The philosophical jurist will not regard this investigation, when
thus carried back even to the ultimate principles of the
transcendental philosophy, as an unnecessary subtlety in a
metaphysic of morals, or as losing itself in aimless obscurity, when
he takes into consideration the difficulty of doing justice in this
inquiry to the ultimate relations of the principles of right.
29. The Rights of the Parent.
From the duty thus indicated, there further necessarily arises the
right of the parents to the management and training of the child, so
long as it is itself incapable of making proper use of its body as
an organism, and of its mind as an understanding. This involves its
nourishment and the care of its education. This includes, in
general, the function of forming and developing it practically, that
it may be able in the future to maintain and advance itself, and
also its moral culture and development, the guilt of neglecting it
falling upon the parents. All this training is to be continued till
the child reaches the period of emancipation (emancipatio), as the age
of practicable self-support. The parents then virtually renounce the
parental right to command, as well as all claim to repayment for their
previous care and trouble; for which care and trouble, after the
process of education is complete, they can only appeal to the
children, by way of any claim, on the ground of the obligation of
gratitude as a duty of virtue.
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