“Such things occur constantly,” she said. “I daresay we have all heard the story of the little girl who said she liked to go to church when they sang the hymn about the bear. No? Well, it runs that she made this remark to her mother, who was more interested in her child’s preferences than it is likely any servant would have been. So she asked, ‘Which hymn is that, my dear?’ ‘Oh, the one about the bear that squints.’ ‘The bear that squints!’ said the mother, surprised, and knowing at once that something was wrong. ‘What does this mean?’ She could not ask the child to show the hymn, for she could not yet read. But instead of saying ‘Don’t be silly!’ she pursued the inquiry. ‘What makes you think there is anything about a bear that squints?’ ‘Oh, I’ve heard you sing it often,’ replied the child. ‘You sing “the consecrated cross-eye bear!”’” They both laughed. “That may be apocryphal,” commented Miss Foster, “but if so it is a fable which covers a great deal of fact.” “It need not be apocryphal,” returned Lucy. “A distinguished preacher once told me that as a child he learned the lines— “‘Satan trembles when he sees The weakest saint upon his knees.’ Surely a beautiful image, and one which to the adult mind it seems impossible to misunderstand. But from the standpoint of the child, accustomed himself constantly to sit on people’s knees, the idea presented itself differently. He fancied that it was the saint’s sitting on Satan’s knees which caused Satan’s agitation! It never occurred to him that there could be any other meaning, and his puzzle was not over any doubt on that head, but only concerning what, in such a circumstance, was the cause of Satan’s dismay, for he knew that if he himself sat on anybody’s knees, he was rather in that person’s power, and could be easily got rid of. He went on saying and singing that hymn for years, the wonderment always recurring. He told me that the truth did not dawn on him till he was a grown youth attending theological classes. Then he said it came with such a lightning-flash that it nearly made him cry out in chapel!” “There is even a more serious aspect of this kind of misunderstanding,” said Miss Foster, “which may really lead to a wrong stratum of character if children are not encouraged to speak out and show how they take things. Grown-up people sometimes say hasty or playful words which no other ‘grown-up’ would take literally, but children do. It often seems to me as if, though the little folk are themselves ready to ‘make believe’ to any extent, yet they cannot credit any ‘make believe’ in others. Let me tell you a story in illustration.