Page:The lady or the tiger and other stories, Stockton (Scribner's 1897 ed).djvu/181

Rh in the training of a parent by the child that the matter should be taken in hand as early as possible. He or she who begins to feel, in the first years of parental life, the restrictions of filial control, will be much less difficult to manage as time goes on, than one who has not been made aware, until he has been a parent for perhaps ten or twelve years, that he is expected to shape his conduct in accordance with the wishes of his offspring. In such cases, habits Of self-consideration, and even those of obtrusive self-assertion, are easily acquired by the parent, and are very difficult to break up. The child then encounters obstacles and discouragements which would not have existed had the discipline been begun when the mind of a parent was in a pliant and mouldable condition. Instances have occurred, when, on account of the intractable nature of father or mother, the education intended by the child has been entirely abandoned, and the parents allowed to take matters into their own hands, and govern the family as it used to be done before the new system came into vogue, But it will nearly always be found to be the case, in such instances, that the ideas of the parent concerning his rights and prerogatives in the family have been allowed to grow and take root to an extent entirely incompatible with easy removal.

The neglect of early opportunities of assuming control by the child who first enables a married couple to call themselves parents, is not only often detrimental to its own chances of holding the domestic reins, but it also trammels, to a great extent, the action of succeeding children. But no youngster, no matter how