mother.  She was assured that her boy was bound to come to physical ill, for he was so courageous, so adventuresome, so daring.  To her he was the duck instead of the chicken she thought she was hatching out.  One day he climbed to the roof of the barn.  His sister followed him.  The two were slowly, and in perfect security, “inching” along on the comb of the roof, when the mother happened to catch sight of them.  With a scream of half terror and half anger, she shouted to them to come down at once! Up to that moment, I had watched both children with comfort, pleasure, and assurance of their perfect safety.  Their manifest delight in their elevated position, the pride of the girl in her pet brother’s courage, and his scarcely concealed surprise and pleasure that she should dare to follow him, were interesting in the extreme.  But the moment that foolish mother’s scream rent the air, everything changed instanter.  Both children became nervous, the boy started down the roof, where he could drop upon a lower roof to safety.  His little sister, however, started down too soon.  Her mother’s fears unnerved her and she slid, and falling some twenty-five feet or so, broke her arm.

Then—­and here was the cruel fatuity of the whole proceeding—­the mother began to wail and exclaim to the effect that it was just what she expected.  May I be pardoned for calling her a worrying fool.  She could not see that it was her very expectation, and giving voice to it, in her hourly worryings and in that command that they come down, that caused the accident.  She, herself, alone was to blame; her unnecessary worry was the cause of her daughter’s broken arm.

Christ’s constant incitement to his disciples was “Be not afraid!” He was fully aware of the fact that Job declared:  “The thing which I greatly feared is come upon me.”

Hence, worrying mother, curb your worry, kill it, drive it out, for your child’s sake.  You claim it is for your child’s good that you worry.  You are wrong.  It is because you are too thoughtless, faithless, and trustless that you worry, and, if you will pardon me, too selfish.  If, instead of giving vent to that fear, worry, dread, you exercised your reason and faith a little more, and then self-denial, and refused to give vocal expression to your worry, you could then claim unselfishness in the interest of your child.  But to put your fears and worries, your dreads and anxieties, around a young child, destroying his exuberance and joy, surrounding him with the mental and spiritual fogs that beset your own life is neither wise, kind, nor unselfish.

Another serious worry that besets many parents is that pertaining to the courtship or engagement of their children.  Here again let me caution my readers not to construe my admonitions into indifference to this important epoch in their child’s life.  I would have them lovingly, wisely, sagely advise.  But there is a vast difference between this, and the uneasy, fretful, nagging worries that beset so many parents and which often lead to serious friction.  Remember that it is your child, not you, who has to be suited with a life partner.  The girl who may call forth his warmest affection may be the last person in the world you would have chosen, yet you are not the one to be concerned.