Character — Ch 2b - Home Power, cont.

The respective influences of the father and the mother on the training and development of character, are remarkably illustrated in the life of St. Augustine.

While Augustine's father, a poor freeman of Thagaste, proud of his son's abilities, endeavoured to furnish his mind with the highest learning of the schools, and was extolled by his neighbours for the sacrifices he made with that object "beyond the ability of his means"--his mother Monica, on the other hand, sought to lead her son's mind in the direction of the highest good, and with pious care counselled him, entreated him, advised him to chastity, and, amidst much anguish and tribulation, because of his wicked life, never ceased to pray for him until her prayers were heard and answered.

Thus her love at last triumphed, and the patience and goodness of the mother were rewarded, not only by the conversion of her gifted son, but also of her husband.

Later in life, and after her husband's death, Monica, drawn by her affection, followed her son to Milan, to watch over him; and there she died, when he was in his thirty-third year.

But it was in the earlier period of his life that her example and instruction made the deepest impression upon his mind, and determined his future character.

There are many similar instances of early impressions made upon a child's mind, springing up into good acts late in life, after an intervening period of selfishness and vice.

Parents may do all that they can to develope an upright and virtuous character in their children, and apparently in vain.

It seems like bread cast upon the waters and lost.

And yet sometimes it happens that long after the parents have gone to their Rest--it may be twenty years or more--the good precept, the good example set before their sons and daughters in childhood, at length springs up and bears fruit.

One of the most remarkable of such instances was that of the Reverend John Newton of Olney, the friend of Cowper the poet.

It was long subsequent to the death of both his parents, and after leading a vicious life as a youth and as a seaman, that he became suddenly awakened to a sense of his depravity; and then it was that the lessons which his mother had given him when a child sprang up vividly in his memory.

Her voice came to him as it were from the dead, and led him gently back to virtue and goodness.

Another instance is that of John Randolph, the American statesman, who once said: "I should have been an atheist if it had not been for one recollection--and that was the memory of the time when my departed mother used to take my little hand in hers, and cause me on my knees to say, 'Our Father who art in heaven!'

" But such instance must, on the whole, be regarded as exceptional.

As the character is biassed in early life, so it generally remains, gradually assuming its permanent form as manhood is reached.

"Live as long as you may," said Southey, "the first twenty years are the longest half of your life," and they are by far the most pregnant in consequences.

When the worn-out slanderer and voluptuary, Dr. Wolcot, lay on his deathbed, one of his friends asked if he could do anything to gratify him.

"Yes," said the dying man, eagerly, "give me back my youth."

Give him but that, and he would repent--he would reform.

But it was all too late!

His life had become bound and enthralled by the chains of habit.'

[113] Gretry, the musical composer, thought so highly of the importance of woman as an educator of character, that he described a good mother as "Nature's CHEF-D'OEUVRE."

And he was right: for good mothers, far more than fathers, tend to the perpetual renovation of mankind, creating, as they do, the moral atmosphere of the home, which is the nutriment of man's moral being, as the physical atmosphere is of his corporeal frame.

By good temper, suavity, and kindness, directed by intelligence, woman surrounds the indwellers with a pervading atmosphere of cheerfulness, contentment, and peace, suitable for the growth of the purest as of the manliest natures.

The poorest dwelling, presided over by a virtuous, thrifty, cheerful, and cleanly woman, may thus be the abode of comfort, virtue, and happiness; it may be the scene of every ennobling relation in family life; it may be endeared to a man by many delightful associations;

furnishing a sanctuary for the heart, a refuge from the storms of life, a sweet resting-place after labour, a consolation in misfortune, a pride in prosperity, and a joy at all times.

The good home is thus the best of schools, not only in youth but in age.

There young and old best learn cheerfulness, patience, self-control, and the spirit of service and of duty.

Izaak Walton, speaking of George Herbert's mother, says she governed her family with judicious care, not rigidly nor sourly, "but with such a sweetness and compliance with the recreations and pleasures of youth, as did incline them to spend much of their time in her company, which was to her great content."

The home is the true school of courtesy, of which woman is always the best practical instructor.

"Without woman," says the Provencal proverb, "men were but ill-licked cubs."

Philanthropy radiates from the home as from a centre.

"To love the little platoon we belong to in society," said Burke, "is the germ of all public affections."

The wisest and the best have not been ashamed to own it to be their greatest joy and happiness to sit "behind the heads of children" in the inviolable circle of home.

A life of purity and duty there is not the least effectual preparative for a life of public work and duty; and the man who loves his home will not the less fondly love and serve his country.

But while homes, which are the nurseries of character, may be the best of schools, they may also be the worst.

Between childhood and manhood how incalculable is the mischief which ignorance in the home has the power to cause!

Between the drawing of the first breath and the last, how vast is the moral suffering and disease occasioned by incompetent mothers and nurses!

Commit a child to the care of a worthless ignorant woman, and no culture in after-life will remedy the evil you have done.

