until the common things of daily living--the furniture, the books, the
carpets, the chinaware--are made to express that creative joy in the
maker which distinguishes an artistic product from an inartistic one.
This creative joy, in howsoever small degree, may be present in most
of the things that the child does. If he sets the table, he may set it
beautifully, taking real pleasure in the coloring of the china and the
shine of the silver and glass. He ought not to be permitted to set it
untidily upon a soiled tablecloth.

[Sidenote: The Right Spirit]

(6) This is a negative rule, but perhaps the most important of all: DO
NOT NAG. The child who is driven to his work and kept at it by means
of a constant pressure of a stronger will upon his own, is deriving
little, if any, benefit from it; and as you are not teaching him to
work for the sake of his present usefulness, which is small at
the best, but for the sake of his future development, you are more
desirous that he should perform a single task in a day in the right
spirit, than that he should run a dozen errands in the wrong spirit.

(7) Besides a regular time each day for the performance of his set
share in the household work, give him warning before the arrival of
that hour. Children have very incomplete notions of time; they become
much absorbed in their own play; and therefore no child under nine
or ten years of age should be expected to do a given thing at a given
time without warning that the time is at hand.

[Sidenote: "Busy Work"]

Besides these occupations which are truly part of the business of life