Inspirational Stories: Adventures in Many Lands

In writing these stories, no attempt has been made to follow the plot or problem of the poems, which in almost every case lies beyond the child's reach. The simple purpose as found in the whole, or the suggestion of only a stanza or scene, has been used as opportunity for picturing and reflecting something of the poetry and intention of the originals.

The writer hopes for "Child Stories" that it may serve to suggest to teachers how they may utilize the great store of poetry and art at hand. To do this they are themselves under the joyful necessity of keeping close to the great sources. On this last point Mr. Wm. T. Harris says: "A view of the world is a perpetual stimulant to thought, always prompting one to reflect on the immediate fact or event before him, and to discover its relation to the ultimate principle of the universe. It is the only antidote for the constant tendency of the teacher to sink into a dead formalism, the effect of too much iteration and of the practice of adjusting knowledge to the needs of the feeble-minded by perpetual explanation of what is already simple ad nauseam for the mature intelligence of the teacher. It produces a sort of pedagogical cramp in the soul, for which there is no remedy like a philosophical view of the world, unless, perhaps, it is the study of the greatest poets, Shakespeare, Dante, and Homer."