On the Upbringing of Children

Bishop Irenaius of Ekaterinburg & Sibirsk, 1901

Published by St. Xenia Skete (Wildwood, California) in 1991.
audio CD available from St. Paisius Monastery (Safford, Arizona).

Preface

Never in the history of mankind has there been such a plethora of advice available to parents on how to raise their children. There are books about how to maximize your child’s intelligence, talents, creativity; how to speed and enhance his learning; how to integrate and improve his motor skills, his self-esteem; how to get him to use both sides of his brain; and how to make sure he’s “well-adjusted”—in other words, how to produce a “super-baby.” But the shortest review of this material reveals that, from an Orthodox Christian’s perspective, most of it is woefully limited and one-sided. Most often, the books available focus entirely on the child’s adjustment to this world and blithely ignore his moral and spiritual development. There is precious little available to help parents prepare the child to become a citizen of heaven. But what other goal of child-raising can even take a close second to this paramount objective?

It was not that long ago that pious parents raised their children to become Saints, to serve God in this world and the next. Perhaps only two generations ago, parents were still raising Saints in Orthodox countries. But the success of anti-Christianity in our time has been so complete that concern for one’s own salvation is considered, at best, a harmless eccentricity, while concern for one’s children’s salvation is sometimes even considered dangerous by forward-looking educators. It is time for us to ask: Are we the last Christians? “When the Son of Man returns, will He find faith upon the earth?” (Luke 18:8) God forbid that we should be called upon to answer for children whom we have prepared to go to college, but not to confess their faith in a hostile environment.

To parents struggling in this cold modern climate, we offer a small book of timeless guidance on how to teach virtues to children. The homilies in this book were originally published in Russia in 1901. The times have changed considerably since then, but human nature has not. We still have the age-old struggle with the passions, the world, and the fallen spirits. We must still strive to train our own and our children’s souls to the high ideal of holiness given us by Christ. May God grant that this book may assist parents in their difficult and delicate task of raising children fit for His Kingdom.

St. Xenia Skete

October 13/26, 1991

Chapter One

When Should Training Begin?

A hermit distinguished for his holy life and his understanding of the human soul once gave a command to his disciples: “Uproot this tree from the ground.” He pointed to a sapling which, in spite of its youth, had already grown deep roots.

In obedience to the Elder the disciple undertook the task, but despite all his efforts he couldn’t move it at all. “Father,” he said to the abba, “What you have told me to do is completely impossible!”

Then the Elder showed him another one, a young seedling, which the disciple immediately uprooted without any particular effort. The disciple could do nothing with the tree that had grown deep roots, but he could easily pull up the seedling.

If we correlate this story with the upbringing of children, we see that parents are powerless with older children if they did not take the trouble to train them in their tender years, As the proverb says, “What the child learns, the adult does not abandon.” Likewise, the wise Sirach teaches us: “Do you have children? Instruct them, and make them obedient from their youth” (Wisdom of Sirach 7:23).

Very few parents can boast of giving their children a truly good upbringing. Many parents, even preeminently pious ones, have children who unexpectedly display bad characters. One of the basic reasons for this phenomenon must be sought in the parents themselves. Many parents are indifferent to the moral and religious training of their children, or are so blinded by excessive and irrational love for them that they do not want to see anything bad. They are deaf to the observations of well-meaning people and refuse to listen to their good counsel. Only when the defects of their children become unbearable for the parents themselves do they begin to think about correcting their sons or daughters; only then do they resort to training them. But by then it is too late. That is why I think it indispensable to explain to you why the training of children must begin in their infancy.

All of you know how quickly a seed sprouts in the earth. It immediately begins to display some characteristics of the fruit that will consummate its growth. Warmth and moisture quicken the tender sprout within the earth, and little by little it appears on the surface of the soil.

