Ahmadiyyat or The True Islam — Page 224
224 parents of their duty to start the instruction of the child from the moment of its birth. Those parents who realize the significance of this Islamic injunction, will be careful to see that the child is trained to habits of virtue and order from its infancy. It is not to be supposed that they should recite the Adh a n in its ears at the moment of its birth and should then neglect its training till after it grows up. The understanding of a child grows daily in strength, and the stronger it grows the greater the neces- sity of training it. Secondly, the injunction prescribing the recitation of the Adh a n into the ears of a newly born child indicates that the intelligence of the child grows steadily from the moment of its birth, and that it does not attain to full discretion at any given moment. Full discretion is the sum of the impressions which the child has accumulated since its birth. Not a single impression is ever entirely lost. The impression itself may be for- gotten but it leaves behind a legacy of developed intel- lect and discretion. This is confirmed by experience. There have been instances of nervous breakdown during which men have been known to utter phrases and sen- tences in languages of which they were entirely igno- rant. Enquiries have, however, revealed the fact that those phrases and sentences were heard by them in their infancy when they were still in the cradle, and were retained in a corner of the brain. When the objective mind was affected by the breakdown, the subjective mind began to act and old impressions were revived. In short, this Islamic injunction is based on profound wisdom, and is extremely helpful in the moral training of man.