young leaf of the shoot of a plant, even with the finest-pointed needle, the prick will form a knot, which will grow with the leaf, and become harder and harder, and so prevent its obtaining its perfect and complete form. It is very much the case with the human soul. Wounds which touch the tender germ, injure the heart leaves of its being, and blunt or dwarf the beauty of its future life. A harsh word, a black look, a gesture, a sound, are sufficient to inflict such wounds. How needful, therefore, to be on the watch against anything and everything which may sully the bloom, or mar the beauty, of the young and tender life placed in the charge of fathers and mothers.

How different it might have been with thousands of men and women, if each one had been properly protected in their tenderest age, in every possible way, as becometh a human soul, holding, as it does, within itself the spark of some celestial fire, or the fruit of some choice grace. If it is worthy of thought, care, and attention, to manifest every kind of care towards a plant or tree, whose beauty will, after all, only be of a short duration, how much more so is it to guard with jealous care the first buddings of life in the infant mind. Preserve, then, its strength, and it will amply repay you by its vigor, beauty, and fruit, in after days. The child can thus be trained to become a tree of the Lord's right-hand planting, instead of a thorn which will prove a source of sorrow and pain to those around it. Protect, therefore, the tender plant from its earliest days from every noxious and chilling influence.—John W. Kirton, LL.D.