BY MRS. S. M. I. HENRY.
HEREDITY is a mighty force, but it has its limitations. It works both ways; so that, while we cannot afford to ignore it, we need not be terrorized by it. One mother said to me: “I am afraid of heredity. Just to think of the awfulness of eating sour -grapes, and getting your children's teeth on edge! I refuse to look into it. I cannot help what my children have inherited, and I believe it would drive me insane if the evil things which must result to them should get to running about in my brain.” But it is only the most selfish life that can shut itself up to its own generation, saying, as did Louis XV of France, “Things must go on as well as possible while I live ; after that they must go as they will — after me, the deluge.”
To become acquainted with the laws by the ignorant violation of which we have brought evil into the lives of our children, is one of the greatest of obligations ; and to find the remedy for the evil in the operation of these same laws, is not only an obligation to coming generations, but a wonderful opportunity. That we may be able to make the same laws by which evil is transmitted operate for the palliation of the consequences of our sins and mistakes in generations that are to follow, reveals to us the benevolent forethought of God. He has made it possible for every generation to turn the tide of its evil heredity back upon itself, while that which is good and pure may be sent on its blessed way into the future. This possibility, however, is not in man; it is in God alone, through the gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ; and only for those who will honestly consecrate their powers to him, and patiently work together with him for the subjection of the entire being to his truth.
Heredity finds its limitations in environment, and the powers which use it as a medium of influence. It is through the things by which the child is surrounded that good or evil comes to him, and develops in him. It does not require large evil to ruin an almost perfect environment. Eden was perfect in all save the serpent which, found his way into its sacred enclosure. With him forever shut out, it would have been the same old Eden still; and out of it would have gone a race of innocent but untried beings to people the world. This, however, would not have been an unmixed good; for the possibilities to temptation would have remained. Sin and ruin might still have been in the future; for as long as sin is possible anywhere, it must be possible to any who have never, learned how to use that power of resistance by which it is overcome.
It is the work of the home, armed with the powers of the gospel, to create an environment that shall develop the ability, not only to resist the devil, where Adam yielded, but also to overcome the evil heredity which resulted from that yielding. This environment is to be constructed of material things, in themselves, perhaps, as insignificant as the dust of the earth. But it is to be the organic body through which the Spirit of God will work his work of salvation, or through which the same old serpent will work his work of destruction.
The house in which the child lives; the people he lives with; the faces, the voices, which, like the chisel and the hammer of the sculptor, are always hacking away at him ; the clothing he wears; the furniture he uses; the food, the books, the pictures; those who come and go; the work and the leisure, the conversation or silence, together with the atmosphere which he breathes, — all go to make up this wonderful medium through which his life is to be made better or worse than that which went before him.
The influence upon the child of- even the walls by which he is surrounded when the doors must be shut, and all made snug, cannot be computed. Are they in harmony with the influence of our Father's beautiful house,— of “all outdoors,” which has been the little one's delight during the open season? or are they in cold, repellent contrast ? Are they warm, embracing walls, which mellow all sound into music? or are they bare and hard, catching every tone as some rocky cavern might do, and throwing it back in spiteful echoes? Will they draw and hold, or will they repel the memory of the boy as he goes out into the world ? Will he long to be a poet, that he may sing of them? or will he, if a poet, sing of any other than his own father's house ? Will his home stand to him as the type of the “many mansions” ? or will it be remembered simply as a lodging place of doubtful comforts on the way to death?
Costly material is not requisite to an environment through which God can do his best work for the children. God's poor, rich in faith and love, can make of the most humble room, with meager furnishing, that charmed enclosure which shall shut in a beauty of life that time can never dim, and a sweetness of harmony that shall strike the key to love's grandest song. The old kitchen, with its cook-stove and the commonest utensils, has been like a temple of God in the memory of not a few men who have risen to greatness, simply because love and truth sanctified it, and made of it an environment through which God could shine.
Of course we must not forget that the whole wide world contributes to this wonderful combination which we call environment. It surrounds our children in concentric circles, each with its own atmosphere and corresponding influence. The outer world, the neighborhood, the school, the church ; but the home is intended to be the inner compartment to them all,—the insulated chamber, cut off and protected from all that is outside, so that only helpful currents, communicated along Heaven-appointed conductors, can penetrate it, and touch the spring of characters that are being formed within,—characters which, once formed, can be trusted to overcome even the power of an evil heredity, instead of being overcome by it.~
ADVENT REVIEW AND SABBATH HERALD
Feb. 23, 1897 Vol. 74, No. 8
(Written from the Sanitarium in Battle Creek, MI)
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