XI.

CHILDREN'S IDEALS AND AMBITIONS


When you take pains to instruct your children in the way they should
go, it is because you have in mind certain standards of what a child
should do, or of what kind of an adult you wish your child to
become. In other words, you look to your ideals to guide you in the
training of the child. We all appreciate more or less vaguely the
importance of ideals in shaping character, and for this reason we
value ideals, although it is considered smart for adults to sneer at
ideals and idealism--which are supposed somehow to be opposed to the
"practical" affairs of life. But in a way there is nothing more
truly practical than a worthy ideal.

Where there is no vision the people perish; and that is just as true
of the individual as it is of a nation. Moreover, it is the
_youth_ who shall see the visions and draw from them the
inspiration for higher and better things. Fortunately, every normal
child develops ideals. It is for more experienced people to provide
the opportunities for the formation of desirable ideals, to guide
the ideals after they are formed into practicable channels, to use
the ideals to reinforce the will in carrying out our practical
purposes in the training of the child.

You no doubt find it easy enough to recognize and to encourage
ideals that are in harmony with your own, or that seem to you worthy
and likely to have a favorable influence upon your child's career or