habits, taking particular pains to see that bed wetting and
similar bad habits are early overcome; otherwise, he may drag along
through early life and become the cause of great embarrassment both to
himself and his parents.

The control of these nervous habits is somewhat like the management of
the slipping of the wheels of a locomotive when the track is wet and
slippery. The little folks ofttimes endeavor to apply the brakes, but
they are minus the sand which keeps the wheels from slipping. The
parent, with his well-planned discipline, is able to supply this
essential element, and thus the child is enabled to gain a sufficient
amount of self-control to prevent him making a continuous spectacle of
himself.

When nervous children do not walk or talk early, let them alone. Of
course, if later on it is discovered that they are manifestly backward
children, something must be done about it; but if the nervous child is
encouraged to talk too soon there is great danger of his developing
into a stutterer or a stammerer.

PREVENTING HYSTERIA

Every year we have pass through our hands men and women, especially
women, who possess beautiful characters, who have noble intellects,
and who have high aims and holy ambitions in life, but whose careers
have been well-nigh ruined, almost shattered, because of the
hysterical tendency which ever accompanies them, and which, just as
soon as the stress and strain of life reaches a certain degree of
intensity, unfailingly produces its characteristic breakdown; the
patient is seized with confusion, is overcome by feeling, indulges in
an emotional sprawl, is flooded with terrible apprehensions and
distracting sensations, may even go into a convulsive fit, and, in
extreme cases, even become unconscious and rigidly stiff.

Now, in the vast majority of cases, if this nervous patient, when a
baby, had been thoroughly disciplined and taught proper self-control
before it was four years of age, it would have developed into quite a
model little citizen; and while throughout life it would have borne
more or less of a hysteria stigma, nevertheless it would have
possessed a sufficient amount of self-control to have gotten along
with dignity and success; in fact, the possibilities are so
tremendous, the situation is so terrible in the case of these nervous
babies, that we might almost say that, in the majority of such,
success and failure in life will be largely determined by the early
and effectiv