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Your Child: Today and Tomorrow by Sidonie Matzner Gruenberg
page 62 of 190 (32%)
Therefore, while we do not wish our children to be cowards, neither
do we want them to feel reckless. Caution and courage may well go
together in the child's character. Constantly warning the child
against possible danger does not develop caution; it is more likely
to destroy all spontaneous action. Too many mothers are always
saying to their children, "Don't do this, you might hurt yourself,"
or "Don't go to the stable, the horse may kick you," and so on. If a
child is properly taught, he will get along with the ordinary
knowledge concerning the behavior of things and animals that might
be injurious, and he will learn to be careful with regard to these
without being constantly admonished and frightened.

The fear of being considered afraid has its evil side as well as its
good side. While it may often make the child "affect the virtue"
when he has it not, it does, on the other hand, make many a boy and
girl, especially in the early teens, concede to the demands of
prevailing fashions in misconduct, when the conscience and the
knowledge of right and wrong dictate a different course. The taunt
"you dassent" is stronger than the still small voice saying "_thou
must not_." And so Harry plays truant for the first time not so
much because he is tired of school, or because the smell of the
young spring allures him, as because Tommy "dares" him to go
swimming on the risk of getting caught and licked. Harry yields for
fear of being called a "cowardy custard."

It is important to guard against the moral effect of fear when it is
directed against the judgments of others. By always referring the
child to "what others will think" of him, we are likely to make
moral cowards. A child can be taught to refer to his own conscience
and to his own judgment, and, if he has been wisely trained, his
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