doing, we shall often lead him, if he be guilty, to repeat the falsehood; or, if innocent and timid, to plead guilty to a fault which he has not committed. Besides, no small care is necessary that we do not bring children into tempta tion, or put too much to the proof their still weak and unformed principles. There are many suspicious cases, the truth of which being buried in the breast of a child, cannot be discovered; and these it is generally wiser to leave unnoticed; at the same time, the more vigilantly ob serving the offender, and treating him with the greater strictness upon those occasions in which the truth can be ascertained by positive evidence. For example; were a child to assure me that he had so many times read over his lesson to himself, and I had reason to doubt the fact, I would let it pass in silence, dreading the effects of ill-placed suspicion, and knowing, that, if he were guilty and

should choose to deny it, I had no means by which to convict him. On the other hand, if a child tell a nurse that his mother has desired she should give him fruit, or a cake, and she suspect he is deceiving her, let her say nothing to him at the time, but apply, without his knowledge, to the mother; should her suspicions be confirmed, the child is convicted, and the opportunity is at once afforded for reproving and correcting him with decision.

If we have grounds for supposing a child guilty of some common offence, although, as has before been remarked with regard to falsehood, it is better to ascertain the truth by evidence, rather than by the forced confession of the suspected party; yet, sometimes, it may be necessary to question the child himself. This must be done with great caution, not with the vehemence and hurry so

commonly employed on such occasions; but with calmness and affection. We should forbid him to answer in haste, or without consideration; reminding him of the extreme importance and happy consequences of truth; of our tenderness towards him, and willingness to forgive, if he freely confess his fault, and shew himself upright and honourable in his conduct: for truth being the corner-stone of practical goodness, we must be ready, when necessary, to sacrifice to it less important points; and, for the sake of this leading object, to pass over many smaller offences.

I cannot close the subject before us without a warning against a severe, repulsive, disheartening, or satirical system, in the management of children. Nothing is so likely to produce in them, especially in those of timid dispositions, reserve, pusillanimity, and duplicity of

character. On the other hand, good discipline will greatly promote habits of integrity and openness. But it is to be remembered, that the best discipline is always combined with freedom, mildness, sympathy, and affection.

22

AUTHORITY AND OBEDIENCE.

ALL who are engaged in bringing up children must, necessarily, possess a certain share of authority or power over them. This power, being the chief instrument in education, it is to the injudicious use which is made of it, that many of the prevalent defects amongst children are to be ascribed.

On

the one hand, we may observe selfindulgence, insubordination and disobedience on the other, a broken and depressed spirit, one of the most serious, and least curable evils which ill-management, on the part of those who govern, can occasion. The former, arising from a weak, indecisive, and irregular exercise of authority; the latter, from coldness and severity.