THESE are times when one hears much concerning the bringing up of children. I was glad to notice that Professor Lovell, speaking in Sydney, referred to some of the theories that, are current regarding the training of boys and girls in which any kind of repression is considered wrong. Professor Lovell offered a few words of sane thought to parents that are worth their study. America is, I believe, the centre from which came the view that a child should be allowed to manifest every emotion and desire with little, if any, check. This always seems as absurd as tho opposite view prominent in Britain in the mid Victorian era, and also in Puritan times, which sternly repressed every tendency and desire. Going back to Sir Walter Scott's day he tells how, when a little boy, he said during dinner: . "How good this soup is," on which his father ordered a pint of cold water to be poured into it as a lesson not to think of his appetite. But one extreme is as foolish as another, and while one condemns Sir Walter Scott's father as a stupid per- son, we must also condemn those who believe that the child does not need checks. There is a difference between, guidance and training even to the extent of forbidding certain things, and that rather dangerous plan of permitting children to follow their wishes without hindrance. Just as an engine needs a governor to control its power, so does the human engine require a governor, and this is supplied by that rational training that breeds discipline within, and imposes its own restraints by the use of reason and judgment.
Source
1936 'DAY BY DAY.', The Mercury (Hobart, Tas. : 1860 - 1954), 12 May, p. 6, viewed 16 June, 2012, http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article25217232
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