CHAP. VI.

Means for the Support of Parental Authority and Influ ence.-Rewards and Punishments.

HAVING mentioned the objects to be kept in view in education, it may now be proper to say something on the means which it is the duty of a parent to employ to make his authority respected, and to influence the minds of his children.

Of these means, rewards and punishments first demand our attention. Various theoretic discussions have taken place respecting the propriety of employing them in education. I shall neither examine nor produce any theories on this subject, but found what I advance on the Divine example and the Divine command, which, I apprehend, will be far safer guides than any theory; and guides far better suited to those persons who have the management of children-persons generally much better qualified to follow a plain rule than a philosophical speculation. In the government of this our world, God manifestly employs rewards and punishments. They are held out to influence his creatures, and lead them to the performance of their duty, and to their true happiness. The punishments are used reluctantly, and for the purpose of humbling the mind, and leading it to give up forbidden objects and fly to its God. The rewards are most freely offered to those who will re

ceive them with a right disposition of heart, manifested by right conduct towards the gracious Do. nor; and are intended to promote and cherish, as well as to bless, such a disposition. They produce their effect partly by a sense of their value; but more by exciting, in the bosoms of those on whom they are bestowed, a gratitude for the boon, and a love for the Giver. These dispositions will be proportionate to their conviction of their own demerit, and of the Divine goodness; and when they have taken root in the heart, they become the most powerful motives to all christian virtue : they constrain the man, as it were, to live unto his God, and be a new creature in his service. I should trespass improperly on your indulgence, were I to quote passages to prove points which are clear from the general tenor of Scripture, and will be at once admitted.*

The parent, in training his child to christian virtue, will do well to study diligently the Divine plan for promoting the same great object among men, and to follow it as closely as the nature of the case will admit. He will find the precepts on education in the Sacred Volume, to teach his offspring-to guide them to exact obedience from them-to command them to correct them-but yet to "forbear threatening," and not discourage them, best illustrated by that plan, with which they are evidently in harmony.

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How, then, should punishment be employed? Al

* 2 Cor. v. 14. See also, Eph. i. 3; 1 Tim. ii. 13, 17; 1 John iv. 18, 19; Rev. i. 5, 6.-vi. 6, 12, 13.

ways reluctantly, and as sparingly as circumstances will allow, and in such a manner, and with such accompaniments, that while it deters from sin, it may bring the mind into a state to be duly influenced by other and better motives.

And how should rewards be employed? With pleasure, and far more freely, as incentives to good; but still with a guard against their giving rise to habits of self-indulgence or prodigality; and with a constant recollection, that their highest use is to lead to the performance of duty from the more elevated motives of gratitude and affection-It will be necessary to consider the heads of this general outline more particularly.

Punishments should be employed reluctantly. Will any one dispute this position? And yet how often are they inflicted in such a way, that there is not only no reluctance apparent, but they appear to afford positive gratification! It would give me pain to describe scenes which I have witnessed, when a child has been under the correction of a passionate or ill-humoured parent; nay, even of a parent, in general character, neither passionate nor ill humoured, but out of temper at the time. Certainly, punishment under such circumstances fensive form, and is often likely to do much more harm than good. Let all of us who are parents (and I apply this sentiment very feelingly to myself,) take the utmost care that our children shall have no cause to think, that it is partly for our "own pleasure" that we correct them, and not entirely (after the ex

takes a most of

ample of God) for their "profit," that they "may "be partakers of his holiness." I will not dwell on this subject it is a painful one, whether we contemplate the parent or the child; but it is one which ought to engage the most serious consideration, and excite the earnest prayers, of all who wish to do their duty to their children. None, perhaps, stand in more need of close attention to it, than those who are most anxious to omit no part of that duty; since they will feel the faults of their children most keenly, and therefore may be most liable to have their tempers ruffled by them.

Punishment should be employed as sparingly as is compatible with the attainment of its ends. It is in itself an evil; and is attended by several bad consequences, which are comparatively of slight importance when it seldom occurs, but become truly formidable on its frequent repetition. These are the effects to be apprehended on the temper of the child, on its affections, and on its principles of action, and consequently on its conduct. Its temper and its affection for its parent are very likely to suffer during the infliction of punishment, or the imme. diate dread of it; and if such seasons often recur, they will afford a degree of permanence to feelings which would otherwise be incidental and transient, and counteracted by the general harmony and happy intercourse existing between the parent and child. On their deplorable nature, when they become habitual, I need say nothing: every parent will feel it. The child will also suffer with repect to its principles of

action; for, in proportion as it is influenced in its daily conduct by fear of punishment, it acts from the motives which govern a slave; and these motives will be followed by the dispositions and vices of a slave, (except so far as they are counteracted by other and better motives, and their attendant virtues,) which are selfishness, meanness, deceit, and a propensity to tyranny and cruelty. The danger of these evils, and of those mentioned before, appalling as they are, must be encountered, when frequent punishment is necessary; but surely every advisable method should be taken to avaid or to lessen that necessity.

This view of punishment strongly shows the propriety of employing it, when unhappily it is indispensable, in such a manner, and with such accompaniments, as may disarm it as much as may be of its mischief, and lead the mind to higher motives. First, then, as blows and stripes brutalize and harden more than other punishments, let them, if practicable, be avoided. They appeal to mere corporal feeling, without that mixture of reflection and moral feeling which most other punishments even of a corporal nature tend to excite. During an imprisonment within a room or a house, a boy will probably be led to think; but,during a whipping he seldom reflects. The difference is also apparent, when the alternative is between a whipping and some fine or privation-Another evil attending blows and stripes is, that they not only so occupy the mind by corporal suffering as to leave little or no room for other motives; but they are apt to discompose the minds both of parent and child, and unfit the one to urge such motives, and the oth