Publisher's Synopsis
From the PREFACE.
SOME of these Aphorisms appeared in the First Edition of Counsel to a Mother; but, as they subsequently multiplied to such an extent, and took up so much space, I thought it desirable to collect them together, and publish them separately in one volume; more especially as I had so much additional advice to put into the Second Edition of Counsel to a Mother, and for which I otherwise should have had no room.
These Aphorisms might be considered as a part and parcel of Hygienic Science--a subject which I have for upwards of thirty years so laboriously cultivated. These Aphorisms more exclusively treat of the culture and training of the mind of a child; while two of my other works--Advice to a Mother and Counsel to a Mother--are more especially devoted to the care and management of the body of a child. The care and management of the body should go hand-in-hand with the culture and training of the mind. Anything that improves the one conduces to the advantage of the other.
Aphorisms is a book necessary to make the series complete is a needful sequence to two of my other works-- Advice to a Mother and Counsel to a Mother, for the body is so dependent on the mind, and the mind on the body--they are, as it were, links of one chain; so that if one link either of mind or of body be injured, the whole chain is deranged; and, as the strength of a chain is in its weakest part, each link of the chain must be carefully tested and proved and kept in good order; or, otherwise, many a break-down in the journey of life will happen.
Although I have occasionally been a little discursive and have touched upon some few subjects not absolutely on the culture and training of a child; still in the main I have kept pretty closely to my text.
The mental culture and training of a child is of immense importance. Many children are so wretchedly trained, or rather not trained at all, and so miserably managed, or, more correctly speaking, mismanaged, that a few thoughts and reflections on the subject may not altogether be thrown away; it will be well, at all events, to bring the subject prominently before the attention of a mother, as it is of vital consequence to the rising generation --to the future men and women of England.
I have, in these pages, instilled into the minds of mothers, the great importance of training their boys to be manly and their girls to be useful. There is, alas! need for such advice, for boys, now-a-days, are made effeminate by luxury, and girls useless by having nothing to do!
I now commit this little book into the hands of my fair readers and of my kind friends, and, in conclusion, will only say with Chaucer:
"Go, little booke; God send thee good passage." --PYE HENRY CHAVASSE.
