Many a father who will not strike his child feels free to scold him. And a scolding mother is not always deemed the severest and most unjust of mothers. Yet, while it is sometimes right to strike a child, it is at no time right to scold one. Scolding is, in fact, never in order, in dealing with a child, or in any other duty in life.

To “scold” is to assail or revile with boisterous speech. The word itself seems to have a primary meaning akin to that of barking or howling. From its earliest use the term “scolding” has borne a bad reputation. In common law, “a common scold” is a public nuisance, against which the civil authority may be invoked by the disturbed neighborhood. This is a fact at the present time, as it was a fact in the days of old. And it is true[Pg 218] to-day as it was when spoken by John Skelton, four centuries ago, that
“A sclaunderous tunge, a tunge of a skolde,
  Worketh more mischiefe than can be tolde.”

Scolding is always an expression of a bad spirit and of a loss of temper. This is as truly the case when a lovely mother scolds her child for breaking his playthings wilfully, or for soiling his third dress in one forenoon by playing in the gutter which he was forbidden to approach, as when one apple-woman yells out her abuse of another apple-woman in a street-corner quarrel. In either case the essence of the scolding is in the multiplication of hot words in expression of strong feelings that, while eminently natural, ought to be held in better control. The words themselves may be very different in the two cases, but the spirit and method are much alike in both. It is scolding in the one case as in the other; and scolding is never in order.

If a child has done wrong, a child needs talking[Pg 219] to; but no parent ought to talk to a child while that parent is unable to talk in a natural tone of voice, and with carefully measured words. If the parent is tempted to speak rapidly, or to multiply words without stopping to weigh them, or to show an excited state of feeling, the parent’s first duty is to gain entire self-control. Until that control is secured, there is no use of the parent’s trying to attempt any measure of child-training. The loss of self-control is for the time being an utter loss of power for the control of others. This is as true in one sphere as in another.

Mr. Hammond’s admirable work on “Dog-Training,” already referred to in these pages, says on this very point, to the dog-trainer: “You must keep perfectly cool, and must suffer no sign to escape of any anger or impatience; for if you cannot contro............