Let the mother be idle, vicious, and a slattern; let her home be pervaded by cavilling, petulance, and discontent, and it will become a dwelling of misery--a place to fly from, rather than to fly to; and the children whose misfortune it is to be brought up there, will be morally dwarfed and deformed--the cause of misery to themselves as well as to others.

Napoleon Buonaparte was accustomed to say that "the future good or bad conduct of a child depended entirely on the mother."

He himself attributed his rise in life in a great measure to the training of his will, his energy, and his self-control, by his mother at home.

"Nobody had any command over him," says one of his biographers, "except his mother, who found means, by a mixture of tenderness, severity, and justice, to make him love, respect, and obey her: from her he learnt the virtue of obedience."

A curious illustration of the dependence of the character of children on that of the mother incidentally occurs in one of Mr. Tufnell's school reports.

The truth, he observes, is so well established that it has even been made subservient to mercantile calculation.

"I was informed," he says, "in a large factory, where many children were employed, that the managers before they engaged a boy always inquired into the mother's character, and if that was satisfactory they were tolerably certain that her children would conduct themselves creditably.

NO ATTENTION WAS PAID

TO THE CHARACTER OF THE FATHER."

[114] It has also been observed that in cases where the father has turned out badly--become a drunkard, and "gone to the dogs"--provided the mother is prudent and sensible, the family will be kept together, and the children probably make their way honourably in life; whereas in cases of the opposite sort, where the mother turns out badly, no matter how well-conducted the father may be, the instances of after-success in life on the part of the children are comparatively rare.

The greater part of the influence exercised by women on the formation of character necessarily remains unknown.

They accomplish their best work in the quiet seclusion of the home and the family, by sustained effort and patient perseverance in the path of duty.

Their greatest triumphs, because private and domestic, are rarely recorded; and it is not often, even in the biographies of distinguished men, that we hear of the share which their mothers have had in the formation of their character, and in giving them a bias towards goodness.

Yet are they not on that account without their reward.

The influence they have exercised, though unrecorded, lives after them, and goes on propagating itself in consequences for ever.

We do not often hear of great women, as we do of great men.

It is of good women that we mostly hear; and it is probable that by determining the character of men and women for good, they are doing even greater work than if they were to paint great pictures, write great books, or compose great operas.

"It is quite true," said Joseph de Maistre, "that women have produced no CHEFS-DOEUVRE.

They have written no 'Iliad,' nor 'Jerusalem Delivered,' nor 'Hamlet,' nor 'Phaedre,' nor 'Paradise Lost,' nor 'Tartuffe;' they have designed no Church of St. Peter's, composed no 'Messiah,' carved no 'Apollo Belvidere,' painted no 'Last Judgment;'

they have invented neither algebra, nor telescopes, nor steam-engines;

but they have done something far greater and better than all this, for it is at their knees that upright and virtuous men and women have been trained--the most excellent productions in the world."

De Maistre, in his letters and writings, speaks of his own mother with immense love and reverence.

Her noble character made all other women venerable in his eyes.

He described her as his "sublime mother"--"an angel to whom God had lent a body for a brief season."

To her he attributed the bent of his character, and all his bias towards good;

and when he had grown to mature years, while acting as ambassador at the Court of St. Petersburg, he referred to her noble example and precepts as the ruling influence in his life.

One of the most charming features in the character of Samuel Johnson, notwithstanding his rough and shaggy exterior, was the tenderness with which he invariably spoke of his mother [115]--a woman of strong understanding, who firmly implanted in his mind, as he himself acknowledges, his first impressions of religion.

He was accustomed, even in the time of his greatest difficulties, to contribute largely, out of his slender means, to her comfort; and one of his last acts of filial duty was to write 'Rasselas' for the purpose of paying her little debts and defraying her funeral charges.

George Washington was only eleven years of age--the eldest of five children--when his father died, leaving his mother a widow.

She was a woman of rare excellence--full of resources, a good woman of business, an excellent manager, and possessed of much strength of character.

She had her children to educate and bring up, a large household to govern, and extensive estates to manage, all of which she accomplished with complete success.

Her good sense, assiduity, tenderness, industry, and vigilance, enabled her to overcome every obstacle; and as the richest reward of her solicitude and toil, she had the happiness to see all her children come forward with a fair promise into life, filling the spheres allotted to them in a manner equally honourable to themselves, and to the parent who had been the only guide of their, principles, conduct, and habits.

[116] The biographer of Cromwell says little about the Protector's father, but dwells upon the character of his mother, whom he describes as a woman of rare vigour and decision of purpose: "A woman," he says, "possessed of the glorious faculty of self-help when other assistance failed her;

ready for the demands of fortune in its extremest adverse turn; of spirit and energy equal to her mildness and patience; who, with the labour of her own hands, gave dowries to five daughters sufficient to marry them into families as honourable but more wealthy than their own; whose single pride was honesty, and whose passion was love; who preserved in the gorgeous palace at Whitehall the simple tastes that distinguished her in the old brewery at Huntingdon; and whose only care, amidst all her splendour, was for the safety of her son in his dangerous eminence."

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