FAMILY ARRANGEMENTS FOR THE WINTER. 169 pure or bad motives, the occasion was one on which to found instruction of the highest importance to the child. Remove as But the grand remedy for such active children is prevention. far as possible from them, temptations to commit such misdeeds. fill their hands with employment, which has at least the semblance of utility. Do not value considerable expense in the purchase of tools: and then be sure that you place them in a situation to be used without injury to any one; but do not punish them severely with the rod, for perhaps trying to emulate an older brother or sister, in things useful. Children are imitative beings; they see every body around them busy; "they would be busy too." In my endeavours to impress upon mothers the importance of regarding adventitious circumstances in the discipline of the nursery, I trust that no one will infer that in my estimation the rod can always be dispensed with. By no means. In cases of repeated, positive and wilful acts of disobedience to a parent's authority, or commands, I would sometimes recommend the rod. In some cases I have no doubt that the rod will prove effectual, when every other remedy fails. In a variety of cases, it is an easy, safe, and sure method of punishment, but not always the safest and best. In the preceding remarks, I trust that I have briefly, but plainly, exhibited some of the great principles upon which mothers in the discipline of the nursery should act. These are, that mothers should seek to prevent error and crime, rather than trust to punishment after the fault is committed; that before correction, they should ascertain all the circumstances of each case of misconduct, and that they should duly weigh and appreciate the child's motive, rather than, as in the case above alluded to, the intrinsic or reputed value of the waxplant. For the Mother's Magazine. FAMILY ARRANGEMENTS FOR THE WINTER. It is a natural reflection, for those who have seen both bad and good family systems, on witnessing the approach of long and inclement winter evenings; "How many parents will neglect this season to make those arrangements and preparations which might secure the intellectual, moral and religious instruction and improvement of their children! How many dangerous plans are now laying for passing the hours of the autumn and winter before us; how many false pleasures are anticipated; how many unfounded hopes, encouraged by parents, are to end in disappointment; how many arrangements are making, involving the expense of thought, time, or money, which will encroach upon the real interests, and perhaps ruin the solid enjoyments of the family circle, and leave them less happy, less wise, less harmonious, and less prepared for future life, than they now are." We may form any ideas we please about the happiness of other conditions in life but there is, nowhere, such a variety of wonderful influences concentrated, tending to good, as in the family state. There is the school in which 170 FAMILY ARRANGEMENTS FOR THE WINTER. God seems to have ordained that our children shall receive the ground-works of education, both in the affections, habits, and mind. What we get by the fireside, and at the family board, we remember, and what is more, we practice with greater ease, and generally with greater effect, than any thing else. A man might as well forget his native language, or speak a foreign tongue with greater readiness, as to free himself from the impressions of childhood. What is inculcated in the family, whether good or bad, no school can entirely unteach. How important then that parents should adopt and immediately practice upon these two principles: 1st. Home must be the chief seat of enjoyment. 2nd. Home is the best place for education. To these two points I would wish to invite the attention of mothers and fathers, in all circumstances in life. The few remarks I shall have room to make, I design to apply to families of citizens, farmers, mechanics, and labourers. Whether the circumstances be exalted or depressed by wealth or poverty, honour or obscurity; whether health or sickness be their visiter; whether they are in a crowded town or a remote retreat-if there be but a family and a home, the means to be suggested may be at least to some extent applied, and the objects desired in a considerable degree obtained, by timely care and faithful attention. PLAN FOR THE SEASON. 1st. Let the parent determine now, as far as circumstances will permit, on a general system to be pursued every day. I would recommend that this be written down, and followed with such alterations as may be found best. 2nd. Consider what evils will need to be guarded against, and what benefits and advantages to be secured. If records be made, on the beginning of November, of the results of the good mother's reflections and determinations on these subjects, they need not be exhibited, nor preserved for any particular length of time, (though the latter might be recommended,) but the main points will be better remembered, and prove more useful in practice and in review in the spring. The following specimens may perhaps serve some of your readers as a guide, and suggest things more applicable to themselves. Some plan is necessary. The precise time is left for each family to fix for itself. PLAN FOR THE DAY. 1. Rise early, at o'clock. Private devotions. 