I should never dare to say to their faces what I write
so freely on the backs of their papers!

You see, the adult, too, has his love of freedom; and while he can
stand an indirect, impersonal preachment, which he may reject if he
likes without apology, he will not stand the insistence of a personal
appeal. I've let "Little Women" shame me into better conduct, when I
was a girl, at times when no direct speech from a living soul would
have brought me to anything but defiance--haven't you? We have to
apply our principles to the adult world about us, well as to the
child-world, and teach, when we permit ourselves to teach at all,
chiefly by example, by cheerful confession of fallibility, by
open-mindedness. Above all things, we have to respect the freedom of
these others, about whom we are so inconveniently anxious.

It is fair, though, that the spoken word should interpret what we do.
It is fair enough to tell your sister-in-law what you think and ask
her judgment upon it, if you can trust yourself not to rub your own
judgment in too hard. If you are unmarried, and a teacher, you will
have to concede to her preposterous marital conceit a humble and
inquiring attitude, and console your flustered soul by setting it
to the ingenious task of teaching by means of a graduated series of
artful inquiries. Don't, oh don't! seek for an outspoken victory.
Be content if some day you hear her proclaim your truth as her own
discovery. It never was yours, anyway, any more than it is hers or
than it is mine. Be glad that, while she claims it, she at least holds
it close.

If you are a mother, you are in an easier case. You can do to your own
children just what she ought to do to hers, and tell about it softly,
as if sure of her sympathy. If you are very sincere in your desire for
the welfare of her child, you may even ask her advice about yours, and
so gain the right to offer a little in exchange--say one-tenth of what
she gives.

All these warnings apply to unsought advice--a dangerous thing to
offer under any circumstances. Except there is a real emergency, you
had better avoid it. If your nephew or little neighbor is winning
along through his troubles fairly well, best keep hands off. But if
you absolutely _must_ interfere, guard yourself as I suggest, and
remember that, even then, you will assuredly get burned, if you play
long with that dangerous fire of maternal pride!

When your advice is sought, you are in a different posit