PERSONAL OPINIONS.

Wairarapa Age, Volume XXIX, Issue 8273, 29 October 1906, Page 3

PERSONAL OPINIONS.

CONCERNING PARENTHOOD.

(By President Roosevelt.)

"1 do not in the least believe in the patient Gris'elda type of woman, in the woman who submits to gross ani long oontinned ill-treat-ment, any more than I be'ieve in a man who tamely submits to wrongful aggression. No wrongdoing is eo abhorrent as wrongdoing by a man toward the wife and the children who should aroase every tender feeling in his nature.' This and the following views ate expressed by President Roosevelt in an interesting and oharaotenstio article on "Home Life" in the English edition of "Good Housekeeping," a practical coaKazine for the home. DUTY TO THE HOME.

"Selflshnes3 toward them," ho goes on to say, "lack of tenderness towards tharo, lack of consideration for them, above all, rrutality in, any form toward them, should arouse the heartiest scorn and indignation in every upright soul. "I believe in the woman keeping her self-respect iusfc as 1 believe in the man doing so. I believe in her rights juat as muoh as I believe in the man's, and, Indeed, a little more, and I regard marriage aa a partnership in which each partner is honour bound to think of the rights of the other as well as of his or her own.

••But I think the duties are even more important than the rights, and in the long run I think that the reward is ampler and greater well done for duty than for tie insistence upon individual rights, necessary though this, too, must often be.

"lufco the woman's keeping is committed the destiny of the generation to come after na. In bringing up children mothers mast remember that while it is essential to be loving and tender, it is no lees essential to be wise and firm. Foolishness and affection must not be treated as interchangeable tenrs, and besides training sons and daaphterß in the softer and milder vrtuea, mothers moat see to give them those stem and hard qualities wbion in after life they will sure need. Some children will go wrong In spite of the beifc training and some will go right even where their surroundings are most unfoitunate; nevertheless an immense amount depends upon the family training. If mothers, through weakness, bring up bods to be selfish and to think only of themselves; they will be responsible for much sadness among the women who are to be their wives in the future. If they let their daughters grow ap idle, perhaps under the mistaken impression that as they have had to work bard, their daughters shall know only enjoyment, they are pre paring them to be useless to others , and burdens to themselves. FACE LIFE WITH RESOLUTION. Teaob boys and girls alike that they are not to look forward to lives spent in overcoming difficulties. Teach them that work, for themselves aud also for others, is not a curse, but a blessing. Seek to make them happy, to make them enjoy life, but seek also to make them face lite with tbe steadfast resolution to wrest success from labour and adversity, and to do tbeir whole duty before Gnd and to man. Surely she wno can thus train ber sons and her daughters is thrice fortunate among women. There are a good many people who are denied the supreme blessing of children, and for these we have tbe respect and sympathy always due to those who, from no fanlt of their own, are denied any of the other great blessings of life. tiut the man or woman who deliberately foregoes these blessings, whether from vioiousness, coldness, self-ind<ilgence, or mere failuie to appreciate aright tbe difference between the all important and the unimportant—why, snob a creature merits contempt as hearty as any visited upon the soldier who runs away in battle, or upon the man who refuses to work for the support of those dependent ttoon him, and who, though ablebodied, is yet content to eat in idleness the bread which others pro vide. The way to give a child a fair chance in life is not to bring it up in luxury, but to see that it has the kind of training that will give strength of oharaoter. TRUE HAPPINESS. "Even apart from tbe question of national life and regarding only the individual interest of tbo children themselves, happiness in tne true sense is a hundredfold more apt to oome to any given member of a healthy family of healthy-minded ohildren, well brought up, well educated, but taught that they must shift for themselves, must win tbeir uwn way, an 3 by their own exertions make their own positions of usefulness, than it is apt to oorre to those whose parents them selves have acted on, and have traiueJ tbeir ohildren to act on the selfish and sordid theory that the whole end of life is to tnste a few of the good things."