In all these examples, which are merely suggestive, it is impossible
to lay down an absolute moral recipe, because circumstances so truly
alter cases--in all these no mention is made of corporal punishment.
This is because corporal punishment is never necessary, never right,
but is always harmful.

[Sidenote: Moral Confusion]

There are three principal reasons why it should not be resorted to:
_First_, because it is indiscriminate. To inflict bodily pain as a
consequence of widely various faults, leads to moral confusion. The
child who is spanked for lying, spanked for disobedience, and spanked
again for tearing his clothes, is likely enough to consider these
three things as much the same, as, at any rate, of equal importance,
because they all lead to the same result. This is to lay the
foundation for a permanent moral confusion, and a man who cannot see
the nature of a wrong deed, and its relative importance, is incapable
of guiding himself or others. Corporal punishment teaches a child
nothing of the reason why what he does is wrong. Wrong must seem to
him to be dependent upon the will of another, and its disagreeable
consequences to be escapable if only he can evade the will of that
other.

[Sidenote: Fear versus Love]

_Second_: Corporal punishment is wrong because it inculcates fear of
pain as the motive for conduct, instead of love of righteousness. It
tends directly to cultivate cowardice, deceitfulness, and anger--three
faults worse than almost any fault against which it can be employed.
True, some persons grow up both gentle and straightforward in spite