Gold Nugget 197 - Indulgently Cruel Indeed
If some children are “discouraged” by too much strictness, far more are spoiled by too much indulgence. “Indulgence never produces gratitude or love in the heart of a child.” … Cruel indeed are the tenderest mercies of parental weakness and indulgence. …
“Indulgent parents are cruel to themselves and their posterity” (Hall). How numerous are the facts which justify these statements! “As in individuals, so in nations, unbridled indulgence of the passions must produce, and does produce, frivolity, effeminacy, slavery to the appetite of the moment; a brutalized and reckless temper, before which prudence, energy, national feeling, any and every feeling which is not centered in self, perishes utterly.
The old French noblesse gave proof of this law which will last as a warning beacon to the end of time. … Has not Italy proved it likewise for centuries past? It must be so. For national life is grounded on … the life of the family.
The Pulpit Commentary, I Samuel p. 54, I Samuel 2:12-17, (B. Dale) / I Samuel p. 82, I Samuel 3:13, (B. Dale)
Gold Nugget 197
Indulgently Cruel Indeed
