worse faults and failings--all, however, faults which
may very possibly, in part or in whole, be the result of the immature and
undeveloped condition of her mental or bodily powers--falls sick and dies,
and you follow her as she is borne away, and with a bursting heart see her
laid in her little grave, it will be a great comfort to you then to reflect
that you did all in your power, by means of the gentlest measures at your
command, to train her to truth and duty, that you never lost patience with
her, and that she never felt from your hand any thing but gentle assistance
or a loving caress.

And your boy--now so ardent and impulsive, and often, perhaps, noisy,
troublesome, and rude, from the exuberant action of his growing
powers--when these powers shall have received their full development, and
he has passed from your control to his place in the world as a man, and he
comes back from time to time to the maternal home in grateful remembrance
of his obligations to his mother, bringing with him tokens of his affection
and love, you will think with pain of the occasions when you subjected him
to the torture of the rod under the impulse of irritation or anger, or to
accomplish the ends of discipline which might have been attained in other
ways. Time, as you then look back over the long interval of years which
have elapsed, will greatly soften the recollection of the fault, but it
will greatly aggravate that of the pain which was made the retribution of
it. You will say to yourself, it is true, I did it for the best. If I had
not done it, my son would perhaps not be what he is. He, if he remembers
the transaction, will doubtless say so too; but there will be none the less
for both a certain sting in the recollection, and you will wish that the
same end could have been accomplished by gentler means.

The substance of it is that children must, at all events, be governed. The
proper authority over them _must be_ maintained; but it is a great deal
better to secure this end by gentle measures, if the parent have or can
acquire the skill to employ them.

CHAPTER XXII.

GRATITUDE IN CHILDREN.

Mothers are very often pained at what seems to them the ingratitude of
their children. They long, above all things, for their love. They do every
thing in their power--I mean, of course, that some mothers do--to win it.
They make every sacrifice, and give every possible evidence of affection;
but they seem to fail entirely of bri