ABSTRACT
Chapter 3 traces changes to ideas on how to bring up a child from the Renaissance and Reformation through to the Enlightenment and the Romantic Movement. In doing so it explores the influential ideas of Erasmus, Locke, Rousseau and Wordsworth. In Renaissance writings fathers, influenced by their classical learning, were urged to take the lead in child-rearing. In Protestant countries there was anxiety that children, born in a state of sin, might die before they came to a sense of salvation and this sometimes led to harsh disciplining of wayward children. In Catholic countries the Church took on a role of rearing children, sometimes in opposition to what it saw as the lax habits of families. By the eighteenth century secular attitudes were more common and the aim in child-rearing came to train the child in habits that would produce a good adult. Rousseau challenged this and his ideas fed through into the writings of the Romantic poets: for Wordsworth children came straight from heaven, not tainted with original sin. Childhood came to be seen as the best time of life. Children should be happy.
