ng mind they will eventually distort the emotions, deform the
conceptions, and wholly demoralize the health and life activities of
the growing child. Within the limitations of the possibilities of
hereditary endowment, and in view of this wonderful imitative nature,
we are able to make of a child almost anything we desire; not "an
angel," in the ordinary acceptation of the term, but a child who knows
his place and possesses the power of normal self-control.

EARLY FEARS

From two to six years of age, when the imagination is most plastic and
vivid, when the child's imitative instinct is so unconsciously
automatic, is the most effective and opportune time to initiate good
habits and lay the foundations for the later development of a strong
and noble character. "Baby's skies are Mamma's eyes" is just as true
as it is poetical. While a tired and worn-out mother, exhausted by a
multitude of harrassing household cares, may be pardoned for her
occasional irritability, nevertheless the little one unconsciously
partakes of her spirit. When the mother is happy the child is happy.
When Mother is sick and nervous the child is impatient and irritable.

It is unfortunate that this very time of a child's life, when we can
do practically anything we choose with him, is the very time when so
many parents fill the child's mind with the unhealthful fear-thoughts.
"The bogie man'll get you if you don't mind Mamma," or, "I'll get the
black man to cut your ears off," or, "the chimney sweep is around the
corner to take bad little boys," are familiar threats which are so
frequently made to the little folks. These efforts to terrorize the
young child into obedience never fail to distort the mind, warp the
affections, and, more or less permanently, derange the entire nervous
system. The arousal of fear-thoughts and fearful emotions in the mind
of the growing child is very often such a psychologic and a
physiologic shock to the child that the results are sometimes not
wholly eradicated in an entire lifetime.

Just see how far we carry this unwholesome introduction of
fear-thoughts--even to the Almighty. Thousands of us remember being
told as a child that "God don't like naughty boys," or, "God will send
the bad man to get you if you don't be good." Thus, early in life, an
unwholesome fear of the Supreme Being is sown in the mind of the
child, and, as time passes, these false fears grow and come so to
possess the mind and control the emotion