This is what happens with a small child. He comes into the world as a seed, and grows continuously. We know that never does human nature develop so quickly and in so many ways as in these first years of childhood. The bodily development advances quickly and steadily, and the spiritual even more so. The child begins to speak, forms his first concrete ideas, learns to think, to reflect. His will grows stronger and gradually begins to work independently. His mind is enriched by his surroundings, and from these he apprehends the idea of God. He begins to ponder the purpose of life and learns to distinguish good from evil. His conscience awakens, love and hatred begin to work within him, the feelings of honor and shame appear.

In order for all these forces, which elevate a man to the image of God, to develop in the infant as they should, the parents must attentively follow their child’s moral development. Since training has a two-fold purpose—to uproot the evil and to plant the good—parents must begin training their children from the age of infancy.

Many, many parents err on this point! They seem not to know that they both can and must begin training their children in their infancy. Many parents, especially younger ones, for a long time regard a small child as a plaything or doll. They feed it, put it to bed, fondle it, play with it, talk baby talk, protect it in every possible way from chills, etc. But for the rest they let it run, play, and in general do whatever it likes, just as long as it doesn’t disturb them by crying. For a long time they will not see that their adored “angel” is in reality an uncontrollable, disobedient, greedy child. Finally their eyes are opened and they decide to concern themselves with training their spoiled child. But now it is too late—the sapling has grown too big!

Other parents err no less by adopting those incorrect ideas about child-rearing which prevail in certain social strata. When rooted in parents’ minds, these ideas are very hard to erase, because, for one thing, they serve to justify and excuse their children’s faults and bad habits, and, for another, to cover up their own indifference and neglect over their upbringing. “But they are only children,” say these parents. “We can’t take their faults so seriously!” With such and similar pretenses they continually excuse their children’s misbehavior.

True, they are children. But such children! What will become of them? And do they have the right to do evil just because they are children? Is it reasonable to be unconcerned about a sin just because it was committed by a small child? When a conflagration starts in a house, one does not say, “Oh, what a beautiful fire,” but as soon as one sees it, one calls for help with all one’s strength. When the fire of the passions begins to flare up in our children, threatening them with temporal and eternal disaster, how can we watch it with such equanimity?

“Knowledge will come with the years,” say some parents. “The child will begin to think, and will understand what is good and what is bad.” This is a disastrous delusion! Such reasoning is a two-edged sword: one can turn towards the good or the evil. By itself, the knowledge of the good brings no benefit, One must also desire the good and be accustomed to doing it. A man must be guided and trained to this from the first years of childhood, so that later, when he understands the good with his reason, he will exert his will and do it.

Knowledge can be a dangerous gift, if proper training is not begun in childhood. Oh, do not think, parents, that a man is naturally good and honorable! A powerful mind will not benefit a man who did not receive good training at the proper age. The Word of God bears witness that, since the Fall, “the imagination of man’s hear is evil from his youth” (Gen. 8:21).

Justifying the sins of children and youths, and also their own carelessness in training them, many negligent parents protest and say, “But we can’t demand or expect virtue from a child!” But why can we not? Was not He Who gave us a prototype of how to live—our Lord Jesus Christ—a child and youth? Does not the Gospel inform us that “the child grew...and increased in wisdom and stature, and in favor with God and man” (Luke 2:40, 52)?

We see in the lives of many saints that from childhood they cultivated the virtues of godliness, obedience, and simplicity. If the Saviour says of children, “Let the little children come unto Me” (Mark 10:14), and further, “Woe to him who offends one of these little ones” (Matt. 18:6), can we draw the conclusion that children are incapable of achieving virtue? The Saviour said these things because virtue in childhood is selfless and pure, and He desires to find it in every heart.

Therefore, I say to you: woe to parents who are indifferent and do not cultivate good habits and the inclination towards good in the souls of their children from their infancy. They will have to answer for this to God. There will be no mercy for such parents, if they are not vigilant over their children’s upbringing.

Training from infancy is possible—it is even indispensable. Therefore, parents, do not fail to observe any appearance of evil, even in the smallest child, for defects which are unconscious at first will become conscious later. They are the grievous remnant of original sin.

