"There is no place that is so small, petty and narrow as the home is; there is no place so close, cramped and crowded; so limited, restricted and tape-measured. There's no place where there is such agreement, unity and uniformity; where there is so much subordination, subjection and coöppression--if you will pardon the coining of a word--as in the home; no place where there is such conformity of opinion, speech and action; where there is so much dependence, inter-dependence and inter-domination; where so much good advice is given you, so many high examples set up and so many paragons of perfection presented to you; no place where there's so much upholding of old standards and so little scope for building new ones; where respectability is regarded with such reverence and the neighbors' say held so sacred; no place so lacking initiative, so barren of originality, so devoid of daring--no place where you are so tenderly cared for, so kindly comforted, so closely watched, and so grossly misunderstood as the home. It is the most dangerous place in the world. "No, do not interrupt me--I know just what you are going to say. Let me state it for you--while I am at it. What I said is blasphemy, of course, and what you want to say is that the home is the garden where all our virtues flower and bloom; that it is the foundation of our morals, the birthplace of our highest ideals, the great character-builder, the school of patriotism, the source of true religion, the protector of our national life, the benign soul-uplifter, the place where goodness and purity flourish, and the place where the best principles are manufactured. I know just what you are going to say because I, too, have heard some sermons and have read some after-dinner speeches in my life. And I do not say that these utterances are altogether misleading. There is some good, I doubt not, in a sermon and some shadow of truth even in an after-dinner speech. But because the home has ever been the subject of indiscriminate encomiums and puffy panegyrics, no one has ever dared to say anything against it. It has not been treated as a human institution, and so many crimes have been committed in its good name. It is because these beautiful things about it are, or are supposed to be, that so many of us have been sentenced to stay home without a proper trial.