imply as literature. The words, the phrases, the
ideals which literature offers so lavishly, unconsciously stir the
mind to lofty motives and the true perception of the meaning of life.
We must not, of course, commit the fatal blunder of making a didactic
lesson out of what is read. We take care that it is understood and
illustrated, and then leave it to have its own effect."

Children behave better when their minds are occupied; an interest in
literature has proved in numerous instances to be an aid to discipline
in the schoolroom. It is sad to think how little that is refining and
elevating comes into the lives of many children. The attitude of the
average school boy toward life is shown by the fact that he refers to
any stranger as a "guy". The rough horse play of the movies fills such
a boy with exquisite delight. To see on the screen a man have a lot of
dough slapped in his face is the highest form of humor. His mind is
active but it has no suitable nourishment. What is needed is to direct
it. President Angell has told us how boys were inspired by that great
teacher Alice Freeman Palmer:

"I attended a class in English Literature which she was teaching. The
class was composed of boys from fifteen to eighteen years of age, in
whom one would perhaps hardly expect much enthusiasm for the great
masters of English Literature. But it was soon apparent that she had
those boys completely under her control and largely filled with her
own enthusiasm. They showed that at their homes they had been
carefully and lovingly reading some of the great masterpieces and were
ready to discuss them with intelligence and zest."

"Mind grows," says Carlyle, "like a spirit--thought kindling itself at
the fire of living thought."

To keep the heart open to elevating influences, to enjoy really
beautiful things, to take a dignified and noble view of life, these
are the results that must follow association with the best thoughts of
the best minds, which is literature. And it is one of the wonders of
literature that some of the best of it is adapted to every order of
intelligence. When one gets older his mental field widens, he cannot
then read all the best, he must choose; but the classic books for
children are not so numerous that the child may not read and reread
them.

Cultivation of the literary taste of the child may begin as soon as he
can talk. He will early take an interest in simple stories and poems
and sooner than many suppos