studied the problems of childhood, and their results you can use in
learning to know your child. Your problem is always an individual
problem; the problem of the scientist is a general one. From the
general results, however, you may get suggestions for the solution
of your individual problem.

We all know the mother who complains that her boys did not turn out
just the way she wanted them to--although they are very good boys.
After they have grown up she suddenly realizes one day how far they
are from her in spirit. She could have avoided the disillusion by
recognizing early enough that the interests and instincts of her
boys were healthy ones, notwithstanding they were so different from
her own. She would have been more to the boys, and they more to her,
if, instead of wasting her energy in trying to make them "like
herself," she had tried to develop their tastes and inclinations to
their full possibilities.

How much happier is the home in which the mother understands the
children, and knows how to treat each according to his disposition,
instead of treating all by some arbitrary rule! As a mother of three
children said one day, "With Mary, just a hint of what I wish is
sufficient to secure results. With John, I have to give a definite
order and insist that he obey. With Robert I get the best results by
explaining and appealing to his reason." How much trouble she saves
herself--and the children--by having found this much out!

A mother who knows that what we commonly call the "spirit of
destruction" in a child is the same as the _constructive
impulse_ will not be so much grieved when her baby takes the
alarm clock apart as the mother who looks upon this deed as an