sick," she is saying that which is not so, but instead of
reproving her for lying, you prepare an imaginary pill for the doll.
Many children's lies are simply elaborations of their doll- and
plaything-imaginings. When my little daughter told me, and insisted upon
it, that she had seen seven bears, of varied colors, on the avenue,
should I have reproved her for lying? Was it not better to humor her
fancy, to draw it out, to give it free play, being careful gradually to
let her know that I knew it was fancy? I entered into the game with her
and enjoyed it so long as we all understood it was only fancy. It is a
crime to crush a child's power of creating a world by imagination, a
fair world, set in the midst of this world where things are imperfect,
jarring, and disappointing, a world in which everything is always "just
so."

But one must also carefully aid the child in distinguishing between the
world of fancy and the world of fact. This takes time and patience. We
must not rob the life of fancy nor must we allow the habits of freedom
with ideas to pass over into habits of carelessly handling realities.
Along with the development of fancy we must train the powers of exact
observation and statement of facts. The child who saw seven bears, red,
green, yellow, etc., must go to see real bears and must tell me exactly
their colors and forms. Daily training in exactitude of statements of
real facts is the best antidote for a fancy that has run out of its
bounds. It establishes a habit of precision in thinking which is the
essence of truth-telling.

Sec. 2. PROTECTIVE LYING

But there is another form of lying which is frequently met in some form.
It may be called protective lying. Ask the little fellow with the
jam-smeared face, "Have you been in the pantry?" and he is likely to do
the same thing that nature does for the birds when she gives them a coat
that makes it easier to hide from their enemies. He valiantly answers
"No, Mother." He would protect himself from your reproof. There has been
awakened before this the desire to seem good in your eyes and he desires
your approbation most of all. The moral struggle with him is very brief;
he does not yet distinguish between being good and seeming good; if his
negative answer will help him to seem good he will give it.

What shall we do? First, stop long enough to remember that appetites for
jam speak louder than your verbal prohibitions. The jam was there and
you were not. I