There are persons who, having once made up their minds to do a thing,
cannot be moved from their resolution by any amount of persuasion. These
hard natures, these concentrated wills, are bound to have their way, no
matter whom they injure, no matter what stands in the way. Such
persons--and we notice the beginnings of this trait in children--need to
be taught to respect the rights of others. Their wills should
occasionally be allowed to collide with the wills of others, in order
that they may discover that there are other wills limiting theirs, and
may learn the necessary lesson of submission.
In yet other cases obstinacy is due to stupidity. Persons of weak
intelligence are apt to be suspicious. Not understanding the motives of
others, they distrust them; unwilling to follow the guidance of others,
they cling with a sort of desperation to their own purpose. These cases
may be treated by removing the cause of suspicion, by patiently
explaining one's motives where it is possible to do so, by awakening
confidence.
2. UNTRUTHFULNESS
Again, let us take the fault of untruthfulness. One cannot sufficiently
commend the watchfulness of those parents who take alarm at the
slightest sign of falsehood in a child. A lie should always put us on
our guard. The arch fiend is justly called "the father of lies." The
habit of falsehood, when it has become settled, is the sure inlet to
worse vices.
At the same time not all falsehoods are equally culpable or equally
indicative of evil tendency, and we should have a care to discriminate
between the different causes of falsehood in the young child, in order
that we may pursue the proper treatment. Sometimes falsehood is due to
redundant imagination, especially in young children who have not yet
learned to distinguish between fact and fancy. In such cases we may
restrain the child's imagination by directing its attention to the world
of fact, by trying to interest it in natural history and the like.
We should especially set the example of strict accuracy ourselves in all
our statements, no matter how unimportant they may be. For instance, if
we narrate certain occurrences in the presence of the child, we should
be careful to observe the exact order in which the events occurred, and
if we have made a mistake we should take pains to correct ourselves,
though the order of occurrence is really immaterial. Precisely because
it is immaterial we show by this means how much we value accuracy even
in little things.
Then, again, falsehood is often due to the desire for gain. Or it may be
due to fear. The child is afraid of the severity of the parent's
discipline. In that case we are to blame; we must relax our discipline.
We have no business to tempt the child into falsehood. Again,
untruthfulness is often due to mistaken sympathy, as we see in the case
of pupils in school, who will tell a falsehood to shield a fellow
pupil. In the worst cases falsehood is inspired by malice.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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