There is a story told of a Chinese mandarin, who paid a visit to a friend at Paris, at the time when Paris was the seat of politeness. His well-bred host, on the first evening of his arrival, gave him a handsome supper, lodged him in the best bed-chamber, and when he wished him a good night, amongst other civil things, said he hoped the mandarin would, during his stay at Paris, consider that house as his own. Early the next morning, the polite Parisian was awakened by the sound of loud hammering in the mandarin’s bed-chamber; on entering the room, he found the mandarin and some masons hard at work, throwing down the walls of the house. “You rascals, are you mad?” exclaimed the Frenchman to the masons. “Not at all, my dear friend,” said the Chinese man, soberly, “I set the poor fellows to work; this room is too small for my taste; you see I have lost no time in availing myself of your goodness. Did not you desire me to use this house as if it were my own, during my stay at Paris?” “Assuredly, my dear friend, and so I hope you will,” replied the French gentleman, “the only misfortune here is, that I did not understand Chinese, and that I had no interpreter.” They found an interpreter, or a Chinese dictionary, and when the Parisian phrase was properly translated, the mandarin, who was an honest man, begged his polite host’s pardon for having pulled down the partition. It was rebuilt; the mandarin learned French, and the two friends continued upon the best terms with each other, during the remainder of the visit.
The Chesterfieldian system of endeavouring to please by dissimulation, is obviously distinguishable by any common capacity, from the usual forms of civility. There is no hope of educating young people to a love of integrity in any family, where this practice is adopted. If children observe that their parents deceive common acquaintance, by pretending to like the company, and to esteem the characters, of those whom they really think disagreeable and contemptible, how can they learn to respect truth? How can children believe in the praise of their parents, if they detect them in continual flattery towards indifferent people? It may be thought, by latitudinarians in politeness, that we are too rigid in expecting this strict adherence to truth from people who live in society; it may be said, that in Practical Education, no such Utopian ideas of perfection should be suggested. If we thought them Utopian, we certainly should not waste our time upon them; but we do not here speak theoretically of what may be done, we speak of what has been done. Without the affectation of using a more sanctified language than other people; without departing from the common forms of society; without any painful, awkward efforts, we believe that parents may, in all their conversation in private and in public, set their children the uniform example of truth and integrity.
We do not mean that the example of parents can alone produce this effect; a number of other circumstances must be combined. Servants must have no communication with children, if you wish to teach them the habit of speaking truth. The education, and custom, and situation of servants, are at present such, that it is morally impossible to depend upon their veracity in their intercourse with children. Servants think it good natured to try to excuse and conceal all the little faults of children; to give them secret indulgences, and even positively to deny facts, in order to save them from blame or punishment. Even when they are not fond of the children, their example must be dangerous, because servants do not scruple to falsify for their own advantage; if they break any thing, what a multitude of equivocations! If they neglect any thing, what a variety of excuses! What evasions in actions, or in words, do they continually invent!
It may be said, that as the Spartans taught their children to detest drunkenness, by showing them intoxicated Helots, we can make falsehood odious and contemptible to our pupils, by the daily example of its mean deformity. But if children, before they can perceive the general advantage of integrity, and before they can understand the utility of truth, see the partial immediate success of falsehood, how can they avoid believing in their own experience? If they see that servants escape blame, and screen themselves from punishment, by telling falsehoods, they not only learn that falsehood preserves from pain, but they feel obliged to those who practise it for their sakes; thus it is connected with the feelings of affection and of gratitude in their hearts, as well as with a sense of pleasure and safety. When servants have exacted promises from their protégés, those promises cannot be broken without treachery; thus deceit brings on deceit, and the ideas of truth and falsehood, become confused and contradictory. In the chapter upon servants, we have expatiated upon this subject, and have endeavoured to point out how all communication between children and servants may be most effectually prevented. To that chapter, without further repetition, we refer. And now that we have adjusted the preliminaries concerning parents and servants, we may proceed with confidence.
