SPECIAL TRAINING FOR PARENTS:

## The Oberlin Evangelist

## LETTERS TO PARENTS

by The Rev. CHARLES G. FINNEY

August 12, 1840
DEAR BRETHREN AND SISTERS:--

In compliance with an intimation given some time since, that I should, God willing, address some letters to parents, I will now commence the series, with hope of promoting the interests of the rising generation. I shall commence with remarks upon Prov. 6:22: "Train up a child in the way he should go; and when he is old, he will not depart from it," and shall throw my letters upon this text some what into the form of a sermon. In doing which I shall endeavor to show,

I. What is implied in training up a child in the way he should go.

1. It implies such thorough instruction as to root and ground them in correct views of truth, and in right principles of action. If you consult the marginal reading of your Bible you will perceive, that the word rendered "train" in the text, is in the margin rendered "catechise." The idea is that which I have suggested, to thoroughly instruct them in the great principles of righteousness.

2. It implies such thorough government as to root and ground them in correct habits in all respects, such as habits of cheerful obedience to parents, correct habits in respect to early rising, early retiring to rest, correct habits in regard to taking their meals at stated hours, and in respect to the quantity and quality of their food, habits of exercise and rest, study and relaxation. In short all their habits comprising their whole deportment.

3. It implies the training them to a knowledge of, and conformity to all the laws of their being, physical and moral. This is the way in which they should go, and it is in vain to expect to train them in the way they should go, without giving them thorough instruction in respect to the laws of their bodies and minds, the laws of natural and spiritual life and health.

4. It implies not only giving them thorough instruction in these respects, but the thorough government of them and training them in all things to observe these laws.

II. I will notice several things to be avoided in training up children in the way they should go.

1. Avoid in yourself whatever would be injurious in them to copy, and do not suppose that you can yourself be guilty of pernicious practices, and by your precept prevent their falling into the same. Remember that your example will be more influential than your precept. I knew a father who himself used tobacco but warned his children against its use, and even commanded them not to use it, and yet every one of them did use it sooner or later. This was as might be expected. I knew a mother who used tea herself but warned her children against it as something unnecessary and injurious, especially to young people, but all her children fell into the use of it of course. The fact is that her example was the most influential and impressive teaching.

2. Avoid all conversation in their presence, upon topics that may misled them, and beget in them a caviling and wicked spirit, such as all sectarian conversation, unguarded conversation upon the doctrine of decrees and election, speaking of neighbors' faults, or censoriously of any human being. In short whatever may be a stumbling block to their infant minds.

3. Avoid all disagreement between the parents in regard to the government of the children.

4. Avoid all partiality or favoritism in the government of them.

5. Avoid whatever may lessen the respect of the children for either parent.

6. Avoid whatever may lessen the authority of either parent.

7. Avoid whatever may tend to create partiality for either parent.

8. Avoid begetting in them the love of money. But remember that the love of money, is the root of all evil.

9. Avoid the love of money yourself, for if you have a worldly spirit yourself, your whole life will most impressively inculcate the lesson that the world should be the great object of pursuit. Said a wealthy man to me, "I was brought up from my very infancy to love the world and make money my god." When we consider how impressively and constantly this lesson is taught by many parents, is it wonderful that there is so much fraud, theft, robbery, piracy, and selfishness under every abominable form? Many parents seem to be engaged in little else, so far as their influence with their children is concerned, than making them as selfish and worldly as possible. Nearly their whole conversation at the table, and in all places where they are, the whole drift and bent of their lives, pursuits, and every thing about them, are calculated to make the strongest impression upon their little minds, that their parents conceive the world to be the supreme good. Unless all this be avoided it is impossible to train up a child in the way he should go.

10. Avoid begetting within them the spirit of ambition to be rich, great, learned, or any thing else but good. If you foster a spirit of selfish ambition it will give birth of course to anger, pride, and a whole herd of infernal passions.

11. Avoid, begetting or fostering the spirit of vanity in any way, in the purchase of clothing, or any articles of apparel, in dressing them or by any expressions relating to their personal appearance. Be careful to say nothing about your own clothes, or the apparel of any body else or of the personal attractions or beauty of yourself, your children, or of any body else, in such a way as to beget within them the spirit of ambition, pride, and vanity.

12. Guard them against any injurious influence at home. Suffer no body to live in your families, whose sentiments, or habits, or manners, or temper may corrupt your children. Guard the domestic influence as the apple of your eye. Have no person in your house, that will tell them foolish stories, sing them foolish songs, talk to them about witches, or any thing of any name or nature, which ought not to come before their youthful minds.

13. Be careful under what influences you leave them when you go from home, and let not both parents take a journey at the same time, leaving their children at home, without manifest necessity.

14. Avoid every evil influence from abroad. Let no children visit them whose conversation or manners may corrupt them. Let them associate with no children, by going abroad themselves where they will run the hazard of being in any way corrupted.

15. Avoid the cultivation of artificial appetites. Accustom them to no innutritious stimulants or condiments of any kind, for in so doing, you will create a craving for stimulants, that may result in beastly intemperance.

16. Avoid creating any artificial wants. The great majority of human wants are merely artificial, and children are often so brought up, as to feel as if they needed multitudes of things, which they do not need, and which are really injurious to them, and if they ever become poor, their artificial wants will render them extremely wretched, if indeed they do not tempt them to fraud, theft, and robbery, to supply them. Consider how simple and few the real wants of human beings are, and whatever your worldly circumstances may be, for your children's sake, for truth's sake, for righteousness' sake, and for Christ's sake, habituate them to being satisfied with the supply of their real wants.

