Produced by Joshua Hutchinson, Tonya Allen and PG Distributed
Proofreaders. Produced from page scans provided by Cornell University.
Long ago, when you were a little boy or a little girl,—perhaps not sovery long ago, either,—were you never interrupted in your play by beingcalled in to have your face washed, your hair combed, and your soiledapron exchanged for a clean one, preparatory to an introduction to Mrs.Smith, or Dr. Jones, or Aunt Judkins, your mother's early friend? Andafter being ushered in to that august presence, and made to face abattery of questions which were either above or below your capacity, andwhich you consequently despised as trash or resented as insult, did younot, as you were gleefully vanishing, hear a soft sigh breathed out uponthe air,—"Dear child, he is seeing his happiest days"? In the concrete,it was Mrs. Smith or Dr. Jones speaking of you. But going back togeneral principles, it was Commonplacedom expressing its opinion ofchildhood.
There never was a greater piece of absurdity in the world. I thought sowhen I was a child, and now I know it; and I desire here to brand it asat once a platitude and a falsehood. How ever the idea gained currencythat childhood is the happiest period of life, I cannot conceive. However, once started, it kept afloat is equally incomprehensible. I shouldhave supposed that the experience of every sane person would have giventhe lie to it. I should have supposed that every soul, as it burst intoflower, would have hurled off the vile imputation. I can only accountfor it by recurring to Lady Mary Wortley Montague's statistics, andconcluding that the fools are three out of four in every person'sacquaintance.
I for one lift up my voice emphatically against the assertion, and doaffirm that I think childhood is the most mean and miserable portion ofhuman life, and I am thankful to be well out of it. I look upon it asno better than a mitigated form of slavery. There is not a child inthe land that can call his soul, or his body, or his jacket his own. Alittle soft lump of clay he comes into the world, and is moulded into avessel of honor or a vessel of dishonor long before he can put in a wordabout the matter. He has no voice as to his education or his training,what he shall eat, what he shall drink, or wherewithal he shall beclothed. He has to wait upon the wisdom, the whims, and often thewickedness of other people. Imagine, my six-foot friend, how you wouldfeel to be obliged to wear your woollen mittens when you desire to bloomout in straw-colored kids, or to be buttoned into your black waistcoatwhen your taste leads you to select your white, or to be forced underyour Kossuth hat when you had set your heart on your black beaver: yetthis is what children are perpetually called on to undergo. Their willsare just as strong as ours and their tastes are stronger, yet they haveto bend the one and sacrifice the other; and they do it under pressureof necessity. Their reason is not convinced; they are forced to yield tosuperior power; and of all disagreeable things in the world, the mostdisagreeable is not to have your own way. When you are grown up, youwear a print frock because you cannot afford a silk, or because a silkwould be out of place,—you wear India-rubber overshoes because yourpolished patent-leather would be ruined by the mud; and your self-denialis amply compensated by the reflection of superi