n, too, I want you to leave school with introductions to all sorts of
nice people in books; you will find it do you as much good as social
introductions. Schoolgirls are often "out of it" for a time, when they go
home, because they had only "lesson-book" interests; I should like to
begin outside interests with you.

Also, this kind of general interest makes the world seem bigger and more
interesting; we get an idea of how many delightful things there are in it,
and so our pleasures are increased, which is always a great advantage.
Happiness is a duty, and sensible interests are a wonderful help to it.

Touching on many interests shows us our ignorance. I have known
schoolgirls, who were kept to their lessons, Algebra and Latin and periods
of History, and who thought they knew a good deal, because they measured
by a schoolroom standard. When they came in contact with the number of
things that cultivated people of society care for and appreciate, they
learnt a good deal of humility. Certainly the more I read on general
subjects the more I feel my own ignorance, and I think it would be very
odd if it did not have the same effect on you.

The next reason for this sort of lesson, and one of the best, is that it
ought to raise our taste. It is not enough to like or dislike a book: we
ought to train ourselves to like the best books. We do not think ourselves
born judges in music or art; we submit to being trained before we think
our opinion worth giving. It would be just so with a book, but you often
hear girls quite sorry for the author if they find a book dull; they feel
he is to blame! When I find an author dull, whom good critics admire, I
feel pretty sure that I am deficient on that point, and I try to learn to
see in him what they do. I speak from experience; when I found Wordsworth
dull, I knew it was my own fault, and I read and re-read him, and listened
to those who could appreciate him, and now I am rewarded by his being a
real part of the pleasures of my life. We need not leave off liking the
merely pretty writers, such as Miss Procter and Longfellow. I love
Longfellow and admire Miss Procter, but I cared for them both quite as
much when I was seven, and an author who can be in some measure
appreciated at seven ought to give way to deeper authors by-and-by. Like
Guinevere, it is our duty "to love the highest." The great good of
cultivated homes is that we learn to "put away childish things" and to
admire the better