, and almost embryonic
condition of the cerebral and nervous organization, in which the gradual
development of the mental and moral faculties are so intimately involved.
They do not imply any, the least, relaxation of the force of parental
authority, or any lowering whatever of the standards of moral obligation,
but are, on the contrary, the most effectual, the surest and the safest way
of establishing the one and of enforcing the other.

CHAPTER III.

THERE MUST BE AUTHORITY.

The first duty which devolves upon the mother in the training of her child
is the establishment of her _authority_ over him--that is, the forming in
him the habit of immediate, implicit, and unquestioning obedience to all
her commands. And the first step to be taken, or, rather, perhaps the first
essential condition required for the performance of this duty, is the
fixing of the conviction in her own mind that it _is_ a duty.

Unfortunately, however, there are not only vast numbers of mothers who do
not in any degree perform this duty, but a large proportion of them have
not even a theoretical idea of the obligation of it.

_An Objection_.

"I wish my child to be governed by reason and reflection," says one. "I
wish him to see the _necessity_ and _propriety_ of what I require of him,
so that he may render a ready and willing compliance with my wishes,
instead of being obliged blindly to submit to arbitrary and despotic
power."

She forgets that the faculties of reason and reflection, and the power
of appreciating "the necessity and propriety of things," and of bringing
considerations of future, remote, and perhaps contingent good and evil to
restrain and subdue the impetuousness of appetites and passions eager for
present pleasure, are qualities that appear late, and are very slowly
developed, in the infantile mind; that no real reliance whatever can be
placed upon them in the early years of life; and that, moreover, one of the
chief and expressly intended objects of the establishment of the parental
relation is to provide, in the mature reason and reflection of the father
and mother, the means of guidance which the embryo reason and reflection of
the child could not afford during the period of his immaturity.

_The two great Elements of Parental Obligation_.

Indeed, the chief end and aim of the parental relation, as designed by the
Author of nature, may be considered as comprised, it would seem, in these
two objects, namely: f