Page:The Mothers of England.djvu/50

Rh her child, gazing, for the first time in the experience of the latter, upon the phenomena of a thunder-storm. The child feels no alarm as the brilliant flashes of lightning follow each other in quick succession, because it is accustomed to think that safety dwells beside its mother. It therefore watches them with astonishment and delight; and during the intervals, the mother teaches it, that the vivid and sudden light which illuminates both heaven and earth at the same instant, is called a flash of lightning.

Now compare this method of instruction with that which is most frequently adopted; and imagine a little child poring over a spelling-book, spreading its rosy hand upon the page, and with contracted brow, and anxious eye, alternately attempting to spell a disconnected mass of words off the book, and then peeping again at the unintelligible and elaborate meaning given to each word, as if to render it less comprehensible than when it stood alone. Perhaps the word is flash, the meaning of which is painfully hammered out, or probably explained by the teacher, where the child is too young to "learn meanings." But what impression is such explanation likely to make in this instance, when the poor little sufferer, with its strained attention, has next to be questioned in flat, flask, and some dozen other words, each as different from the last in meaning and association as it is possible to be.

It is as little likely that the child in the latter instance should remember the signification and use of the word flash, as it is that it should forget it in the former, while associated with that wonderful evening, when it stood protected by its mother's arms, and looked out upon the world all darkness and gloom at one moment, all brilliance and light the next. I say nothing here of the more expansive and complex idea of a thunder-storm being introduced to the mind of the child, because I have supposed it too young for such an extent of intelligence; but the same principle, I am persuaded, would hold good throughout, and save a world of trouble to those who should afterward undertake the education of children prepared in this manner for being sent to school. Indeed, it is impossible to say to what important, or what trifling matters, all coming under the cognizance of the mother, this principle may not