17. Avoid by all means their being the subjects of evil communications. "Evil communications corrupt good manners." This is the testimony of God. If your domestics, your hands, your neighbors' children or any body else, are suffered to communicate to them things which they ought not to know, they will be irrecoverably injured, and perhaps forever ruined.

18. Avoid their reading books that contain pernicious sentiments, or any thing indecent, or vulgar, or of ill report.

19. Avoid their reading romances, plays, and whatever may beget within them a romantic and feverish state of mind.

20. Avoid suffering gluttony, or any species of intemperance, eating at improper seasons, improper articles, and improper quantities of food, and every thing that shall work a violation of the laws of life and health.

21. Avoid all unnecessary occasion of excitement. Children are naturally enough excited. Pains should be taken to quiet and keep them calm rather than to increase their excitement. This is imperiously demanded both by their health and minds. Societies are often gotten up among children, and great pains taken to get up an interest and excitement among them and to perpetuate this excitement, insomuch that it is often attended with a loss of appetite and sleep, and a serious injury to their health and morals. Parents should be on their guard, against suffering their children to be drawn into such excitement on having any unnecessary connection with or knowledge of them.

The subject will be resumed.

August 26, 1840
DEAR BRETHREN AND SISTERS:--

In pursuing this subject I will notice several others things to be avoided in the training of children.

22. Avoid every thing that can be construed by them into insincerity on any subject. Especially every thing that may make the impression that your word is not to be depended upon.

23. Avoid every appearance of impatience or fretfulness in their presence.

24. Wholly abstain from scolding at them. If you have occasion to reprove them, let it be done with deliberation, and not in such haste and in such tones of voice as to have the appearance of anger.

25. If you have occasion to chastise them, first converse and pray with them, and avoid proceeding to severe measures until you have fully made the impression upon their minds, that it is your solemn and imperative duty to do so.

26. Avoid in your conversation whatever might have a tendency to beget in them the spirit of slander and evil speaking. Never let them hear you speak evil of any man. But always in their presence, as on all other occasions, "be gentle, showing all meekness to all men."

27. Avoid as far as possible whatever may be a temptation to them to indulge evil tempers. "Fathers, provoke not your children to anger," is both the counsel and the command of God. If you find your children naturally irritable and easily made angry, be sure to keep this always in your mind, that the more frequently any temper of mind is exercised, the more readily and certainly will it be exercised whenever there is any occasion for its indulgence. If therefore you find your children inclined to the exercise of any evil temper whatever, be sure, as far as possible, to avoid all occasions that may prove too great a trial for them, and cause them to fall into their besetting sin.

28. Avoid unnecessarily exciting their fears upon any subject. Suffer no one to make them afraid of the dark, or of Indians, or of witches, or of wild beasts. Children are often very seriously injured by creating a morbid excitability upon such subjects, insomuch that they are ever afterwards afraid to be alone in the dark. And their foolish fears are often excited even in riper age, in view of things with which they were foolishly persecuted in their youth.

29. Never give them any thing because they cry for it. If they find that they can get any thing by crying for it, or that they are any more apt to get it because they cry for it, you will find yourselves continually annoyed by their crying. Children should be taught that if they cry for a thing, for that very reason they cannot have it.

III. Several things to be attended to in the training of children.

1. Be honest, and thorough, and correct in forming your own views and opinions on all subjects. This is of great importance. For if your children find you often mistaken in your views upon some important subjects, your opinions will soon cease to have much weight with them. It is immensely important that you be well instructed, and know how to answer their inquiries, especially on all moral subjects. Your opinions ought to have great weight with them. It is for their own good. Your opinions will naturally have great weight with them unless they find you in error. Be careful then as you would preserve your own influence over them for their good, and as you would not mislead them to their ruin, to be thorough and diligent in the use of means to obtain correct information on all moral questions.

2. Let your own habits be both right and regular; your rising in the morning, your retiring at night, the hours at which you take your meals, together with all your domestic arrangements. Let order pervade every thing, and be sure to have a time and a place for every work, and every thing around you. Have a place for every tool, and let every member of your family be constrained to keep every thing in its place. And if they have occasion to use any tool, to be sure to return it to its place before they put it out of their hands. By insisting upon this, you will soon save yourself and them a great deal of unnecessary trouble.

3. Be sure that they are up early in the morning, and retire early at night. This is imperiously demanded by their health, and almost universally by their morals. If children are allowed to be up late in the evening they will not only lie in bed late in the morning, but almost always get into the habit of either making or receiving visits from neighboring children. This will bring in its train a host of evils.

4. See that your temper and spirit are right. "Let the peace of God that passeth all understanding dwell in your hearts, that you may possess your soul in patience." And never suffer your angry feelings to come into collision with theirs.

5. Let the influence which you have over them be an ever present consideration with you. Do not forget it. Do not be unmindful of it, even for an hour or a moment. In whatever you say and do in their presence have an eye to its influence upon them.

