In Landor’s Parable of Asabel, the angel’s gentleness wrought upon that turbulent, refractory spirit, “even as the quiet and silent water wins itself an entrance where tempest and fire pass over.” It is written that other angels did look up with loving and admiration into the visage of this angel on his return; and he told the younger and more zealous of them, that whenever they would descend into the gloomy vortex of the human heart, under the softness and serenity of their voice and countenance its turbulence would subside. Plutarch tells us of Fabius Maximus, that he thought it hard that, while those who breed dogs and horses soften their stubborn tempers, and bring down their fierce spirits by care and kindness, rather than with whips and chains, he who has the command of men should not endeavour to correct their errors by gentleness and goodness, but treat them in even a harsher and more violent manner than gardeners do the wild fig-trees, pears, and olives, whose nature they subdue by cultivation, and which by that means they bring to produce very agreeable fruit.[5] We read of the distinguished Spanish author and statesman, Fermin Caballero, that while under the care of a kind and judicious instructor, he, as a boy, made rapid advance in the study of classical literature; but that on being removed from this tutor, and subjected to harsh and grinding discipline, he lapsed into idleness and obstinacy beyond all control. Not the least wise of the maxims to be culled from the pages of Terence is that in which _satius esse credit Pudore et liberalitate liberos retinere, quam metu_. Southey insists that no man was ever more thoroughly ignorant of the nature of children than John Wesley, as when he enjoins: “Let a child from a year old be taught to fear the rod, and to cry softly; from that age make him do as he is bid, if you whip him ten times running to effect it.” If Wesley had been a father himself, urges that tenderest of fathers, Robert the Rhymer, “he would have known that children are more easily governed by love than by fear.” And as with children, so with men, who are but children of a larger growth; and especially so with women, if we may take the word of one of Shakspeare’s most winsome women for it: “You may ride us With one soft kiss a thousand furlongs, ere With spur we heat an acre.” So with Landor’s Filippa, on whom harsh treatment and compulsory measures are simply thrown away: “Rudeness can neither move nor discompose her: A word, a look, of kindness, instantly Opens her heart and brings her cheek upon you.”