When young children first begin to speak, from not having a sufficient number of words to express their ideas, or from not having annexed precise ideas to the words which they are taught to use, they frequently make mistakes, which are attributed to the desire of deceiving. We should not precipitately suspect them of falsehood; it is some time before they perfectly understand what we mean by truth. Small deviations should not be marked with too much rigour; but whenever a child relates exactly any thing which he has seen, heard, or felt, we should listen with attention and pleasure, and we should not show the least doubt of his veracity. Rousseau is perfectly right in advising, that children should never be questioned in any circumstances upon which it can be their interest to deceive. We should, at least, treat children with the same degree of wise lenity, which the English law extends to all who have arrived at years of discretion. No criminal is bound to accuse himself. If any mischief has been committed, we should never, when we are uncertain by whom it has been done, either directly accuse, or betray injurious suspicions. We should neither say to the child, “I believe you have done this,” nor, “I believe you have not done this;” we should say nothing; the mischief is done, we cannot repair it: because a glass is broken, we need not spoil a child; we may put glasses out of his reach in future. If it should, however, happen, that a child voluntarily comes to us with a history of an accident, may no love of goods or chattels, of windows, of china, or even of looking-glasses, come in competition with our love of truth? An angry word, an angry look, may intimidate the child, who has summoned all his little courage to make this confession. It is not requisite that parents should pretend to be pleased and gratified with the destruction of their furniture, but they may, it is to be hoped, without dissimulation, show that they set more value upon the integrity of their children, than upon a looking-glass, and they will “keep their temper still, though china fall.”
H —— , one day when his father and mother were absent from home, broke a looking-glass. As soon as he heard the sound of the returning carriage, he ran and posted himself at the hall door. His father, the moment he got out of the carriage, beheld his erect figure, and pale, but intrepid countenance. “Father,” said the boy, “I have broke the best looking-glass in your house!” His father assured him, that he would rather all the looking-glasses in his house should be broken, than that one of his children should attempt to make an excuse. H —— was most agreeably relieved from his anxiety by the kindness of his father’s voice and manner, and still more so, perhaps, by perceiving that he rose in his esteem. When the glass was examined, it appeared that the boy had neglected to produce all the circumstances in his own favour. Before he had begun to play at ball, he had had the precaution to turn the back of the looking-glass towards him; his ball, however, accidentally struck against the wooden back, and broke the glass. H —— did not make out this favourable state of the case for himself at first; he told it simply after the business was settled, seeming much more interested about the fate of the glass, than eager to exculpate himself.
There is no great danger of teaching children to do mischief by this indulgence to their accidental misfortunes. When they break, or waste any thing, from pure carelesness, let them, even when they speak the truth about it, suffer the na
tural consequences of their carelesness; but at the same time praise their integrity, and let them distinctly feel the difference between the slight inconvenience to which they expose themselves by speaking the truth, and the great disgrace to which falsehood would subject them. The pleasure of being esteemed, and trusted, is early felt, and the consciousness of deserving confidence is delightful to children; but their young fortitude and courage should never be exposed to severe temptations. It is not sufficient to excite an admiration of truth by example, by eloquent praise, or by the just rewards of esteem and affection; we must take care to form the habits at the same time that we inspire the love of this virtue. Many children admire truth, and feel all the shame of telling falsehoods, who yet, either from habit or from fear, continue to tell lies. We must observe, that though the taste for praise is strong in childhood, yet it is not a match for any of the bodily appetites, when they are strongly excited. Those children, who are restrained as to the choice, or the quantity, of their food, usually think that eating is a matter of vast consequence, and they are strongly tempted to be dishonest to gratify their appetites. Children do not understand the prudential maxims concerning health, upon which these restraints are founded; and if they can, “by any indirection,” obtain things which gratify their palate, they will. On the contrary, young people who are regularly let to eat and drink as much as they please, can have no temptation from hunger and thirst, to deceive; if they partake of the usual family meals, and if there are no whimsical distinctions between wholesome and unwholesome dishes, or epicurean distinctions between rarities and plain food, the imagination and the pride of children will not be roused about eating. Their pride is piqued, if they perceive that they are prohibited from touching what grown up people are privileged to eat; their imagination is set to work by seeing any extraordinary difference made by judges of eating between one species of food and another. In families where a regularly good table is kept, children accustomed to the sight and taste of all kinds of food, are seldom delicate, capricious, or disposed to exceed; but in houses where entertainments are made from time to time with great bustle and anxiety, fine clothes, and company-manners, and company-faces, and all that politeness can do to give the appearance of festivity, deceive children at least, and make them imagine that there is some extraordinary joy in seeing a greater number of dishes than usual upon the table. Upon these occasions, indeed, the pleasure is to them substantial; they eat more, they eat a greater variety, and of things that please them better than usual; the pleasure of eating is associated with unusual cheerfulness, and thus the imagination, and the reality, conspire to make them epicures. To these children, the temptations to deceive about sweetmeats and dainties are beyond measure great, especially as ill-bred strangers commonly show their affection for them by pressing them to eat what they are not allowed to say “if you please” to. Rousseau thinks all children are gluttons. All children may be rendered gluttons; but few, who are properly treated with respect to food, and who have any literary tastes, can be in danger of continuing to be fond of eating. We therefore, without hesitation, recommend it to parents never to hazard the truth and honour of their pupils by prohibitions, which seldom produce any of the effects that are expected.