For example, if an infant discovers—as he quickly will—that he can get whatever he wants by crying, he will cry until his desire is gratified, and the more often this is repeated, the more stubborn and capricious he will become. The same happens with other human weaknesses; with the passing of years, "they are manifested in their full extent. For example, it is said of Dometian, one of the cruelest persecutors of Christians, that when he was a boy he liked to torture and kill various animals. The future torturer already existed in the small boy. That is why it is necessary to begin training in infancy.

Observe consistently the inclinations of your child and, with proper training, uproot whatever you see that is unfitting, as a gardener in the proper season prunes a tree of its barren shoots. The heart of a child can be likened to a garden, and the parents are God’s gardeners, who from its infancy must cleanse the garden—the child’s heart—of the weeds and tares of sins and sinful habits. If they delay, however, and evil becomes well rooted, if the child’s heart becomes overgrown with sins, then they will not be able to pull the tares out.

St. John Chrysostom writes: “Do you complain that your son is unmanageable? You could easily have corrected him while he was yet a child; you could have accustomed him to order, to study, to consistency in his duties; you could have treated the weaknesses of his soul. When the ground of his heart was still suitable for cultivation, you should have uprooted the thorns, before they were firmly rooted. Because of your negligence, your child’s passions will now be very difficult to overcome.”

To train a child, however, is not only to uproot evil, but also to accustom him to good from a young age. Which virtues must we especially cultivate in the soul of a child? That subject will occupy us in the following chapters.

The Holy Scriptures make clear to us the basic reason why we must accustom children to good from their infancy. Sirach the Wise writes: “If a youth chooses his path, he will not depart from it when old.” That is to say, if a man even from his youth chooses the good path, if from his young years he loves the good, then even when he grows old he will not change. There is even a folk saying that teaches us this: “As in the cradle, so in the grave.”

Parents, remember the words of Sirach the Wise: “Do you have children? Instruct them, and make them obedient from their youth” (Wisdom of Sirach, 7:23); and the wise saying: “What the child learns, the adult does not abandon.”

Chapter Two

Laying the Foundations

In the preceding homily we explained that the Christian training of children must begin in their infancy, since a man’s first five or six years are the most important and decisive ones in his life. We also indicated in what training should generally consist—parents must uproot everything evil from the souls of their children and guide them towards everything good. In this homily and the ones after we will examine in more detail which faults you must especially uproot and which good principles you must breathe into your children.

According to the words of Solomon the Wise, “The beginning, of wisdom is the fear of the Lord” (Prov. 1:7). On this basis, the first virtue parents must cultivate in their children’s souls as early as possible is, I think, the fear of God—that is to say, faith in and devotion to Him.

But why, you might ask, must we parents, and especially we mothers, teach our children faith and piety from their infancy? Because only if a child is taught to be godly and embrace the life of the Church from a young age can we have some faith that in his mature years, when temptations will surround him from all sides and savage passions will besiege him, he will remain a devout Christian, holding to the Christian principles taught him by his mother.

The simple religious admonitions which a Christian mother feeds into her child together with her milk usually remain with it for all its life. Even if the child is later conquered by sinful passions or deceived by evil examples and steps onto a bad road, he will still more easily repent and more quickly return to the path of good than one who was not taught Christian principles in his childhood. Even if he forsakes the path to salvation, the memory of his innocent and happy childhood years will at times awaken within him. He will remember the simple prayers he learned from the lips of his mother—who perhaps has long been resting in the grave—and the admonitions she gave him when he sat on her knees. Even though, living a life of sin, he has forgotten to pray, some night when going to sleep he will involuntarily remember that his mother taught him to make the sign of the Cross before sleep and that she “crossed” both him and herself.

The sweet memories of innocent childhood have awakened many from the lethargy of sin and brought them again close to God. Understand therefore, what a great blessing it is for children to have devout mothers! In their most tender years they teach them to have faith in God and piety. The child should learn about God from his mother—not from his nurse or teacher. In the home chapel, not the schoolyard, the child should offer up his first morning prayers to God, for his mother is the one who should teach him to pray. Thus it always is in truly pious and God-fearing families.

