In the days of infancy and early childhood, training for boys and girls may be more nearly identical than in later life.  A large part of the differentiation in the work and play of little boys and girls would seem to be quite artificial.  We give dolls to girls and drums to boys, but only because of some preconceived notion of our own.  The girls will drum as loudly and the boys care for the baby quite as tenderly, until some one ridicules them and they learn to simulate a scorn for “boys’ things” and “girls’ things” which they do not really feel.

Throughout this chapter, therefore, it is to be assumed that the training suggested is quite as applicable and quite as necessary for one sex as for the other.

Young mothers sometimes ask the family doctor, “When shall I begin to train the baby to eat at regular intervals, to go to sleep without rocking, in general to accept the plan of life we outline for him?” The answer seldom varies:  “Before he is twenty-four hours old.”  It is therefore evident that all the basic principles of living, whether physical or mental, must have their foundations far back in the child’s young life.

[Illustration:  Photograph by Brown Bros.  Helping with the housework.  The boy or girl who successfully fills a place in the home of his childhood will be in a fair way to undertake successfully the greater task of founding a home of his or her own]

As a basis for all the rest, we must work for health.  A truly successful life, rounded and full, presupposes health.  Regular habits, nourishing food, plenty of sleep, are axiomatic in writings treating of the care of young children, yet it is surprising how often these rules are violated.  “It is easier” to give the child what he wants or what the others are having; easier to let him sit up than to put him to bed; easier to regard the moment than the years ahead.

[Illustration:  Already well started on his education]

Aside from the physical foundation, the training that we are to give our little children will probably be based upon our conception of what they need to make them good sons and daughters, good brothers and sisters, good friends, good husbands and wives, and good fathers and mothers.  In other words, it is the social aspect of life that we have in mind, and our social ideals.  Whatever the boy “wants to be when he grows up,” he is sure to have social relations with his kind.  Whether the girl marries or remains single, she cannot entirely escape these relations.  Indeed they are thrust upon both boy and girl already.  What then do they need to enable them to be successful in the human relations of living?

We might enumerate here a long list of virtues that will help, but, since long lists shatter concentration, let us narrow them to four:  (1) sympathy, (2) self-control, (3) unselfishness, (4) industry.