Heroism in Bearing Penalties––There is a bit of heroism in the bearing of a penalty which is very apt to do away with any sense of contrition for the offence; and the plucky little fellow, who takes his punishment with an air, is by no means a bad and hardened young offender; but is an economist of opportunities, making the best of what comes to hand for his own real education. His mother’s distress, his father’s disapproval, these are quite different matters, and carry no compensating sense of hardihood. Reflections like these lead one to spare the rod, not at all out of over-sensibility to the child’s physical suffering, for we must have him endure hardness if we mean to make a man of him, but purely because it is not easy to find a punishment that does not defeat its own ends.
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