Children ought to have stories at hand precisely as they ought to have
food, toys, games, playgrounds, because stories meet one of the normal
needs of their natures. But these stories, like the food given to the
body, ought to be intelligently selected, not only for their quality
but for their adaptation. There are many good books which ought not to
be in the hands of children because children have not had the
experience which interprets them; they will either fail to understand,
or if they understand, they will suffer a sudden forcing of growth in
the knowledge of life which is always unwholesome.

Only stories which are sound in the views of life they present ought
to be within the reach of children; these stories ought to be well
constructed and well written; they ought to be largely objective
stories; they ought not to be introspective, morbid or abnormal in any
way. Goody-good and professionally "pious" stories, sentimental or
unreal stories, ought to be rigorously excluded. A great deal of
fiction specially written for children ought to be left severely
alone; it is cheap, shallow and stamped with unreality from cover to
cover. It is as unwise to feed the minds of children exclusively on
books specially prepared for their particular age as to shape the
talk at breakfast or dinner specially for their stage of development;
few opportunities for education are more valuable for a child than
hearing the talk of its elders about the topics of the time. There are
many wholesome and entertaining stories in the vast mass of fiction
addressed to younger readers; but this literature of a period ought
never to exclude the literature of all periods.

The stories collected in this volume have been selected from many
sources, because in the judgment of the editor, they are sound pieces