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Lorsque le document est trop grand pour fttre reproduit en un seul clich*. 11 est film* A partir da Tangle sup*rieur gauche, de gauche * droite. et de haut en has. en prenant la nombre d'imagas nteessaire. Les diagrammes suivants illustrant la mithoda. 1 2 3 1 2 3 I; 4 5 6 1^ 1^137 til m m iuuu 1^ 14.0 ll 2.5 1.8 MICROCOPY RESOLUTION TEST CHART NATIONAL BUREAU OF STANDARDS STANDARD REFERENCE MATERIAL 1010a (ANSI and ISO TEST CHART No. 2) THE TEMPLE PRIMERS ^: CHILD HIS NAluRE tMD NURTURE By W. B. DRUMMOND, M.B., CM., M.R.C.P.E. Physician to the Western Dispensary, Edinburgh ^ 9 i^ ^ ^ > \ s >• ■' Valentine. Dundee THE AGE OF INNOCENCE From a Piiturc by Sir Joshua Kcynolds M CO R v^-^^'.o>:o<---- ■ care of children is kept b view throughout. The limiutions of space have necessiuted con^derable compression, but the author trusts that cor c'.reness Oi diction has not resulted in obs' rity of meaning. A number of sub^cto have been omitted entirely, in order that others, perhaps not intrinsically more important, which are included, might be made more fully illustrative of general principles. The short list of references at the end includes a number of works likely to be useful to those who wish further information on the subjecu treated of. Fuller bibliographies are readily accessible. W. B. D. 9 Brougham Place, Eoinsurou, Dtttmbtr i^oot TABLE OF CONTENTS CHAP. 'A0« I. Nature and Nurturc ...•••• 3 II. Chiu> Stuot 14 III. The Surroundings or Tii£ Cuiu> . . . • . is IV. The Case or the iNrANT . . . • • 34 V. The Growth or the Child 50 (With additional references to the care of children). VI. The Senses 60 VII. The Muscles 71 (With some account of Play). VIII. The Emotions . 83 IX. The Intellect 93 X. The Will 106 XI. Habit 119 XII. Froebel and the Kindergarten 131 (An Example of a Mode of Nurture founded on the Study of Child Nature). THE CHILD: HIS NATURE AND NURTURE CHAPTER I Nature and Nurture The extreme helplessness of the human in&nt is perhaps its most striking characteristic. It is not its most remarkable characteristic. Compared to the young bird which can look after itself shortly after escaping from the egg, or the young lamb which can run beside its mother when a few hours old, the human infant is indeed helpless. Yet helplessness does not necessarily mean anything more than immaturity, and many animals are even more immature at birth than is the baby. The young kangaroo, for example, at the time of its birth measures little over one inch in length, and for some time afterwards its helplessness is so great that it cannot even suck, and the milk has to be forced down its throat, as it hangs on the nipple, by the action of a muscle which com- presses the mammary gland. The helplessness of the infant is not merely the result of immaturity like the helplessness of the baby kangaroo, but is the concomitant of another character which, if less striking, is far more remarkable. This character may be designated " educability." It is not absolutely peculiar to the in&nt, being found also in the young of many other animals, but it may almost be said that while it is given to the brutes in measure, it is given to man without measure. s 4 NATURE AND NU1.«URE The Biological Importance of Bducahility.— Let me give examples to illustrate this feature. Mr Spald- ing blin<5blded some chickens immediately after they were hatched, and after two or three days, when they were stronger, removed the hoods which he had placed over their eyes. He says that their behaviour "was in every case conclusive against the theory that the perceptions of distance and direction by the eye are the result of experience, or of associations formed in the history of each individual life." " Often at the end of two minutes they followed with their eyes the movements of crawling insects, turning their heads with all the precision of an old fowl. In from two to fifteen minutes they pecked at some speck or insect, shew- ing not merely an instinctive perception of distance, but an original ability to judge, to measure distance, with something like infallible accuracy." Contrast this with the behaviour of a baby several months old. Miss Shinn reports of her niece that she grasped at the moon, and when told it was too far away was not satisfied until she had seen everyone in the room in turn stretch out their hands to demonstrate that they also could not reach it. These two examples illustrate very clearly the contrast between educability and instinct. The chick comes into the world endowed with an inherited capacity for doing certain things which the child also will have to do. But the child is born, not wiih the power of doing, but with the power of learning. In time it will localise its perceptions in space as accurately as the chick, but not until it has learned by experience after many mistakes and many failures. At first sight it might seem that the chick had here an advantage over the child. Why is it that the child should have to learn with so much trouble, and often with pain, what the lower animals can do by nature? Might these things and others yet more hard to learn not equally well have come to him by instinct? These instinctive actions of the chick which have been quoted are of course com- paratively simple, but when we consider such instincts as NATURE AND NURTURE 5 the comb building of bees, the tunnel making of termites, the slave-making of Formica rufescens and other ants, there seem to be hardly any limits to the variety and complexity of the actions which may result from appropriate stimuli acting upon inherited nervous mechanisms. It is often very difficult to tell whether a certain habit in an animal is to be called instinctive or intelligent, and actions which are certainly purely instinctive have sometimes a very odd resemblance to intelligence. Take this example, given by George and Elizabeth Peckham in their monograph on the Solitary Wasps. These insects make nests which they furnish with prey to serve as food supply for the young. Each species has its own particular habits in the way it makes its nest and in its choice of prey. Sphex ichneumonea makes a hole in the ground. She then captures a grasshopper, places it just at the entrance to the excavation, and then enters to see that all is right before dragging it in. In experimenting with a French Sphex which has the same habit, " Fabre moved the creature a little way off; the wasp came out, brought it to the opening as before, and went within a second time. This was repeated again and again until the patience of the naturalist was exhausted, and the persistent wasp took her booty in after her appropriate fashion. She must place the grasshopper just so close to the doorway, she must then descend and examine the nest, and after that must come out and drag it down. Nothing less than the performance of these acts in a certain order satisfies her impulse." This interesting observation illustrates not only the perfec- tion of an instinctive action, but how an instinct may fail through its very perfection. We do not know whether to be more surprised at the normal behaviour of the wasp, or at its inability to cope with a trifling emergency, where the olightest gleam of intelligence would surely have guided it aright. It is just here that we find the superiority of the simplest intelligent actions over the same or similar actions performed instinctively, and why it is that in recent times a premium has been placed on educability over instinct. In the 6 NATURE AND NURTURE struggle for existence among the higher animals brains have come to count for r:.Oie and more. The history of the higher animals of our own day has been in the main a history of evolving brain power. During the untold ages which preceded the appearance of the mammalian type Nature gave almost her whole power to the evolution of perfect bodily form. When in the early tertiary period intelligence began to count for something in the struggle for existence, the brain of the highest animals was, according to modern standards, absurdly small; but in the period which has elapsed since then, the brain has undergone, amongst the mammalia, a far greater development in size and complexity of structure than it did in all the preceding ages. The development of intelligence, then, we may look upon as having been closely associated with the replacing of instinctive acts by habits which were acquired anew by the individuals of each generation, who were thereby enabled to adapt themselves to alterations in their environment, to deal with emergencies, and to obtain supremacy over individuals and species more closely bound in the mesh of circumstance. But this lapsing of instinctive power-^ at any rate of those necessary for the individual life, could not proceed very far uti«-il provision was made for the care of the young du-^ng the period of acquirement or education. Hence it is that we find the greatest intelligence among those animals that take care of their young, and we may agree with Mr Fiske in finding in the prolongation of the period of infancy in man the pre- Jiminary requisite for the evolution of his highest feculties. Fiom these considerations then it appears that the infant with "its all-pervading similitude of structure" to that of the higher mammals differs from them very markedly in this, that it inherits from its parents a far smaller stock of ready-made instincts,! and still more in this, that it inherits an infinitely larger capacity for education. And by capacity for education is meant nothing less than this, that the chil.. xrom his earliest infancy tends to adapt himself to his environment, to yield I See chapter xi., «« Initinct and Habit." NATURE AND NURTURE 7 himself, like clay in the hands of the potter, to be moulded day by day by the habits, the tastes, the passions, the ideals of those among whom he Uves, to be impressed in a the wnd ways for good or for evU by all he sees and hears. *' vVwc to receive and marble to retain," he is influenced for life by the early impressions which touch his body and his mind. «« There was a child went forth every day ; and the first obiect he looked upon, that object he became; and that object became part of him for the day, or a certaic part of the day, or for stretching cycles of years. (Whitman.) These biological considerations are of considerable import- ance at the present time, for there is a tendency, I will not say to lay too much stress upon the influence of heredity, but to take a somewhat narrow view of what heredity really means. Heredity is spoken of as our ancestors spoke of Fate. Nature is stronger than Nurture, it is said, and this w regarded as equivalent to saying not only that the chUd mherits certain tendencies fron- his parents, but that these must of necessity develop w':en the ume comes. Many reaUsing in themselves an inherited tendency to yield to a particular temptation, or to contract a particular disease, are Scouraged from strivmg to escape from what they regard as a decree of Fate. There is no use fighting agamst Nature, they say. But if we realise that nature in the case of the child is in large measure a capacity for reacting to his environ- ment, and that his environment is in large measure under human control, ..icn no matter what views we may hold upon such disputed questions as the inheritance of acquired char- acters, we reach this conclusion, that, however certain it may be that whatsoever tendencies, either good or evil, the child mherits from his parents will shew themselves if the environ- mental conditions are favourable, it is just as certain that they wiU never shew themselves if the conditions are unfavourable. In the facts that it is possible for man so to alter the environment of the infer as to favour the preservation of eood qualities, and to hinder or prevent the development ot evil tidencies, and that the infant has z marvellous capacity t NATURE AND NURTURE for individual adaptation to such changes, we find the greatest encouragement to efForts at social reform. Nature and Nurture,— Let us speak of rll the physical, mental, and moral agencies which surround the growing child, all the domestic, scholastic, and social in- fluences brought to bear upon him, under Mr Gallon's con- venient term Nurture. Nature and nurture each have their own part to play in the development of the child. To nature he owes his possibilities; to nurture he owes his realisations of these. He can only realise his highest possibilities if his nurture be adapted to draw them forth. This power of individual adaptation to altered nurture is possessed in only a very slight degree by the lower animals^— a good example, however, is found in the bee-grub which becomes a queen or a worker according to its diet—as indeed necessarily follows from the comparative simplicity of the conditions of their existence, even in those cases where a comparatively long babyhood might render such adaptation possible. It is very different from the slow process of adaptation which is brought about by the operation of natural selection, which of course also affects human life. As an example of the human power of individual or direct adapta- tion let us consider what happens when a child accidentally loses his sight in earliest infancy. Although the change here supposed is in the child, it really alters the whole outside world to him, and necessitates the most profound adaptive changes in him. We may consider this a change in his physical environment. To us it seems tliat the child is blind ; to him it appears that the world is in darkness. Now the adaptive changes which result in the child, summarised in the briefest manner possible, are these. In the first place the visual centres of his brain never undergo development at all. This ner itates his acquiring all his knowledge of the world through his other senses, which he cultivates rnitil they acquire an amazing acuteness. The parts of the brain which act as centres for these senses not oi:ly undergo a higher degree of cultivation than they normally would, but they JL a 18 NATURE AND NURTURE 9 fbrai among themselves a quite w^ series of association tracts. In addition tc all thi:, many blind persons acqu^e what may almost be called a new sense, somefmes caUed the face sense, by which they are able to tell the position and to some extent the sire of solid bodies placed near them, so that they can walk about freely and avoid obstacles even m a straage place. . r If such a remarkable and far-reaching series of organic changes can be brought about by a change in the physical environment, what may not result from a change m the social, or the mental, or the moral world m which the chUd grows up? Every child, no matter wi.at his parentage, comes into the world with numerous possibilities; with numerous tendencies both good and evil. What thcpe are depends upon his nature ; which of them are to develop, and what form they are to take depends upon his nurture. Let him come into the world with strong social instincts, there may atrophy if he is brought up in solitude, or may make of him, according to his nurture, a society man, or a philanthropist, or an anarchist. . . ^ , i The importance of education both for the purpose ot imparting instruction and for moulding character is of course well recognised. What is not sufficient' realised is the importance of these early months and ye?ii which nature h^ set apart in order that each generation may start afresh, pe past acquirements of the race are not simply transmitted to the infant. They have in large measure to be re-acquu-ed by each individual. There should be far more earnestness m our endeavour to understand the child, the hope of the fanuly and of the nation, and to surround him with every helpfd and wholesome influence. «* During earliest childhood," Mid Plato, ** the soul of the nursling should be made cheerful and kmd, by keeping away from him sorrow and fear and pain, by soothing him with the sound of the pipe and with rhythmical move- Heredlty^—^et though I speak strongly ot the influence of nurture, I would not be thought to undervalue the import- lO NATURE AND NURTURE Mce of a good stock. ChUdrcn are not autochthones. Their roots stretch for back into the past. They owe to their ancestry all the promise of what they may be. The child does tend to be like his parents, or his grandparents. Mr Galton tells us that the chUd owes one-fourth to each of his parents, and to each of his grandparents one-sixteenth. There has been much discussion of late years as to the possibility of the transmission of acquired characters, and most naturalists are agreed that such transmission is at least unproved. A great deal of the literature on the subject is based upon an imperfect understanding of what is rcaUy signified by the term acquired. Sone writers seem to think it is to the point to argue that, if the doctrine of evolution is true, every new character must have been acquired some time, and must have been transmissible, otherwise evo' ition could not have taken place. But naturalists use the term acquired in a special restricted sense, to denominate a character arismg in the individual as the result of use or disuse, or as the direct effect of external influences. A young man's moustache may be an acquisition, but it is not in the biological sense an ac- quired character ; but a growth of hair due to repeated irritation of the skin, for example by the chafing of a belt, would rightly be termed acquired. Again if a man s hau: falls out or turns grey at thirty without any obvious reason we do not speak of his baldness or greyness as acquired, H-t if it results directly from an illness we do. And in the oue case we may expect his son to turn bald or grey prematurely, in the other we have no right to do so. ... Another source of difficulty is that all acquired characters, with the exception of accidental or experimental mutilations, have a congenital basis. No amount of chafing will produce a growth of hair from a part of the body where there are no hair bulbs. No amount of application will make a musician or a mathematician of a man who does not possess the sttuctural conditions necessary for such accomplishments. And there- fore when we find the son of a mathematician or a musician following in his father's footsteps we find no proof in this that NATURE AND NURTURE II acquired characters are inherited, but merely that the boy. having inherited from his father the necessary neuromuscdar basis, which in the father was innate and therefore transmiMible. acquired his accomplishment in the same way as his father did before him, but aU the more easily on account <)f his father's tastes and habits, his instruments, and books, and '%?;^:^^^rtse of diseases, the fact that certain ailments such as consumption, and rheumausm, and gout run in families merely proves the transmission of a congen U^ inability to resist the attacks of such diseases when the external circumstances are such as to favour theu acqu«mon. The direct inheritance of certain diseases is regarded as due to infection of the offspring before or at the time of birth. The waole question is very comphcated, and it would te out Of place to discuss it fully here. It seems to me t^at it is probTbly true that characters acquired by use or disu^ are not transmitted. But I believe that it is not improbable, even if it cannot be said to have been proved that acquired constitutional changes may in some mstances be ^f^^f* <>[ at any rate produce secondary effects upon the offspring, l thin/for example that it is rash to assert that ^^^ "^Ts changes producea jj insanitary surroundmgs, the toxic ettects Seed by certain poisons when their influence is long Eed, and the coUtutional efiects produced by some SiLes, cannot bring about changes in the reproducnve cells which will affect the offspring. If we accept this doctrine of the non-inhentance of acqmred characters it must emphasise for us the necessity for t^e most careful nurture in the child of those good q^abties^^ich h^^ parents possessed, but it may also save us from the feehng that we are kruggling against nature in trymg to overcome ten- dencies to e^l. While we dare not trust to the good qualities of the parents reappearing in the child without patient and careful training, we need not despair of elmunaung defects which may have no root in the child's nature. The Survival of the Unfit -There is one other 13 NATURE AND NURTURE 1 subject which, on account of its importance, must be referred to briefly here. There are many people at the present dav who seem afraid lest in trying to make the conditions of lite more easy, and to diminish the intensity of the struggle for existence, we are merely providing a burden for the future by permitting the unfit to survive. It is seriously argued that diseases are really beneficial in their operation, by weeding out the unhealthy from among us, and allowing a more vigorous stock to survive. It has even been asserted that all the efforts of temperance reformers only perpetuate the evil of drunken- ness by preventing the elimination of those who are unable to withstand the temptation to drink. Now it is certaiuly the case that we owe much of our present knowledge of disease, and much of the improvement which has taken place in recent years in the saniury arrange- ments of our houses and our towns, to efforts to cope with epidemic disease, and there is no more certain evidence th?