2. O'clock. Family prayers, with reading the Scriptures and singing. Breakfast. (For remarks on meals see beyond.) 3. 4. or otherwise. 5. 66 Domestic duties by the mother and daughters, either in turns Arrangements for staying at home alone, for receiving or making visits, walks, or rides. FAMILY ARRANGEMENTS FOR THE WINTER. O'clock. Arrangements for the evening abroad. "Evening family devotions-singing and prayer. 171 (See below for remarks on the plan for a day. The numbers refer to the divisions above noted.) EVILS TO BE AVOIDED. 1st. Domestic disputes and discord. 2nd. Frivolous and ill-natured conversation at meals. 3rd. Talking of dress and food. 4th. Roving thoughts and conversation. 5th. The habit of living for the hour, or the day. 6th. Mortification or pride, from looks, manners, dwelling, connexions, &c. 7th. Late retiring and late rising. 8th. Too much company. 9th. Too little society. 10th. Monotony of fireside instructions or enjoyments. 11th. Admitting evil influences from the neighbourhood. 12th. Excluding good, ditto. 13th. Sacrificing the family interests to business. May there be few families who will have to guard against so long a file of enemies as I have here named! The list has been made so large, rather to convey an idea of what classes of evils the good parent should be guarded against. REMARKS ON THE PLAN FOR A DAY. 1. Early rising is a duty of a high order. Every young child, properly treated, prefers it from instinct, and cannot without difficulty be trained to be late. It affords a wholesome kind of self-denial, followed by immediate, as well as perceptible benefits. As the mother does, so will the family generally do. Landscapes, animals, the human frame and spirits, all invite us to rise early. A busy father may easily instruct his children half an hour or more a day, by rising early. We get by it the finest sight of creation, the best appetite for our breakfast, the most cheerful frame of mind, as well as the most favourable period for devotion. 2. Vocal music should be a part of the daily employment of every body. Brothers and sisters, accustomed to harmonize in voice, will seldom be discordant in words or feelings. The exercise trains to ideas of order, and associates sweet sounds and pure feelings with the recollection of family scenes, the examples and counsels of parents, and prepares every one for ten thousand good thoughts and influences in subsequent life. It is, besides, a part of private as well as public worship, established by God, and every parent should have David's example before her, as well at home as at church. 3. Meals. The dangerous topics of conversation mentioned under the second and third heads among the evils to be avoided, should be outlawed at the family table. Let the good parent but declare, in her own heart, irreconcileable war against them, and use as much influence as she can to keep them away, and she will take one of the principal steps necessary to secure 172 FAMILY ARRANGEMENTS FOR THE WINTER. the happiness and improvement of her children, indeed of the whole family circle for the winter. Whoever attempts the task, for the first time, will be astonished at the wily nature of these enemies: under so many forms will food, dress, ill-nature and frivolity present themselves, and try, often under disguises, to occupy the thoughts and feelings. The parent should always be provided with subjects of conversation to meet any such case. Something worth knowing may be picked up every day, and brought out with the parental smile soon after the blessing has been pronounced, and when all will be best prepared to follow the lead that may be given. Let one or more subjects, thus secretly chosen, be noted down, even in single words; and what a pleasing review would the list present to the parent, at the close of the season! Let it be a particular object to learn something favourable to the character of neighbours or friends to relate and comment upon, standing ready to chide every unfounded, disparaging remark which ill-nature or bad habit (a great thing in these matters) may incline any one to make. How effectual a cure might a parent thus easily put to the evils, mentioned under the first, second, eleventh, twelfth, and perhaps other heads of those to be avoided! If both parents would combine to act in this manner, how changed would soon become many a family circle at breakfast, dinner and supper, and indeed from morning till night! 4. Domestic duties.