September 9, 1840
DEAR BRETHREN AND SISTERS:--

In addressing you farther on this subject I remark,

6. That in training children, parents should remember their nature, and that their will is in the first instance influenced by sense, and not by moral considerations--that their bodily appetites come to have a strong influence over their will, before moral truth can reach the heart through the conscience, unless their minds are enlightened by a supernatural divine agency. Hence,

7. Parents should remember that physical training must precede moral training. Pains should be taken to keep their bodily appetites in a perfectly natural state. And as far as possible prevent the formation of artificial appetites, and do all that the nature of the case admits to restrain the influence of the appetites over the will.

8. Parents should remember that all artificial stimulants lead directly to intemperance--that tea, coffee, tobacco, spices, ginger, and indeed the whole family of innutritious stimulants, lead directly and powerfully to the formation of intemperate habits--create a morbid hankering after more and more stimulants, until both body and soul are swallowed up on the terrible vortex of intemperance.

9. Parents should remember that the least stimulating kinds of diet, are best suited to the formation of temperate habits in all respects. And just as far as they depart from a mild, bland, unstimulating diet, they are laying, in the perversion of the child's constitution, a foundation for any and every degree of intemperance.

10. Parents should remember that the temper of the child is in a great measure dependent upon, and intimately connected with his physical habits. If, during the period of nursing, the mother makes a free use of innutricious stimulants, she is continually poisoning the infant at her breast, and rasping up its nervous system into a state of extreme irritability. The certain consequence sooner or later, will be the development of an irritable temper, with many disagreeable and even disgusting traits of character. If when the child is weaned from the breast, the irritating process is still kept up--if it is fed with much pastry, unripe fruits, at unseasonable hours, and in improper quantities--nothing else can be expected than that it will be a spoiled child.

11. Parents should secure the earliest opportunity to get the mastery of the will. The very first time, at whatever age, children manifest temper and set up their will, they should be calmly but firmly resisted. It matters not how young they are. If they manifest a disposition to obtain a thing by crying, or in any way insisting upon having their will, the parent should at once adopt some method of steadily and perseveringly opposing their will in that particular. To press the hand upon them and hold them still when they are struggling and screaming to get up, or even to let them lie and scream is vastly better than to yield any point to them when their spirit is stirred, and their will is stubborn.

12. Parents should begin at the outset to get the mastery over the will and then keep it. The most steadfast and uniform perseverance is essential to retaining the mastery of their will. I have always observed that persons whose will has not been early subdued and kept under, are either never converted, or if hopefully converted, make but little progress in piety. I have had so much opportunity of making observation is this respect, that if I find a person lingering under conviction, and finding it very difficult to submit to God--if I find him grieving and quenching the Holy Spirit, and if converted, given to perpetual backsliding, I often make inquiry, and with scarcely a solitary exception, find that parental authority has never had a thorough influence over him--that his will was not early subdued, and ever after, while in a state of minority, kept in a state of unqualified submission and obedience.

13. Parents should lay great stress upon the unconditional submission and obedience of their children. Some parents seem to have adopted the principle of not subduing the will of their children until they are old enough to be reasoned with, when they expect to govern them by reason, and moral suasion as they say. Now it should be understood that any thing is moral suasion that acts as a motive--that the rod is one of the most powerful and even indispensable forms of moral suasion. It acts as a most commanding motive when the mind is very insensible to the voice of reason. It is no doubt the duty of parents to teach their children in the outset, that it is their right and their duty to insist upon unconditional submission to their will--to make the child understand from the very first that the will of the parent is a good and sufficient reason for the child's pursuing a required course of conduct. If the child is not taught that this is a good and sufficient reason--if it is left to demand other reasons, and if the parent is to succeed in gaining the child over to any course of conduct in proportion as he satisfies or fails to satisfy the child with the offered reasons, the child is inevitably ruined. For in such cases, if the reason satisfies the child, and he yields obedience, it is not filial obedience, it is not rendered out of respect for the authority of the parent. It is no recognition of the parent's right to govern or of the child's duty to obey the parent. It is simply yielding to the offered reasons, and not to parental authority. Parents must therefore commence the government of the child, and perfect their influence over its will, if they ever expect to do so, long before the child can be reasoned with. In this respect the parent stands to the child in the place of God, lays his influence upon the will, and holds it in a state of submission to parental authority until the higher claims of God can come in--until moral considerations can be thrown in upon the mind as the regulator of the will. And ordinarily moral truth will have greater or less influence with the will, just in proportion to the perfection or imperfection with which parental authority has influenced the will.

October 7, 1840
DEAR BRETHREN AND SISTERS:--

In continuing my remarks upon the subject of training children, let me say--

14. Keep them, as much as possible, with yourself, and under your own eye. Be yourself, as far as possible, the companion of your own children. There is perhaps no greater error among parents, than to suffer the children of a neighborhood to mingle with each other, without restraint, find their own sports, and employ themselves as they please. There is scarcely no neighborhood in which there are not more or less children, who have heard more or less filthy conversation, vulgar, hateful, polluting, immoral, and perhaps profane and blasphemous things; and whose minds have become deeply imbued, perhaps, with the spirit of the pit, or some other abomination, that, if left without restraint, will corrupt all the children in the neighborhood. Thus, one wicked child, if left to mingle freely with the whole neighborhood of playful, confiding, and unsuspecting children, will defile and ruin them all. Therefore, beloved, keep your children at home. Suffer no children of your neighbors to come within your yard, or upon their play ground, without your consent. And be careful not to give your consent, unless you or some responsible adult member of your family can be with them. Be sure that you do not confide in the purity of a neighbor's children, because their parents are good people, and suppose that the minister's or the deacon's children, may safely be left to mingle with yours of course. You should remember, that the best of parents may have their children corrupted by contact with other wicked children; and you cannot be sure that they have not been. Therefore, be on your guard, or perhaps, from the children of pious parents, an influence may flow in upon your family, that will deeply corrupt and finally destroy your children.

