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144 The Century of the Child
bad habit or fault by corporal punishment, a
real ethical result is not reached. The child
has only learnt to fear an unpleasant conse-
quence, which lacks real connection with the
thing itself, a consequence it well knows could
have been absent. Such fear is as far removed
as heaven from the conviction that the good is
better than the bad. The child soon becomes
convinced that the disagreeable accompani-
ment is no necessary result of the action, that
by greater cleverness the punishment might
have been avoided. Thus the physical pun-
ishment increases deception not morality. In
the history of humanity the effect of the teach-
ing about hell and fear of hell illustrates the
sort of morality produced in children’s souls
by corporal punishment, that inferno of child-
hood. Only with the greatest trouble, slowly
and unconsciously, is the conviction of the su-
periority of the good established. The good
comes to be seen as more productive of happi-
ness to the individual himself and his environ-
ment. So the child learns to love the good.
By teaching the child that punishment is a
consequence drawn upon oneself he leams to
avoid the cause of punishment.
Despite all the new talk of individuality the
greatest mistake in training children is still
I
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