There is another matter that must be considered. It is often stated, by the most careful parents as well as by those who are careless, that complete and perfect sympathy exists between them and their children. “My child tells me everything” has been the thought to bring comfort to many mothers. But is this true? For myself I have wondered if such an ideal can ever be attained fully. Nor am I certain, if we think of the child only, whether it is an ideal really to be desired. We have to remember that we—the parents—belong to one generation and the child to another. And this barrier of age is felt in nothing more strongly than it is in sex. The intense and complicated forces that have moulded us are but awakening in the young life. We can, at best, hope only to guide our children; we can give to them some little knowledge gained by the experience of our mistakes, but we cannot give them the knowledge they can gain only from life, nor can we save them from making their own mistakes.
Idle curiosity is banished by simple honest teaching, and much evil is thereby prevented. But the boundless curiosity of the child is not and, indeed, should not be satisfied. The boy or the girl, as he or she grows older, will have to experiment, to find out for himself or herself. To ignore this need is, I am certain, to blind ourselves to the facts of life. We must be prepared that, with all our care, our most loving efforts to gain the confidence of our children will be met by refusals.
And although this failure may, and, indeed, must sadden us as we watch the child of our love passing out of the protective circle of our power to help, we need to know that this is a natural process—a step forward that should be taken by the boy or girl; we even fail in our duty do we try to hold them back and refuse to loosen the cords of guidance. The child is fulfilling his or her own needs in turning from us. Age cannot always help youth. In the early years the child desires and should have the very individualised and binding relation with its parents, but when he is older he ought to free himself from the old bindings—from the covering protection of the mother and father—if he is to establish his own character and suitably adapt himself to the world outside the home.