e natural expression of the spirit, without
self-consciousness, constraint, or the tyranny of hours and tasks. It is
the highest form of energy, because it is free and creative; a joy in
itself, and therefore a joy in the world. This is the explanation of the
sense of freedom and elation which come from a great work of art; it is
the instinctive perception of the fact that while immense toil lies
behind the artist's skill, the soul of the creation came from beyond the
world of work and the making of it was a bit of play. The man of
creative spirit is often a tireless worker, but in his happiest hours he
is at play; for all work, when it rises into freedom and power, is play.
"We work," wrote a Greek thinker of the most creative people who have
yet appeared, "in order that we may have leisure." The note of that life
was freedom; its activity was not "evoked by external needs, but was
free, spontaneous and delightful; an ordered energy which stimulates all
the vital and mental powers."

Robert Louis Stevenson, who knew well how to touch work with the spirit
and charm of play, reports of certain evenings spent at a clubhouse near
Brussels, that the men who gathered there "were employed over the
frivolous mercantile concerns of Belgium during the day; but in the
evening they found some hours for the serious concerns of life." They
gave their days to commerce, but their evenings were devoted to more
important interests!

These words are written for those older people who have made the mistake
of straying away from childhood; children do not read introductions,
because they know that the valuable part of the book is to be found in
the later pages. They read the stories; their elders read the
introduction as well. They both need the stuff of imagination, of which
myths, legends, and fairy tales are made. So much may be said of these
old stories that it is a serious question where to begin, and a still
more difficult question where to end. For these tales are the first
outpourings of that spring of imagination whence flow the most
illuminating, inspiring, refreshing and captivating thoughts and ideas
about life. No philosophy is deeper than that which underlies these
stories; no psychology is more important than that which finds its
choicest illustration in them; no chapter in the history of thought is
more suggestive and engrossing than that which records their growth and
divines their meaning. Fairy tales and myths are so mu