Children are sometimes injudiciously restrained with regard to exercise; they are required to promise to keep within certain boundaries when they are sent out to play; these promises are often broken with impunity, and thus the children learn habits of successful deceit. Instead of circumscribing their play grounds, as they are sometimes called, by narrow inconvenient limits, we should allow them as much space as we can with convenience, and at all events exact no promises. We should absolutely make it impossible for them to go without detection into any place which we forbid. It requires some patience and activity in preceptors to take all the necessary precautions in issuing orders, but these precautions will be more useful in preserving the integrity of their pupils, than the most severe punishments that can be devised. We are not so unreasonable as to expect, with some theoretic writers on education, that tutors and parents should sacrifice the whole of their time to the convenience, amusement, and education of their pupils. This would be putting one set of beings “sadly over the head of another:” but if parents would, as much as possible, mix their occupations and recreations with those of their children, besides many other advantages which have been elsewhere pointed out with respect to the improvement of the understanding, they would secure them from many temptations to falsehood. They should be encouraged to talk freely of all their amusements to their parents, and to ask them for whatever they want to complete their little inventions. Instead of banishing all the freedom of wit and humour, by the austerity of his presence, a preceptor, with superior talents, and all the resources of property in his favour, might easily become the arbiter deliciarum of his pupils.
When young people begin to taste the pleasures of praise, and to feel the strong excitations of emulation and ambition, their integrity is exposed to a new species of temptation. They are tempted, not only by the hope of obtaining “well-earned praise,” but by the desire to obtain praise without the labour of earning it. In large schools, where boys assist each other in their literary exercises, and in all private families where masters are allowed to show off the accomplishments of young gentlemen and ladies, there are so many temptations to fraudulent exhibitions, that we despair of guarding against their consequences. The best possible method is to inspire children with a generous contempt for flattery, and to teach them to judge impartially of their own merits. If we are exact in the measure of approbation which we bestow, they will hence form a scale by which they can estimate the sincerity of other people. It is said that the preceptor of the duke of Burgundy succeeded so well in inspiring him with disdain for unmerited praise, that when the duke was only nine years old, he one day called his tutor to account for having concealed some of his childish faults; and when this promising boy, and singular prince, was asked “why he disliked one of his courtiers,” he answered, “Because he flatters me.” Anecdotes like these will make a useful impression upon children. The life of Cyrus, in the Cyropædia; several passages in Plutarch’s Lives; and the lively, interesting picture which Sully draws of his noble-hearted master’s love of truth, will strongly command the admiration of young people, if they read them at a proper time of life. We must, however, wait for this proper time; for if these things are read too early, they lose all their effect. Without any lectures upon the beauty of truth, we may, now and then in conversation, when occurrences in real life naturally lead to the subject, express with energy our esteem for integrity. The approbation which we bestow upon those who give proofs of integrity, should be quite in a different tone, in a much higher style of praise, than any commendations for trifling accomplishments; hence children will become more ambitious to obtain a reputation for truth, than for any other less honourable and less honoured qualification.
We will venture to give two or three slight instances of the unaffected truth and simplicity of mind, which we have seen in children educated upon these principles. No good-natured reader will suspect, that they are produced from ostentation: whenever the children, who are mentioned, see this in print, it is ten to one that they will not be surprised at their own good deeds. They will be a little surprised, probably, that it should have been thought worth while to record things, which are only what they see and feel every day. It is this character of every-day goodness which we wish to represent; not any fine thoughts, fine sentiments, or fine actions, which come out for holyday admiration. We wish that parents, in reading any of these little anecdotes, may never exclaim, “Oh that’s charming, that’s surprising for a child!” but we wish that they may sometimes smile, and say “That’s very natural; I am sure that is perfectly true; my little boy, or my little girl, say and do just such things continually.”
March, 1792. We were at Clifton; the river Avon ran close under the windows of our house in Prince’s Place, and the children used to b
e much amused with looking at the vessels which came up the river. One night a ship, that was sailing by the windows, fired some of her guns; the children, who were looking out of the windows, were asked “why the light was seen when the guns were fired, before the noise was heard?” C —— , who at this time was nine years old, answered, “Because light comes quicker to the eye, than sound to the ear.” Her father was extremely pleased with this answer; but just as he was going to kiss her, the little girl said, “Father, the reason of my knowing it, was, that L —— (her elder brother) just before had told it to me.”
Complete Novels of Maria Edgeworth Page 706
