Page:Home Education by Isaac Taylor (1838).djvu/155

 the same results as are obtained at school, but must seek equivalents; and we may often command what is of higher value.

Difficulties such as these scarcely attach to female education; for a mother, possessed of the qualities fitting her superintend that of her daughters, is rarely at a loss in communicating to them such principles as will make it safe to leave them in the enjoyment of as much personal liberty as a daughter at home can wish for.

But a father finds it otherwise with his sons, after they reach their teens; for, the vastly high erenergyenergy [sic], animal and mental, of the male temperament, and for which adequate employment is not always available, must be disciplined, not broken down, by bringing the moral sense into fuller operation. A home-bred youth, not cowed or pinned to the sleeve, needs to be inspired with far more sentiment than would be necessary for him at school. And if these ends can actually be secured, that is to say, if youthful vigour and animation can be preserved unimpaired, along with enough feeling and principle to guarantee mild and discreet conduct, we then gain a real advantage.

Our purpose, in this respect, will be much facilitated, if the tastes of a youth are such as impel him to enter, with eagerness, into literary or scientific pursuits, as his father's companion and assistant. The genuine zest of intellectual labour being generated and kept in activity, this bond of fellowship between a father and a son, on the ground of philosophy or learning, may easily be made to extend its influence on all sides, and thus enable the former the more readily to govern the spirit of the latter. The bare force of paternal authority does not suffice for this end; for if it ensure specious obedience only, little good is done;― if actual obedience then there is a probability that the vivacity of the mind has been too much broken down by the