But with all these sources of value, its highest and
most beautiful use is the means which it gives us to create
ideals or standards. If we lacked these two elements, we
should have nothing to strive for or judge our actions, and
life would soon lose all its charms. To the general on the
field of battle it pictures the personality of some famous
leader; and to the boy or girl who leaves the shelter of home
it brings to view the father or mother whose life shines
forth as a living incentive to nobler and higher aspiration.
Scarcely less valuable, is its relation to man as a means
of broadening his intellectual horizon. That this was rec
ognized long ago, we need only refer to Plato who recom
mended that literature both “true and false” should be
taught the youth at an early age, meaning by “false,” stor
ies, myths and moral poems which would stimulate the ima
ginative activity. It gives a breadth of culture that could
not be otherwise reached, and it opens up history, geogra
phy, and reading by bringing before the mind’s eye, im
ages, that perhaps might never be realized in any other way.
Outside of its educational qualities, it is a mental ac
tivity that is peculiarly fitting to the younger members of the
race. Banish this element out of their lives and what have
you? Why nothing but a premature and only partially de
veloped people. The feelings are now at their highest ebb
and must have some means of giving vent to themselves. It
may be in some physicial manifestation, but just as often
they free themselves in lofty flights of imagination where
the unseen seems to give as much pleasure and profit as the
objects of these images do themselves. If youth knew no
mental activity but reason and cold intellect, it would lose
all its charms and the flower of the race would be no more
attractive and inspiring than the adult’s seriousness of later
life.
When we consider the field of literature, especially
poetry and the drama, and see what elements are funda-