DAUGHTERS 333 



and allowing another raises a curiosity which will do far 

 more harm than leaving it alone. All that is harmful in 

 the Bible or Shakespeare is simply not understood. Why 

 should it not be the same with other books? No one 

 ever dreams of what they do not know. Dreams often 

 distort and twist our knowledge ; no dream ever instructs 

 us in anything of which we are ignorant. 



Without forbidding any one book or other, it would 

 be wise for a mother to recommend her daughter not to 

 read the current novels of the day, at the time they are 

 being continually discussed in public, if they are of a 

 nature which unfits her to join in the conversation. It 

 is not that there is harm in having read the book, but 

 there are some things which it is impossible for a girl to 

 talk about. In Eichter's ' Levana,' which I mention 

 elsewhere, there are some excellent passages on this very 

 subject. In this permission to read or not to read books, 

 as in all else that seriously concerns the education of 

 children, the all-important thing is that the father and 

 mother should agree. Nothing has so bad an effect on 

 children, and they are quick to learn it, as that father 

 thinks one thing and mother another. A wife had far 

 better allow a fault to pass than try to stop that which 

 she knows her husband would allow ; and a husband had 

 far better back the mother when he thinks her wrong 

 than condemn her before her children. There is an old 

 saying that widows' children turn out well. I do not 

 think this means that women are more fitted to manage 

 a family alone than men are, but men very rarely give the 

 subject their consideration. There is nothing, when men 

 really try, that they do not do better than women from 

 the highest in art and literature, to the humblest cooking 

 and tailoring. I think the old saw merely means that one 

 will and one law are better than a divided judgment. If 

 a woman has strong views on education, let her begin by 