* the drainage and water supply require looking to than an out- break of typhoid or other water-borne disease. To this extent we may believe that disease has been beneficial in its operations. But as an eliminating factor in the struggle for existence, such epidemics strike both the just and the unjust, both the weak and the strong. The blow falls, not on indi- viduals who are unfit, but on communities that have failed to take heed in time ; and though the weak doubtless suffer most, the weakness of childhood may prove as fatal as weakness of constitution. Salvation for the community is not to be found by waiting for the slow and somewhat problematical appearance of immunity through selection, but by turning from the ways of error. Again, with reference to diseases which attack not com- munities but individuals, who presumably have some inherent weakness of constitution, I believe that even here it is impos- sible for us by any effort towards social righteousness really to find ourselves fighting against nature. The conditions of existence in human society are extremely complex, and no matter what changes we may make in these conditions the NATURE AND NURTURE iS fittest wiU continue to sunriTe in the future as in the j«st. If wVrocceed in so altering the conditions as to eliminate some r^S Sciive agency, «ch as die assault of a pamcuU. di^ase, we no doubt prevent the race from acauiring through S selection immunity from that disease, tn other words. ^ prevent it from attaining perfect adiurtment to the old wncUtions. But this need not neccWy be a d»advanuge unless the old conditions return. By the practical d^aPP^f^; ance of small-pox and cholera from our midst, not by the natural acquisition, through natural selection, of immonityjbut by artificial shelter from assault, have we as a nation been rendered weaker? On the contrary those who were most susceptible may not in other respects have been unfit, but may have been possessed of many desirable qualities which could ill be spared; and in any case they were still open to the action of all other selective agencies. A second result ^f great importance which follows any wise measuie of sanitury reform is to be ^und »n the in- creased health and well-being of aU those who m other circumsunces would have survived attacks of disease, but in a weakened condition ; for every decrease m mortality which has followed sanitary improvement has meant not only the survival of so many per thousand who would m former circumstances have died, but the entire escape from illness of many who would indeed under the old regime have survived, but in a condition of perhaps permanently lowered vitality. This sutement applies with especi^ fore tr f^ts and young children, fhe infantUe mortality is ac .-dgcd w be a most reliable test of the sanitary cond.tiou.t a dismct. From our present point of view a high infantile mortality means that Jhe surviving chUdren are growing up m conditions where a healthy human life is not possible. Natural selection is doubtless weeding out the unfit ; it is at the same time preserving a race who wUl be fit, it may be, for hfe m a slum-and for nothing better. The enormous percentage of reiections in the medical exammation during recent rwruitmg in our large towns is a striking commentary on the fact that 14 CHILD STUDY the iD^mtUe mortality in these towns t?erages something likt 1 50 per thousand. CHAPTER II ChUd Study Thbrb were great educators before Rousseau; yet to .'.lousseau, in spite of all his Tagaries, exaggerations, and paradoxes, we owe many of the doctrines which in our own day are becoming the dogmas of the New Education. At one time it was considered ample qualification for a teacher that he knew the subject he proposed to teach, and the idea that knowledge can be handed on from one to another by means of words only ib not so foreign to much of the teach- ing of our own day. Yet the fundamental importance of a knowledge of children's ways to any one who aspires to teach them is so obvious that one knows not whether to be more surprised that Rousseau should be credited with having been the first to base education entirely on a study of the child to be educated, or that in doing so he was so much before his time. It is not a little curious to compare many of the results of the modem child study movement with the educational doctrines propounded by Rousseau, whose influence may be traced in the teaching of all the great educators who succeeded him. It is only in our own day that Child Study has become a movement organised in the form of numerous societies in all parts of the world, and indicating its energy by the issue of an enormous body of literatu|e. The recent rapid growth of the movement is traceable chiefiy to the scientific work of Darwin and to the impulse which the doctrine of evolution has given to all branches of scientific research. Doubtless a subsidiary reason for this progress is to be found in the promise the movement holds out of results of educational value and of the establishment of a true science of pedagogy. 1^ :;hild study 15 In other wordt, the inter-tt in the robjert ii in the firit place scientific, and in the aecond practical. The tciencef which deal with the ttudy of chUd life are physiology, anthropology, and psychology, and none hat taken the child 10 seriously as the last* The study of the phvsiology of the child has been re- wardM by a tuller knowledge of the conditions necessary for healthy child life. It has placed on a scientific basis our knowledge of the special requirements of the growing child for fresh air, for food and clothing, for rest and exercise ; and this knowledge is being taken advantege of in improving the sanitary conditions of houses and schools, m inspectmg and regulating the milk supply, in providing playgroimds and open spaces in our large towns, and in arranging trips to the country for poor children. The doctrine of evolution has added enormously to ^ur interest in the beginnings of things, and it is from this side that the science of anthropology comes into touch with childhood. Every child in the course of his growth, accord- ing to the doctrine, passes through suges which correspond to stages in his anct<*tral history. From this point of view we interpret the child's instinctive love of animals and his understanding of them, his impulsiveness, his often un- governable passions, and many other traits which appear and disappear ; and hopes are entertained that a fuller knowledge of the course of development in the child may tlirow light on many important questions, for example on the origin of language. Side by side with direct observation of the child must go interpretation. This is the province of the science of psychology. This is the most difficult branch of child study and the most fascinating. He who would underuke it must be gifted not only with the power of observing with scientific accuracy, but with what has been called the scientific imagination. He must love his subject and his subjects. He must possess an undersunding heart and sympathetic insight, and be able to lay aside his own grown up habits and ways of looking at things. Only by becoming again as r j^ CHILD STUDY child doe. not «e ^^^^^^^^^ S^t ex Jt *ord. «,i^ we see, ^'"^ that there^hen they are used by him and ^Xrex"tly^hr4 ^» » - AfiJl"/"'*- not by us, cxaciiy wnai, t mental and moral "«'r 'S't.^e w ; Twhich t rl» Tthe difceot growth, and the way in w°"=" changes in our Lterial. of instmcnon, most md^e Peat «« g '''''^i:;tt,lln™In-ti"'mTy place to :j*:f:n!' 'ln::id"orgLg the chUd knowledge we must teach him to seek ^^^F ;!'f°%„.y _The methods which The Methods ot CblU Study.^ ^ S:::a.'jri'nt:°tr1Csthirwe ^y^caU the Indi.dna. fcc*Xa^ wVL''^;<«t -^«* »gt^^^^^ „ore or less ^0".P'f;«"^°L^''rfThild1tudy may be who have '""tnbuted to thw hew o. en , , mentioned Tied™ann.S.g.smund.Darwn,l;^e^er, y^ l^^"-X^<^'^^' da^r'altho^h the author CHILD STUDY 17 a very close correspondence in the order of events. For example take the behaviour of Baby Hall and Baby Preycr towards their reflection in a mirror : both babies first noticed their image in the seventeenth week ; both first laughed at their image in the seventeenth week ; both looked at an image and then turned to find the real object in the twenty-fourth week ; both licked the image in the sixty-first week. Baby Preyer turned the mirror round to find the child in the fifty- seventh week, baby Hall in the forty-ninth week. Baby Preyer made grimaces at his image in the sixty-seventh week, baby Hall in the sixty-second week. The points in which children diverge most widely from what may be considered the type are themselves of the greatest interest, and are worthy of the closest scrutiny from the suggestions they may give us of the existence of faults which require rectifying, or of talents which require cultivating. For example a child may be unduly late in learning to talk, and this naturally suggests the fear that he is feeble-minded. Yet an ex- amination may show that he is slightly deaf; or that he is suffering from the want of the stimulus of young com- panions ; or again that he is one of those children spoken of by M. Perez who will not make use of words until they grasp their meaning, but who, although very slow in beginning to talk, make very rapid progress when they do begin. The Collective or Mass Method of studying children con- sists in the examination of special points in a large number of children for the purpose of gaining knowledge of the typical course of development, and so forming a background as it were against which individual children may be studied. This method includes the physical examination of children whereby we ascertain the average weight and height at different ages, the average rate of growth, differences in the relative measurements of the various regions of the body at different ages, differences between the sexes, and so on. It includes in the next place the application of experimental tests such as the examination of the hearing power, of acuteness of vision, of colour vision, of the prompt- i8 CHILD STUDY ness of reaction to various stimuli under various circumstances, such as fatigue. Lastly, it includes the examination of replies made orally or in writing by large numbers of children to questions designed to bring out some definite fact in their mental history. For the purpose of carrying out the experimental methods of investigation psychological laboratories have been estab- lished, especially in Germany and America, and furnished with apparatus for the purpose of making exact observations. The appliances used include colour mixers, lenses, prisms, and other instruments for testing the senses of sight, hearing, taste, temperature, etc. ; more complicated apparatus for measuring the time required for mental processes ; and instruments for the experimental investigation of such mental processes as memory, attention, and so on. Apart from these direct methods of studying the child there are several indirect methods by which we may obtain assistance, but which cannot take the place of the direct methods. The spontaneous writings of children in the form of letters, essays (not class exercises), and autobiographies, often furnish excellent examples of the childish ways of looking at things, especially when the child has made a confidant of a diary not intended to be seen by others. The journal of Marie BashkirtsefF which attracted so much attention a few years ago is a good example of this kind. We are promised a further series of writings from her pen. Many autobiographies contain interesting reminiscences of childhood, but these are frequently written merely to illustrate the features bearing on the later career of the writer, and are coloured by his later personality and prejudices. Then we have the portrayal of the child in fiction and in poetry. But the child depicted by the author or the poet is often not the child we know, but the child of genius, the artist or poet in miniature. Wordsworth represents to us the subjective aspects of the mind of a child-poet. Stevenson, CHILD STUDY 19 in his "Child's Garden of Verse," portrays the child of genius, a genius which extends to all about him, as to the cow " who gives me cream with all her might to eat with apple tart." It is noteworthy, however, that Wordsworth testifies to his own childish experience as the voicing of vague feeling more or less universal in the normal child. He has taught us that the child is not simply an immature man ; that something may even pass out of life when childhood's days are gone, and " the things which we have seen we now can see no more." Are we to set aside the testimony of a poet to a universal experience as mere sentimentalism, the projection of his own emotionalism upon the object of his imagination ? Or may not the selective emotion of a poet sometimes discover traits which are hidden from the cold-blooded scrutiny of science? No doubt one must distinguish between science and poetry, and in all scientific work the most watchful restraint is necessary lest sentiment should cloud the judgment. But will a man who has a keen eye for the poetic aspect of child life, and who is sensible of the peculiar charm of infancy, be rendered unfit thereby to trace the first beginnings of those traits which are afterwards to form the fibre of the child's conscious life? May he not be all the better qualified to seize the germ of what afterwards blossoms into consciousness? Perhaps, however, there may be some mean between Wordsworth's apostrophe to the child, «« Mighty prophet ! Seer blest, On whom those truths do rest Which we are toiling all our lives to find ; " and the cruel query of a man of science, who asks, "Is there in sober truth any other living creature's offspring which is so passionate, so ;dfish, so noisy, so troublesome, so exacting, so offensive m some respects as the human baby?" Says Rousseau in "Emile," "Un instant vous diriez: C'est un genie, et I'instant d'apr^s : C'est un sot. Vous vous troni- periez toujour s : C^est un enfant,** ^ 1 Quoted from Tracy (♦• The Pgychoiogy of Childhood "). 90 CHILD STUDY The Practicat Results of Child Study.—ln the following pages we shall frequently make use of the results, both theoretical and practical, which have been reached by the various methods which have just bc-n briefly sketched. Some of the educational results which have been arrived at are not, strictly speaking, new, but it is not the smallest of the claims of the Child Study movement that it has succeeded in bringing home to large numbers of teachers .oughts and methods which had for long been the theories, and even the fads of a few. The systematic observations which have been published on the development of individual babies have aroused the interest of m?ny parents, have stimulated them to observe their own infants carefully, and have helped them to understand them in a way they could not have done without such assistance. They have also impressed upon them the fact that the child's education begins in the cradle, and that the years before the child goes to school are at least as important to both the mental and the bodily nurture as are all the years of school life. A similar service has been rendered to innumerable teachers by bringing before them the fact that child study is a daily problem ])re8ented by every child in their class. Teachers who have undertaken special observations on their children have been rewarded by finding a fresh interest in their work, and by gaining an insight into the individuality of their pupils such as they had never before acquired. Such observations may also indicate faults in the method of teaching. For example, in an American school an inquiry was made as to which subjects of study the children liked, and which they disliked. It was found that 76 per cent, of the boys who were studying geometry expressed dislike to it. The teacher's attention was called to this and he was greatly surprised. " On re- flec:ion it occurred to him that the reason must be that he undertook to do more than the class were able to stand." Consequently, " he reversed his methods and determined that he would cover the ground only as fast as his pupils could do CHILD STUDY 31 it thoroughly. Three months later he polled the same class again, whereupon 75 per cent, declared that they specially liked geometry." ^ The collective method of investigation is showing clearly that I'ider all the individual peculiarities of children we come upon the reign of law. Not only the physical but the mental and spiritual development of every child takes place in accord- ance with law. All true education must be based upon obedience to these laws. Many of these laws have in past times been obeyed more or less blindly. It is the function of child study to enable teachers to understand and obey them intelligently. Every individual child passes through certain definite stages of development, which are indeed not sharply separated from one another, but which may be represented somewhat as follows : — {a) A stage of sensation, in which the various sense organs are acted on by the outside world, and re- sponsive movements are noticed more or less de- finitely indicative of pleasure or pam. (^) A stage of perception with differentiation of the sense Ainctions, and adaptive movements, (f ) A stage of representation in which appear memory, imagination, attention, and more complex motor co-ordinations. (d) A stage of reflection, reasoning, unselfish emotion, and volunta'^ ovement. As an example of applicatior ■ >f child study to the special features of school life, the study of fatigue may be cited as having already led to important practical results. It has, for instance, emphasised the close relationship existing between mind and body by showing how the school work is influenced by the bodily condition of the children, by the amount they sleep, by die nature of their food, by the arrange- ment of their meals, by the purity of the air in the schoolroom, 1 Ptdi^^ai SimiHory^ 1898, page $ll. 22 THE SURROUNDINGS OF THE CHILD by the state of the weather, and so on. It is s^owmg how f Lue may be diminished by a suitable arrangement of the 2ol Sublets with reference to one another, by proper rSeSods of teaching, and by taking the most difficult subjects wh?n the brain is ffeshest. ' If the mind is fatigued, the same Tmountof work cannot be done, and if an attempt is made to push the child, the work is apt to be done »niFrfecUy with L result not only that it is soon forgotten but that bad mental habits are firmed. Over-pressure is not due so much to over-work as to doing the wrong things at the wrong tLs and in the wrong way. The study .f^^j;^^ also to indicate that during periods of rapid boddy growth the amount of mental work ought to be diminished rather than increased. Such a period occurs^ fo": ^^^ ^ ^f " the seventh and ninth year, and is thought to be due to the rapidity of growth, and a temporary want of correlation S?ween the muscular and circulatory systems. A similar state of affairs may recur a few years later. Many otrls of fourteen are unable to undertake without over fatigue so .uach wo k as they could overtake at twelve. The amount of work must obviously be measured by the mental stram »t produces, not by the number of pages to be learned, seeing jh^'J^^/^y of execution and abUity to bear fatigue have to be taken into account. CHAPTER III The Surroundings of the Child It is not always possible to procure for the child the surroundings we should like, but the condiuons really essen lal to physical health are comparatively simple, and their attam- "^?;ette Of the iV.