"To deny that wrong and pitiful things exist in life is folly,
but to believe that these things are made better by promiscuous
discussion at the hands of writers who FAIL TO PROVE BY THEIR
BOOKS that their viewpoint is either right, clean, or helpful, is
close to insanity. If there is to be any error on either side in
a book, then God knows it is far better that it should be upon
the side of pure sentiment and high ideals than upon that of a
too loose discussion of subjects which often open to a large part
of the world their first knowledge of such forms of sin,
profligate expenditure, and waste of life's best opportunities.
There is one great beauty in idealized romance: reading it can
make no one worse than he is, while it may help thousands to a
cleaner life and higher inspiration than they ever before have
known."
Mrs. Porter has written ten books, and it is not out of place
here to express her attitude toward them. Each was written, she
says, from her heart's best impulses. They are as clean and
helpful as she knew how to make them, as beautiful and
interesting. She has never spared herself in the least degree,
mind or body, when it came to giving her best, and she has never
considered money in relation to what she was writing.
During the hard work and exposure of those early years, during
rainy days and many nights in the darkroom, she went straight
ahead with field work, sending around the globe for books and
delving to secure material for such books as "Birds of the
Bible," "Music of the Wild," and "Moths of the Limberlost.
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