St. John Chrysostom writes: “As soon as children begin to comprehend, the parents should teach them the Symbol of Faith, how to pray and chant, and the order of the Divine Services.” The same Hierarch gives the following advice to mothers; “Mothers, teach your young children to cross themselves. If they cannot make the sign of the Cross by themselves, sign them yourselves with your own hands.” He also writes to a certain widowed mother named Leto: “It should be a very pleasant thing for a Christian mother to teach her small child to utter the most sweet name of Jesus while his voice is yet weak and his tongue stammering,”

This tells us, I think, that parents, especially mothers, who bear the greatest responsibility for training their children in the first years of their lives, must from their infancy cultivate religious feeling in their souls, which will later bear fruits of faith and piety.

How can we do this? How can we breathe religious feeling into our children?

Parents can achieve this by teaching the basic truths of our holy faith to their children while they are yet very young. Don’t be frightened! Every mother can do it; it is very simple.

With simple, heartfelt words, let her speak as often as possible to her young children about. their compassionate and good Heavenly Father, Who loves them so much and gives them every good thing. A little later, at intervals, let her tell chem about the life of the first people in Paradise, how happy they were there as long as they obeyed God, and that Heaven will be incomparably better for those who obey God and their parents. She should also tell chem that Adam and Eve sinned, and that because of this sin, they and all men after them became unhappy. Therefore the Saviour had to come down to earth so that men could again enter Heaven, which God had closed because of the sin of the first parents.

The mother should also tell her children about the birth of Jesus Christ, the pious shepherds, the three wise men, the evil King Herod who slaughtered the innocent babies, and about the ascent of the twelve-year-old Jesus to the Temple and his laborious life in Nazareth. She should also tell them about His passion and death on the Cross, explaining that the Lord suffered all this because men were so bad. Then every child will immediately understand that he should not be bad. Then let the mother continue and speak about the Resurrection and the Ascension of the Lord into Heaven. The child will want his mother to tell him more, more...

Then she can tell him about the Mother of God—Her entrance into the Temple at the age of three, about Her life there, and furthermore that She loves mankind and fulfills the requests of those who pray to Her. Talk to him also about the holy angels, especially about his guardian angel, who loves good children!

She should also take advantage of the different feast days to teach her children the great truths of our holy faith. She can use the holy icons which are in every Christian home, and the crosses her children wear, to tell them Who is portrayed nailed to the Cross and what the holy icons depict. Every day she should take her child to the icon-corner, make the sign of the Cross herself and then trace it on him with his own little hand. In this way she will gradually teach him to make the sign of the Cross and pray by himself. Finally and most importantly, she must not fail to bring her child to church and the Spotless Mysteries every Sunday.

Doing all this, the good mother will teach her child the basic truths of Christianity, which even the smallest child is able to assimilate, even before he starts going to school. Children show greater receptivity than adults to all that relates to the Divine; it is sufficient that they grow up under the influence of pious mothers.

How easy it is, for example, to link the Christmas tree with the story of Christ’s birth! How easy it is at Pascha to tell the children the story of how the Saviour suffered and died for the sins of mankind. The child will understand that for this reason we must not sin. Tell him also that God raised Him up—and that we also will die, but that if we are good the Saviour will raise us up just like Lazarus.

How easy it is to inspire in a small child love and reverence for the Divine Services of the Church! It is enough to make him understand that in church the Lord, Who is present everywhere, is more perceptible—the God Who loves children so much and Who calls them also to Himself. Consequently, in church we must stand quietly, carefully make the sign of the Cross and pray.

