ed, when Mary obeys the call at once, leaving
her play immediately and coming directly, to say nothing about the prompt
obedience, but to treat it as a matter of course. It is only in the
cases of failure that she seems to notice the action. When Mary, greatly
interested in what for the moment she is doing, delays her coming, she
says, "You ought to come at once, Mary, when I call you, and not make me
wait in this way." In the cases when Mary did come at once, she had said
nothing.

Mary goes back to her play after the reproof, a little disturbed in mind,
at any rate, and perhaps considerably out of humor.

Now Mary may, perhaps, be in time induced to obey more promptly under this
management, but she will have no heart in making the improvement, and she
will advance reluctantly and slowly, if at all. But if, at the first time
that she comes promptly, and then, after doing the errand, is ready to go
back to her play, her mother says, "You left your play and came at once
when I called you. That was right. It pleases me very much to find that I
can depend upon your being so prompt, even when you are at play," Mary will
go back to her play pleased and happy; and the tendency of the incident
will be to cause her to feel a spontaneous and cordial interest in the
principle of prompt obedience in time to come.

Johnny is taking a walk through the fields with his mother. He sees a
butterfly and sets off in chase of it. When he has gone away from the path
among the rocks and bushes as far as his mother thinks is safe, she calls
him to come back. In many cases, if the boy does not come at once in
obedience to such a call, he would perhaps receive a scolding. If he does
come back at once, nothing is said. In either case no decided effect would
be produced upon him.

But if his mother says, "Johnny, you obeyed me at once when I called you.
It must be hard, when you are after a butterfly and think you have almost
caught him, to stop immediately and come back to your mother when she calls
you; but you did it," Johnny will be led by this treatment to feel a desire
to come back more promptly still the next time.

_A Caution._

Of course there is an endless variety of ways by which you can show your
children that you notice and appreciate the efforts they make to do right.
Doubtless there is a danger to be guarded against. To adopt the practice of
noticing and commending what is right, and paying _no attention whatever_
to what is