«eiy.-The nursery should be a room of good size. A room at the top of Ae ho««e possesses the advantages of quietness. good>^> ^?"^ P^" ^r. Preferably it should be on the sunny side of the house, THE SURROUNDINGS OF THE CHILD 23 eren though an equaUy good room on the shady side should have a better view. The window space should be ample, and the windows should not be overshadowed by trees. The floor should be covered with cork carpet or hnoleum, or may be stained, in which case all the cracks between the boards should be carefully "filled." The floor should not be highly polished in case of accidents. A floor treated m this way can easUy be kept clean by means of a damp cloth. It should be washed not oftener than once a week, and while it is drying the windows should be widely opened, and the children should be taken out. , , . . Warming and VentUation.—The nursery should be kept at a temperature of 60° F. In very cold weather the temperature should be a little higher, but should not be allowed to be above 65' F., unless very exceptionally m cases of sickness. In this country the room is usuaUy warmed by means of an open fireplace. This naethod, although wasteful, possesses several advantages ; it is con- venient, no impurities are added to the air of the room, and the draught which is created up the chunney actt as a powerful ventilator. Addioonal advantage of the fireplace as a ventilator is taken in the ventilating grates, such as Galton s, which are provided with an air-chamber behind the hreplace. An opening below admits fresh air from the outside to the chamber, where it is warmed, and then escapes into the room by an opening above the chimney-piece. The fireplace should be provided with a fire-guard which can be fixed m position, and which is too high to be easily climbed. Few things are of greater importance for the chUd s he^ than that he should have an abundant supply of pure air. We have been hearing a great deal lately of a new cure for con- sumption, and this new cure consists in nothing more than this, that the patient should day and night be bathed m an atmosphere of fresh pure air. If fresh air be thus potent to cure disease, it must surely be equaUy powerful in prevent- ° The air of the nursery is vitiated by the respiration of its THE SURROUNDINGS OF THE CHILD inhabitants, by the burning of lamps, candles, night-hghts, or gas jets, and by the dust that arises in the course of house- hold wear and tear. The pollution of the air is not due solely or even chiefly to the carbonic acid which is added to the air as the result of respiration and combustion. The closeness of a badly ventilated room is due to organic matter which is given off along with water vapour from the lungs, and to a lesser extent from the skin. This organic matter is highly poisonous, and is the cause of the headache, lassitude, and sleepiness experienced when a room becomes close. When children are compelled to spend a large part of their lives in ill-ventilated rooms and to rebreathe these deleterious products of respiration they cannot but suffer in health. In order therefore to keep the room fresh the air requires to be frequently renewed. As already mentioned, the draught of the chimney caused by the fire is a powerful ventilator, as air is continually being removed from the room, and being replaced by air from outside, and from other parts of the house. It is important to recognise the course taken by these currents of fresh air. Doors usually fit more tightly above and at the sides than at the bottom, where there is usually a considerable space under which a strong draught may pass along the floor in the direction of the fireplace. This draught may not be noticed by adults, but is a frequent cause of colds among children who are beginning to creep about the floor. It may be diminished when necessary by a mat placed outside the door, or, better, by a screen inside the room. The fresh air entering by the window tends to fall in a stream towards the fireplace. A well-known device for securing a freer current of fresh air consists in raising the lower sash and fitting under it in its whole width a board about five inches broad. Fresh air enters the room between the sashes and is directed by the lower sash towards the ceiling, so that a draught is obviated. In warm weather when no fire is needed, the damper of the grate should not be closed, as the chimney will still assist in ventilating the room. Every day, when the children are out, the room should be thoroughly flushed out I 1 1 THE SURROUNDINGS OF THE CHILD 35 with fresh air by opening the windows widely top and bottom. This should also be done in the morning and agam immediately before bedtime, if the room is used for sleepmg in. The evening flushing is especially necessary if the gas has been burning in the room for any length of time. An ordinary gas jet consumes as much air as five or six people. Fresh air is just as important at night as by day, and may be admitted directly from the outside by means of the device already mentioned. The greatest care must be taken to keep the crib out of the direct line of the draught; that is to say, it must not be within the lines joining the window, the door, and the fireplace. If additional prote don is necessary, a screen, which should not be too high, may be placed between the crib and the window. In very cold weather fresh air may be admitted by leaving the door instead of the window open, and opening slightly a window in the passage or on the staircase. I see no objection to a small fire in the nursery at nieht in very cold weather provided the room is not allowed to get too hot, which it is not likely to do if Jiere is ample ingress for fresh air. It is certainly better to temper the co d ai? of the room by means of a fire than to load the child with a heavy weight of bed-clothing which interferes with his breathing, and disturbs his sleep. Besides, m the latter case the child is apt to throw aside the bed-clothes or to crawl out from among them during his sleep, and so to expose himself to chill. The wails of the nursery may be covered with smooth glazed paper, or may be painted. Glazed paper and oil paint catch little dust and can readily be cleaned with a damp cloth. Distemper painting is inexpensive and can be readily renewed. Rough papers catch so much dust that they are unsuitable for the nursery. Care should be taken that the paper is free from arsenic and the paint from lead. Cornices and mouldings are simply dust traps and should not be present in the room. The furniture should be simple m character. *^ane- bottomcd or wicker chairs with moveable cushions are pre- a6 THE SURROUNDINGS OF THE CHILD ferable to heavily upholstered articles because they harbour less dust. For the same reason the krger pieces of furniture shouM not be heavily carved. Wardrobes or chests of drawers, if present, should be on castors so as to be easily moved, but as such articles diminish the air space considerably they are better kept elsewhere if the room is not very large. The nursery table should be of deal, or at any rate have a plain wood top, so that it can be scrubbed. A small low deal table, which the children can move about and on which they can amuse themselves with their toys, will be found very useful as a plaything. Indeed all the furniture of the nursery should be capable of being requisitioned in this way. If the floor is polished or protected by cork carpet, one or two loose rugs or art squares will be sufficient additional covering. These should be of close texture and moveable, but should not slide about easily on the floor. Wool or hair mats or pile carpets are unsuitable. A few good coloured prints in simple frames or even without frames are necessary to add to the cheerfulness of the room. They should not be too good to be destroyed when the room requires disinfection. The cradle or crib should be without curtains or drapery which would interfere with the free access of air. The form of crib known as the hospital cot is very convenient as the sides can be let down. The mattress should be stuffed with good hair, and may be protected by placing over it a water- proof sheet while the baby is young. This should, however, be got rid off as soon as possible as it is very heating. The pillow should be small and thin. A room furnished in this way can easily be kept clean. The walls and floor can be dusted with a damp cloth, and the rugs and cushions can be frequently shaken and beaten out- side. All soiled linen and slops should be removed from the room at once. While it is convenient to have a bathroom and water-closet on the same floor there should be no plumbing of any description within the nursery itself. Even the outflow pipe from a basin may serve to admit sewer air to the room. THS SURROUNDINGS OP THE CHILD 37 Disinfectants are to be used only if an infectious illness occurs. Under such circumstances all carpets, rugs, curtains, and as much of the furniture as it not required should be removed * immediately to prevent contamination. When the time comes for disinfecting the room, toys, pictiu-e books, etc., should be destroyed, and the room repapered or painted. The Nurse, — The proper choice of a nurse is obviously of the greatest importance, but it is impossible to describe in detail the qualities she should possess. To do so would be to enumerate most of the feminine virtues. But at least she should, in addition to possessing a character above suspicion, be strong, active, W free from disease. She should be cheerful, good-natured, gentle in speech and manner, neat and tidy in person and habits. Above all, she should be truthful in deed as well as word. As to age she should preferably be between twenty-five and thirty. As to ex- perience she can bring no better recommendation than that she has been for some years nurse to a family where the children are such as you would like yours to be. In addition she must be foi^ i of children and must not be afraid of hard work, for hard work it really is, though the children be the best in the world. And remembering what the nurse's work is, let her have privileges, and especially abundance of time off duty. School J hygiene, — The subject of school hygiene, after long neglect, has of recent years attracted a considerable amount of attention, but even yet parents are not sufficiently alive to the iitiportav i of the question in their choice of a school. Only a few of the most important points can be referred to here. Class Rooms, — Efficient ventilation is of the first importance. Fresh air is as necessary to a child as good food. No instruction gained in school can compensate for the ill-health or lowered vitality which result from living in an impure atmosphere. It is not easy to lay down rules as to the proper number of cubic feet per child, so much depends upon the arrangement of the room, and the means 38 THE SURROUNDINGS OP THE CHILD of rentilation. The age and social condition of the children have also to be taken into account. Ragged and dirty children add more lo the impurity of the atmosphere than those of a better class. Young children, also, by their restless" habits stir up the dust, and so cause inipurities to be on the whole more abundant in the air of the infant class rooms after use than is the case in the higher departments. That the amount of cubic space commonly prescribed for class rooms is too scanty is generally agreed. No greater mistake can be made than to suppose that the size of the children as compared with adults can be taken as a guide. Even healthy children, according to Sir John Simon, "in pro- portion to their respective bodily weights, are about twice as powerful as adults in deteriorating the air in which they breathe." Schools are frequently the chief means of dis- seminating an infectious disease in a district, and although even the best ventilamn cannot eliminate this risk, bad ventilation must greatly increase its intensity. The amount of cubic space required in class rooms by the Education Department — 120 cubic feet — is far too little even for the sm^lest children. Mr Charles E. Paget is of opinion that 400 cubic feet per scholar should be allowed in elementary schools and 800 in the great public schools. Cloak rooms separate from the class rooms should always be provided. Authorities are not agreed as to the relative advantages of the principal systems of ventilation. A good system of artificial ventilation, e.g, by the propulsion by means of fans of a sufficient supply of filtered air into the class rooms at a suitable temperature, hab often effected a great improvement in the purity of the atmosphere. But whatever system may be adopted the means of carrying out thorough natural ventilation by free opening of the windows should always be present. The system of carrjring on some form of fresh air drill whenever the class room is to be vacated has a distinct educational value, to the teacher as well as to the pupils. Lighting, — The windows should be of large size and THE SURROUNDINGS OP THE CHILD 29 to arranged as to permit of cross-ventilation. They should extend up to within a few inches of the ceiling. The window sill may be higher than is usual in a sitting room, e.g. 4 feet or 4 feet 6 inches. The principal windows should be on the left hand side of the pupils as they are sitting. The pupils should never sit so as to face any of the windows. Desks and Seats. — The best modern desks and seats are adjustable both to the size of the child and to the requirements of different occupations. The back of the seat should give support to the sitter's back by allowing for the natural curves. One good form of school chair has two supports, a lumbar and a dorsal, both adjustable for height. The vertical method of writing now coming into vogue allows of a better attitude than the old sloped method. The influence of attitude on maintenance of attention is very pronounced, hence it is important that the seating should be such as to render the attitude of attention comfortable. Teachers would do well to remember that fatigue is an important cause of faulty attitude, and that any attitude if long continued will cause fatigue. Playrooms. — Where it is possible to provide playrooms these should be light and airy. Preferably they should be on the ground floor and communicate directly with the playground. Boarding Schools, — Boarding schools include not only the large public schools but orphanages and other schools for special classes of children, schools under the Poor Law, reformatories, and numerous private institutions. The grossest hygienic defects in these institutions have arisen from the massing of large numbers of children together, whereby the general standard of health was lowered, and the spread of disease from one child to another was favoured. The great prevalence of ophthalmia and other diseases in certain of these buildings has led to the general condemnation of the system of barrack schools. It is also beginning to be recognised that it is only by the segregation of the children in comparatively small groups that they can obtain some of 30 THE SURROUNDINGS OF THE CHILD they are the mental and moral advantages from which ,>recluded by the want of any home life. The Larger Environment,— One of the saddest features of modern civilisation is the sacrifice of infant life, which in some districts of the country is truly appalling. In healthy country districts the death-rate among children under one year is 80 or 90 per thousand, which seems a very high figure, yet in most of our large towns it is about 1 50, and in some of the more crowded industrial centres it reaches or surpasses the dreadful proportion of 200 per thousand. In Liverpool in 1899 the mortality among infants under one year was 242 ; in Preston in 1897 it was 262. This means that, of all the children born, one out of every four or five never reaches the age of one year. While a proportion of these deaths is unavoidable, quite a large percentage must be admitted to be due to preventable causes — perhaps the whole of the excess of the unhealthy over the healthy districts. And "if preventable, why not prevented?'* as the Prince of Wales said with reference to tuberculosis. Among important causes of death in young infants are prematurity of birth, bad hereditary tendencies, inexperience and neglect on the part of the mother, and industrial con- ditions, especially the employment of women in mills during pregnancy and shortly after child-birth. The children are sent out to nurse during the day, and are often fed on an innutritious and unsuitable diet instead of milk. Improper food and methods of feeding are also amongst the most potent factors in increasing infantile mortality. It is said that during the siege of Paris, when the general mortality was doubled owing to the sufferings and privations under- gone, that of infants was reduced by 40 per cent, owing to the mothers being forced to suckle them. The importance of guarding the milk supply from con- tamination by the germs of infectious diseases has been forced upon the attention of the local authorities by the occurrence of numerous epidemics which have been traced to milk infection. During the last year or two another aspect ^:S^ THE SURROUNDLs or OF IHE CHILD 31 of the milk supply has attracted a great deal ot interest. Owing to the great extension of our large towns, a large proportion of the milk required has to travel a long distance from the coimtry, and a considerable time has therefore to elapse before it can reach the consumer. In order to pre- vent the milk from turning sour, many dairymen have been in the habit of adding some preservative to the milk, and have maintained that such a practice did not constitute an adulteration, on the ground that the preservative used, usually bofacic acid, was non-poisonous and harmless. To test the truth of this assertion Professor Boyce of Liverpool tried the experiment of feeding a number of kittens on milk con- taining ten grains of boracic acid in each pint. He found that the kittens underwent rapid emaciation and soon died. Kittens fed upon pure milk under the same conditions developed quite normally. Kittens fed on milk containing only five grains of boracic acid in each pint also emaciated and died. Experiments were also tried with a powerfiil antiseptic, formalin, which has lately been recommended as a milk preservative. Professor Boyce found that kittens fed on milk containing i part of formalin in 50,000 increased in weight by only 70 per cent, of the weekly gain of healthily fed kittens. There can be no reasonable doubt that these pre- servatives would have a similar effect upon infants. The insanitary conditions and the overcrowding that too often attend life in a large town are responsible for many outbreaks of disease, and mean lowered health and loss of spirits for adults as well as children. Perhaps the greatest sufferers are the children who have survived the period of infancy, and who are subjected to slow poisoning by breath- ing impure air, and to slow starvation from improper more often than from insufficient feeding. Children in proportion to their size need more fresh air and fc^d than adults. They need scope for the exercise of their activities. Their impulses are directed towards the exercise of their bodily