Yes, parents! If your heart overflows with faith and love for God, you will find a thousand and two ways to pass on these feelings to your child. We do the greatest wrong to our children if we deprive them of the treasure of faith and piety. The saying is absolutely correct that “the soul of a man [consequently, also of a child] is by nature Christian.” God expects to see Christian manifestations in a child’s soul. The Psalmist truly writes: “Out of the mouths of babes and sucklings hast Thou perfected praise” (Ps. 8:3). For this reason, in order to develop and firmly root the spirituality of your child’s soul, teach him to pray to God when he is young. He can pray, however small he is. Since he asks his parents for everything he wants, why can’t he ask his Heavenly Father? Just begin teaching him when he is small, and prayer will gradually become a necessity for him. Regularly say morning and evening prayers together with your children, as well as the prayers before and after meals, so that they won’t come to the table like unreasoning beasts to their manger, but will learn that if we want gifts from God, we must ask and thank Him for them. Every child should know the “Our Father,” the “Theotokos Virgin, rejoice,” and other short prayers.

It is a very grievous thing that common family prayer has almost completely disappeared in our age. Indeed, it is exactly for this reason that we see so many unhappy families and so many failures in child-rearing—men have ceased to pray. The Lord’s words “Ask and it shall be given you” (Matt. 7:17) still, as always, possess power. Maybe some will counter: “The child doesn’t understand the prayers.” Of course he doesn’t fully comprehend the meaning of the prayers; but small though he be he will enter into the climate of piety, which is exactly what he needs. He can feel God even though he has not yet formed any clear idea of Him. He perceives that there exists some higher Being Who loves us and Whom we also should love. When the child utters the words of the prayers, he thinks of God, he offers up his feelings to Him. One such prayer issuing from an innocent child’s heart is much more pleasing to God than the prayer of an intellectual who, though he fully understands every word of the prayer, offers it up only with his cold reason and not with a warm heart. The Psalmist tells us how pleased God is with the prayers of children: “Out of the mouth of babes and sucklings hast Thou perfected praise” (Ps. 8:3).

In order for parents to give their children Christian training, they themselves must first of all be pious and God-fearing; they themselves must love to pray. If the mother does not have faith and piety, if she does not find—because she does not seek—joy and consolation in prayer, she will not succeed in teaching her children to be pious. Only when a child sees his mother praying frequently and fervently will he learn to do likewise.

You see now, dear parent, why it is necessary to teach children piety even from their infancy. You see that mothers especially must teach their children faith, godliness, and prayer even before they start to go to school. Therefore I address you, Christian mothers: the best inheritance you can leave your sons, the richest dowries you can prepare for your daughters, is a truly Christian upbringing. As I have briefly indicated to you, teach them the basic truths of our holy faith, teach them piety and prayer. Teach by words, but most of all by example. In vain will catechists and teachers labor later to make your children good, godly Christians, if the foundations were not laid at home. If you admonish your children in piety and the fear of God, you can have hope that they will continue to be a consolation and joy to you—for if they fear and love God, they will also be obedient and grateful to you. If you teach your children to fulfill their duties to God, they will also fulfill their duties to you.

Therefore, parents, raise your children for God and Heaven! Then you will also have joy from them here on earth.

Chapter Three

Teaching Your Children Obedience

Only a few passages in the Gospels refer to the childhood years of our Lord Jesus Christ, but these few are very significant and instructive. Thus, St. Luke the Evangelist writes about the twelve-year-old Jesus: “And he went down with them, and came to Nazareth, and was subject unto them” (Luke 2:51).

The quality the Evangelist emphasizes here about the “child Jesus”—His obedience to His earthly parents—the Apostle Paul also stresses in reference to His Heavenly Father, when he writes about Jesus in His adult years: “He was obedient unto death, even the death of the Cross” (Phil. 2:8). The Apostle goes even further—on this obedience hangs the salvation of the whole world. “For as by one man’s disobedience many were made sinners, so by the obedience of one shall many be made righteous” (Rom. 5:19).

It is not necessary for us to speak at length about the lofty significance of obedience in the life of mankind in general; all parents know how important it is in the rearing of children. We can even say that he who has succeeded in teaching his children obedience has solved the problem of their upbringing. This is because the will is the strongest power of the soul, governing all the other powers. That which we will, that we also think, say, and do.