Objection. But most parents are apt to say, we cannot give up our time to our children. We are obliged to attend to other matters. To this I reply:

That this very seldom need to be so. If parents would satisfy themselves with a competency of this world's goods, and abandon their fastidious and fashionable ways of living, they would, in almost all cases, have abundant time for companionship with their children.

Obj. 2. But again it is objected, that children need the society of each other--that the children of a neighborhood are benefitted by contact with each other--that without this contact, they are apt to be selfish, and proud, and to lack interest in others besides themselves. To this I answer:

That to be sure, children need society. They need contact with other minds. They need to be so associated with human beings, as to take an interest in them, to witness the developments of character, and to develop their own characters. But it is believed, at least by me, that children are vastly more benefitted by contact with adult minds, than with the minds of children. I mean of course, those adults whose spirit, and conversation, and conduct, are what they ought to be. And, to be sure, it ought to be contact with those who take an interest in them. The example of adults has more influence with children, than that of children with each other. And I honestly say, I would not care to have my children ever see any other children, could they be favored with the right kind of adult contact.

15. Provide means for their amusement at home. Children must have amusement. They must and will be employed. They must have a room and ground to play in. They must have means and things with which to amuse themselves. And parents can never make a more just and appropriate use of their money, than providing with it the means of amusing, employing, and educating their children. It is a vast mistake in parents, to suppose that money thrown away, or misapplied, that is expended in the purchase of hobby-horses, little carts, wagons, sleds, dolls, sets of furniture for their play houses, needles, thimbles, scissors, boards, hammers, saws, augers, and tools with which to amuse themselves, and with which to imitate the various specimens of architecture which they see around them.

It should be remembered, however, that children love variety; that they are never satisfied long with any one thing. They should not, therefore, be provided with too many things at once. For should you purchase many things at a time, you will soon find it impossible to provide novelties for them. Generally, a single novelty at a time is sufficient to amuse them. A child will find a great many things to do with a gimblet. When he has amused himself with this until it is laid aside, add a penknife. With his gimblet and knife he can peg pieces of wood together. If to these you add, after a time, a hammer, then a little saw; and thus proceed carefully, but with due attention to just what is needed for their amusement, you will render them quiet at home without occupying much of your own time.

You will find it very important to let your children have each one some place for his tools; and let it be an invariable rule, that whenever he has done using them, they are to be put everyone in its place. Let the child be made to feel, that it is of great importance that nothing should be lost or mislaid. Thus you will cultivate a habit, that will be of vast service to him through life. If he has little carts or wagons, be sure that he never leaves them out in the rain, or dew, but has them securely housed; and the reasons why tools should not be exposed to the weather, should be made familiar to his mind. If you have but one child, he will be lonesome, unless you take a little pains, in teaching him how to amuse himself. You must play with him, take him with you when it is convenient, go into his play room or ground, show him how to use his little blocks, his little tools, his hobby-horse, and try to give his little mind a start in the direction of inventing his own amusements.

16. If you have several children, study to make them satisfied with each other's society, without feeling a disposition, either to go abroad for companions, or to invite those from abroad to come to them. They must be restrained, and kept from doing these things or they are undone. This then must be a subject of study, of prayer, of much consideration, on your part, how you may make your children love each other, be willing to stay at home, and be satisfied with their books, play things, home, and friends, without roving abroad for amusement or employment.

17. Cultivate in them a taste for reading. To this end you must read to them yourself, or employ some judicious and excellent reader to read to them. You should yourself continue, from time to time, to search out and purchase such books as will interest and edify them, from which you can read to them from time to time, such stories and things as will interest them, and make a deep and right impression on their minds. But, beloved, be sure to be judicious in the selection of books and pieces. Read nothing to them which you have not read over yourself. Consider what your children are; and ponder well what will be the natural influence of the pieces which you purpose to read or to have read to them. And in all your selections have the moral bearings of whatever you, in any way communicate to them, strongly before your mind. Be sure to let no one at any time give your children books, tell stories, read things, or sing songs, or in any way make communications to them, the moral tendency of which is injurious.

18. Encourage them in employing themselves usefully; that is--in doing whatever may be beneficial to themselves or others; in the summer in keeping a little garden--and at all times in imitating the mechanic arts--making any pieces of machinery or tools for their own use, little tables, chairs, bed-steads, and in doing, in short, whatever can contribute to the well-being of their species.

