In those times it was thought that the world of imagination could be brought to bear on the quality of the mind’s interaction with things of a worldly nature. Children were encouraged to flex their mental muscles as much as possible and the strength of their imagination was valued as equal to the that of the body and will.
It is often said, by those who have studied these things, that the stories in the Book of the Guardians, although purporting to recount the history of the Guardian’s exploits, also provide a guide to the broadening of the readers own mental universe by including children’s tales and quests of the the moral mind.
The Guardians of the Cave 