powers. They should delight to run, to play, to climb, to shout, to laugh. But under the conditions of life in an 32 THE SURROUNDINGS OP THE CHILD industrial town they are robbed to a great extent of the happiness and vitality which should be the prerogative of every child. When, if not in childhood, can any of us ftdly appreciate the spirit of Browning's words : — *• Oh, the wild joys of living I the leaping from rock up to rock, The strong rending of boughs from the fir-tree, the cool silver shock Of the plunge in a pool's living water, the hunt of the bear. And the sultriness shewing the lion is couched in his lair. How good is man's life the mere living ! how fit to employ All the heart and the soul and the senses for ever in joy I " However the lot of the town child may be ameliorated by improved sanitation, by the better inspection and regulation of the food and milk supply, and by the establishment of play- grounds and trips to the country, perhaps the best hope for the future lies in the establishment of cheap means of locomotion whereby a large proportion of the working classes will be able to move out to new districts, where it will be more easy to avoid the worst of the old evils, and where- especially ample open spaces can be preserved for playgrounds, gardens, and parks. Even now it would be possible for far more people to livd out of the large towns where they work did they realise the advantages that would accrue to the children by their doing so. It is not only the children of the very poor who suffer from town life. They at any rate have the streets in which to play But to the children of the well-to-do, and even of the respectable working classes, this has often to be denied, and it is not always possible to find a satisfactory substitute. In truth, there can be no substitute for free play in the open air with suitable companions, and there is no other way in which the young can so well build up a store of health and strength and energy. The custom of spending a month or two in the country every year is of course altogether advantageous and indeed essential, but cannot perfectly take s • THE SURROUNDINGS OF THE CHILD 33 the place of a real country life, and probably we may agree with John Locke that the best place in which to bring up a young child is an honest farmhouse. The importance of a country life is especially great in the case of children who are delicate as the result of illness, or who have any inherited weakness of constitution. Nervous children, children who are always catching cold, and those who have any hereditary tendency to chest complaint, benefit greatly by an open-air life in a dry equable climate. The physical advantages of a country life are greatly enhanced by the constant fund of interest and pleasure which Nature provides. Nothin'- ^u do more to add to the richness aid value of lif > a true and deep love of Nature, and this can best , awakened when the child is young. The inherent love of !Tature doubtless differs greatly among children, but all children love to be out of doors. Many of the instincts which appear in children, for instance those which determine the particular form of play which for the time being seems most engaging, indicate unmistakably that an out-door existence is as it were intended for the child ; and inasmuch as the function of such instincts in the child is not so much to mmister to his bodily wants, which are provided for by his parents, as to form the starting-point of intellectual and moral habits, the importance of suitable scope for their exercise is obvious. Living things es^w;cially move the heart of the child, and long before he ii old enough to appreciate the beauties of scenery he may iinow and love "the green things growing," and drink in those strong and deep impressions direct from Nature in a w: y we can never do in after life when << Nothing can bring back the hour Of splendour in the gnus, of glory in the flower." 34 THE CARE OF THE INFANT CHAPTER IV The Care o1 the Infant During the ii'"'t few weeks of its life the infant should spend most . the time in sleep. It is better that even from the first it should not sleep beside its mother but in a crib of its own. If the infant shows any sign of feebleness of ^XiK circulation, such as blueness or coldness of the extremities, warm bottles wrapped in flannel should be placed near it, but not touching it. The cradle should be without rockers. The practice of rocking is unnecessary and sometimes harm- ful, and if it is indulged in the infant soon acquires the habit of not sleeping without it. Care ot the Byes, — During the first few days the eyes should be washed after the bath with a solution of boracic acid. The eyes should be protected from too bright light, and when the child is asleep the room should be darkened. Care ot the Mouth. — It is often recommended that the gums should be washed with a little boracic acid solution and a piece of soft linen after feeding. This practice is hardly necessary in the case of strong infants, but if the child is delicate it may prevent the growth of thrush. The Isladder and Bowels, — Some control of the bladder and bowels can be taught at a very early age. The infant should never be allowed to lie even temporarily with a wet napkin. If care is taken to change the napkin wVenever necessary the child will soon learn to appreciate the comfort of dryness and will attract the nurse's attention by whimpering or odier sign when a change is required. The baby should from the first be held out at regular periods — after its bath and after each feeding — and by the time it is a few months old it will have learned to make its wants known. When an accident does happen the child should not be scolded, as this will only frighten a nervous child and may increase the difliculty of control. THE CARE OF THE INFANT 35 The Nervous System. — The nervous system of yjung children is very sensitive to outside impressions, and harm may readily be done by the influence of improper surroundings. It is especially important that the child should have abundant sleep, and that it should not be excited, especially near bedtime, by the attentions of too many admiring visitors. S/eep.— For the first few weeks of life the infant should sleep twenty hours or more out of the twenty-four, waking only to be fed and bathed. The period required for sleep by children of diflTerent ages is shewn in the following table : Birth to four weeks . . 20-22 hours. One to six months . . 16-18 hours. Six months to one year . . 14-16 hours (i 1-12 hours at night and two naps by day). One to two years . 12-14 hours (one nap by day). Two to six years ... 12 hours. Six to ten years ... 1 1 hours. Ten to fifteen years . . 9-10 hours. It is of great importance that the training of the child in proper habits of sleep should be begun at birth. This can usually be accomplished easily by attending to two points. First, the child should be accustomed from the very first to being fed at regular intervals by the clociy as explained in the section on feeding. Second, the child should be accustomed from the very first to being put into its cradle awake and left to go to sleep. If the child is well, its appetite satisfied, and its feet warm, nothing more is necessaiy to induce sleep than a warm and comfortable bed in a quiet, darkened room. I make the statement in this absolute form of young infants only, and I am assured by experienced nurses that they never find any difficulty in inducing a regular habit of sleep when they have the child to tliemselves, and it such a habit can be established it will render it more easy to prevent any methods of artificially inducing sleep subsequently resorted to from becoming tyrannous. Children certainly 36 THE CARE OF THE INFANT differ considerably in the ease with which they fall asleep, and in older children the length of the day sleep, the time the child has spent out of doors, and the kind of play indulged in before bedtime all have a marked influence on the induction of sleep. The practice of hushing or lulling an infant to sleep is of considerable psychological interest. " The earliest cradles of the race were rocked in rhyme to sleep," and perhaps the evolutionist may seek to explain the soothing effect of rhythmical motion by reference to a greater antiquity than a mother usually has in mind when she is searching for family traits in her offspring. When one seeks for some ad- vantage which may explain the continuance and universality of a practice so troublesome, it may be suggested that the rocking and the mother's lullaby are amongst the earliest waves that break upon the child from the sea of feeling in which he finds himself, and that, associated as these are with the earliest dawn of consciousness, they help to awaken and strengthen the emotional links which bind mother and child together. Here, it may be, is laid the foundation of that heightened emotional sensibility, which, in adults as well as children, so often attends the failing darkness of the "solemn evening hour" when the mother finds her child's confidence most completely hers. If the child requires to be wakened this should be done very gently. If the child is shaken or spoken to in a loud tone, it may waken up startled or frightened, and a nervous baby may even be thrown into convulsions. It is wonderfiil how soon most babies get into the habit of waking at the proper time for their drinks if these are given with regularity. The Skla, — The skin of the infant requires care not only because it is an exceedingly delicate structure, but be- cause it possesses such active excretory functions that it hap been aptly described as the most important gkjd in the body. The chief factors in preserving its healthy activity are bathing and clothing. Bathing, — A baby should have one bath every day, and if strong he may have two. The temperature of the bath THE CARE OF THE INFANT 37 should be about 90° F. at first and should be tested by means of a bath thermometer. As the baby grows older the temperature of the bath may be gradually lowered, but until he is a year old should not be under 80°. Strong babies and older children may be quickly sponged over with tepid or even cold water after the morning bath. This is best done by means o^ a large sponge while the child is sitting in a little warm water. Care must be taken that the room is sufficiently warm, and that the skin lias not been chilled by the child's playing about with insufficient clothing. The healthy glow of the skin when it is rubbed dry is a sign that the bath is doing good. During the first few months the baby should be carefully sponged with soap and water (and a flannel), on the nurse's lap, then gently placed in the bath and quickly sponged over till all the soap is removed. It should then at once be taken out and quickly and thoroughly dried with a soft warm towel. Only a perfectly pure soap should be used, and it should not be used too freely. An overfatty soap should be used if the skin is delicate. A separate small sponge should be kept for the face. If the skin is thoroughly dried especially in the folds and flexures powder will be hardly necessary ; if used, it should not be perfumed. Sea Water Baths. — Salt water baths are more stimulat- ing than fresh, and are good for children of all ages. A handful of rock salt may be added to every gallon of water. Sea-bathing may be allowed when the child is six or seven years of age. The best time for a bathe is about three hours after breakfast. The head should be wetted first, and five minutes is long enough for the child to stay in at first. If the water is cold he should not be allowed to stay in so long. After bathing he should be rapidly and thoroughly dried with a rough towel, dressed, and sent for a run. Clothing, — To the male intelligence the ordinary methods of clothing an infant appear very cumbersome and inconvenient, occupying a needless amount of time and involving a repeated turning about of the child upon its face and back again. Many i8 THE CARE CF THE INFANT improvements have been introduced into the art, but these seem slow to find their way into the nursery. The essential points are that the clothes should be warm without being heavy ; that they should not confine the movements of the child in any way ; and that they should be so made that the child can be easily and quickly dressed and undressed. Excess in clothing is indicated by too profuse perspiration so that the underclothing becomes damp. Deficiency of clothing is indicated by coldness of the extremities and signs of discom- fort by the child. Damp underclothing and cold feet indicate an improper distribution of the clothing, one of the commonest faults in the dressing both of infants and older children. In practice the methods of dressing babies vary quite legitimately to such an extent that it is possible here to do no more than give a few hints in the hope that some of them may be useful. The binder should be of the softest flannel, and should not be too long. It is usually bound, but probably the baby's delicate skin would be quite as comfortable if the binding were omitted. It should be applied smoothly and not too tightly, and fixed with safety pins or stitches. Worsted is better than cotton for this purpose as a few large stitches can be passed very quickly and will not readily slip. Some medical men recommend the omission of the binder on the ground that it restricts the movements of the child's muscles, prevents proper expansion of the chest, and weakens the wall of the abdomen. This charge may be quite legitimate in cases where the binder has been improperly applied. The use of the binder is to act as a safeguard during the great strain which is thrown upon the abdominal wall whenever the child cries, and during severe attacks of coughing. Until the navel is perfectly healed it would not be safe to do without this protection. Care should be taken that the binder is not drawn too tight. It ought to be applied just sufficiently firmly to preBs upon the abdomen and support it when it is distended and strained during crying. It ought not to be so broad as to impede the movements of the chest. THE CARE OF THE INFANT 39 The other garments worn by the child should be so made as to be easily and quickly put on and taken off, so that the child may not be needlessly wearied and irritated by the p'-ocess. The sleeves should be provided with very wide inlets to make it more easy for the nurse to insert the baby's arms. If the baby is at all feeble it is an advantage to have the garments made to open widely, and all to button or tie in front or behind. They can then be arranged in their proper Older one inside the other prior to dressing, and the baby can be slipped into them all at the same time. The dress and petticoat should not be so long or so heavily frilled as to be a burden to the child when it is taken out. For going out the baby ought not to be worried by being partially stripped and redressed, but should simply be dressed in such additional clothing as may be necessary . The child is usually shortened at the age of two or three months. There should be no hurry in discarding the binder if the child is delicate, if it cries a great deal, or if it suffers from a cough. Care should be taken that the lower part of the body is sufHciently protected so that the baby may kick about freely without danger of catching cold. In the case of old'^' children the same general rules as to clothing apply. The under garments should always be woollen and of loose texture. The body and limbs should be com- pletely clothed. Stockings should be long and suspended from some garment above. Garterb or constricting bands of any sort should not be allowed. Bare legs or knees should be permitted only in very hot weather. The weight of the clothing should be borne by the shoulders, not by the waist. Shoes should be rights and lefts and should be sufficiently stout to protect the feet from cold and damp. Drawers should be worn even by very young children, who, indeed, from their habits of sitting and creeping on the floor especially need this protection from draughts and dirt. The nightdress should always be of a woollen material, and a thin knitted wo«;llen shirt may be worn under it if considered necessary, or a woollen spencer may be worn over the nightdress. 40 THE CARE OF THE INFANT No greater mistake in the clothing of children can be made than to attempt to harden them by under clothing. If a child is insufficiently clad it is not only liable to catarrhal attacks which may produce a susceptibility to more serious disease, but the nervous energy is exhausted in striving to make up for the excessive loss of heat, with the result that the child becomes pe> '-h and irritable, and its nutrition suffers gravely. Airing, — The age at which the baby may be taken out for the first time will depend chiefly on the season and the state of the weather. At first an airing of fifteen or twenty minutes is sufficient, but as the child grows the time should be gradually increased. For the first two or three months it is better for the cb?!d to be carried out, especially if the weather is cold ; afterwards it may be taken in a perambulator, in which it can lie. It should be protected from bright sunlight and from cold winds. Even in cold weather the baby may be taken out if the sun is bright and there is not too much wind, but in very windy or wet weather it may be taken for an airing in a large room whose windows have been open for some time. This is also useful before taking the infant out for the first time in order to accustom it to change of temperature. When the baby is old enough to sit up in its perambulator it should be provided with cushions to support its back when it gets tired. It is of considerable importance that the baby carriage should have very easy springs so that the child may not be jolted in passing over stones or over the kerb. Exercise, — The infant obtains exercise for its muscles in crying, kicking, grasping, in being carried about by the nurse, in being turned about in the crib, bathed, dressed, taken out. By the time he is three or four months old he should be allowed to kick about on a rug or in a large bed. Older children should have abundant exercise in a cool playroom or out of doors. As to wal '.s in bad weather there are very few days, indeed when it is unsuitable for children who are past babyhood to be out of doors, provided they are properly clothed and are in active movement all the time they are out. THE CARE OF THE INFANT 4» In very cold weather the important points to attend to (in addition to clothing^ are that the child is warm, but not over- heated, before going out, and that he is not allowed to stay out till he is tired. It is a mistake to send a chilly shivering child out "to get warm." Let him have a good romp first for five minutes with the skipping rope, be he boy or girl, and a biscuit, and then he will be able to face the cold. Rain will do no harm if the wet things are changed on coming home. A child who is suffering from even a slight cold should not be sent out in doubtful weather, as a further chill is then readily caught. Food and Feeding, — A child can have no better start in life than a few years of uninterrupted health, and among the conditions necessary to obtain this none are of greater import- ance than proper methods of feeding. The superiority of human milk over all other foods for infants, from the point of view of digestibility and of nutritive value, is proved by accumulated experience and is acknowledged by all authorities on the subject. Our knowledge of the principles upon which must depend the successfvil rearing of "bottle babies'* iics indeed advanced greatly in recent years, but even yet artificial methods of feeding have to bear even graver charges than their liability to produce indigestion and colic in the unfor- tunate infants who have been deprived of their mother's milk ; for a well-known medical authority, speaking on this subject recently in an after dinner speech, quotes a collective in- vestigation on the future of bottle-fed babies as showing **that intellectual obliquity, moral perversion, and special crankiness of all kinds result directly from the early warp given to the mind of the child by the gross and unworthy deception to which it is subjected — a deception which extends through many months of the most plastic period of its life." The Times for Feeding. — The nursing infant should be fed at definite times for two reasons. The first is that regular feeding begins the training of the child in regular habits, and especially aids the habit of regular sleep ; tlie second is that irregularity in nursing disturbs the quality of THE CARE OF THE INFANT the milk. Too frequent nursing is apt to render the milk indigestible. Too prolonged intervals are apt to render the milk thin and innutritious. The new-born child should be put to the breast within a few hours of birth, and thereafter at intervals of three or four hours until the flow of milk becomes established. From the third day till the sixth week the breast should be given at regular intervals of two hours during the day. At night one or two feedings should suffice between lo p.m. and 6 a.m., and although the baby may at first awaken more often than this every effort should be made to accustom it to doing with- out a drink for four or five hours at a stretch at night. After the first six or eight weeks the intervals between the feedings should be lengthened to two and a L-lf hours, and after two months more to three hours. After the sixth month the baby should sleep six or seven hours at a stretch at night. The Composition of Human MUk,—U\\k is an emulsion which owes its white colour to the presence of fat in the form of minute globules. The average composition of human milk contrasted with cow's milk is shown in the following table : — Fat, . Sugar, . Proteids, Salts, . Water, Human Milk. Cow's Milk. 3-4 4*3 4 07 87 Cream. 