If you can lead children to cure themselves of their faults in such a way that they shall have a good time in doing it, there is a double gain.
In due time, by this kind of management, and by other modes conceived and executed in the same spirit, Bella gained so great an ascendency over the children that they were far more ready to conform to her will, and to obey all her directions, than they would have been to submit to the most legitimate authority that was maintained, as such authority too often is, by fault-finding and threats, and without any sympathy with the fancies and feelings which reign over the hearts of the children in the little world in which they live..