19. Make your children your confidential friends. In other words, you be the confidential friends and companions of your children. Accustom them to confide to you all their secrets and every thing that passes in their minds. On multitudes of occasions, they have thoughts, and not unfrequently you will find manifest suggestions from Satan, which, if known to you, might enable you to do them immense good. Now, if you accustom them to throw their little minds open to you, and to feel that you, in every thing sympathize with them, that they may have the most perfect confidence in you, you will naturally come to be, as you ought to be, their confident and their counsellor. But if you will not give your time to this--if you turn them off and say, O, I cannot attend to you, or if you treat them harshly, or sarcastically--if you mortify them, and treat them with unkindness--if you manifest no sympathy with and for them, after repeated attempts to get at your heart, finding themselves baffled, they will turn sadly away, and by degrees seek sympathy and counsel from others. Thus you will lose your own influence over them, and give them over to other influences, that may ruin them. How amazingly do parents err in these respects. Father--Mother--how sadly do you err--how grievously do you injure your children--nay, how almost certainly will you ruin them, if you drive them, by your own wickedness, or leave them, to seek for confidential companionship away from home.

October 21, 1840
DEAR BRETHREN AND SISTERS:--

I remark:

22. Cultivate natural affection among your children. Remember, that what is called natural affection, is natural in no other sense, than that it is natural for children to love those that love them. Therefore, what is generally called natural affection is cultivated affection. Therefore, great pains should be taken by parents, to cultivate among children, not only an affection for themselves, but for each other. Many parents, and fathers especially, treat their children in such a manner, as that their children have very little affection for them, and in many instances, it is to be feared, that they have none at all. And then, perhaps, the children are upbraided with the want of natural affection, as they call it, in their children, when they take little or no pains to be worthy of or to cultivate their affection.

23. Again--encourage inquiry on the part of your children. They come into a world of novelties. Before they are a week old, they may be seen staring around the room, as if they would inquire who, and what, and where they are. As soon as they are able to talk, they manifest the most intense desire to be instructed in regard to every thing around them. Now parents, and all others who have the care of children, should encourage their inquiries, and as far as is possible, or proper, give them satisfaction on every subject of inquiry. Give them reasons, as far as may be, that shall satisfy their little minds.

24. Parents will find their children inquisitive on those subjects that are by many supposed to be of too delicate a nature to be conversed upon by children. E.g., What constitutes a breach of the 7th commandment, and things of this nature. At a very early age, it is no doubt proper to inform children, that they are yet too young to be instructed upon such subjects; but that, at a suitable time, you will give them the requisite information, requesting them at the same time, not to converse with others than their parents, about such things as these. but previous to the age of puberty, and before an explanation of such things will excite improper feelings, parents should, beyond all question, give their children requisite instruction and caution upon all such subjects. When instruction is given, caution and admonition should be so frequently repeated, accompanied with solemn prayer, and instructions from the word of God, as to make a deep impression on the mind, and thoroughly to quicken and awaken conscience. Parents cannot neglect to do this without guilt, inasmuch as it is expressly enjoined upon parents, by the authority of God, to teach their children the law and commandments of God. "And thou shalt teach them diligently unto thy children, and shalt talk of them when thou sittest in thine house, and when thou walkest by the way, and when thou liest down, and when thou risest up."

25. Parents, and the guardians of children, should never suffer themselves to evade the inquiries of children by falsehood. For example--When an infant is born in the family, telling them that the physician brought it, or that it was found in a hollow tree, or, in short, telling them any thing false about it. There is nothing improper, unnatural, or indecent, in letting them know so much upon the subject, as that it was born of their mother.

26. To tell children falsehoods about such things, is only still further to excite their curiosity, and create the necessity either of telling them the truth or still more falsehoods.

27. Be especially careful of the influences that act upon your children at common schools. It often seems to me, that parents hardly dream of the amount of corruption, filthy language, and conduct, often witnessed in common schools. Little children of the same, as well as of the opposite sexes, deeply corrupting and defiling each other. These things are often practised, to a most shocking extent, without parents seeming even so much as to know of it. I would rather be at any expense, at all within my means, or even to satisfy myself with one meal a day, to enable me to educate my children at home, sooner than give them over to the influence of common schools, as they are often arranged and conducted.

28. Remember that your children will be educated, either by yourself or by some one else. Either truth or error must possess their minds. They will have instruction, and if you do not secure to them right instruction, they will have that which is false.

29. Prove yourselves in all respects worthy of the confidence of your children. Let them always witness in you the utmost integrity of character. Let them, in no instance, see in you the appearance of deceit, falsehood, or unkindness. Let your whole heart stand open to them; and in return, you will find, as a thing of course, that their little hearts will stand open to you. If you show yourselves worthy of their confidence, rely upon it you will have it.

30. Deal thoroughly with their consciences. As soon as they are able to be instructed on moral questions, give yourself to a thorough enlightening their minds upon every precept of the law of God. Put their minds as fully as possible in possession of those truths that will make their consciences quick and sharp as a two edged sword.

31. Guard against the cultivation of so legal a spirit, as to drive them to despair when they have sinned. While you cultivate the most discriminating conscience, be sure also, to instruct the little one thoroughly in respects to the plan of salvation by faith in Jesus Christ.

32. Add physical discipline to moral instruction. I have referred to this subject before, but wish to say in addition, that it is doubtless one of the greatest errors, in the education of children, to overlook the fact, that at that early age the discipline of the rod, will often present to them a more powerful motive than can be brought to bear upon them by moral truth, presented to their uninformed minds. The rod cannot safely be laid aside, until the powers of the mind are so fully developed and the mind so thoroughly instructed, that the whole range of moral truth may be brought to exert its appropriate influence upon the mind, without the infliction of pain. It seems to me, that some parents effect to be wiser than God, in taking it upon them to decide, that it is not wise to use the rod upon children. Prov. 19:18: & 23:13, 14: "Chasten thy son while there is hope. and let not thy soul spare for his crying." "Withhold not correction from the child; for if thou beatest him with the rod, he shall not die. Thou shalt beat him with the rod, and shalt deliver his soul from hell."

