Part 6 (1/2)

Jane S came home with her clothes soiled and hands badly torn

”Where have you been?” asked her mother

”I fell down the bank near the mill,” said Jane, ”and I should have been drowned, if Mr M had not seen e of the brink?”

”There was a pretty flower there that I wanted, and I only meant to take one step, but I slipped and fell down”

_Moral_: Young people often take but one step in sinful indulgence [Poor Jane!], but they fall into soul-destroying sins

They can do it by a single act of sin [The heinous act of picking a flower!] They do it; but the act leads to another, and they fall into the gulf of Perdition, unless God interposes

Now, quite apart frorounds Could we iine a lower standard of a Deity than that presented here to the child?

Today the teacher would coht add a word of caution about choosing inclined planes in the close neighborhood of a body of running water as a hunting ground for specimens and a popular, lucid explanation of the inexorable law of gravity

Here we have an instance of applying a moral e have finished our story, but there areis left to chance in this enuity or i for himself

Henry Morley has condemned the use of thisin a fairy story is like the snoring of _Bottom_ in _titania's_ lap”

But I think this applies to all stories, and most especially to those by which we do wish to teach sohs says in his article, ”Thou Shalt Not Preach”:[19]

”Didactic fiction can never rank high Thou shalt not preach or teach; thou shalt portray and create, and have ends as universal as natureWhat Art demands is that the artist's personal convictions and notions, his likes and dislikes, do not obtrude theed in his work by the logic of events, as they do in nature, and not by any special pleading on his part He does non hold a brief for either side; he exereat artist works in and _through_ and _from_ moral ideas; his works are indirectly a criticis a ins to fall froreat distinction of Art is that it aims to see life steadily and to see it wholeIt affords the one point of viehence the world appears harmonious and coe, that it is of _s dramatically

In Froebel's ”Mother Play” he de that their highest use consists in their ability to enable the child, through _suggestion_, to form a pure and noble idea of what a man may be or do The sensitiveness of a child's mind is offended if the moral is forced upon him, but if he absorbs it unconsciously, he has received its influence for all ti out thea flower on a stalk instead of letting the flower grow out of the stalk, as Nature has intended In the first case, the flower, showy and bright for the moment, soon fades away

In the second instance, it develops slowly, co to perfection in fullness of time because of the life within

Lastly, the element to avoid is that which rouses emotions which cannot be translated into action

Mr Earl Barnes, to whoratitude for the inspiration of his educational views, insists strongly on this point

The sole effect of such stories is to produce a form of hysteria, fortunately short-lived, but a waste of force which ht be directed into a better channel[20] Such stories are so easy to recognize that it would be useless to make a for with stories from the lives of the saints

These, then, are the main elements to avoid in the selection of ht be added in the way of detail, and the special tendency of the day may make it necessary to avoid one class of story eneration of teachers and parents

CHAPTER V ELEMENTS TO SEEK IN CHOICE OF MATERIAL

In his ”Choice of Books,” Frederic Harrison has said: ”Theis to knoe shall _not_ read, e shall keep frole of infor knowledge”