She can talk to it about its books, and awaken a desire in its mind to
understand what it reads. Children are always curious in regard to the
phenomena of nature, and whether this curiosity lives or dies depends
very much on the answers it receives to its first questions. If the
mother cannot answer them herself, she can help the child to find an
answer somewhere else, and she should beware how she deceives herself
with the idea that she has not time to attend to the moral and
intellectual wants of her child. She has no right to so immerse all her
own mind in the cares of life that she cannot, while attending to them,
talk rationally with her children. The mothers who best fulfil their
higher duties towards their children are quite as often found among
those who are compelled to almost constant industry of the hands, as
among those of abundant leisure. There is nothing in the handiwork of
the housekeeper or the seamstress that need absorb all the mental
attention; and hers must be an ill-regulated mind that cannot ply the
needle, or perform the more active duties of the household, and yet
listen to the child as it reads its little books, and converse with it
about the moral lessons or the intellectual instruction they contain.
The mother has it in her power to influence the mode in which the child
makes companions of its books more than any other person; and the
character of its Companionship with them through life will generally
depend in a great degree on the tastes and habits acquired in childhood.
Pages:
189
190
191
192
193
194
195
196
197
198
199
200
201
202
203
204
205
206
207
208
209
210
211
212
213