Are you ready for another Charlotte Mason Read Along? Parents and Children is much different from her first volume because in this volume she takes on the monumental task of enlightening us on the role of the parent in the education of a child. The first chapter really does seem odd at first reading, but I promise stick with this one and you will be blessed through the readings. If you just can’t get into the first couple chapters check out these short summaries provided by Ambleside Online to help you know what is coming up, and be encouraged to to keep reading. Or if you need a little more help check out these chapter by chapter summaries also found on Ambleside Online.
Below you will find my own personal narrations, connections, and some of my favorite quotes. However, I’d love to hear from you and your own interpretation and enlightenments as you read through this volume. Feel free to share in the comments below, over on Instagram, or even on the Facebook page as we dive into another Charlotte Mason Home Education Series Volume.
Chapter 1: The Family
This chapter is a bit off putting at first, especially in today’s clime. That said the general principle is that initial quote by FD Maurice, a 19th century theologian.
The family is the unit of the nation
FD Maurice
She begins by sharing about another 19th century thinker, Rousseau, who many hang their hats on in the educational philosophy world. As one of the lovely ladies in our local book club always reminds us, Charlotte is very good at sifting through information and taking the good while leaving the bad. She doesn’t want to fully condemn the person’s complete works if there is a nugget of good in it. And Rousseau is prime example. He has many many flaws. I just learned today he the great thinker and revolutionizer who promoted parents education their own children, sent his own children to a foundling home so that he could focus on his work. However, he had one redeeming truth that changed the world. He “turned the hearts of the fathers to the children.”
He perceived that God placed the training of every child in the hands of two, a father and a mother; and the response to his teaching proved that, as the waters answer to the drawing of the moon, so do the hearts of parents rise to the idea of the great work committed to them.
Charlotte Mason, Volume 2, pg 3
The rest of the chapter takes the assumption that family is a unit, a communal group, that is vital to the nation. Understanding that parents are vital to the family unit is the premise we get from Rousseau, but Charlotte takes it a step further pointing out the vitality of a strong family unit in its respect to the nation. We must be social, serve our neighbors, and serve the nation in order to fill our proper place within the nation. Isolation will not yield a happy healthy family nor nation, and the same with serving one another. This mimics what Paul says in Galatians,
For, brethren, ye have been called unto liberty; only use not liberty for an occasion to the flesh, but by love serve one another. For all the law is fulfilled in one word, even in this; Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself.
Galatians 5:13-14
Her point being in this chapter that we have families that make up a larger whole, the nation. We have the responsibility as parents to raise children our children, not as separate entities, but as a small part of the whole world. We have a responsibility as a family unit to help our children connect with those around us and to serve one another.
Chapter 2: Parents as Rulers
In this chapter we continue on with the analogy that the family is a nation, or part of the whole society. If the family is the nation then the parents are the rulers.
But be his knowledge of the law little or much, no parent escapes the call to rule.
Charlotte Mason, Volume 2, pg 10
If you are a parent then you are called to rule your little nation, and failure to do so is not an option. Failing to claim our rule is not excusable. Then she outlines multiple ways in which we may refuse to claim our rule and the problems that ensue, and couples them with multiple Shakespeare references. Charlotte shares the ways in which we as parents can abdicate our rule, and honestly they do not seem that they are the giving away of power until she describes it. There are many ways to abdicate our rule, and thus we give over our power and authority to whatever substitute we let take our place. Whether it be the child themselves, another person, or some other ruling force.
If we don’t teach our children to follow Christ, the world will teach them not to.
This is applicable in all things in life because if we do not claim our rule, something else will come into fill the gap we are supposed to fill.
The parents owe it to society to make them better than they are, and to bless the world with people, not merely good-natured and well-disposed, but good of set purpose and endeavour.
Charlotte Mason, Volume 2, pg 12
While our children are not our own to claim, they are first and foremost the Lord’s, we do have a responsibility towards them. As Peter tells us, “As every man hath received the gift, even so minister the same one to another, as good stewards of the manifold grace of God.” As parents we are given the duty and role to steward and train our children in the ways of the Lord. We are deputed under a “divine commission” to raise our children well.
I will touch quickly on the comments of the bottom of page 15 through mid page 16. Ms. Mason gives a quite accurate caution against those who believe their children are merely a commodity of the state to be cared for by the parents as opposed to those who recognize their authority comes from both God and state, with God being the primary.
God forbid that we should ever lose faith in the blessedness of family life
Charlotte Mason, Volume 2, pg 16
As I read this section it hit quite home with what is going on in the world today, and also made me think of the fiction novel The Giver by Lois Lowry. In The Giver, Ms. Lowry describes a dystopian world where family is a nothing but a name to a group of people living together all focused on the continuance of society without regard to the Divine, to beauty, to connection, to much of what makes us human. It then also reminded me of little Jacks in The Green Ember series. Taken from his home and educated without the beliefs from his parents. Separated from his parents for most of the time and when he comes home he is more a member of the state than of his family. Or
Or if those fictional example seem too far fetched, what about the Nazi youth forces. I read a biography called Hansi, that describes very much the same fate. The family unit is destroyed for the “preferred efficiency and superiority of the state” Sadly this commodity of the state mentality is where many nations and people are urging us to move towards today.
All this aside, there are limitations to our authority as parents for we are not the divine. We must remember it is deputed to us, and that we have a Divine authority above us. As the good steward it is our responsibility to lead in a way that honors our authoritarian and makes our authority seem effortless. Our authority must not be absolute and supreme, but rather keeping in mind that we have this authority from God and as such must honor Him in our ruling.
Would you care to join us for the rest of the read along? Here is our reading schedule. I do apologize that this first installment is a day late, as will happen sometimes in home with 6 kids, ministry life, and general craziness. I pray that these readings are a blessing to you, and that you can find community here to discuss your foray into the world of the incomparable Ms. Charlotte Mason.
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