Day 50 Cotton-wool

"Wrap me in Cotton-wool," Tatiana Alida

“We are careful not to dilute life for them, but to present such portions to them in such quantities as they can readily receive.”

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“Do not let us bring up our children in glass houses, for fear of the ravages of pity upon their tender hearts. Let them know of any distress which would naturally come before them and let them ease their own pain by alleviating in some way the sufferings they sorrow for. Children were not given to us with infinite possibilities of love and pity that we might choke the springs of pity and train them into hardness of heart. It is our part, on the contrary, to prepare these little ministers of grace for the larger and fuller revelation of the kingdom of heaven that is coming upon us.” 

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“We temper Life too much for Children. ––I am not sure that we let life, and its circumstances have free play about children. We temper the wind too much to the lambs; pain and sin, want and suffering, disease and death––we shield them from the knowledge of these at all hazards. I do not say that we should wantonly expose the tender souls to distress, but that we should recognise that life has a ministry for them also; and that Nature provides them with a subtle screen, like that of its odour to a violet, from damaging shocks. Some of us will not even let children read fairy tales because these bring the ugly facts of life too suddenly before them.”

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“We certainly may use atmosphere as an instrument of education, but there are prohibitions, for ourselves rather than for children. Perhaps the chief of these is, that no artificial element be introduced, no sprinkling with rose-water, softening with cushions. Children must face life as it is; if their parents are anxious and perturbed children feel it in the air. ‘Mummie, Mummie, you aren't going to cry this time, are you?’ and a child's hug tries to take away the trouble. By these things children live and we may not keep them in glass cases; if we do, they develop in succulence and softness and will not become plants of renown. But due relations must be maintained; the parents are in authority, the children in obedience; and again, the strong may not lay their burdens on the weak; nor must we expect from children that effort of decision, the most fatiguing in our lives, of which the young should generally be relieved.”                                  
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“…human nature needs the discipline of failure as well as of success.”
 
 
Examen: Do I see children as “little ministers of grace?” Where might I be trying to protect children too much?  Are there adults I try to protect?  What is the danger in this?


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We are careful: Charlotte M. Mason, Parents and Children, 2:232.
Do not let: 2:267.
We temper Life: Charlotte M. Mason,, 3:183–84.
We certainly may: Charlotte M. Mason, Towards a Philosophy of Education, 6:97.
 ...human nature needs: 6:xxxi.

Day 50 Cotton-wool meditation/ 100 Days copyright Laurie Bestvater 2025

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