It would appear that, ultimately, the family of Susanna Wesley was
almost as numerous as that of her father had been. A singular want of
accuracy characterises all the records, but it is safe to say that her
children were some eighteen or nineteen in number. Death came often
during those years of persecution. John Wesley speaks of the serenity
with which his mother "worked among her thirteen children;" but ten was
the number of those who were spared to enjoy the blessing of that
enlightened, affectionate, and admirable training on her part, which has
been so fully recorded, and of which the fruits were witnessed
especially in the eminence of her sons Charles and John. She paid the
utmost attention to physical training. Punctuality in the hours of
sleep was carefully carried out from infancy through the years that
followed. The rules regarding food were all admirable, and the younger
children were early promoted to a place at the parents' own table. Mrs.
Wesley has committed all these matters to writing, and her own words are
valuable for their wisdom. "In order to form the minds of children, the
first thing to be done is to conquer the will. To inform the
understanding is a work of time, and must, with children, proceed by
slow degrees as they are able to bear it. But the subjecting the will is
a thing which must be done at once, and the sooner the better." "Then a
child is capable of being governed by the reason and piety of its
parents, till its own understanding comes to maturity."
Again she writes: "Cowardice and fear of punishment often lead children
into lying," and accordingly, to save her own from temptation, the rule
was--"whoever was charged with a fault of which they were guilty, if
they would ingenuously confess it and promise to amend should not be
beaten." The most careful discrimination was made between inadvertent
and deliberate falsehood.
"If they amended, they were never upbraided afterward." Kindly
commendation was regularly awarded to obedience evidently done at a
sacrifice. "When the thing crossed the child's own inclinations, and
when any of them performed an act of obedience, or did any thing with an
intention to please, though the performance was not well, yet the
obedience and intention were kindly accepted, and the child with
sweetness directed how to do better for the future."
Recreation was liberally allowed, and outdoor physical amusements
encouraged. "High glee and frolic," so notably appearing in the
narrative that, in after days, some writers thought to turn this matter
against John Wesley, remarking that he had himself been indulged by his
mother at home in amusements which he was now prohibiting to the
students under him at college. He made the difference of age and the
demands of duty his defence, rather than any difference of principle.
Here, surely, the motherly instinct of this remarkable woman may be of
use to-day, in clearing the line of duty in the question of amusements.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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