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THE CONGRESS OF WOMEN.
into an atmosphere of peace and good-will and joy, such as the kindergarten offers, is to make the dinginess and misery of the tenement house impossible for that child when growth shall have come. The child of the slums becomes vicious and wicked because effected by the false maxims of his environment. “ The world owes every man a living,” is a motto of the tramp, the thief, the pickpocket. The child brought up with no other influence must inevitably look upon the world, not as his natural God- given inheritance to use and enjoy, but as an estate to which others have defrauded him of his natural rights. He must gain by craft and crime that which others have appropriated.
Those whom we call great are so because they most fully accept the truth that their lives belong not to themselves, but to the race. The child standing at the portal of the future, wherever his feet are placed, finds himself confronted by the institutional life of man, offering varied relationships.
To lead a human being to master himself and his relationships is to educate him. The kindergarten takes hold of the family relationship and idealizes it for the child. One of Froebel’s finger-plays names the fingers for the different members of the family. The children sing:
'■ “This is the mother, kind and dear;
This is the father, with hearty cheer;
This is the brother, strong and tall;
This is the sister who plays with her doll;
And this is the baby, the pet of all.
Behold the good family, great and small.”
As they sing the different fingers are raised, and when the little one takes its place the idea of a perfect whole is gained. The finger family would be incomplete without the little one. The hand would be imperfect. Each is needed in its place to make the whole. The moral is obvious. Each member of the human family is needed in its rieht place to make a beautiful home. The little one, pet of all, must stand in its turn and help as the little finger does, when its work is needed. There are many other family songs which impress the same lesson. The mothers everywhere testify to the influence which is felt in the home. “ My Johnny is a different boy since he went to the kindergarten,” says the mother. “ He talks so pretty, now, and he runs so quick to get the coal.”
The reflex influence of the plays of the kindergarten on the home is not the least important of its effects. One mother was convicted of her own unworthiness, when she heard her Jennie singing, “ This is the mother, kind and dear.” “ I haven’t been a good mother,” she confessed with bitter tears; “ but I’d like her to sing it truly of me.” This confession was made to the kindergartner, for the heaviest doors open to, and the kindest hearts are reached by the kindergartner, who goes into the poorest home as the friend of the children. That is her only passport to favor and it serves. The charity visit is rarely productive of good, but the visit of a friend is always welcome.
The home atmosphere is often changed, too, by the pretty colored things which are brought into it. Jennie carries home the red and white mat she has woven. The mother is delighted to see what “ her Jennie” can make. She likes to show it to the neighbors when they drop in. But there is not a place worthy of this bright, clean mat. Perhaps the wall is washed to make a clean background for it, or the mantel is dusted. “ My mother dusted the mirror,” one child reported, “and she put my card in the frame.” When the wall has been washed and the mirror dusted, the window must be cleaned, so that the light may come in better, and the stronger light shows the doubtful spots on the floor. So the floor is washed, and, at length, the dingy room becomes clean.
The “divine discernment” is bred within children, who are taken from dinginess and strife and surrounded for a portion of every day with an atmosphere of peace and