WE have presented several articles on the subject of the fifth commandment, and the relations of parents and children under that commandment. We are sure that we have made it plain by the Scriptures that parental authority must be exercised, and that obedience to it and respect for it on the part of the child, must be insisted on, on the part of the parents. We find an editorial on this subject in the Sunday School Times of September 17, which we have decided to notice, for two reasons: (1) Because the teaching of the article is essentially pernicious; and (2) because the utterances of the Times are so widely received as authoritative, that it is necessary to counteract as far as possible its pernicious teaching on this important subject.SITI November 10, 1887, page 679.1

The Times had said that “no parent has a right to break his child’s will.” A correspondent replied, asking the Times to tell what it meant by the will, and then what it meant by the expression, breaking the will. The correspondent also argued that if the child’s will be to do foolishly, and he willfully persists in his folly, then that will ought to be broken. We shall not attempt to discuss the metaphysical question of, “What is the will?” nor the discussion of what the Times meant by the expression, “breaking the will.” There is given in the article an illustration which explains the whole matter, and which displays the pernicious error of the teaching. We quote:—SITI November 10, 1887, page 679.2

“And now to illustrate this by a very simple example. A father says to a little child: ‘Johnny, shut that door.’ Johnny says, ‘I won’t.’ The father says, ‘You shall.’ Johnny responds, ‘I won’t.’ An issue is here made between two wills—the father’s and the son’s. The father is determined not to yield his will to his child’s will. The child is determined not to yield his will to his father’s will. It is the old conflict between ‘an irresistible force and an immovable body.’ ... What then should be done with such a child in an issue like this? ... Let the parent turn to the child in loving gentleness, ... and tell him tenderly of a better way than that which he is pursuing, and urge his wiser, nobler choice.... But if the worst comes to the worst, let the parent say to the child: ‘Johnny, I shall have to give you your choice in this matter. You can either shut that door or take a whipping.’ Then a new choice is before the boy, and his will is free and unbroken for its meeting.... If the boy chooses to be whipped rather than to obey, the father must accept the result so far, and begin again for the next time.”SITI November 10, 1887, page 679.3

But suppose he follows this advice, then what has he upon which to begin again for the next time? Nothing but a disobedient and stubborn child, confirmed in his stubbornness and in his disobedience, by the weakness of the father in following the pernicious advice of the Sunday School Times. Then when the “next time” comes, the result will be the same, and “the father must accept the result,” and at that rate when shall the child ever learn to obey? Never in the world. For whenever he is told to do a thing which he does not want to do all that he has to do is to say, “I won’t,” and stick to it, and “the father must accept accept the result.” True, the father may whip him, but he must never even attempt to compel him to do what he has chosen not to do, for “that would be to deprive the boy of a choice,” don’t you see—the choice to disobey his parents—and that would never do! The truth is, that if the Sunday School Times had deliberately set about to formulate a rule for the cultivation of stubborn, rebellious, and disobedient children, it would be impossible to formulate a rule more perfectly adapted to the purpose than it has done in the illustration here given.SITI November 10, 1887, page 680.1

We say again, We refuse to consider, even in this connection, the question of what is the will? or What is it to break the will? or whether the will may rightly be broken. All this is only metaphysical, and unprofitable as well. What we want to consider is the wholly moral, and, to the children intensely important, question, Shall the child obey the parent? or shall the parent yield to the stubborn disobedience of the child? The Times says that if a father tells his son to shut the door, and the son replies, “I won’t,” and sticks to it, and chooses a whipping instead, then the father may whip the son, “accept the result so far, and begin again for the next time.” But who is to shut that door? According to this instruction the father must shut the door, if it is to be shut at all. If the door is not shut by either, then the son will therefore count himself of equal importance to his father in any difference that may arise between them; and he will have a right to so count himself, because the father himself has admitted it. Then what becomes of parental authority? It is surrendered. And just as surely as the father shuts that door, just so surely will that son take to himself the credit of superior importance, and will count his choice as of superior authority, to that of his father; henceforth he will hold his father’s authority (?) in contempt, because of the defeat which that father has confessed; and in the strength and confidence of the victory which he has won, which the father has confessed, and for which he will give himself the fullest credit,—in the strength and confidence of that victory he will confirm himself “for the next time,” and when “the next time” comes he will surely repeat the performance, and so on ad lib. Then what has become of the principle of parental authority? It is not simply surrendered, it is soon annihilated, and the child rules the parent, despising the government in the home, in the school, and at last in the State, and if he doesn’t finally bring up in the penitentiary, it will be because of his good fortune more than because of his desert.SITI November 10, 1887, page 680.2

Instead of such pernicious teaching as this, gives us the word of God, which commands obedience. “Children, obey your parents,” is the precept of the word of God, and not as the Sunday School Times would have it, children, choose a whipping, if you wish, rather than obey your parents. The word of God is, “I know him [Abraham], that he will command his children and his household after him, and they shall keep the way of the Lord, to do justice and judgment.” And Abraham was the friend of God, and the father of all them that believe. May men walk forever in the steps of the faith of our father Abraham, and according to the precept of the word of God, in the training of children, rather than in the way of the pernicious metaphysics of the Sunday School Times.SITI November 10, 1887, page 680.3

There is hardly one child in ten who, having once taken such a position as is here supposed, would not rather take a whipping than to yield. And if, as is suggested by the Sunday School Times, he is to be given the whipping and the matter dropped there, the child will be satisfied—and almost irreparably injured. Whereas if he is given the whipping and compelled to shut the door besides, he may indeed be dissatisfied, but he will also be humbled, and lastingly benefited. J.SITI November 10, 1887, page 680.4

“A Generous Proposition” The Signs of the Times 13, 42, p. 665.

“The Working of Satan” The Signs of the Times 13, 43, pp. 680, 681.