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قراءة كتاب Concerning Children
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CONCERNING CHILDREN
By Charlotte Perkins Stetson
IN THIS OUR WORLD. Cloth, 16mo. 5/—
WOMEN AND ECONOMICS. Cloth, 12mo. 6/—
THE YELLOW WALL PAPER. Paper boards, 12mo. 2/—
G. P. Putnam's Sons
24 Bedford Street Strand
London, W.C.
CONCERNING CHILDREN
BY
CHARLOTTE PERKINS [STETSON] GILMAN
AUTHOR OF
"WOMEN AND ECONOMICS," "IN THIS OUR WORLD,"
"THE YELLOW WALL PAPER."
LONDON: G. P. PUTNAM'S SONS
BOSTON: SMALL, MAYNARD & CO.
1903
TO
MY DAUGHTER, KATHARINE
WHO HAS TAUGHT ME MUCH OF WHAT
IS WRITTEN HERE
Contents.
| Page | ||
| I. | The Precious Ten | 3 |
| II. | The Effect of Minding on the Mind | 25 |
| III. | Two and Two Together | 46 |
| IV. | The Burnt Child dreads the Slipper | 70 |
| V. | Teachable Ethics | 96 |
| VI. | A Place for Children | 118 |
| VII. | Unconscious Schooling | 139 |
| VIII. | Presumptuous Age | 156 |
| IX. | The Respect due to Youth | 169 |
| X. | Too Much Consideration | 183 |
| XI. | Six Mothers | 200 |
| XII. | Meditations on the Nurse-maid | 212 |
| XIII. | Children and Servants | 233 |
| XIV. | Mothers, Natural and Unnatural | 255 |
| XV. | Social Parentage | 278 |
Concerning Children
I.
THE PRECIOUS TEN.
According to our religious belief, the last best work of God is the human race. According to the observation of biologists, the highest product of evolution is the human race. According to our own natural inner conviction, this twofold testimony is quite acceptable: we are the first class.
Whatever our merits when compared with lower species, however, we vary conspicuously when compared with one another. Humanity is superior to equinity, felinity, caninity; but there are degrees of humanness.
Between existing nations there is marked difference in the qualities we call human; and history shows us a long line of advance in these qualities in the same nation. The human race is still in the making, is by no means done; and, however noble it is to be human, it will be nobler to be humaner. As conscious beings, able to modify our own acts, we have power to improve the species, to promote the development of the human race. This brings us to the children. Individuals may improve more or less at any time, though most largely and easily in youth; but race improvement must be made in youth, to be transmitted. The real progress of man is born in him.
If you were buying babies, investing in young human stock as you would in colts or calves, for the value of the beast, a sturdy English baby would be worth more than an equally vigorous young Fuegian. With the same training and care, you could develope higher faculties in the English specimen than in the Fuegian specimen, because it was better bred. The savage baby would excel in some points, but the qualities of the modern baby are those dominant to-day. Education can do much; but the body and brain the child is born with are all that you have to educate. The progress of humanity must be recorded in living flesh. Unless the child is a more advanced specimen than his father and mother, there is no racial improvement. Virtues we still strive for are not yet ours: it is the unconscious virtues we are born with that measure the rise of nations.
Our mechanical products in all