him a model--of manner, of gesture, of speech, of habit, of
character. "For the child," says Richter, "the most important era
of life is that of childhood, when he begins to colour and mould
himself by companionship with others. Every new educator effects
less than his predecessor; until at last, if we regard all life as
an educational institution, a circumnavigator of the world is less
influenced by all the nations he has seen than by his nurse." (2)
Models are therefore of every importance in moulding the nature of
the child; and if we would have fine characters, we must
necessarily present before them fine models. Now, the model most
constantly before every child's eye is the Mother.

One good mother, said George Herbert, is worth a hundred
schoolmasters. In the home she is "loadstone to all hearts, and
loadstar to all eyes." Imitation of her is constant--imitation,
which Bacon likens to "a globe of precepts." But example is far
more than precept. It is instruction in action. It is teaching
without words, often exemplifying more than tongue can teach. In
the face of bad example, the best of precepts are of but little
avail. The example is followed, not the precepts. Indeed,
precept at variance with practice is worse than useless, inasmuch
as it only serves to teach the most cowardly of vices--hypocrisy.
Even children are judges of consistency, and the lessons of the
parent who says one thing and does the opposite, are quickly seen
through. The teaching of the friar was not worth much, who
preached the virtue of honesty with a stolen goose in his sleeve.

By imitation of acts, the character becomes slowly and
imperceptibly, but at length decidedly formed. The several acts
may seem in themselves trivial; but so are the continuous acts of