where every benefactor becomes so easily a malefactor, only by
continuation of his activity into places where it is not due; where
children seem so much at the mercy of their foolish parents, and where
almost all men are too social and interfering. We rightly speak of the
guardian angels of children. How superior in their security from
infusions of evil persons, from vulgarity and second thought! They
shed their own abundant beauty on the objects they behold. Therefore,
they are not at the mercy of such poor educators as we adults. If we
huff and chide them, they soon come not to mind it, and get a
self-reliance; and if we indulge them to folly, they learn the
limitation elsewhere.

We need not fear excessive influence. A more generous trust is
permitted. Serve the great. Stick at no humiliation. Grudge no office
thou canst render. Be the limb of their body, the breath of their
mouth. Compromise thy egotism. Who cares for that, so thou gain aught
wider and nobler? Never mind the taunt of Boswellism: the devotion may
easily be greater than the wretched pride which is guarding its own
skirts. Be another: not thyself, but a Platonist; not a soul, but a
Christian; not a naturalist, but a Cartesian; not a poet, but a
Shakspearian. In vain, the wheels of tendency will not stop, nor will
all the forces of inertia, fear, or love itself, hold thee there. On,
and forever onward! The microscope observes a monad or wheel-insect
among the infusories circulating in water. Presently, a dot appears
on the animal, which enlarges to a slit, and it becomes two perfect
animals. The ever-proceeding detachment appears not less in all thought,
and in society. Children think they cannot live without their parents.
But, long before they are aware of it, the black dot has appeared, and
the detachment taken place. Any accident will now reveal to them their
independence.