nd as the family blood flows in the child, it
looks upon itself as part of the family and not as an Ego. But the moment
it commences to manufacture its own blood, the Ego asserts itself, it is
no longer Papa's girl or Mamma's boy, it has an "I"-dentity of its own.
Then comes the critical age when parents reap what they have sown. The
mind has not yet been born, nothing holds the desire nature in check, and
much, very much, depends upon how the child has been taught in earlier
years and what example the parents have set. At this point in life
self-assertion, the feeling "_I am myself_", is stronger than at any other
time and therefore authority should give place to _Advice_; the parent
should practice the utmost tolerance, for at no time in life is a human
being as much in need of sympathy as during the seven years from fourteen
to twenty-one when the desire nature is rampant and unchecked.

It is a crime to inflict corporal punishment upon a child at any age.
Might is never right, and as the stronger, parents should always have
compassion for the weaker. But there is one feature of corporal punishment
which makes it particularly dangerous to apply it to the youth: namely,
that it wakens the passional nature which is already perhaps beyond the
control of a growing boy.

If we whip a dog, we shall soon break its spirit and transform it into a
cringing cur, and it is deplorable that some parents seem to regard it as
their mission in life to break the spirit of their children with the rule
of the rod. If there is one universal lack among the human race which is
more apparent than any other, it is lack of will, and as parents we may
remedy the evil in a large measure by guiding the wills of our children
along such lines as dictated by our own more mature reason, so that we
help them to grow a backbone instead of a wishbone with which
unfortunately most of us are afflicted. Therefore, never whip a child;
when punishment is necessary, correct by withholding favors or withdrawing
privileges.

At the twenty-first year the birth of the mind transforms the youth into a
man or a woman fully equipped to commence his own life in the school of
experience.

Thus we have followed the human spirit around a life cycle from death to
birth and maturity, we have seen how immutable law governs his every step
and how he is ever encompassed by the loving care of the Great and
Glorious Beings who are the ministers of God. The method of his fu