33. Let them see that your religion is your life--that it is your joy and rejoicing from day to day--and not that it fills you with gloom and melancholy. Many professors have such a kind of religion, as to render them rather miserable than happy. They are almost constantly in bondage to sin, and consequently under a sense of condemnation. They are wretched, and exhibit this wretchedness, daily, before their children. This creates the impression on their little minds, that religion is a gloomy thing, fit only for funerals and death-beds; and only to be thought of on a near prospect of death. Now this is making the most false and injurious impression upon their minds that can be conceived. It is a libel upon the religion of Christ. But shocking to say, it is almost as common as it is false. Now your children should see, that you are religious in every thing, and that in all things you are not reluctantly but joyfully acquiescent in the will of God.

34. By all means let them daily see, that you are not creatures of appetite--that you are not given up to the pursuit of wealth, or to the pursuit of fashion--not seeking worldly reputation or favor--that neither good eating, or good drinking, or good living, in any other sense than holy living, is the object at which you aim. Let them see, that you are cheerful and contented with plain, simple food--that you are strictly temperate in all things, in respect to the quality and quantity of whatever you eat, drink, do, or say. In short, let your whole life inculcate the impressive lesson, that a state of entire consecration to God is at once the duty and the highest privilege of every human being.

35. Be sure to pray much with and for them. Never punish them without praying with them. Whenever you give them serious admonition pray with them. Pray with them, when they lie down and when they rise up. And enforce the lesson by your own example, that they are never to do any thing without prayer.

36. Lay hold on the promises of God for them. Search the Bible for promises. Lay your Bible open before you. Kneel over it, and spread out the case of your children before God. Begin with the covenant of Abraham, and understand that God made the covenant as well with the children as with the parents. And remember that an inspired Apostle has said, "The promise is to you and to your children, and to as many as are afar off, even as many as the Lord our God shall call." Take the promise in Isa. 44:3-5: "I will pour water upon him that is thirsty, and floods upon the dry ground; I will pour my Spirit upon thy seed, and my blessing upon thine offspring; and they shall spring up among the grass, as willows by the water-courses. One shall say I am the Lord's; and another shall call himself by the name of Jacob; and another shall subscribe with his hand unto the Lord, and surname himself by the name of Israel." Remember, that this promise was made more especially to the Church under the Christian dispensation, and respects the children of Christians, more especially than the children of Jewish parents. Throw your souls into these promises, and wrestle until you prevail.

November 4, 1840
DEAR BRETHREN AND SISTERS:--

I will now call your attention--

IV. To some of the difficulties in the way of training up children in the way they should go.

1. A want of the requisite information on the part of parents, and especially on the part of mothers, to whose care and management they are principally committed. Thus far, as a general fact, female education has been so much neglected, that but few women have the requisite information of the proper training of children. There is a most sad deficiency in this respect, in the training of young women, in reference to their being future mothers. Why, the education of daughters is one of the most important things in the world. That women should be educated, is wholly indispensable to the salvation of the world. An enlightened and sanctified generation of mothers would exert the greatest influence upon future generations, that ever was exerted upon human beings. It is one of "guilt's blunders," to educate the sons, and suffer the daughters to go with little or no education.

2. Another difficulty is, the want, often, of education, and still more frequently of consideration, on the part of fathers. Most fathers seem to be so much engaged in business, politics, or amusements, as to leave very little time for deep consideration in respect to their responsibility and influence with their children. This is all wrong; for if there be any thing that demands the attention and time of the father, it is those things that concern the well-being of his children. If he neglect his own household, whatever else he does, he virtually "denies the faith, and is worse than an infidel."

3. A want of a sense of responsibility in both parents, often prevents their training up their children in the way they should go. Without a keen and efficient sense of responsibility, parents will never do their duty to their children, however much they may love them.

4. A want of agreement between the parents, in regard to training their children. If the parents do not agree upon the course to be pursued--if they do not lend to each other the whole weight of their influence, children will soon see it, and parental influence will soon lose its power over them.

5. The ruinous notions that are prevalent among parents, in regard to training up children. Many parents have given themselves so little to consideration upon this subject, as that their opinions are little more than dreams, and old wives' fables, upon the subject of training children.

6. There is often a great difficulty, on account of the loose notions and habits of neighborhoods in regard to their children. If a parent who is anxious to preserve the morals of his children, makes up his mind to keep them at home, it is often unjustly thought and said, that it is because he thinks his children better than the neighbors' children. Or, if he keeps his children at home, the neighbors' children are suffered to come in throngs to visit them. In this case they must be sent home, at which their parents are often offended, or suffered to remain, at the hazard of all those evils that arise from suffering children to mingle together without restraint. Or, to avoid this, the time of the father or mother, or of some adult member of the family, must be given up to superintend and accompany them in their plays. It should be always understood by parents, that they have no right to suffer their children to go to a neighbor's house, to play with his children, without first obtaining the consent of the parents of such children. And, if they do, they ought to be willing to have them sent home, at the discretion of those whose children they visit. Certainly no man has a right to inflict on me or my family the visit of his children, without my knowledge or consent. Nor have I any right to do so with him. And I had much rather a neighbor would turn his horse into my yard to feed, without my consent, than to turn his children into my yard to play with my children, without my consent. I say much rather. I might say, almost infinitely rather, as the horse would only devour the feed; but who can calculate the evil that may result from one hour's unrestrained and unobserved intercourse of children with each other.

