[Side note: I]

How is it that the master carefully scrutinizes the character of
a servant before admitting her into his house, lest her influence
in his home might be for evil, and that same man allows the
author to pass in unchallenged? The author comes, not to minister
but to master; to impress his thoughts on the minds and perhaps
blast the virtue of the children.

[Side note: 2]

Since every parent is bound to provide that his children's
apartments are well supplied with healthy air, is not the
obligation far more serious to take care that the moral
atmosphere of the home does not hold the deadliest poisons in
solution?

[Side note: 3]

[Side note: Questions]

Why does not the young girl, who is so fastidious about the class
of people with whom she will associate, exercise even ordinary
discrimination in the selection of an author? This is the
companion whose influence sinks deeper and lasts longer than that
of the person with whom she sips tea or takes a walk. He whispers
into her soul under the shade of the midnight lamp. He embeds his
principles on her brain. He lives in her dreams. He becomes her
oracle to conjure by.