PEDIATRICS Vol. 51 No. 4 April 1973, pp. 619
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THE DUTY OF PARENTS TOWARD THEIR DEPRAVED CHILDREN—

T. E. C. Jr. M.D.

Complete rejection of the belief in depravity or innate tendencies to wickedness of children did not appear generally in popular American literature until just before The Civil War.1 The following passage, written in 1810 by Cyrus Comstock of Hartford, Connecticut, typifies the generally accepted Calvinist belief of the early 1800s in the innate depravity of children:

It is a consideration truly to be deplored that children have depraved hearts. This depravity, if unrestrained, will certainly lead them in the road to eternal ruin. And when parents out of excessive fondness, indulge their children in every thing, and resign their own judgments, and suffer themselves to be governed by them, they strengthen this depravity, and bind their children stronger and stronger, under these chains of moral darkness, and it would be just with God, if he should reserve such children under these chains of darkness to the judgment day. There parents must meet their children and give an account how they train them up. 2