Never rebuke a child in the first moments of passion, whether on your side or hers. If on yours, she will perceive that, you conduct yourself according to caprice and resentment, and not according to reason and affection: you will, in consequence, irretrievably lose your authority. If you correct in the first gust of her passion, her mind is not sufficiently collected to confess her fault, to conquer her feelings, and to acknowledge the importance of your advice: such a mode may even hazard your pupil's respect for you. Always let the child see you are mistress of your own feelings; and nothing can effect this so much as _patience_. Watch every moment, each day, when correction may be well-timed. Never tell her of a fault, without, at the same time, suggesting some mode of redressing it, which will induce her to put it in practice; for nothing is more to be avoided than that chagrin and discouragement which are the consequence of mere formal correction. If a child is discovered to be a little rational, I think you should win it insensibly to _wish_ to have its faults disclosed, as this would be the way of making it sensible of them, without causing affliction: never, however, recount too many faults at a time. We should consider that children have a tender intellect, that their age makes them susceptible chiefly of pleasure, and that we often expect from them a correctness and seriousness of deportment, which their instructors are sometimes incapable of evincing. A very dangerous impression of _ennui_ and sadness is produced on their mind, by perpetually talking to them of words and things which they do not understand: no liberty, no amusement! always lesson, silence, constraint, correction, and threats! Our ancient forefathers knew better. It was by the charm of verses and music that the Hebrews, Egyptians, and Greeks, introduced the principal sciences, the maxims of virtue, and the politeness of manners. Without reading, people scarcely believe these things, so distant are they from present custom! nevertheless, little as history is known, there is not a doubt but that this was the common practice for many centuries. However, let us so far correct our own age, as to unite the agreeable and the useful together, as much as lay in our power.