from what has been said in the foregoing pages, it is an irresistible inference that the greatest of all handicaps a child can have, short of being born hopelessly deficient, is to be born into a home where he will be exposed to mind-deadening or emotion-stressing influences—a home where he will receive neither adequate mental stimulus nor adequate moral training. under such circumstances, so profound is the influence of the early environment, his growth to a normal manhood is impossible, unless other and more favourable influences from outside the home affect him with sufficient force to offset the home surroundings. fortunately, this happens in many cases, but, as hospital, asylum, and court[304] records testify in sad abundance, in many cases the adverse home environment proves indeed decisive.
and, on the opposite, that child is unquestionably getting the best possible start in life who is born of parents appreciative of his mental needs, sincerely devoted to him, but not over-devoted, watchful of his physical health and alert to prevent him from becoming a slave to his emotions. the purpose of both this book and its predecessor, "psychology and parenthood," has been to help this latter class of parents and, perchance, to awaken other parents to the need for giving more care and intelligent attention to their children than they have hitherto been doing.
certainly, the discoveries of modern psychology and physiology have made it increasingly evident that the business of child-rearing is, of all businesses, far and away the most important to the race. and it is a business that has become more important than it ever was in the past, because of the greater demands made on human mentality, and the more[305] numerous sources of stress on human emotionality that are involved in the increasing complexity of civilised life. either the clock of progress must be stopped and the world revert to more primitive modes of living, or else the men and women of the days to come must be conditioned, through wiser educational methods that begin in the first years of life, to adapt themselves more smoothly to the modern environment.
we do not want to stop the clock of progress. but neither could we wish to see the people of the world degenerate into a race of psychasthenes, neurasthenes, and otherwise mentally or nervously disorganised men and women. happily, means of attaining smoother adaptation, of increasing both the mental vigour and the nervous resistance of the race are now available. they are available, thanks chiefly to the labours of the medical psychologists. and it is my hope that, by stressing the adaptatory elements in their discoveries and presenting them concretely to the lay reader, i may have contributed something[306] to promote appreciation of these elements by parents in general, and appropriate action for the benefit of the growing generation. first and last, be it clearly understood, it is on the development of a really efficient parenthood that the future of society depends.
the end
