ssed.

In claiming thus for our children's books this embodiment of wholesome
truth in beautiful forms, we are not favoring any feeble
_dilettanteism_, or sacrificing practical strength to pleasant fancy.
Nay, quite the contrary; for it is certain that truth has power,
especially with the young, only when it is so embodied as to show itself
in the life, and to speak and act for itself. We believe in dynamic
reading for children; and we now make a distinct and decided point of
this, quite positive, as we are, that books are a curse, if they merely
excite the sensibilities and stimulate the nerves and brain, and bring
on sedentary languor, and do not stir the muscles, and quicken the will,
and set the hand and foot to work and play under the promptings of a
cheerful heart. Undoubtedly many children read too much, and spindle
legs and narrow chests and dropsical heads are the sad retribution upon
the excess. But the best books are good tonics, and as refreshing and
strengthening as the sunshine and the sea-water, the singing-circle, and
the play-ground. Let us encourage this tonic quality in our juvenile
literature, and favor as much of sound muscular morality and religion as
stories of adventure, sketches of sports, hints of exercise and health,
with all manner of winning illustrations, can give. It is well that Dio
Lewis is now on a mission to our Young Folks, and after exhorting
adults, and especially the clergy, to repent of their manifold sins
against the body, he is now carrying the gospel of health to children;
and I have been quite amused at having him quoted against my own
physical transgressions, by his most attentive reader, the youngest
member of the family. The cure should not stop there; but the tonic
force should knock at every door of the mental and moral faculties, and
touch every chord of latent power. A fresh, free, dauntless will should
breathe through every page, and be the invigorating air of our juvenile
literature, and be as essential to its strength as truth is to its light
and beauty to its color. The great social, civil, and religious forces
that move the nation should be brought to bear upon the young, not by
learned essays or by ambitious philosophizing, but by living
portraitures and taking life-sketches, stirring songs and ballads. A
good home story can express as much of the law and economy of the
household as a chapter of Paley or Wayland. Our girls and boys will feel
the great pulse-beat o