4 7 1*5 0*2 87-3 8 to 20 4 3*4 o*6 84 to 72 lOO'O lOO'O lOO'O It will be noticed that human milk contains more sugar and less proteid than cow's milk. Cream has practically the same composition as the milk from which it is obtained, except that it contains a larger percentage of fat, and a proportionally smallci percentage of water. Cream containing 8 per cent, of fat, usually called 8 per cent, cream, is thin cream such as THE CARE OP THE INFANT 4S has risen to the surface of milk standing in a cool place after fiye hours. Twenty per cent, cream is moderately thick cream obtained by the centrifugal separator. An even higher percentage of fat is sornt.. Wet'Nursing. — When maternal nursing is impracticable the child must be brought up by artificial feeding or by wet- nursing. Wet-nucsing is seldom necessary, but may be the only means of saving the life of a very delicate infant. Even in such circumstances it is seldom necessary to retain the services of the nurse for more than two months. The nurse must of course be healthy and have a good supply of milk. While there should not be too great disparity between the ages of the children, on account of the changes which take place during lactation in the composition of the milk, it is better that the nurse's child should be the elder by six or eight weeks. The condition of the nurse's child will then show whether her supply of milk is sufficient in quantity and of good quality, and in addition her child will be less likely to suffer from the want of his mother's milk than if he were hand-fed from the outset. Weaning, — The process of weaning should take place when the child is about ten months old, or earlier if the child is not thriving and gaining weight. It should be carried out gradually and will be all the more easily effected if the baby has been accustomed, from the age of four or five months, to having at least one feeding a day from the bottle. Artificial Feeding, — Of the numerous methods of artificial feeding the best, and the only ones we need consider THE CARE OF THE INFANT 45 in any detail, are those which make fresh cow's milk their basis. The mam difficulty in the use of cow's milk lies in the imount of proteid present and in the density of the curd, which is a great tax on the infant's power of digestion ; and the younger the infant the more this tax is felt. The amount of proteid can readily be reduced by dilution with water ; or with barley water, which often renders the milk more digestible, apparently by preventing the curd from being so dense as it would otherwise be. Mere dilution of the milk witli the addition of sugar is sometimes sufficient preparation. More often by the time the milk has been diluted sufficiently to render the proteid digestible the amount of fat has been too much reduced, and it is therefore necessary to add a sufficient quantity of cream (see the tables of the composition of milk and cream on page 42). By mixing together suitable pro- portions of milk, cream, and water, and adding the proper quantity of sugar, it is possible to produce a modified milk containing whatever percentages may be desired of proteid, fat, and sugar. In several large towns in America and in England milk laboratories have been established for the purpose of supplying milk modified in accordance with the prescription of the physician. The milk properly modified is sent out daily in the necessary number of feeding-bottles each containing the quantity required for one meal. The home modification of milk has to be carried out in a less elaborate manner. For example a mixture whose per- centage composition closely resembles that of mother's milk can be made by mixing together one part of fairly thick ( 16%) cream, two parts of milk, and three parts of water or barley- water, and adding one ounce of milk sugar to each pint. If ordinary white sugar is used, rather less should be added. For very young infants a mixture such as the above may require to be still further diluted. Another very usefiil method of modifying milk at home has been described by Dr Meigs. A quart of fresh milk is poured into a tall vessel and left to stand in a cool place for 46 THE CARE OF THE INFANT three hours, by which time the greater part of the cream will have risen into the upper half of the milk. The lower half of the milk is then to be run off through a tap in the bottom of the vessel or may be syphoned off. The milk left is now to be made up to the original bulk, or less by the addition of water, and milk sugar is to be added m the proportion of an ounce to each pint. Dr Meigs also recom- mended the addition of lime water to the extent of one part in four of the mixture. I pi ci'er to have the mixture made as described and sterilised, a sufRciency of lime water being added to each bottle as it is used. Condensed milk suitably diluted is easily digested by young infants and has the advantage of being easily prepared and of being practically sterile. Even the best brands, how- ever, are insufficiently nutritious, and therefore should not form the sole food of an infant for more than a few weeks. Sterilisation, — When milk can be obtained which is fresh, pure, and clean, the process of sterilisation is un- necessary. As milk reaches the consumer, however, it swarms with micro-organisms, the most dangerous of which, on account of their almost universal presence, are those which are concerned in the causation of die various forms of infantile diarrhoea. The danger of infection by the germs of scarlet fever, diphtheria, or typhoid fever is also by no means inconsiderable. Infection with tuberculosis doubtless occurs occasionally through the milk, but this particular danger has certainly been exaggerated. The simplest method of sterilising milk is to boil it, or as this alters the taste of the milk and somewhat diminishes its nutritive value, the method of pasteurising or sterilising at a low temperature may be substituted. This consists in heating the milk to a temperature of 167° F. and maintaining the temperature for twenty minutes. The sterilisation obtained is less complete than that which results from boiling, but is quite sufficient for ordinary purposes, if the milk is to be used the same day. There are many excellent sterilisers in the market. One of the best is Soxhlet's, in which the THE CARE OF THE INFANT 47 milk is ster-lised in a number of bottles each of which contains a sufficient quantity for a feeding. A simpler and less pensive method is to place the milk or die modified ex- milk mixture in a large glass flask or bottle, or in a tin, and to place this in a pan of cold water so that the water comes up to the level of the milk. The pan is placed on the ^re and the water is allowed slowly to come to the boil and to boil briskly for five minutes. Having been set aside for ten minutes the flask of milk should be stoppered, cooled rapidly, and kept in a cool place. The Bottle. — ^The best bottle is that which can be most readily cleaned. It should be graduated in ounces, and should be provided with a teat which can be turned outside in and scrubbed. The ordinary tube bottles are objectionable because it is practically impossible to keep the interior of the tube cle?r. The baby ought to be carefully fed with the bottle ' . s« and comfortable, and they should wear no corsets. Indeed it would be an ad- vantage if these articles could be discarded altogether during childhood. They not only compress the abdomen but fix the lower part of the r'nest and impede the action of the diaphragm, and thus no. cnly make respiration more difficult, but throw a greater strain upon the heart whenever the girl is moving actively. Children should be allowed to exercise their voices freely, as Nature prompts them to do. Singing and reading aloud are excellent exercises both for the vo'ce and the lungs. The Nervous System. — The head of the newly-born child, as has been stated already, is ver} large comparatively to the rest of the body, and as the face is very small the size of the head is really due to the brain case. The brain of the newly-born infant may indeed be 8;;x)ken of as relatively enormous. The proportion to the rest of the body is stated to be six times as great as is the case in the adult. The convolutions are not fully developed at birth, their fuller development being in fact largely dependent on the flood of sense impressions which now begin to reach them. The brain continues to grow vcrv actively in size un seven years old, the period of greatest rapidity year. After the seventh year increase in wci ht continues very slowly till adult life. The rapid increase in the size of the brair is connected with a peculiarity in the sk ill which may h*^ m ationed here. The part of the skull whi h forms the i ain am \h made up of eight separate bones, which in th= idult e T*"ry closely united together. At the time of bii i thes. hot "^ are only partially developed, and at several p 'es th« distinct intervals between them. The largeb of tht;!. situated on the top of the child's head and is c tkd fontanelle, or popularly the opening in the head. *' : bones grow this is gradually filled u{ and is usuall) .it d the child is - ing the first THE GROWTH OF THE CHILD 57 about tV e twentieth month. Delay in clo«tire may indicate that the brain is stii growing acti^/ely, b is more often a sign of MMTie dincase such aa rick< The growth t)t the brain i^ not merely , i inert ie in size. Before Hrth the i upr sions ri ching the brain froi the out- side world >fe few ^ number and chiefly tactile , a mere rivulet of ense ir ;>• sions compared to the flood which bep,in8 to pour in from all des and through all the organs of sense as soon as the chilu enters the world. It is by the influence of thi« ingoing ^'^eam that a great part of the ''ortex of the brwn stimuhted to develop. Those ?-ea8 whic receive imiressioiis frori the senses tore up the aem v of sense imprcssicms. The part of the cortex concerned n the r iovements of the body likewisi undergoes rapid growti and wc fi?k' the f' eble inchoate mov< ents oi the infant gradv att^iiung detinitffiess an Tram. lilhtit See. for Child Study ^ vol. ii., XS97. 86 THE EMOTIONS Again a little girl of twenty-seven months was accidentally run over by a dog and much frightened. Next day she shewed signs of fear on seeing a dog in the street. Two nights after the occurrence she awoke from sleep with a violent outcry and was found in a paroxysm of fright from a bad dream. " Doggie run over baby ana (therej " she repeated again and again. Next day she could not be induced to go into her bedroom, protesting, "Doggie in ana," and for several days the sight of a dog m the street threw her into such a paroxysm of fear that she had to be brought home to be comforted (Baldwin). The condition known as " night-terrors " is distinct from such night-mares as have been referred to, and is a more serious condition for which medical advice should be sought. The child usually wakes up through the night in extreme fright at some vision he has seen. He often seems completely bewildered and may not recognise where he is or those about him. Next morning there is often no recollection of what has happened. Fear is in the first instance innate or inherited. Timid mothers have timid children, and such timidity is very apt to be increased sympathetically during babyhood. On the other hand, innate fears are likely to diminish or disappear with the gradual accumulation of experience, and the more readily if the child's attendants are unemotional. Surprise and Astonishment, — States of pleasurable feeling are frequently manifested, even when the baby is only a few days old, by wide open eyes which give the child a surprised look. Hence it is very difficult to determine when surprise is really felt for the first time by the child, but there can be no doubt that it appears very early. Novelty of im- pression is the principal cause of the feeling, and we can hardly suppose that a child can fed surprised until he has begun to take some stock of his sensations. The infant who was surprised at his own fingers, and ** stared at them with great attention" r,t the age o£ one week (Tracy) seems altogether too precocious, for the power of fixation does not THE EMOTIONS develop for some weeks. Preyer's baby looked surprised on the twenty-fifth day when his father nodded to him, and again when he spoke to him in a deep voice. Miss Shinn's niece also began to assume a look of interest on the twenty- fifth day as she stared at the faces of those about her, but it was not till towards the end of the third month that her gazing about the room was attended by a look of surprise. It is only after the baby has gained some experience of his surroundings, often not till he is four or five months old, that he is liable to be overcome by astonishment, manifested by wide open eyes, fixed gaze, opening of the mouth, and cessa- tion of movement. This speechlessness may be followed by signs of pleasure or of fear. Preyer's baby manifested astonishment in the twenty -second week, when his father suddenly entered after a brief separation * impulse furnishes a good example of a spreading movement. THE EMOTIONS Thus there may be noticed successively a contraction ,f the brows, a fixed gaze, dilatation of the nostrils, clenching of the jaws, stiffening of the arms, closing of the fists, and an im- pulse to run forward and attack or injure. Even in young babies the impulse to beat an ofi^ding nurse or toy is very strong. In older children the feeling of anger may pass from a painful into a partly pleasurable state following the injury of the object of offence. Indeed, this pleasurable phase of anger may occur at a very early period where the transition may be very abrupt. Has the desire to obtain this pleasure anything to do with the habit not uncommon in babies of suddenly scratching any face within their reach ? The irascibility and impulsiveness of children are un- doubtedly instinctive, and illustrate very strikingly the analogy between the child and inferior races. To a certain extent anger must be regarded as not only natural but legitimate, the protest of the infant against the discomforts of life. Outbursts of this kind, if neither excited by caprice on the part of the attendants, nor aggravated by punishment, nor ever, on the other hand, allowed to avail anything, soon become infrequent. In older children, as M. Perez remarks, " we should recognise in the passionate temper one of the most firuitful principles of human activity, one which, if united with sympathy, will lead to acts of self-devotion and may help in the formation of moral habits by obliging the child to examine himself and his own actioos." On the other hand, as the same writer also says, anger ** is the two edged sword of human wickedness, which wounds the striker as well as the victim. If indulged in too frequently, it will injure the moral and physical development of the child, who ought always to be surrounded by an atmosphere of peaceful serenity, and in whom we should endeavour to maintain lalm- ness and tranquillity of spirit." Love, Sympathy,— The simple feeling of pleasure in the young infant is very closely connected with its dependence upon the care of the mother or nurse. Kence we early find the outward manifestations of trust and love directed towards THE EMOTIONS 89 the mother, and as the intellect develops and the imagination of the child enables him to enter into her states of feeling, we find the higher emotion of sympathetic love. Mrs Hall records that on the two hundred and thirty-first day *' a cry from the mother caused by the child's vigorous use of his teeth was tbllowed by a grieved cry from the child. The same proceedin'g was repeated later." A similar event may raise quite a different emotion. Miss Shinn's niece, in *^ fourteenth month, was trying experiments on herseh* with sharp hairpin, when she ** unexpectedly turned ^md tested it on me, and my movement and exclamation delighted h;r greatly." The latter of these anecdotes illustrates a feature of the manifestatio*:s of the tender emotion which is often well marked even in children of four or five years of age, namely, that their love and sympathy, though very real and often very demonstrative, is to a large extent irreflective. Hence it is that we so frequently find children innocently wounding by their remarks the feelings of those they love. Jealousy, Bnvy, — Children are naturdly selfish little mortals, and their sense of proprietorship in (ho affections of their mother enters largely into the feeling of pain and aversion which the sight of other people may call forth. If these persons are seen to share the attention of the mother, aversion may give place to jealousy and hatred. Jealousy may appear early in the first year, but seems to be more common in the second. Darwin noticed that his child shewed jealousy at fifteen and a half months on seeing a doll fondled. Another child of the same age was jealous if sugar was given to its nurse. Another, also of fifteen nionths, was jealous if he saw his father and mother kiss each other and *< would run up <:nd try to separate them, scolding and pushing away his father who was by no means the favourite " (Perez). Envy arises from the desire to possess whatever pleasing thbg is seen, and often because the child does not Uke to see anyone else possess something which he does not have himself. How little envy is dependent on any foresight of the pleasure to 90 THE EMOTIONS be obtained from the coveted object is well illustrated by the following story from Dr James. A boy of five (who had been told the story of Hector and Achilles) was teaching his younger brother, aged three, how to play Hector, while he himself should play Achilles, and chase him round the walls of Troy. Having armed themselves, Achilles advanced shouting «« Where's my Patroklos ? " Whereupon the would- be Hector piped up, quite distracted from his role, " Where's my Patroklos ? I want a Patroklos ! I want a Patroklos ! " and broke up the game. The jesthetic Emotions. — The aesthetic emotions form a very complex group which appear somewhat late in childhood, requiring as they do for their development, especially in their higher forms, some degree of intellectual culture and of emotional experience. Very