-The exercise of sweeping is one of the most healthful which could be selected for a female; and the active movements and exertions required in various other duties which they too often leave to servants, or regard as drudgery, might have saved from untimely graves many a young woman who has been taught to despise useful labour-more honourable than fashionable idleness, and far less dangerous to the health than injudicious dress and late hours. And let the mother, on these and other subjects, make herself more independent of fashions, and prevailing opinions, than I have time to describe. She will be answerable for it, if her daughters lose health, or shorten life, by compressing their frames for appearance; if they derive from her example or training, the false, the injurious, the degrading, the often fatal idea, that manual labour is disgraceful, unbecoming, or unnecessary to health and cheerfulness, as well as to real respectability, in every son and daughter of Adam. Children should not be promised any mere frivolous gratification, as a reward for a domestic or other duty. This places both in a wrong, false light. The duty, if performed well and with a proper spirit, is the source of greater enjoyment, at least in its effects; and many of those things which are desired, are not preferred by the child for any thing in them, but only for the value placed on them by their elders. Happy is that family where each child finds some kind of active exercise to perform, with the return of every day, in useful business of some kind or other. Far happier pass the hours in the house of the farmer and mechanic, and even the day-labourer, if the children are thus provided for within doors or without, than in the most splendid families in our country, whose young inhabitants learn by daily experience what the good judgment of others often FAMILY ARRANGEMENTS FOR THE WINTER. 173 conjectures, namely, that want of occupation for the body, the mind and the feelings, with a sense of usefulness, are necessary to our enjoyment, from the very constitution of our nature. 5. All arrangements should be made with calmness, and for some reason. able object, of sufficient importance and value to be frankly avowed. A child should never see an elder excited at the prospect of visiting or receiving a friend, appearing in the street or at a public place, or doing any thing away from home. The interest shown in such things should be seen to arise, at least in a great measure, from the love of home, and the desire of making it the centre of happiness and intelligence. The child should be taught and trained to look upon the external world as a field from which every member of the family is bound to bring in a portion of food, and to which he is to desire to communicate some benefit as far as he can, but he have no reason to believe that after all there are enjoyments to be found in it, which the parent prefers, or even puts on an equality with those afforded by the fireside. 6, 7. I have room only to refer the reader from these heads to what has been said under the third and fourth. 8. Amusement and instruction should always be abundantly provided for an evening at home. The means will vary with the ages of the children, and the various circumstances around them. Even a mother in the most retired, humble and destitute condition, has means at her command, so long as she possesses any portion of that cheerfulness which arises from submission to God and trust in him. If her last stick is on the fire, it may give light enough to show a countenance that her little ones will love, and to let them interchange looks of affection, and deeds of brotherly and sisterly kindness. She can repeat some affecting or holy narrative while she mends the tattered garment; encourage their prattle or their remarks on the scanty knowledge they may have collected; do something to keep alive the sparks of intellect and the glow of affection around her; and in a simple hymn carry her little flock, as it were on a mother's wings, to Heaven. Such scenes may be thought extreme: but they have existed, and I doubt not do exist, and their effects are sometimes such as the great and honourable and luxurious mother might desire. "Ah," exclaimed a warm-hearted man, who had been nursed by a poor but affectionate parent, as he looked upon an infant, “Ah, take your pleasure now, for I never have been half so contented since I left my mother!" Parents must love their children's real interests, and consult them, or they never will be loved, or successful in training them. While even the poorest have some means of intellectual domestic instruction within their reach, while there are Bibles, Tracts, Sunday School Libraries, &c., how many, how various, how abundant means are at the command of those who are in more comfortable circumstances! We have books appro. priate to different ages, from the English Penny Magazine, Peter Parley's Magazine, Geography, &c., &c., with others of a more religious tendency, up to the best classical writers of different countries, at prices greatly reduced within a few years. What a fund of knowledge, literature and science, may be obtained for thirty dollars, in the seventy odd volumes of Harper's Family Library, how many moral benefits from Jane Taylor's works, Mrs. Sherwood's |