ts surroundings and
its associations whether they are suitable to be stamped upon its
plastic mind. As it grows, she will aim to quicken and purify it
sentiment, and to cultivate a love of the beautiful in form, in color,
in sound, especially as these are exhibited in the works of Nature; will
endeavor to bring it into the fullest sympathy with all forms of animal
life, down to 'the meanest thing that feels.' It is a good sign when a
boy loves animals and is kind to them; but when he is bent on killing
things, it can be quite safely inferred that he has not received at home
lessons in love and had his sympathies and affections duly awakened.
Home-life in this country is not, as a general thing, such as to bring
the best affections into a healthy play. There is too much worry, too
much taking thought of the morrow, too much dissatisfaction with the
present condition, too much eagerness to get rich. Some fathers never
sufficiently dismiss their business and cares from their minds, to play
with their children and to show them those little attentions which their
young hearts crave; and mothers expend their souls in the cares and
vexations of housekeeping, or, if, by reason of their position and
wealth, they are free from these, in social or other matters which shut
them off, more or less, from those maternal functions which they should
consider it their highest duty to exercise. Filial affection certainly
does not increase in this country, as the years go on. Is it too much to
say, perhaps it is, that it is rather the exception than the rule, for
children, after, and often before, their majority, to show a strong
attachment either for their parents or for each other? And there is a
word in our language that has quite survived its usefulness; and if
things continue to go on as they are now going, it will soon be a fit
subject for an Archaic Dictionary--I mean the word REVERENCE. It still
maintains its place in our Dictionaries of living vocables, but the
thing it represents is a _rara avis in terris nigroque simillima cygno_.
Vain is the attempt to awaken the religious sentiment in a child, to
cause it to _feel_ the real significance of the words, as it utters
them, 'Our Father who art in heaven,' in whom the filial and the
reverential sentiments are quite extinguished. These sentiments are the
soil in which the religious sentiment can best germinate, grow, bud,
and fragrantly bloom.

During a child's earliest years the foun