Since There Are Thousands Of Fairy Tales,

Punishment May Make Us Obey The Orders We Are Given, But At Best It Will Only Teach An Obedience To Authority, Not A Self-control Which Enhances Our Self-respect.

What Cannot Be Talked About Cannot Be Put To Rest. And If It Is Not, The Wounds Will Fester From Generation To Generation.

The Question For The Child Is Not Do I Want To Be Good? But Whom Do I Want To Be Like?

Fairy Tales Are Loved By The Child Not Because The Imagery He Finds In Them Conforms To What Goes On Within Him, But Because--despite All The Angry, Anxious Thoughts In His Mind To Which The Fairy Tale Gives Body And Specific Content--these Stories Always Result In A Happy Outcome, Which The Child Cannot Imagine On His Own.

Plato--who May Have Understood Better What Forms The Mind Of Man Than Do Some Of Our Contemporaries Who Want Their Children Exposed Only To "real" People And Everyday Events--knew What Intellectual Experience Made For True Humanity. He Suggested That The Future Citizens Of His Ideal Republic Begin Their Literary Education With The Telling Of Myths, Rather Than With Mere Facts Or So-called Rational Teachings.