ept to prevent others from acting.

Again and again I say, postpone even a good lesson if you can, for fear
of conveying a bad one. On this earth, meant by nature to be man's
first paradise, beware lest you act the tempter by giving to innocence
the knowledge of good and evil. Since you cannot prevent the child's
learning from outside examples, restrict your care to the task of
impressing these examples on his mind in suitable forms.

Violent passions make a striking impression on the child who notices
them, because their manifestations are well-defined, and forcibly
attract his attention. Anger especially has such stormy indications
that its approach is unmistakable. Do not ask, "Is not this a fine
opportunity for the pedagogue's moral discourse?" Spare the discourse:
say not a word: let the child alone. Amazed at what he sees, he will
not fail to question you. It will not be hard to answer him, on
account of the very things that strike his senses. He sees an inflamed
countenance, flashing eyes, threatening gestures, he hears unusually
excited tones of voice; all sure signs that the body is not in its
usual condition. Say to him calmly, unaffectedly, without any mystery,
"This poor man is sick; he has a high fever." You may take this
occasion to give him, in few words, an idea of maladies and of their
effects; for these, being natural, are trammels of that necessity to
which he has to feel himself subject.

From this, the true idea, will he not early feel repugnance at giving
way to excessive passion, which he regards as a disease? And do you
not think that such an idea, given at the appropriate time, will have
as good an effect as the most tiresome sermon on morals? Note also the
future consequences of this idea; it will authorize you, if ever
necessity arises, to treat a rebellious child as a sick child, to
confine him to his room, and even to his bed, to make him undergo a
course of medical treatment; to make his growing vices alarming and
hateful to himself. He cannot consider as a punishment the severity
you are forced to use in curing him. So that if you yourself, in some
hasty moment, are perhaps stirred out of the coolness and moderation it
should be your study to preserve, do not try to disguise your fault,
but say to him frankly, in tender reproach, "My boy, you have hurt me."

I do not intend to enter fully into details, but to lay down some
general maxims and to illustrate difficult cases.