“Such was the foundation upon which I built. I determined that there should not be a minute in the day when my children should not be aware from my face and my lips that my heart was theirs, that their happiness was my happiness, and their pleasures my pleasures. “Man readily accepts what is good, and the child readily listens to it; but it is not for you that he wants it, master and educator, but for himself. The good to which you would lead him must not depend on your capricious humour or passion; it must be a good which is good in itself and by the nature of things, and which the child can recognize as good. He must feel the necessity of your will in things which concern his comfort before he can be expected to obey it. “Whatever he does gladly, whatever gains him credit, whatever tends to accomplish his great hopes, whatever awakens his powers and enables him truly to say _I can_, all this he _wills_. “But this will is not aroused by words; it is aroused only by a kind of complete culture which gives feelings and powers. Words do not give the thing itself, but only an expression, a clear picture, of the thing which we already have in our minds. “Before all things I was bound to gain the confidence and the love of the children. I was sure that if I succeeded in this all the rest would come of itself. Friend, only think how I was placed, and how great were the prejudices of the people and of the children themselves, and you will comprehend what difficulties I had to overcome.” After narrating what we already know he goes on: “Think, my friend, of this temper of the people, of my weakness, of my poor appearance, of the ill-will to which I was almost publicly exposed, and then judge how much I had to endure for the sake of carrying on my work. “And yet, however painful this want of help and support was to me, it was favourable to the success of my undertaking, for it compelled me to be always everything for my children. I was alone with them from morning till night. It was from me that they received all that could do them good, soul and body. All needful help, consolation, and instruction they received direct from me. Their hands were in mine, my eyes were fixed on theirs. “We wept and smiled together. They forgot the world and Stanz; they only knew that they were with me and I with them. We shared our food and drink. I had about me neither family, friends, nor servants; nothing but them. I was with them in sickness, and in health, and when they slept. I was the last to go to bed, and the first to get up. In the bedroom I prayed with them, and, at their own request, taught them till they fell asleep. Their clothes and bodies were intolerably filthy, but I looked after both myself, and was thus constantly exposed to the risk of contagion.