hot lamp or a stove, whenever affairs can be so arranged that he is
not likely to burn himself too severely. One such lesson is worth all
the hand-spattings and cries of "No, no!" ever resorted to by anxious
parents. If he pulls down the blocks that you have built up for him,
they should stay down, while you get out of the room, if possible, in
order to evade all responsibility for that unpleasant result.

Prohibitions are almost useless. In order to convince yourself of
this, get some one to command you not to move your right arm or to
wink your eye. You will find it almost impossible to obey for even
a few moments. The desire to move your arm, which was not at all
conscious before, will become overpowering. The prohibition acts like
a suggestion, and is an implication that you would do the negative act
unless you were commanded not to. Miss Alcott, in "Little Men," well
illustrates this fact in the story of the children who were told not
to put beans up their noses and who straightway filled their noses
with beans.

[Sidenote: Positive Commands]

As we shall see in the next section, Froebel meets this difficulty by
substituting positive commands for prohibitions; that is, he tells the
child to do instead of telling him not to do. Tiedemann[E] says that
example is the first great evolutionary teacher, and liberty is the
second. In the overcoming of disobedience, no other teachers are
needed. The method may be tedious; it may be many years before the
erratic will is finally led to work in orderly channels; but there is
no possibility of abridging the process. There is no short and sudden
cure for disobedience, and the only hope for final cure is the steady
working of these two great forces, _example_ and _liberty._