But the new ideal is that man, to stand straight and upright,
must not be bent at all only supported, and so prevented from
being deformed by weakness.

One often finds, in the modern system of training, the crude
desire for mastery still alive and breaking out when the child
is obstinate. "You won't!" say father and mother; "I will teach
you whether you have a will. I will soon drive self-will out of
you." But nothing can be driven out of the child; on the other
hand, much can be scourged into it which should be kept far
away.

Only during the first few years of life is a kind of drill
necessary, as a pre-condition to a higher training. The child
is then in such a high degree controlled by sensation, that a
slight physical pain or pleasure is often the only language he
fully understands. Consequently for some children discipline is
an indispensable means of enforcing the practice of certain
habits. For other children, the stricter methods are entirely
unnecessary even at this early age, and as soon as the child
can remember a blow, he is too old to receive one.

The child must certainly learn obedience, and, besides, this
obedience must be absolute. If such obedience has become
habitual from the tenderest age, a look, a word, an intonation
is enough to keep the child straight. The dissatisfaction of
those who are bringing him up can only be made effective when
it falls as a shadow in the usual sunny atmosphere of home. And
if people refrain from laying the foundations of obedience
while the child is small, and his naughtiness is entertaining,