Is it "that touch of nature
which makes the whole world kin"? Is it the perfect self-forgetfulness
of the children? Is it a touch of self-pity that the radiant visions
of our childhood days have been dispelled, and the years have brought
the "inevitable yoke"? Or is it the touching sight of so much
happiness contrasted with what we know the home life to be?
Sydney Smith says: "If you make children happy now, you will make them
happy twenty years hence by the memory of it;" and we know that virtue
kindles at the touch of this joy. "Selfishness, rudeness, and similar
weedy growths of school-life or of street-independence cannot grow in
such an atmosphere. For joy is as foreign to tumult and destruction,
to harshness and selfish disregard of others, as the serene, vernal
sky with its refreshing breezes is foreign to the uproar and terrors
of the hurricane."
For this kind of ideal play we are indebted to Friedrich Froebel, and
if he had left no other legacy to childhood, we should exalt him for
it.
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