 Original Stories encourages its readers to develop what were at the time coming to be labelled middle-class values: industry, self-discipline, economy, and charity. As Andrew O ’ Malley points out in his analysis of 18th-century children ’ s books, "middle-class writers wanted children to associate happiness with morality and social utility instead" of "the trappings of wealth and status". The end of the 18th century saw the development of what is now referred to as the "middle-class ethos", and "children ’ s literature became one of the crucial mechanisms for disseminating and consolidating middle-class ideology" throughout British and American society. Works by children ’ s writers such as Anna Laetitia Barbauld, Ellenor Fenn, Sarah Trimmer, and Dorothy Kilner all embrace this ethos, although they differ radically in their opinions on other political issues, such as the French Revolution.