7. Another great evil is the recklessness of parents, in respect to training their children. Many parents seem to turn their children to and fro, to wander like a wild ass' colt. If so be they are out of the way, it matters little with some parents, where or in what company they are. Now if there is any thing in the universe that deserves the severest reprehension, and I must add, the deepest damnation, it is such a reckless spirit in parents. It is tempting God. No language can describe its guilt.

8. A great want of firmness on the part of parents, in training their children, is another great evil. Firmness may respect:

(1.) The government and discipline of their children.

(2.) Guarding them against evil influences from abroad.

(3.) Resisting those habits of society that would subject their children to that kind and degree of contact with other children, which will positively ruin them.

(4.) It may respect those fashions, in regard to dress and many other things, that tend to carry their children away from God.

9. Another difficulty in the way is a want of faith and deep piety in parents. Many parents seem to have no practical confidence in the promises of the Bible, in respect to their children. They have very little piety; and many of them seem not to know that there are such multitudes of exceeding great and precious promises upon which they may rely.

10. Another difficulty is, a want of a sense of responsibility to the neighborhood, in parents. An ill managed family is the greatest nuisance that can infest any neighborhood. No man has a right to neglect the proper training of his children, and thereby render them a pest to society, any more than he has a right to build a mill dam, that will flood a timbered country, and thereby destroy the lives of the people. Now the former is an infinitely more aggravated sin than the latter. And if a man deserves to be indicted for building such a mill dam, as is often the case, how much more does he deserve to be indicted for a common nuisance, in suffering an uninstructed and unmanaged family to pour their abominations over the neighboring children. Such a family ought to be regarded as a public nuisance. Such fathers and mothers ought to be labored with, advised, admonished, and if need be, rebuked, and even indicted. And the influence of such families should be as strictly and religiously guarded against as we would guard against the influence of the devil.

11. Another great difficulty is, the influence of the flesh in the present state of the human constitution. The bodies of infants generally come into the world saturated with tea, coffee, and often with alcohol. They are born of mothers who have lived on the most stimulating kinds of diet, and from their very birth, nurtured upon whatever is calculated to pamper their appetites and rasp their nervous system into a state of the utmost excitement. This promotes a precocious development of all their organs, and gives great power to their animal propensities. It is almost sure to deliver them over, at a very early age, to the dominion of appetite and lust.

November 18, 1840
DEAR BRETHREN AND SISTERS:--

I now observe:

V. That if the condition be fulfilled, that is, if a child be trained up in the way he should go, it is certain, that when he is old, he will not depart from it.

1. Because God has said it.

2. He has laid the foundation of this certainty in the very nature of human beings. It is a fact, well known to every body, that human beings form habits, by the repetition of any given course of conduct, or feeling, until their habits become too confirmed to be counteracted and put down by any thing but Almighty Power. It is the law of habit that lies at the foundation of the difficulty of bringing sinners to abandon their sins. A long indulged and confirmed habit is, in the Bible, compared to the strength and stability of nature itself. God says, "Can the Ethiopian change his skin, or the leopard his spot? then can ye, who are ACCUSTOMED to do evil learn to do well." Here the law of habit is compared to the strength and permanency of nature itself. Now if a child be trained up in the way he should go, the rectitude of his future conduct is secured, not only by the promise and grace of God, but by this law of habit, which is laid deep in the foundation of his constitution.

3. Thus God has put the destiny of the child into the hand of the parent, who naturally loves it more than any other human being.

4. But again, God has established the law of parental affection, for the benefit of the child, and so far as may be, to secure the training it up in the way it should go. I might quote a great many passages of scripture in confirmation of this doctrine; but if the text itself does not satisfy your mind, no multiplication of texts would do so.

Here I must notice an objection to the view of the subject I have taken. There is one common and grand difficulty, which has seemed to stumble Christians, in respect to their laying hold on the promises, in regard to their children, and calculating with any thing like certainty upon their being converted, sanctified, and saved. It is this: Many good men have, in all ages, had abandoned and reprobate children. To this I answer:

(1.) Good men are not always perfect in judgment, and therefore may be, and sometimes doubtless have been guilty of some capital error, in training their children.

(2.) A great many good men have been so occupied with the concerns of the Church and the world, as to pay comparatively little attention to the training of their own children. Their children have been neglected and almost of course lost. At all events, when they have been neglected, they have not been trained up in the way they should go. So that the condition has not been fulfilled.

(3.) Many good men have lived in bad neighborhoods, and found it nearly or quite impossible to train up their children in the way they should go, without changing their locations. And notwithstanding they saw the daily contact of their children was calculated to ruin them, and did, as a matter of fact, prevent their training them up in the way they should go; yet they have, probably from a sense of duty, remained where they were, to the destruction of their children. In such cases, the ruin of their children may be chargeable to their neighbors, because the influence of their neighbor's children prevented their bringing them up in the way they should go.