God gives the soul this power so that it can will and do only what is good, and abhor and avoid what is evil. But our will is weak by reason of sin and tends to incline towards evil. Even if we know what is good, we have the strength neither to will nor to do it. “For the good that I would I do not: but the evil which I would nor, that I do” (Rom. 7:19).

This weakening of the good will is the result of original sin, as is also capriciousness and obstinacy, which from childhood must be overcome and uprooted. A grapevine bears a rich harvest of sweet fruit, not when it is left to grow as it would, but when it is pruned and trained to a trellis. Discipline has the same result in a child—by restraining waywardness and obstinacy, it enables him to bring forth fruit.

However, before I speak about the most simple and sure ways to teach children obedience—which, I think, is what chiefly interest fathers and mothers—I must emphasize here that obedience is a “plant” that cannot grow and bear fruit in every home. It flourishes only where the soil is suitable.

In families where a spirit of disrespect for the laws of God and man prevails, where no authority is recognized, or where divine or human laws are only invoked to defend one’s own advantage, children cannot be taught obedience. Whoever wants his children to obey him must himself respect every proper authority and just law. These authorities are God, the Church, and the State. Do we ourselves, first of all, respect these authorities and their laws?

Many do not reflect at all on their duties towards God, while they eagerly take great pains over anything that stirs their interest. Moreover, in many families God is discussed as though He were a fairy tale, and as though faith in Him is suitable only for old women. All this the child sees and hears. We can easily predict that he will draw the conclusion: “If my father doesn’t honor God, doesn’t obey God, then I don’t have to honor or obey my father. If God and His commandments are myths, then the fifth commandment, ‘Honor thy father and mother...’ is also a myth. It follows that my parents don’t have to mean anything to me.” And we have to agree with this conclusion, for logic is on the side of the child!

Thus, one can understand that parents who do not respect the Church cannot teach their children obedience. “What have I to do with the priest? Why do I need his advice? Can we really believe all he says?” Such words the children hear at home, while at school and in church they learn that “children must obey their parents, priests, and all adults.”

The priest dutifully repeats to the children: “Honor your father and mother...,” while at home the parents mock him and undermine his work. The child will come to the final conclusion: “Since my father doesn’t recognize any of the commandments of God that the priest talks about, there is no reason for me to listen to the priest when he teaches us about the fifth commandment.” Again, logic is on the child’s side!

The same applies to lawful civil authority. Thus, whoever despises the authority of God and the Church and who obeys the civil laws only out of fear, or not at all, cannot demand respect for his own authority from his children. Therefore, parents, if you want your children to be obedient to you, you yourselves must respect all legitimate authorities and observe their laws.

But let us suppose that a home possesses the proper atmosphere for the cultivation of obedience in children. How are we to cultivate it? Take note of some rules to be followed:

Don’t permit any stubbornness or capriciousness in your children, however young they may be. This doesn’t mean, however, that you should completely curtail the child’s will. If he lays claim to something he is entitled to have, you must fulfill his desire with full willingness. For example, if he asks for food at an appropriate time because he is hungry, you should fulfill his desire. If you refuse, you will be harsh and unloving. Does he ask for something he needs in school? You must give him what he asks for, because otherwise you will force him to acquire it in some illegitimate way. It is a different matter when the child asks for something that is not allowable—then you must refuse him, regardless of his tears. Pay no attention to your child’s self-willed whims, for whoever gives way once will forever after be a slave to him.

In the endeavor to overcome their children’s obstinacy and capriciousness, the parents must act in concert. The one must not cast down what the other has built up. A child never becomes so self-willed as when one parent allows what the other forbids. For example, the child comes to the mother crying and complaining that the father has not given him something he asked for. The mother should not express her sympathy for the child, and still less any displeasure against the father for not doing the child’s will. The older children should do the same, as well as relatives and everyone living in the house—and especially the grandparents.

