It is because we love the children that they do for us so great a good thing. It is for the reason that we know them and that they know us that we love them. We know them so intimately; and they know us so intimately; and we and they are such familiar friends! The grown people of other nations have sometimes, to quote the old phrase, "entered into the lives" of the children of the land; we in America have gone further;--we have permitted the children of our nation to enter into our lives. Indeed, we have invited them; and, once in, we have not deterred them from straying about as they would. The presence of the children in our lives,--so closely near, so intimately dear!--unites us in grave and serious concerns,--unites us to great and significant endeavors; and unites us even in smaller and lighter matters,--to a pleasant neighborliness one with another. However we may differ in other particulars, we are all alike in that we are tacitly pledged to the "cause" of children; it is the desire of all of us that the world be made a more fit place for them. And, as we labor toward the fulfillment of this desire, they are our most effectual helpers. In our wider efforts after social betterment, they help us. Because of them, we organize ourselves into national, and state, and municipal associations for the furtherance of better living,--physical, mental, and moral. Through them, we test each other's sincerity, and measure each other's strength, as social servants. In our wider efforts this is true. Is it not the case also when the field of our endeavors is narrower? Several years ago, I chanced to spend a week-end in a suburban town, the population of which is composed about equally of "old families," and of foreigners employed in the factory situated on the edge of the town. I was a guest in the home of a minister of the place. Both he and his wife believed that the most important work a church could do in that community was "settlement" work. "Home-making classes for the girls," the minister's wife reiterated again and again; and, "Classes in citizenship for the boys," her husband made frequent repetition, as we discussed the matter on the Saturday evening of my visit. "Why don't you have them?" I inquired. "We have no place to have them in," the minister replied. "Our parish has no parish-house, and cannot afford to build one." "Then, why not use the church?" I ventured. "If you knew the leading spirits in my congregation, you would not ask that!" the minister exclaimed. "Have you suggested it to them?" I asked. "Suggested!" the minister and his wife cried in chorus. "_Suggested_!" "I have besought them, I have begged them, I have implored them!" the minister continued. "It was no use. They are conservatives of the strictest type; and they cannot bring themselves even to consider seriously a plan that would necessitate using the church for the meeting of a boys' political debating club, or a girls' class in marketing."