From a 1788 Limerick NewspaperSource: North Irish Roots, Vol. 18, No. 2 (2007), p. 52Published by: North of Ireland Family History Society (NIFHS)Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/27697742 .

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From a 1788 Limerick newspaper

A SHORT SYSTEM OF EDUCATION or TEN MINUTES ADVICE TO PARENTS how to train their Children in the way they ought to walk, which, when they are old, they certainly will not depart from.

I. As the mind certainly expands of itself, the less you interfere in restraining it, the less contracted will its operation be; wherefore,

II. When a child is able to speak and walk, always give it its own way. You will have then but little trouble and anxiety.

III. When able to sit on a chair, and high enough for a table, introduce them into card parties; they cannot too soon learn any useful accomplishment.

IV. Take them abroad with you on Sundays to pay visits, and always have them at all your parties on that day, at cards or music. They will by this means avoid being Methodists or Presbyterians.

V. Indulge them in giving their opinions, and speaking on all subjects, particularly among their superiors, and encourage habits of contradiction.

Those are a proof of genius. VI. Instruct the girls in everything pertaining to dress; and enable them to

display their critical abilities on the dress of others. They cannot to soon be

taught what they were born for. VII. Encourage habits of elegant expense; the manner in which they lay out

their money developes their genius and bent, and when early cultivated never leaves them.

IX. As soon as boys can ride, provide them with horses, a servant to attend

them, and money in their pockets. Riding, particularly on Sundays, is a

very useful exercise.

X. Be not over particular in enquiring into where they have been, why they have slept out, &c.

- For this begets a notion of lying.

XL If their expenses encrease, you must support them, as they are much better

judge of that matter than you can possibly be. XII. Affairs of gallantry are always to be encouraged; nothing so much improves

experience, which is the foundation of all wisdom, and where cheap, is

good for nothing. XIII. If your sons and daughters are not disposed for any business, you must

take them for two or three months to a watering place. A contempt for

money is a maxim in all sound philosophy. XIV. In the choice of books, horses, women, and other articles of genteel life,

you are never to interfere. It is they who are to read the books, ride the

horses, &c. and not you. XV. The period of life between infancy and manhood, commonly called

youth, is to be abolished. Manhood to commence at twelve years old, and womanhood at ten.

XV. After the said ages, your authority ceases. The only privilege you retain, is, to determine whether you pay their expence-bills in bank or in cash.

XVI. Swearing, drinking, wenching, and gaming, being the product of this

system of education, are of course to be overlooked.

52

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