eing made to understand the harm that they do; but think Parents
ill-natur'd, or that they have fancies fit only to be smil'd at, who
will deny their Child a thing for no other reason, it may be, but
because he has desir'd it: And who before he is trusted to go alone
will check his Resentment, Impatience, Avarice, or Vanity, which they
think becomes him so prettily; neither will suffer him to be rewarded
for doing what they bid him to do.

This I am sure, that who so has try'd how very little Sense is to be
met with, or can be infus'd into Nurses, and Nurse-Maids; and with
what difficulty even the best of them by those who make it their
business to watch over them, are restrain'd from what they are
perswaded has no hurt in it, will soon be satisfy'd how little fit it
is to trust Children any more than is necessary, in such Hands. And no
wiser than such, if not much worse, are the greatest part of those who
are usually their immediate Successors, _viz._ young Scholars and
French Maids, erected into Tutors and Governesses, only for the sake
of a little Latin and French.

In Mr. L---- s excellent _Treatise of Education_, he shews how early
and how great a Watchfulness and Prudence are requisite to the forming
the Mind of a Child to Vertue; and whoso shall read what he has writ
on that Subject, will, it is very likely, think that few Mothers are
qualify'd for such an undertaking as this: But that they are not so
is the Fault which should be amended: In the mean time nevertheless,
their presum'd willingness to be in the right, where the Happiness of
their Children is concerned in it, must certainly inable them, if they
were but once convinc'd that this was their Duty, to perform it much
better than such People will do, who have as little Skill and Ability
for it as themselves; and who besides, that they rarely desire to
learn any more than they have, are not induc'd by Affection to do for
those under their care all the Good that they can. Since then the
Affairs either of Men's Callings, or of their private Estates, or the
Service of their Country (all which are indispensibly their Business)
allows them not the leisure to look daily after the Education of their
Children; and that, otherwise, also they are naturally less capable
than Women of that Complaisance and Tenderness, which the right
Instruction and Direction of that Age requires; and since Servants are
so far from being fit to be rely'd upon in that great concern, th