diverse views have been held as to the nature and origin of these emotions, and chi' " study seems likely to throw some light on the question. Perhaps the most interesting standpoint is that which regards them as closely related to play. Grant Allen indeed has suggested that play may be regarded as an exercise of the active functions, and the aesthetic feelings as a play of the receptive functions — a view which is more interesting than convincing. Both functions are frequently exercised jointly. Much of the play of children is highly imaginative and even dramatic, while motor activities are strongly called into play in various forms of art. Studies of the aesthetic sense in children shew that there is little appreciation of beauty as such before the age of three years, and even for years afterwards the objects considered beautifiil are those which are novel, which are brilliantly coloured, which call up memories of past pleasures, or which the child has heard admired. Young children, as a rule, prefer a coloured picture to a black and white one, however superior the execution of the latter may be. The subjects which appeal to them are those representing action, and especially of children enjoying familiar pleasures. The love of scenery either in pictures or in reality is a THE EMOTIONS 91 rery late acquirement. Children indeed do not seem to set a landscape as such. They see a particular hill, or a house, or a clump of trees but do not uke in the whole tStct, Appreciation of the symbolic aspect of nature is to a large extent a natural gift involving as it does a high activity of perception combined with imaginative powers. Possibly the germ of this side of esthetic emotion may be found in the personification with which young children frequently endow natural objects, attributing to them their own feelings. Tbfi Training of the Emotions,— The culture of the emu -i been a somewhat neglected subject especially anrr ^ ^se moralists who regard ignorance as the root of all ' . he emotions have been set in opposition to the inteLv^....al fan Ities and regarded as liable to interfere with the processes of judgment and reasoning. It must be admitted that this opposition is not altogether fanciful. A one-sided development of the emotions may certainly give rise to prejudices which prevent the proper play of intellect and give rise to a morbid sentimentalism. But, on the other hand, a too great concentration of the mind upon purely intellectual studies may result in a starving of the emotions and rob life of much of its richness and value. The mathematician who listened to a beautiful poem and then asked, " But what does it prove ? " and Darwin's confession of his own loss of the love for poetry are the classic examples of what I mean. If we take the child himself as our guide in this matter we have no choice between the rival claims of the emotions and the intellect. The proper work of the child is harmonious growth. The first aspert of emotional culture is that which atiaches to moral discipline, and finds in the emotions the springs of action. Here tl.^ important fact taught us by the history of development is that the first conscious acts of the child before the first budding of intelligence are necessarily, dependent on the feelings. All the movements of the child, the stretching of his limbs, his cries, his fiseding, result in an 9» THE EMOTIONS increase or a decrease of his pleasurable sensations, and a gradual selection of those which give rise to pleasure. The selfishness of young children is simply an endeavour to obtain those sensations which are remembered as pleasurable.^ In the whole-hearted devotion of the suckling to the busmess of feeding we may find the germ both of selfishness and sympathy, for it is through the recognition of the mother as the source of pleasure and the bearer of relief from dis- comfort that the instinct of love is awakened. But we find here also the germ of another instinct through which the mother obtains her strongest power over the child, and is able to foster those emotions which are helpful and to repress those which are hurtful. This is the social instinct, which is so strong in young children that any want of harmony between themselves and their guardians and com- panions is acutely felt. The repress' "■: . of undesirable tmotions is thus greatly aided by the diss "probation which they uniformly excite, while on the other hand the selfish love of the child, encouraged to act itself out in little deeds of service and self-sacrifice, may lay the foundations of sympathy and compassion. The intellectual value of the emotions is found chiefly in the exciting of interest. Education has been called the science of interesting. Let a child once become thoroughly interested in any subject and his mastery of it will be limited only by his abilities and his opportunities. It has frequently been pointed out that a strong undercurrent of emotion under- lies much of the best scientific work. It should not be forgotten that many of the emotions have a strong intrinsic value, especially in the colouring they give to life. Children should be taught to appreciate and enjoy the beauties of Nature, of art, and of music, for to know the beautiful when we see it, to desire it about us, to strive tu create it for ourselves, are amongst the ways to a fuller life INTELLECT CHAPTER IX Intellect In previous chapters we have already said enough to show that the child's first learning is not fi-om words but from things. ** The first act of the human intellect," says Preyer, ** consists in the ordering of the impressions made upon the organs of sense." By Uiis process, which is termed percep- tion, the child becomes aware of material things as the source of his sensations. ** As everything that enters the mind finds its way through the senses, the first reason of a human being is a reason of sensations ; this it is which forms the basis of the intellectual reason ; our first masters in philosophy are our feet, our hands, our eyes. . . . That we may feam to think we must therefore exercise our members, our nenses, our organs, for they are the instruments of our intelligence " (Rousseau). The progress of perception in the child is very gradual; it is excited by interest and curiosity; it implies attention, mei: ory, discrimination, association ; and these all prepare the way for *;he higher intellectual processes. The extent to which die eij-ly mental development of the child is independent of spoken language u well shewn by the case of deaf-mutes. The course of development in these children is so closely parallel to that of normal infants that the parents often fail to discover that anything is the matter until the child is two years of age or even older. They then seek medical advice because the child is not learning to talk, and are often quite surprised at the discovery that the child is totally deaf. Amongst the earliest intellectual tendencies of the child none is of greater importance than curiosity. Of this we have already spoken as a " chronic hunger foi new sensations." But curiosity is more than this, fo'' .ath it comes the hungei for information, the desire to understand, and the instinct to INTELLECT experiment. During the lecond three months of life children will stare about a room with eager interest and curiosity. They watch the movements of those about them, and they turn about to find out the source of sounds. After the art ot seizing has been learnt the child soon begins to use his senses with purposive co-ordination, and spends his time in makmg all sorts of experiments with the different parts of his own body, and with ever3rthing within his reach. The intellectual element in the child's interest may be very apparent at an early age. Baby Hall on the two hundred -md sixtieth day struck a cup with a spoon, ..ad, liking the sound, repeated it several t^mes. " He then struck a sauce-plate ; as this gave a clearer, more ringing sound, he at once noticed the difference. His eyes opened wider, and with an absorbed expression, he hit first one and then the other as many as twenty times." So also Baby Preyer, when three hundred and ninet<%n days old, striking a plate with a spoon noticed the dulling of the sound when his free hand accidentally touched the plate, and continued to experiment by changing the spoon from one hand to the other and using the free hand to dull the sound. The same child in the fourteenth month took off and put on the lid of a can seventy-nine times without stopping a moment. His attention all the time was strained to the utmost shewing that his intellect was taking part. The sense of pain often be- comes a subject for curiosity in the second year, and children often take pleasure in pricking, pinching, and slapping different parts of their person with a mixture of pretence and experiment. The curiosity of the child finds a strong help-mate in the instinct of imitation which develops to a considerable extent during the second six months and impels him to strive to reproduce the movements and actions of his elders. Every fresh acquisif" gives him the greatest pleasure, and as his power of observation increases and he gains more control over his movements, his imitative attempts become more ambitious, and their intellectual value more pronounced. Everyone who INTELLECT 95 comet in conuct with tVv; chil '. furniihes «*copy,** and actions obtenred casually in the st- ^ or words and opinions over- heard, will be reproduced with the utmost impartiality. A child of eight and a half months, after seeing his mother poke the fire, crept to the hearth, seized the poker, and thrust it back and forward in the ash-pan, chuckling to him- self with great glee (Tracy). A little girl only fifteen months old had already begun to imitate her father s frowns and irritable ways. When three years old she said to a visitor with whom the had begun o argue 9 '♦« in her Other's style, "Do be quiet, will you, you never . me finish rcy sentences!" (Perez). Book-keeping was a favourite occupation with a little boy in the twer.'y-eighth month. Armed with paper and a pencil 1^ would '^sk, "What did I spend?" or would soliloquise ' I did jpend seventeen shillings for a ..addock. I did spend fourpence at the grocer" (Herbertson). Memory, — Memory has a physical as well as a psycho- logical aspect. In the first place it corresponds to th^. property all material bodies possess of retaining impressions made upon them. As is now generally taught, 3ie impressions received by the brain from the various organs of sense are recorded mechanically, and the record thus formed is called mechanical memory. This record must not be pict-red as impressed upon a tabula rasa. On tlie contrary, at the time of birth the brain already contains a record of the experiences of past generations, an inherited tendency to select amongst the im- pressions reaching it, to record some and to reject others. Even in the first random movements of the infant we find an example of this primitive memory, for these, however irregular and purposeless they seem, havt ever a decided tendency to arrange the limbe in the position they occupied before birth. The appearance of every instinctive movement we may also regard as the unfolding of the ii lerited memory of ancestral habits. In all this there is nothing absolutely inevitable. The inherited memory does not simply unfold as the result ofz vis a tergOf but has to be called forth by the 96 INTELLECT experience of the child, which is recorded on the very substance of the growing brain. The brain grows not only after the patteru of ancestral habit, but to the impressions of individual experience, and in this way provision is made, }>rovision infinitely greater than is the case in any of the ower animals, for individual adaptation and response to environment and education. Every child in repeating the experience of his ancestors and carrying out tendencies derived from them enters by individual acquisition upon hi? inheritance, his own experience graving deeper the lines of phyletic memory, or forming new adaptive combina- tions. I desire to emphasise this physical aspect of memory, because it enables us to picture in an exceedingly crude way the fact that the individual memory of everyone does not begin with the earliest incident he can recall, but with the first experiences of infancy. Many things which in after life have the appearance of intuitions, many likes and dislikes, many trdts in ^e emotional character may thus result from impressions and experiences whose incidents cannot be recalled. The ability to recall a &ct is what is commonly meant by memory. It involves retention, and proceeds by the process of " association of ideas," whereby our perceptions, our ideas, our thoughts are woven into connection with one another so as to form a network in which all new acquisitions must take their place. To Mr Darwin the facility with which associated ideas were acquired seemed " by far the most strongly marked of all the distinctions between the mind of an infant and that of the cleverest full-grown dog." Mr Darwin records of one of his children at five months, " as soon as his hat and cloak had been put on, he became very cross if not taken out at once." Baby Hall by the eighth week had come to know that * ore keen, and we find the number of voluntary acts rapidly increasing.^ During the imitative period of babyhood the child's obscrvafions of the actions of those about him form a new source of motor ideas, or rather of ideas of new combinations of movements, and the pleasure of carrying these into effect becomes one of the chief joys of living. Professor Baldwin considers .hat such imitative movements furnish the first clear proofs of volition. ** The normal child's first exhibition of volition," he says, " is found in its efforts to imitate some- thing, and what it imiutes, its *copy,' is of two kinds (i) something external, such as movements seen or noises heard ; (2) something internal arising in its own memory, imagina- tion, or thought." It is difficult however to see how a child should imitate new combinations of movements until he has made the discovery that he can make old ones, that is that he can will them. If we must have a definitely recognisable criterion before we may call a movement voluntary, no doubt we must wait for the occurrence of such imitation of something external as Baldwin desiderates, but if the essential act of the will is to be found in the effort of attention it seems impossible to deny that the will does become active in the imitation of movements which had been hitherto entirely, and are still chiefly, instinctive in their performance. Nature abh rs a sharp line of division as she abhors a vacuum, and w> -^ ■ ver the will may be the evidence seems to point to no THE WILL the conclusion that it assumes control gradually, and in the first instance over movements already "there." Instinct is of considerable importance in determining the course of the development of voluntary muscular control. Instinctive movements, attended by "the pleasurable feelmgs which accompany all exercise of function, naturally attract the attention of the child, and thus at an early period furnish " copy " for their more or less voluntary reproduction, when the outward occasion for their exercise again presents itself, and recalls to the child's memory the past pleasing as- sociations. tnbibMon, — " Don't say don't " is a pedagogical maxim which recognises the comparative inefficiency of a merely negative training. Inhibition, the will not to do, is more difficult and comes later than the will to do. It is preceded as we have just seen by the involuntary inhibition of movements which are not being attended to. Some power of active inhibition may be noticed during the second six months of life. In a carefully tramed chUd this is manifested in the acquisition of control over the excretions. When the child awakes from sleep feeling uncomfortable he desires to relieve himself. But along with the idea of present relief there arises also the idea of the discomfort which will follow. To the latter idea he directs his attention and cries to attract the attent'on of his nurse. But the child's power of attention is very weak and ill-sustained, and his inugination is unpractised, and so, if he is not attended to immediately, the more pressing solicitations of the actual discomfort force themselves upon hid consciousness, and an accident results. Inhibition of n /ement is thus to be understood as a positive action of the will, a deliberate turning of the attention to a contrary idea. It is an important epoch in the child's development when he begins to discover that he can do this. When the child is at this stage, often in the second year of life, we may meet with the phenomenon of contrary suggestion. Everything which is proposed meets with opposition from the child. If you wish to shake hands with him he puts THE WILL III his hand behind his back. He objects to being taken out and resents being brought in. In the morning there is a struggle before his clothes can be put on, and at night a storm before he goes to bed. Disobedience of this sort is not to be taken too seriously. The child is learning that he can obey and disobey. He is discovering his personality. He is learning that he is an agent. The treatment should not be coercion. Disapprobation, uniform and not too strongly expressed, patience, and if possible the example of older children, will usually soon lead the child to recognise that voluntary obedience is the price of happiness. Occasionally this form of contrariness becomes really troublesome, especially in children who have been spoiled. In such cases the most effective plan is simply to mah the child have his own way. If he won't get ready to go out, let him understand that if he is not ready in time he will be left behind. If he won't let himself be dressed in the morning, insist on his staying in bed for another hour. If he won't take his breakfast, send it away. The child readily understands the justice of retributive punishment of this kind, and is even helped by it to a judgment of the nature of his own acts. As his self-knowledge thus awakens, he begins to desire the acknowledgment of his personality by those about him, and this instinctive craving for approval for himself and his conduct adds itself to his natural imitativeness and suggestibility in overcoming a phenomenon which often gives a good deal of annoyance in the nursery. The Effect of Voluntary Exercise, — Voluntary activity thus arises by the gradual acquisition of control over the movements. In this the feeling of satisfaction associated with certain actions, the instinctive tendency to imitate the movements of others, and the natural disposition of the child to carry out any action suggested by word or sign, all aid in the development of command over the bodily powers. Under- lying all these is the natural restlessness of the child, and the strong interest he feels in his own' movements quite apart from their results. A healthy child desires to be doing 112 THE WILL anything rather than sitting still, and games and toys are often valued in direct ratio to the amount of activity which they call forth. All the occupations of childhood which give command of the muscles, and lead to the graceful and exact performance of bodily movement, thus play an important part in the develop- ment of the will. That such command of the instruments of the will should be as complete and perfect as possible, the child must have ample opportunity for the exercise of his powers, and the example and stimulus of suitable companion- ship. He should not be allowed to be too easily satisfied with his own performances, but must be encouraged to persevere in the accurate carrying out of his desires. The cultivation of correct pronunciation, of distinct articulation in reading and singing, of a proper choice of words, of neatness and dexterity in the use of the hands, and of accuracy of observation, all these are a training of the will in so far as they involve effort, attention, and perseverance. The Character of the Child's