A few remarks must close what I have to say to parents at this time:

1. You see the great importance of Maternal Associations. Mothers must make the training of their children the subject of much consideration, study, and prayer. If any mind should be well stored with knowledge, it is the mind of a mother. If any one needs to understand philosophy, mental, natural, and moral, it is a mother. If any one needs wisdom of a serpent and the harmlessness of a dove, it is a mother. It is, therefore, all-important that mothers should associate together, exchange views, and books, and converse, and pray, and discuss, and devise every measure, for training up their children in the way they should go.

2. There should also be Parental as well as Maternal Associations. If there be any thing important to the interests of this world, it is that children should be universally trained up aright. And how wonderful it is, that fathers are so slow to perceive the necessity of deep study and research, prayer, discussion, reading, and conversation, on the subject of training their children. There are associations among men for almost every thing else, and yet, I hesitate not to say, that associations for this end are as necessary and important as for any other object whatever. Pious mothers are often at their wits' end, to know what to do to secure the salvation of their children. They are greatly at a loss, to know what course of training will most likely result in their sanctification. They go to their husbands; but their minds are engaged in every thing else. They have paid very little or no attention to the subject of training their children. And, as a general thing, if a father governs his family at all, it is only by a legal system, more or less rigid, according to his natural temper, habits, and way of doing things. And notwithstanding the wife needs the counsel of her husband, and the father of her children, fathers are, as a general thing, little prepared to give them counsel. There should be a great deal of consultation between the father and mother of every family, in relation to training the children--a great deal of consideration and forethought.

But another thing that renders both Parental and Maternal Associations of the utmost importance is, that there may be concert and unanimity in the neighborhood, on the subject of training children. If possible, every father and every mother should be enlisted in these associations, so as to secure the right training of all the children in the neighborhood. For, as I have said in a former letter, one unmanaged family will often, in spite of all that can be done, corrupt a whole neighborhood. Parents, therefore, ought to be instructed throughout whole neighborhoods, in respect to training their children. For if some families of children are allowed to run about and visit, both by day and by night, it will be difficult to restrain other children in the neighborhood from doing the same thing; and as moral influences tell with so much readiness as that the results spread as naturally and as certainly as a contagious disease, it is, therefore, of the utmost importance, to secure the attention and hearty co-operation of every parent in the neighborhood.

3. Permit me here again to revert to a topic, which I have mentioned in a former letter, and say again, that it is of the utmost importance, that care should be taken to secure the right kind of domestic help. As you value the souls of your children, do not receive into your family any filthy girl or young man, or old man, that will tell falsehoods to your children, tell them vile stories, use vulgar language, or in any way corrupt their morals or their manners. I would sooner have the plague in my family, than to have such influences as these. I would not suffer the nearest relative I have on earth to remain in my family, unless he would refrain from corrupting my children.

4. Again, see the great importance of selecting the right kind of Sabbath School teachers.

5. You see the great importance of selecting the right kind of books and periodical literature for your children. There are many books and periodicals, and those too that are extensively circulated, that I regard as of a very pernicious and highly dangerous tendency. They are calculated to form any thing else than right notions and character among children.

6. All the domestic arrangements of every family should have a special regard to the training of their children. The right training of them should be a prime object, and every other interest of the family should be made to bend to this. The hours of retiring in the evening and rising in the morning, the hours at which meals are taken, kinds of foods, and in short all the habits of the family should have a direct reference to the right training of the children. Nothing should be suffered to enter into the family arrangements that has a tendency to injure their health, their intellect or their heart. No company should at any time be received and entertained whose conduct may endanger the manners or morals of the children.

7. Mothers should never, under any pretence whatever, neglect their own children for the purpose of attending to other matters. Mother, remember that nothing can compensate for the neglect of your duty to your children. This is your first great indispensable duty, to train your children in the way they should go. Attend to this then, whatever else you neglect.

8. Do not suppose that you can attend to this without being yourself devotedly pious. No mother has begun to do her duty to her children, who is not supremely devoted to God, and is not endeavoring to train them up for God. Some mothers will neglect their children under the pretence of going to meeting and especially attending protracted meetings, leaving it, as they say, with God to take care of their children while they do his work. They seem to think the time spent in taking care of their children is almost thrown away. And even some seem unwilling to have children because they shall have to throw away so much time in taking care of them. Now woman, you ought to know that a leading object of your life is to bear and train up children for God--and that time is as far as possible from being lost which you spend in this employment.

Other women, instead of neglecting their children to attend to their devotions, are neglecting their devotions almost altogether, and pretending to discharge their duty to their children while they are neglecting God and religion. Now this is equally erroneous with the other course. No parent can train up children in the way they should go, without maintaining a spirit of deep devotion to God on the one hand, and on the other without paying the most rigorous and unremitted attention to their training, physical, intellectual, and moral. Mothers should be emphatically "keepers at home." During the minority of their children, they should consider it their great business to train them up in the way they should go.

9. But in doing this they should consult God at every step, and should not imagine that they begin to do their duty any farther than they consult the living oracles, and live under the constant guidance of the Holy Spirit.

10. If you would train your children in the way they should go, be invincibly firm in training your own family, let other families do as they may.

11. Remember that if you resist the true light, or neglect your duty to your children, God "will visit the iniquities of the fathers upon the children, and upon the children's children, unto the third and fourth generations."

Your brother in the bonds of the gospel,

C.G.FINNEY