Do not allow children to disturb their older brothers and sisters, the servants, or any older people. They should not give arrogant commands. They should ask for what they want, not order it. They should be grateful for what is given them, and express thanks for it.

Never overlook your children’s disobedience—whatever the father or mother says must be done without delay. The child’s conscience should tell him: “If 1 don’t immediately do what father or mother says, I’m not doing well.” The parents should know in advance that whatever they say will be done without fail. Only in this way can we overcome children’s waywardness and help them form a will that is strong and inclined towards the good.

Obedience is in essence the submission of one’s will to the will of another. But in order for me to submit my will to another’s, I must respect that person. If I am to follow him, I must love him. Therefore, you must conduct yourselves in such a way that your children will respect you, for respect is a fundamental prerequisite of obedience.

By nature, a child feels special respect for his parents. The fifth commandment supports this natural feeling. What happens, however, when he sees something in his parents that provokes repugnance and hatred in his innocent child’s feelings, when he is unable to respect them however much he wants to? How can a child respect a father who is continually drunk, a mother who insults and curses, parents who constantly quarrel? When parents give a bad example, they not only shake their children’s respect for them, but also.undermine the foundations of obedience. Won’t the child think: “But what kind of parents are you?”

So parents must watch their behavior and avoid anything that could impair their children’s regard for them. Take care to never belittle each other, or you will undermine your children’s respect. The father and mother must be ruled by feelings of mutual respect and treat each other considerately. They must never blame each other. They must never allow themselves unseemly discussions, especially in front of the children. Never let them hear expressions like: “You're always lying, just like your father,” “You're going to grow up to be as useless as your father,” or, “You're just as wasteful as your mother,” “You're lazy, just like your mother.” When children hear words like these, it is idle to ask for their respect and obedience.

Furthermore, never allow yourselves unbecoming jokes and games with the children. The father who habitually plays the clown in front of his children cannot expect respect from them, and neither has he any right to complain about their own unsuitable behavior. This doesn’t mean that you always have to be serious and stern with them. Everyone can easily distinguish the tender and affectionate gravity of parents from the foolish clowning that decreases their authority. Children will always feel the greatest reverence for a sober and fondly-loving father. One glance from him is enough to make them obey immediately.

Do you want your children to be obedient? Show them your love. Not a love that weakens them, that gives way to all their demands, but a wise and heartfelt love that looks to their true benefit. When a child sees such love, he will obey not from fear but from reverence.

Don’t be indifferent to your child’s joys and sorrows! Never say that the children are a burden or torment for you. Never indicate that any sacrifice on your part for your children’s happiness is too great or heavy. Always give your children whatever they need, with willingness and joy. How can a small child love parents who grumble at giving him a piece of bread? Every now and then, give your children small satisfactions and joys. A little present on some feast day or on his name day, when given with love, strengthens a child’s love.

Draw your children’s hearts to you; create an open and trusting relationship with them. Distrust and lack of confidence kills love.

Don’t augment a fair punishment with scornful ridicule or biting reproaches. One such incident can harden a child’s heart and extinguish every trace of love.

These are the basic means you should conscientiously use to teach your children obedience. First of all, accustom them to obey you because it is the will of God. Take care in time that capriciousness does not become rooted in them. Do not tolerate their obstinacy or impudence towards anyone. Don’t give them everything they want. Accustom them to self-control, moderation, and temperance.

Always demand that your children do what you say immediately and exactly. Be consistent—you should only have to speak once. But for your children to be able to obey, never tell them to do something they cannot, something that exceeds their ability. Do not yourself be capricious or arbitrary in your demands, allowing today what you forbade yesterday. Don’t oppose each other in actions concerning the children. Take care to retain your children’s respect for you, avoiding anything that could shake it.

Finally, never forget to invoke the blessing of God on your work in bringing up your children. Only then will your labor, struggles and concern be crowned with success. With God’s help, your children will learn obedience.

This concludes the first three of ten chapters of On the Upbringing of Children.