Will,— In a little child without experience, without foresight of any but the immediate consequences of his actions, it is natural that the will should be very impulsive, governed by feeling and not by reason. What he desires and wills to do is what he likes at the moment. What is called the wilfulness of little children is really indicative of weakness rather than of strength of will. The will is open to the influence of only the simplest motives, because these alone are understood and attended to. So long as the child's actions are entirely impulsive, excited by the cravings of the moment, he is still in the animal stage of existence. But with the development of voluntary control over his movements various interests are aroused. His growing intelligence enables him to understand the immediate and remote effects of his actions, and at an early period we find a strong tendency to pursue definite ends. In (bis tendency we may find the beginning of the child's ethical development, for with the growth of self-knowledge he learns to pass judgment upon his actions and to submit himself to the influence of ideals of conduct. The ability to rule the THE WILL "3 conduct by such ideas in accordance with the laws of right, and to sacrifice immediate gratification in the pursuit of distant ideals is what is commonly meant by self-control. The recognition of worthy and enduring ideals, and the feettng of the relative moral value of different courses of action, matters of experience and must therefore be a work are of time. Such ideals are part of the heritage of the race, but they are not transmitted as such to the child. They must be acquired by each generation afresh. This is the function of training. To train a child to feel and recognise the higher motives of conduct is an important part of moral education. To train him to subordinate to such motives the promptings of the lower appetites and impulses is the vri^st important aspect of the training of the will. In this the function of the educator is twofold ; firstly, to ensure that the lower forms of appetite and impulse are so guided and controlled from the first in accordance with the higher principles of conduct that when the child awakens to a knowledge of these, he may also discover that their claim on his allegiance has already been unconsciously recognised by his practice; secondly, to encourage the growth of interests which tend so to strengthen the higher forms of desire that the child may find his freedom in willing to do what he ought. To express the matter in another way, the child must learn to obey in order that he may rule. He must be taught, somehow, to obey, because the soil for the growth of his moral and spiritual life can only be prepared by the discipline of the lower impulses and desires. But in order that he may not remain dependent on the will of another, obedience must as far as possible be ■J, :.ured, not by coercion, but by creating desires for right conduct and by allowing him, so far as he can be trustt^i, liberty of choice. Seli'ConiroU — The fundamental aspect of self-control is the ability to resist temptation to sensuous gratification. Children are frequently spoken of as creatures of the senses. There is no more important aspect of the child's early nurture than its influence in guiding nature in the selection of a favourite H 114 THE WILL teacher from among these "first masters in philosophy." As I suspect common opinion to be a little unjust to the normal character of the healthy child, and a little too ready therefore to make allowances for his supposed natural propensity to greediness and covetousness, I am pleased to observe Miss Shinn's summing up of her notes c the development of the senses in her niece, to the effect that " the higher senses led from the first in the child's psychological activity. So far from finding an early dominance of taste and smell, displaced later by that of the senses that supply more mental interest, I found a lively attention to sight impressions very early, slowly overtaken by attention to Ciiier sensations in direct rather than inverse order of their intellectual importance." The gratification of appetite is certainly an important interest in childhood. But this interest is naturally awakened by hunger, and whes this is satisfied the healthy child is quite ready to be led off by otlier impulses and interests which minister to the divine hunger of curiosity. A wholesome nurture will therefore see to it that the child has ample freedom to experiment and explore. It will encourage him to seek pleasure in the activity of healthy play. It will seek to multiply all wholesome interests and enjoyments. In the second place it will strive to form and strengthen the will, negatively by starving any undue tendency to seek pleasure in sensual indulgence, and positively by exercise in self- restraint. The importance of avoiding the cultivation of artificial appetite in young children is far from being sufficiently recognised. Yet all practices which teach the child to dwell upon the pleasures of appetite ; the rewarding of obedience or the soothing of irritability by dainties which gratify the palate ; the indulgence of the child in whatever is going at table, or in whatever he pleases to cry for, knowing well by past experience that his parents will at length, like the unjust judge in the parable, be wearied by his much lamenting ; — all these directly and greatly increase the difficulty of all subsequent training in self-control. In these matters, so ^ as the mere indulgence of appetite is concerned, th'. THE WILL "5 child is entirely in the hands of his guardians. But it is important that his training should not be merely negative, but that little by little he should be exercised in /^^-restraint, in good-natured submission to restriction or deprivation; in the deferring of present satisfaction to future gratification ; in the restraint of haste in eating, of greediness, of covetousness ; in sharing his pleasures with others, and in willingness to subordinate his personal desires to the common welfiire. The power of controlling exhibitions of feeling and passion is very slowly acquired. The child's early outbursts o. passion are instinctive reactions without moral significance. They are experiences which, for the time beings over- whelm him by their intensity. They serve the purpose not only of increasing his stock of emotional experience, but, if rightly guided, of affording play for the exercise of self- control. The pron.inence of suggestibility in the child is a powerfiil instrument in the hands of anyone who understands the working of a child's minJ, and renders it easy, in the period of reaction which follows a storm of passion, to awaken him to a sense of the evil of uncurbed outbursts of emotion, and to instil into him those ideas and motives which will stand by him and help him when he again feels he is losing his self-control. Self-knowledge and self-judgment thus prepare the way for self-direction. There is, perhaps, no child • ' ^xn education can do more to make or mar than one in >f. a generous disposition and a passionate tempera- ment go k t,-ther. Cruo:. all outbursts of emotion, carrying the day if need be "at the point of the sword,*' and the flame will smoulder, mwardly nourishing the roots of all forms of selfish anger. Guide them into the service of the will, and they lay the foundation of a hatred of wrong and a generous scorn of evil. All forms of self-control involve in some measure couuol of the thoughts. It is not enough that the outward ex- pression of unlawful desire and passion should be checked. The direction of the thoughts must also be completely and resolutely turned until the mind rest£ in the possession of the ii6 THE WILL higher motive. Until the will is able to do this the evil is only cloaked. As St John strongly expresses it, "Every one that hateth hie brother is a murderer," for hatred only waits for opportunity to inflict the direst evil. But the power thus to see the hij»her, and to accept its claim when the importunity of the lower is urgently felt, is necessarily of slow growth. Yet here again the openness of the child's mind to suggestion renders it possible to multiply all worthy motives of conduct. Inasmuch as the various lines of association reinforce one another, even the lower motives of right conduct, such as personal afl^ecdon, or desire for praise, may be fitly used to supplement and strengthen the higher, reverence for what is right, provided they are kept in due subordination. The exercise of the will in the control of the thoughts is as important a part of mental as of moral ^raining. Here the power of concentrating the attention on the work in hand is the main point to be secured. The child's mind is naturally as restless as his body, and unless strong interest in the subject can be aroused, he lets his wits go wool-gathering. Interest, therefore, must be secured, and whenever possible should be intrinsic in the subject. Especially ought the power of observation to be exercised in the discovery or the recognition of the innumerable links which connect all new bits of knowledge with common well-known things. The will is also exercised in the concentration of the attention required in learning anything by heart, or in such practices as mental arithmetic, where mental operations have to be performed with speed. Finally, the child must be taught the habit of attending to whatever he is engaged in. Dawdling over a book, or a task, or anything else, is not merely a waste of time, but a positive evil, weakening the power of concentrating the mind upon a subject. Free Will. — The term free will popularly refei. ^o the feeling of freedom which attends the ability to determine one's actions by ideas. In proportion as the lower motives of conduct cease to appeal to us, and we become able to set THE WILL 117 aside all conflicting impulses without any sense of loss or renunciation, we gain the sense of harmony between our conduct and the ideal law of our life, and feel that we arc free. Free will in this sense is the aim of all education of the will. It is an aim which cannot, of course, l>e accom- plished ir. childhood, if indeed it can ever be accomplished altogether in this life. Nevertheless, it is only by keeping this end in view from the beginning that harmony can be attained between discipline and freedom. Discipline means control. It often means restriction. But if the end of discipline be freedom, the discipline must be such as will restrict, and restrict effectually, those impulses and desires which interfere with freedom. Every act of will is in reality an act of choice, and every act of choice implies restraint. We can attend to nothing without restraining impulses to attend to other things. We can choose nothing without rejecting the alternative. Hence, in the training of the will, restriction is necessary in the first place to prevent the choice of the lower in ignorance or caprice, and in the second to define the direction in which choice will give the largest freedom. No greater mistake can be made than to suppose that a reasonably strict discipline interferes either with a child's sense of freedom or with his happiness. A very large part of a child's happiness consists in a sense of harmony with his sur- roundings, and the child naturally seeks for this by striving to assimilate his conduct to the examples, customs, and ideals he finds about him. Such harmony is obviously unattainable under a shifting discipline which permits one day what is forbidden the next. Hence one object of any discipline which has the child's happiness at heart should be to define as clearly as possible the limits between what is permitted and what is forbidden, between what is right and what is wrong, for only in this way can the child form any clear conception of the ideal of conduct which is considered suitaUe for him. This definiteness can only be attained by a con- sistency analogous to that by which Nature teaches tho child ii8 THE WILL the limitations imposed upon him by the physical world. The absoluteness of the laws of Nature do not produce in the child a sense of his weakness and helplessness, but on the contrary, by defining what is possible and what is impossible, awaken in him a delightful sense of growing power. So also a discipline which, while suited to the child's stage of develop- ment, is absolutely consistent and unwavering in its require- ments, if felt to be restrictive in times of forgetfiilness or impulse, serves chiefly to define those ideals of conduct towards which he is attracted by his desire for harmony, his love of approbation, his pursuit of pleasiu-e. How closely related discipline is to happiness is nowhere better exemplified than by the well-known fact that, next to actual ill-usage, there is no quicker way of making a child unhappy than by simply giving him everything he wants. Attend to every caprice, supply him at once with everything he fancies, praise everything he does, and in an incredibly short time he will be an ungoverned, miserable, spoiled child. Having said so much on the necessity of control, let me now conclude by referring very briefly to the necessity of liberty. Necessary as control is to define the child's ideal, il is in itself regative and unproductive. It is without power. It does nothing to strengthen the will on the positive side. The will can only be strengthened by voluntary activity, hence the child must be taught to love whatever ideal of conduct it is sought that he should follow. Hence, also, the ideal must be a child's ideal and must appeal to him through all worthy motives of conduct— a child's motives, not a man's. Yet do not urge motives more than necessary. Take for granted that the child desires to do right. Trust him, and let him know that he is trusted. Do not promise him either happiness or approval as a reward for doing right, but let him feel that he obtains both. When resuiction is necessary and right, let the child be held to a perfectly faithful account, that the feeling of order and of law may gain a hold upon him, but do not let any sense of conflict with duty be felt unnecessarily. It is often an assistance to HABIT 119 have a definite time for the performance of certain duties, and even then to be careful not to remind the child too abruptly of what is expected of him. The announcement of bedtime, for instance, need not fall like a bolt from the blue just when the child is in the excitement of play, or en- grossed in the most interesting chapter of his book, even though discipline must be maintained. Let the child have reasons for commandments when he is able to appreciate them, but do not teach him to expect them or to wait for them. As far as possible couple negative commandments with some alternative so that the child may feel that he has some freedom of choice. Lastly, do not expect too much of the child. Moral forcing is at least as dangerous as intellectual. Sensitive children may easily be led to develop a very keen sense of right and wrong at an early age, out we cannot but tremble for the future of a child who has to consider the ethics of all his actions at the age of five, or who feels the " sense of sin " at seven. One can hardly be too careful not to worry such children over trifles. On the other hand, with high- spirited, headstrong children great patience is often needed, and even guidance through a course of trial and error, in order that the will may be led to choose the right. CHAPTER XI Habit " Habit," wrote Carlyle, " is the deepest law of human nature. It is our supreme strength; if also, in certain circumstances, our miserablest weakness." "Habit is our fundamental law ; Habit and Imitation, there is nothing more perennial in us than these two. They are the source of all Working and Apprenticeship, of all Practice and Learning, in this world." Definition. — Habit, in the wide sense of the term, 120 HABIT ii i means that all the functions of living creatures tend to repeat toemselves, or at any rate to become easier by repetition. The law of habit reigns not only in the domain of action, but also m the domains of feeling, and of thinking. The Physiology of Habit— Habit depends funda- mentally on the plasticity of the nervous system whereby all nervous currents tend to leave their traces in the paths they tr£7erse. The currents which enter the young brain through the sensory nerves not only stimulate the brain to grow, but they seek outgoing channels which are manifested by the movements resulting. Every time a sensation-action circuit IS traversed the path is made deeper and the action tends to be more readily repeated. It is for this reason that the most trivial acts are of importance. They are not isolated. They tend m similar circumstances to recur and to give rise to habits. The plasticity of the nervous system upon which habit depends is greatest in the young. Efforts which are made while the brain is actively growing give direction to the processes of growth. Hence it sometimes happens that where persistent efforts have been made to acquire somr new movement with only partial success, the desired result is attained quite easily on a renewed attempt after a period of rest. "After one has done all in one's power, the nervous system does the rest." The simplest habits occur as the reflex response of the nervous system along some beaten pathway of discharge; the most complex depend upon a physical basis of an associated system of such paths. Habits, in short, are artificial reflex'-s. Upon the possibihty of laying down the lines of such reflexes all education depends. The Practical Effects of Habit,~RMt may be regarded m the first instance from the practical standpoint as a labour-saving device. (i) Habit enables us to carry out our actions more accurately and promptly and with less fatigue, or in other words, practice makes perfect. In learning to use the muscles in any new way the attention is at first strained and H\BIT 131 energy is exhausted in the effort. The required movements are likewise executed awkwardly. But every repetition renders the movement more and more easy, and at last actions which at first could be carried out only with the greatest difficulty are performed promptly and accurately and with little or no sense of effort. ' (2) Habitual actions are carried on with a minimum of conscious attention. The simplest habits are performed with the unconsciousness of reflex actions. If they enter into consciousness at all, they do so during or even after their performance. More complex habit>ial actions similarly require scarcely any conscious attention save in the necessary effort to start. Examples of these practical effects of habit are supplied by every act of our daily life. We should never have learnt to stand, or walk, or run, to button our clothes, or tie our boots, if we had had to begin each morning as to a fresh U.J'. But in learning these things and a thousand others not only has practice made perfect, but the more habitual of our actions are performed almost without consciousness. (3) Habit not only renders particv' * actions easier of perfc mance, but particular kinds of actions. The man who has never handled any implement of greater precision than a plough^share or a pruning hook will have much greater difHculty in ^diining an occupation requiring a finer co-ordina- tion of movement, such as woodcarving, than an artist or a draughtsman. In this way habit not only lays down lines of association, but in a sense it furnishes momentum. Hence the importance of the early training of children in order that the force of habit may in due time assist volition. Intellectuai and Ethical Aspects of Habit. — Habit has a more important aspect than those already considered. If habits were merely a device for rendering our acquirements stable, and enabling us to go our daily round with faultless uniformity, we should end our life where the ants and bees begin. And indeed all our regularities of habit do tend to become purely automatic in their perform- 133 HABIT ance, and regarded from the outside might seem to have no greater value than