dance.

FOOTNOTES:

[24] I am following here, as elsewhere, the direction indicated by the
German philosopher, my obligations to whom I have before acknowledged,
and from whose work on the Science of Pedagogy I have so often quoted.

[25] We may, from the same cause, expect soon to detect signs of the
same trouble, to a marked degree, in Russia.

[26] Plato, _Rep._, Book III.

[27] _Pedagogics as a System._ Rosenkranz, p. 83, Published by William
T. Harris, St. Louis, Mo.

A MOTHER'S THOUGHT

ON THE

EDUCATION OF GIRLS.

"Why does the meadow flower its bloom expand?
Because the lovely little flower is free
Down to its root, and in that freedom bold.
And so the grandeur of the forest tree
Comes not from casting in a formed mould,
But from its own divine vitality."

A MOTHER'S THOUGHT

ON THE

EDUCATION OF GIRLS.

There is no situation in life more freighted with responsibility than
that of the mother of girls, be it one or many, the one as heavy as the
many, because the only child is less naturally situated; and therefore
upon the mother rests the necessity of intentionally providing many
influences which are spontaneously produced in a large and varied family
circle.

I emphasize also the responsibility of the education of girls over boys
for the same reason, because girls are more largely withdrawn from the
natural education of life and circumstances than boys, and their
development seems to depend more exclusively upon the individual
influence of the mother.

The public school, the play-ground, the freedom of boyish sports, the
early departure from home to college or business, the prizes offered to
ambition, all exercise a powerful influence upon the boy, tending to
modify the action of the mother's conscious training. More powerful than
her intellectual and determined effort is usually her affectional
influence, swaying him unconsciously and giving him always a centre for
his heart and life, to which he returns from all his wanderings.

For men, too, life, with all its evil, seems to be measurably adjusted.
We do not hear constant discussions of men's sphere and men's education.
Each man is left very much to work out his own career, without the
responsibility of the whole sex resting upon him. He is at liberty to
make mistakes in his medical practice, to blow up steamboats by his
carelessness, to preach dull sermons, and write silly books, withou