artful adaptations of life and form which grip the imaginations of
little folks.

The diet of babes cannot be determined by the needs of grown-ups. A
spiritual malnutrition which starves would soon set in if adult wisdom
were imposed on children for their sustenance. The truth is amply
illustrated by those pathetic objects of our acquaintance, the men and
women who have never been boys and girls.

To cast out the fairy tale is to rob human beings of their childhood,
that transition period in which breadth and richness are given to
human life so that it may be full and plastic enough to permit the
creation of those exacting efficiencies which increasing knowledge and
responsibility compel. We cannot omit the adventures of fairyland from
our educational program. They are too well adapted to the restless,
active, and unrestrained life of childhood. They take the objects
which little boys and girls know vividly and personify them so that
instinctive hopes and fears may play and be disciplined.

While the fairy tales have no immediate purpose other than to amuse,
they leave a substantial by-product which has a moral significance. In
every reaction which the child has for distress or humor in the tale,
he deposits another layer of vicarious experience which sets his
character more firmly in the mould of right or wrong attitude. Every
sympathy, every aversion helps to set the impulsive currents of his
life, and to give direction to his personality.

Because of the important aesthetic and ethical bearings of this form
of literary experience, the fairy stories must be rightly chosen and
artfully told. In no other way can their full worth in education be