supernatural in itself, tells beyond the supernatural sphere and raises the natural qualities, by self-knowledge, by truth, by the safeguard of religion against hardness and isolation and the blindness of pride, even if the minimum of educational facilities have been at work to take advantage of these openings for good.  A Catholic child is a child, and keeps a childlike spirit for life, unless the early training is completely shipwrecked, and even then there are memories which are means of recovery, and the way home to the Father’s house is known.  It may be hoped that very many never leave it, and never lose the sense of being one of the great family, “of the household of faith.”  They enjoy the freedom of the house, the rights of children, the ministries of all the graces which belong to the household, the power of being at home in every place because the Church is there with its priesthood and its Sacraments, responsible for its children, and able to supply the wants of their souls.  It is scarcely possible to find among Catholic children the inaccessible little bits of flint who are not brought up, but bring up their own souls outside the Church—­proud in their isolation, most proud of never yielding inward obedience or owning themselves in the wrong, and of being sufficient for themselves.  When the grace of Q-od reaches them and they are admitted into the Church, one of the most overwhelming experiences is that of becoming one of a family, for whom there is some one responsible, the Father of the family whose authority and love pass through their appointed channels, down to the least child.

There is no such thing as an orphan child within the Church, there are possibilities of training and development which belong to those who have to educate the young which must appeal particularly to Catholic teachers, for they know more than others the priceless value of the children with whom they have to do.  Children, souls, freighted for their voyage through life, vessels so frail and bound for such a port are worthy of the devoted care of those who have necessarily a lifelong influence over them, and the means of using that influence for their lifelong good ought to be a matter of most earnest study.  Knowledge must come before action, and first-hand knowledge, acquired by observation, is worth more than theoretic acquirements; the first may supply for the second, but not the second for the first.  There are two types of educators of early childhood which no theory could produce, and indeed no theory could tell how they are produced, but they stand unrivalled—­one is the English nurse and the other the Irish.  The English nurse is a being apart, with a profound sense of fitness in all things, herself the slave of duty; and having certain ideals transmitted, who can tell how, by an unwritten traditional code, as to what ought to be, and a gift of authority by which she secures that these things shall be, reverence for God, reverence