My Friends: I had a purpose in writing this novel.

It was to honor and magnify the sweetness and dignity of the condition of Motherhood, and of those womanly virtues and graces, which make the Home the cornerstone of the Nation.

For it is not with modern Americans, as it was with the old Greek and Roman world.

They put the family below the State, and the citizen absorbed the man.

On the contrary, we know, that just as the Family principle is strong the heart of the Nation is sound.