14. Children will be able gradually to learn and practice benignity and beneficence towards others in these early years, if they see alms distributed by their parents among the poor, or even if they themselves are ordered to bestow them;[1] likewise if they be occasionally taught to impart something of their own to others; and when they do so, they ought to be praised.
15. The early Church Fathers used to say, and most truly, that “Indolence is Satan’s cushion”; for whoever Satan finds entirely unemployed he will be sure to occupy him, first, with evil thoughts, and afterwards with shameful deeds. It is the office of prudence to allow no man, even from his earliest years, to be idle; but by all means exercise the child with assiduous labors, that thus a door to the most destructive tempter may be closed. I know labors which the shoulders of children can bear, although they were nothing more (which cannot really be the case) than mere play. “It is better to play than to be idle, for during play the mind is intent upon some object which often sharpens the ability.”[2] In this way children may be early exercised to an active life, without any difficulty, since nature herself stirs them up to be doing something. But of this I have already spoken in the seventh chapter.
16. As long as children are learning to speak, so long they should be free to talk as they like, and to prattle freely. When they have acquired the use of speech, it is of the highest importance for them to learn to keep silence; not as if I wished to make them statues, but rational little
- ↑ See in this connection the practice of the good woman Gertrude in Pestalozzi’s Leonard and Gertrude.
- ↑ Fröbel ordinarily is given chief credit for emphasizing the educational value of play. Comenius, however, is entitled to no small credit in this connection. The importance of play with young children finds expression again and again in his writings.
F
