for the encouragement of others.  Why should I waste a single minute in such a negative and cheerless way as reading anybody’s personal abuse of anybody else—­least of all myself?

These silly outbursts never reach me and they never can; and they, therefore, utterly fail, and always will fail, of their aim; yet, my dear friend, there is nevertheless a serious side to such folly.  For it shows the need of education, education, education.  The religious editor and the preacher who took joy in his abuse of me have such a starved view of life that they cannot themselves, perhaps, ever be educated into kindliness and dignity of thought.  But their children may be—­must be.  Think of beautiful children growing up in a home where “excoriating” people who differ with you is regarded as a manly Christian exercise!  It is pitiful beyond words.  There is no way to lift up life that is on so low a level except by the free education of all the people.  Let us work for that and, when the growlers are done growling and forgotten, better men will remember us with gratitude.

I felt greatly complimented and pleased to receive an invitation the other day to attend the North Carolina Teachers’ Assembly in June.  I have many things to do in June, but I am going—­going with great pleasure.  I hope to see you there.  I know of no other company of people that I should be so glad to meet.  They are doing noble work—­the most devoted and useful work in this whole wide world.  They are the true leaders of the people.  I often wish that I were one of them.  They inspire me as nobody else does.  They are the army of our salvation.

Write me what they are doing.  Write me about the wonderful educational progress.  And write me about the peach trees and the budding imminence of spring; and about the children who now live all day outdoors and grow brown and plump.  And never mind that queer sect, “The Excoriators.”  They and their stage thunder will be forgotten to-morrow.  Meantime let us live and work for things nobler than any controversies, for things that are larger than the poor mission of any sect; and let us have charity and a patient pity for those that think they serve God by abusing their fellow-men.  I wish I saw some way to help them to a broader and a higher life.

     Faithfully yours,

     WALTER H. PAGE.

III

That Page should have little interest in “excoriators” at the time this letter was written—­in April, 1902—­was not surprising, for his educational campaign and that of his friends was now bearing fruit.  “Write me about the wonderful educational progress,” he says to this correspondent; and, indeed, the change that was coming over North Carolina and the South generally seemed to be tinged with the miraculous.  The “Forgotten Man” and the “Forgotten Woman” were rapidly coming into their own.  Two years after the delivery