CHAPTER XVII

FEAR

1. Those who have made a study of the depths of the human mind, tell us that fear was transmitted to man by his primitive ancestors, that it is therefore inveterate to man, and that the reaction known as fear manifests itself in the very early stages of his life. It is true, perhaps, that man has inherited a tendency to fear from earlier generations, but so has he received other deleterious proclivities, which, however, he has succeeded in destroying through a process of repression and elimination. Man possesses in his potential make-up all the tendencies of his countless progenitors, from the dweller of the cave to the citizen of the civilized world; and yet in his development to a higher state, he is shedding those characteristics which are injurious to his progress, and retaining only those which fit him for the environment in which he finds himself. The other propensities are starved out through lack of nutriment and encouragement. Fear, in prehistoric ages, when men and beast met in sudden and fatal encounters, had a vital function. But today it has outlived its protective significance and serves only as a generator of sickness and a destroyer of mankind. The persistence of fear in man is simply due to man's failure to arm himself against it and drive it from the domain of his consciousness.

2. We are so overpowered by the force of fear, that we are unable to look upon it objectively. We continue to encourage the existence of this arch enemy of man, and indeed begin very early to impress it upon the tender mind of the young. We bring up our children under the shadow of fear. We inculcate fear from the very earliest stages of their training. We teach them to fear the heat, the cold, the wind and the rain. We teach them to look upon strangers with suspicion and apprehension. We teach them to shrink from our domestic animals; it is no uncommon sight to see a child cower with terror at the approach of a friendly dog. We attempt to exact instant obedience through shocking tales of goblin and bogey men, torturing their placid, susceptible imaginations with the most dreadful fears. Above all, we teach them to fear pain and sickness, and thus infest their minds with poisonous germs long before they contract them from any physical source.

3. No good purpose has ever been served by disturbing the nerves of our little ones with the emotion of fear. A child, for example, may suffer more from the fear of a fall than from the fall itself. While it is true that the early steps of a child must be watched, and its early experiences guided, yet a guardianship based on the instilling of fear into the young mind, is far more harmful than any baleful experience which the unguarded child may encounter. It is seldom that an accident befalls a child through its own lack of care or experience; the divine instinct for self-preservation works strongly and unconsciously from the very earliest stages of childhood. God

has created His creatures with the necessary provisions for the protection of life. Many of the bumps, both actual and figurative, which the child receives, are nature's method of gently preparing the child for the greater hardships, the heavier blows that she may ask him to encounter adequately later in life. And yet we see mothers endlessly warning their children not to jump,, not to run, lest they fall; not to do this, not to do that, lest they be hurt, subduing the child with the fear of hurtful consequences, and crippling their development by barring them from necessary experiences. The child will not be hurt by countless falls, but the fear of the fall which has been bred into him, will leave an indelible and hurtful impress upon his nervous organism.

4. The lessons of fear which the child receives from its parents are intensified by the methods employed at the school in which he receives his education and lifetraining. We glory in the fact that we have made great strides in the science of education, that we are more practical in the choice of subjects for study, that we have a deeper insight into the soul of the child. And yet, in our method of imparting knowledge and in the relations between teacher and pupil, we can boast of but little progress. We still look upon the child as a more or less unwilling receptacle that must be stuffed with learning. The teacher is still a being to be feared, the school room still a prison house, and learning a punishment.

5. Everything in nature, every form of existence enjoys absolute spontaneity and freedom, except man. In the very early stages of his existence, he is put into chains,

and passes through life from one stage or system of coercion to another. One of the reasons why the human mind is the least active of all his organs, why man is so frequently lazy to think, is because the faculty of thought was not permitted spontaneous exercise in the early steps of its training. It has become accustomed to work only under coercion or fear.

6. Children are not indolent by nature. Watch them at their games and see how much energy they expend, how much strength they lavish, and how much work they perform, and yet how much joy they derive from this expenditure of vitality. Why cannot knowledge be imparted by a method which will transform their play energy into learning energy? Why should they feel exhausted at the end of a lesson, and yet full of glee at the end of a game? Apply to a game the method you now apply in the class-room, and you will find that the children will abhor it and will quickly tire; while, if, on the other hand, you apply to a lesson the method employed in a game, the minds of the pupils will be exhilarated, and they will love their work. Children love play because it furnishes an adequate outlet to their superabundant physical energy. Knowledge likewise can be imparted in a way that will furnish an adequate outlet to their equally abundant mental energies. Children can be made to master a lesson with the same joy with which they master a new game. Fear and coercion defeat the aims of education, for their impress on the mind become a handicap to the child and lessens his fitness to meet the

greater issues of life for which education was originally intended.

7. A grievous error which the teachers of religion have committed in ages past, and to an almost equal degree today, is the fear of God which they have indelibly impressed upon young and old. "Fear thy God," has been the command to their followers-implying thereby that our God is a High Judge, a King, a despot even, watching closely the wrongdoings of His people, ready with His messengers of punishment behind Him in hosts, to mete out sickness and affliction and want upon those who violate the least of His injunctions or laws. In other words, we may say that, from this point of view, God has brought us into existence only that he might have greater multitudes to rule over, to command, and to direct.

8. It was not at all the intention of the Jewish teachers and sages of old to teach the fear of God. Many of their utterances regarding the relationship between God and man have been greatly misunderstood and therefore misinterpreted. This misunderstanding has been due greatly to the dual meaning of the Hebrew word, "Yirah." "Yirah" means both to reverence and to fear. This word, employed numerous times throughout the Pentateuch with reference to man's attitude toward God, may lead to the translation of either, "Fear thy God," or, "Reverence thy God." It is clear that the translators of the Bible did not consider the significance of the latter meaning and its import upon both the ethics and the character of the race. To revere our God means that we are to look upon Him