upon a consciousness of values, a sense of proportion; the only way
in which wealth and poverty, rank and insignificance, can affect a
life, is in a certain degree of personal comfort; and it is one of
the most elementary lessons that one can learn, that it is not
either wealth or poverty that can confer even comfort, but the
sound constitution and the contented mind.

What I would here plead is that the artistic sense, of which I have
spoken, should be deliberately and consciously cultivated. It is
not an easy thing to get rid of conventionality, if one has been
brought up on conventional lines; but I know by personal experience
that the mere desire for simplicity and sincerity can effect
something.

All persons engaged in education, whether formally or informally,
whether as professed teachers or parents, ought to regard it as a
sacred duty to cultivate this sense among the objects of their
care. They ought to demand that all people, whether high or low,
should be met with the same simple courtesy and consideration; they
ought to train children both to speak their mind, and also to pay
respect to the opinion of others; they ought not to insist upon
obedience, without giving the reasons why it is desirable and
necessary; they ought resolutely to avoid malicious gossip, but not
the interested discussion of other personalities; they ought to
follow, and to give, direct and simple motives for action, and to
learn, if they do not know it, that it is from this simple and
quiet independence of mind that the best blessings, the best
happinesses come; above all, they ought to practise a real and
perceptive sympathy, to allow for differences of character and
taste, not to try so much to form children on the model of their