inborn instinctive activities. But regarded from within, habit acquires a new significance as the process upon which our mental life is built. All mental phenomena develop through an ascending series of stages, and on habit depends the possibility of the passage from stage to stage. Perception, for example, depends upon the formation and habitual association of certain pathways for nervous current. Memory, imagination, reasoning, the association of ideas, etc., likeMrise depend upon the law of habit. All our activities which have been individually acquired, yet in the end are performed with the unconsciousness of instinct, have been necessary steps in our development. They tell not only what we dc^ but what we are. This may be rendered more clear by considering the relationship between habit and instinct. Habit and instinct. — It has been already recognised that the evolution of intelligence has been closely associated with the replacing of instinctive acts by habits individually acquired. The relationship or at any rate the resemblance between habit and instinct is recognised in common parlance when we speak of any acquired activity which has become habitual as " instinctive." The same relationship is recognised in the definition of instinct as inherited habit. It was at one time believed that animals were provided at birth with a complete range of instincts perfectly adapted to guide them without fault or failure in all the possible circum- stances of life, fiut no one now believes that animals are nothing but conscious automata. There are abundant facts to prove that instincts are neither altogether blind nor altogether invariable, but may be modified by individual experience, education, and intelligence. Birds, for example, which have been hatched and brought up alone, do not sing the character- istic song, nor build the characteristic nest, of their kind. Even ants, wasps, and bees, which furnish the most marvellous examples of the complexity and the perfection of instinct, doubtless exhibit also individual psychical variations. As examples of these are not yet numerous, I will quote one HABIT 133 illustration from George and Elizabeth Peckham. *«We have now and then," they say, ««8een a queen of PoTutu fiuca occupy a comb of the previous year instead of building a new one for herself, shewing a better mental equipment than her sisters, who were not strong-minded enough to change their wa^s and so built new nests alongside unoccupied old ones which were in good condition." If a similar individual variation of an action usually instinctive were repeated a number of times the action in the modified form would become a habit. So soon as an animal, in following the promptings of its instincts, becomes able to profit by experience and to adapt the precise form of its activities to altered requirements, we find the beginning of intelligent action. The insiinct repeated in the altered form soon becomes mechanically perfect, and ranks as a habit. Between the instincts which were inherited and the habits which are acquired the whole mental activity of which the animal is capable develops. For the development of intelligence Nature has found room mainly in two ways. In the first place, by slightly relaxing her hold on an instinct she has allowed some freedom of adaptation to circumstances, so far as intelligence was able to profit thereby. Intelligence is mainly acquired in the school of experience. Hence we find that many actions are carried on by instinct to begin with. Thereafter they may be modi- fied to suit circumstances by intelligent adaptation on the lines which experience indicates. Such actions would be in part instinctive and in part intelligent. A still further relaxation is provided for by the transient character of certain instincts. Many instincts appear to possess their greatest impelling force on the first occasion of their mani- festation. Thereafter the experience so gained becomes part of the individual's acquirements, and finds opportunity for its exercise by the disappearance, or at any rate the diminished impulsiveness, of the instinct as such. In this way there may be grafted upon an instinct a habit which outwardly may appear to differ little from the instinctive activity itself, but which has been raised to a higher mental plane. Again instincts 124 HABIT I i may be "periodic in development and serial in character," hence the experience and intelligence gained by, and the habits formed upon, the earlier manifestations may determine the special direction of the later when they arise. In the second place, far greater scope for individual adapta- tion was provided for by the appearance of the period of babyhood in which the young is for a season protected and cared for by the parents. In this way a far greater relaxa- tion of the complexity of instinctive activities has been possible than in species where the needs of life have to be provided for by each individual from the time of birth. The longer the period of babyhood, and the greater the care of the young by the parents, the greater has been the opportunity for the perfection of instinctive activities by imitation, practice, and experience, under circumstances where mistakes were not of serious importance ; the greater also the opportunity for the development of intelligence. When we turn our attention from the animal to man, we find that in the conduct of human life instinct is at a minimum, habit at a maximum. The prolonged period of maternal care has rendered unnecessary the perfection of instinct required for a life self-sustaining from the first. Even those instincts which are most essential to life have lapsed to such an extent that the child is entirely dependent on parental care. Never- theless the ancestral instincts have not entirely gone. On the contrary the whole range of instinct-feelings found in the animal reappears in human life. But they appear in an altered form as relics of a past. To a large extent they no longer guide man in the perils of life, nor are they trusted to secure him his necessities. Every instinct, as James says, is an impulse, and we can best understand all the instinct-feelings or impulses of children if we regard them as the representatives of the primi- tive instincts. The various forms of emotional reaction, the groundless fears of fur, of feathers, of darkness, or the various forms of the play activity can only be explained by referring them to distant heredity. Their present importance, however, ■^■^>Xili HABIT VT I2S is not to provide relics for the delectation of the antiquarian psychologist. They are necessary stages in the development of intelligence. From them all else ultimately comes. In former chapters we have already traced how feeling in the form of sense-perception gradually brings the child to a knowledge of the outside world and of his own body ; to the formation of ideas ; and so to his intellect. On the other hand with the progress of sense-perception the more complex feelings and emotions are excited, recognised, and interpreted by the growing intelligence, judged as desirable or undesirable, and translated into action by the will. Similarly acts which had been reflex or instinctive are learned, understood, chosen deliberately, and, it may be, forged by frequent repetition into habits — habits which may be performed as automatically as instincts yet carry with them the moral value of acts of will. Summary of the Practical Value of Habit, — I . Habit is a labour-saving device. It saves from a useless waste both of physical and intellectual power. 2. Every stage of our mental life has been built upon a basis of acquired habit (perception, memory, imagination, etc.). 3. In the domain of conduct habit acquires an ethical significance as the acquired result of volitional activity. The Formation of Habits. — Habit being thus con- ceived as " the deepest law of our nature " we now turn to the question of how habits can be deliberately formed. The chief rules which can be laid down on the subject are the following : ( i ) The first requisite is a sufficient motive force at the outset. Professor Bain lays great stress on this rule, inattention to which is a frequent cause of failure. Such a motive may be something extrinsic such as rewards and punishments, love of approval, deference to public opinion. Such motives have their place and value as in- centives, but they should be so used as to reinforce and not to overshadow the intrinsic. The great point to be gained is to produce a strong inclination in the child's mind towards the habit aimed at. This is Nature's method of teaching. The strong desire of the young child to touch and handle what- 126 HABIT ever he sees is Nature's method of laying down those haUtual associations on which perception depends. Similarly speech is acquired through the propensity to imitate, the pleasure in making sounds, and the desire to communicate with others. All the normal impulses, propensities, interests of children are the indications of some want which is being felt. They imply the presence of power. The aim of education should be to get this power at the back of a desired end, by shewing the child how a legitimate satisfaction of his impulses may be gained. As James ^ expresses it, in a properly rounded development every one of the very numerous instinct- tendencies of the child would start a habit towards certain objects, and inhibit a habit towards certain others. (2) The second requisite is a long series of repetitions. A stone flies in pieces after many blows from a hammer. Which blow shivered it into fragments ? Every blow. Each stroke helped in loosening the particles and defining the natural lines of cleavage. The last stroke only completed what the others began. So in the formation of habits every stroke counts. The work does not have to be begun afresh each morning. Yesterday's strokes are still there to help the process. And behmd yesterday's are all the habits already formed, good or bad, to help or to hinder to-day*s work. (3) The third requisite is an uninterrupted continuity of performance. Never allow an exception to occur. This is a rule which is frequently very difficult to carry out, yet any exception undoes a good deal of what has already been gained. One is very apt to err in this respect when a child has been seen to be trying to act up to some lule which has been laid upon him. Some day he fails and one is apt to say to oneself, " Oh ! well, poor fellow, he has been doing his best, we won't count this time," forgetting that the omission will count against him all the same. This attitude of mind results chiefly from feeling that the acquisition of a habit is a difficult ^ W. James, ' « Principles of Psychology." See chapters on Instuut and on Habit. HABIT 127 thing, and will go on all the more easily after a rest. The law of habit however is quite to the opposite effect. Any ingrained habit becomes a source of pleasure if continued long enough, more readily of course if the act is in its nature pleasurable. But even actions which are disagreeable at first lose their irksomeness when they become habitual. Hence every exception which occurs when such an act is becoming habitual merely pr'^longs the feeling of irritation. Children ?lso notice very ^'.ly if an omission on their part is observed and yt, sed over without remark, and are very ready to interpret the omission as an indication that the habit in question does not matter very much after all. "Why do you come to table without washing your hands when you know I always send you to do it ? asked a mother of her son. " Once you didn't," said the boy.^ On some Special Habits, — Habits, like instincts, are passed on from one generation to another, but they are passed by different channels. Instincts are transmitted by heredity. Habits, which may differ almost as little as instincts, in successive generations, are not inherited directly, but passed on by tradition or custom. In order that tlio child may learn to conform to the best in the customs and traditions of the race, in order that he may as early as possio e acquire good habits, it is necessary that he should have a considerable degree of submissiveness. Hence in early life obedience has been generally regarde** as the greatest virtte. If it is one of the rights of children " to be well brought up," obedience must become a habit at an early age, in order that the child may profit to the utmost in the wisdom of the race, and with as little conflict as possible between inclination and authority. The child must be taught obedience in order that he may be taught to act in accordance with those rules of conduct which should guide him in after life, in order that, when the time of self-government comes, these may not appear to him strange things to be judged and perhaps opposed. The formation of the habit of obedience need not wait until the child's will has 1 See Harrison, « A Study of Child Nature." 128 HABIT begun to manifest its activity. The early training of the child In regular habits of feeding and sleeping, the importance of v^y-^a for the physical well-being of the child has already been mentioned, is itself a training in passive obedience which brings the force of habit to aid in teaching th^ lesson of voluntary obedience. This is well expressed by Horace Bushnell, who says, "There is what may be fitly called a Christian handling for the infant state that makes a most solid beginning of government. It is the even handling of repose and gentle affection which lays a child down to sleep so firmly that it goes to sleep as in duty bound; which teaches it to feed when food is wanted, not when it can be somehow made uneasy, or the mother is uneasy for it ; which refuses to wear out the night in laborious caresses and coaxings, that only reward the cries they endeavour to compose ; which places the child so firmly, makes so little of the protests of caprice in it, wears a look so gentle and loving, and goes on with such an evenness of system, that the child feels itself to be, all the while, in another will, and that a good will ; consenting thus by habit and quickly to be la])ped in authority, jou as it consents to breathe in the lap of Nature and her atmo- spheric laws. And thus it becomes a thoroughly governed creature, under the mere handling of its infantile age.'* The same kind of care not only in the careful regulation of the times for feeding and for rest, for athing and for exercise, but also in the strict attention to cleanliness and neatness in every way will likewise greatly help the child in learning habits of order and punctuality and cleanliness. Great consistency and uniformity in early training not only aid the formation of such habits as have been mentioned, but increase one's personal influence over the child, teaching him the habit of trust, and making it easier for him to feel that the commands which are laid upon him are in themselves reasonable. The habits of obedience and trust, thus estab- lished by the exercise of ..uthority resting on its ovm right, are now enlisted in the service of the aim of all true discipline, the production of a self-governing being. HABIT laq Next in order to the natural submissiveness of the child, which enables him to be introduced almost unconsciously into human customs, comes tiie instinct of imitation whereby he is prompted to play his own part in acquiring the habits of his kind. " Instinct and imitation ; there is nothing more perennial in us than these two." The imitativeness of the child is greatly aided by his suggestibility, through which some sense of the relative value of acts may be awakened. Through Uiese the child may le^rn those complex habits which constitute "good manners," and thereby make an important step in gaining control over involuntary movements and emotions. In mental training special attention should be paid to the cultivation of the means of acquiring knov/ledge so that proper habits of thought may be formed. In the training of the special senses much should be made of accuracy of observation, and the child's interests should be widened so that he may find pleasure in pursuing his own investigations into things about him. Accuracy in speech also requires careful training that it may become habitual. "Accustom your children," said Dr Johnoon, " constantly to this ; if a thing happened at one window, and they, when relating it, say that it happened at another, do not let it pass, but instantly check them ; you do not know where deviation from truth may end." ^ Children should also be accustomed to performing whatever they have to do promptly and expeditiously. When the time for lessons comes, speed in learning should be encouraged as well as accuracy, in order that the habit of attention may be formed. This will be rendered much more difficult if such bad habits have been permitted to develop as dilatoriness in dressing, or getting ready to go out, or dawdling over meals. Similarly the child's early training in order and neatness will aid the development of orderliness of mind, assist him in forming the habit of comparing new knowledge with old, and of discover- ing r\e connection between the objects of knowledge. "The peculiarity of the moral habits," says Professor 1 Boswell's <> Life of Johnson." 130 HABIT Bain, ** distinguishing them from the intellectual acquisitions, is the presence of two hostile powers, one to be gradually raised into the ascendant above the other. It is necessar^r-, above all things, in such a situation never to lose a battle. Every gain on the wrong side undoes the effect of many conquests on the right." Hence the importance of arranging the force of habit on the right side in advance. A moral habit is not thoroughly established until the sense of conflict is lost. A child is not really truthful until it has become his second nature to tell the truth, even when doing so conflicts with a momentary inclination to seek a short way out of a difficulty. When a difficulty of this kind does arise, and the child is tempted to tell a self-interested lie, nothing can help him more than a carefully acquired habit of truthfulness and accuracy, which will often cause him to answer truthfully almost before he feels the temptation to do otherwise. Yet in this, as in all habits which can be called moral, the child must win his own battles. The function of education is to guide the intellect into a knowledge of right and wrong, to supply motives for right conduct, and to furnish occasions for the exercise by which alone moral habits can be cultivated. Duties should come to the child as a privilege and a trust. " A sense of duty done calls forth a feeling of independence." The child should be trained in the habit of kindness and thoughtfulness for others, and especially should advantage be taken of times when he is in the mood to display a disposition to increased confidence or affection to find or suggest occasions for service, that his emotions may not by habit become a mere jentimentalism. In training in moral courage, likewice, exercise is of the greatest importance, and especially the development of habits of self-reliance. Here lies the danger of too frequent appeal to the lower motives of conduct, and especially of en- couraging too great deference to public opinion, by constantly asking about trifles, What will people think ? or What will people say i FROEBEL AND THE KINDERGARTEN 131 CHAPTER XII Froebel and the Kindergarten A Mode of Nurture The chief aim of education in the past has been the impartir ; of knowledge. The object of the teacher has been to indut his scholars to learn, and by the drill of frequent repetition to cause them to remember. The mateiial of instruction was confined to such subjects as could be studied in books. The most successful teacher was he whose scholars knew most, as tested by examinations. For many years there has been growing up in our midst a new conception of education, which looks primarily not to the knowledge to be taught, but to the individual to be educated. To Pestalozzi especially we owe the conception of education as the development of all the powers of each individual, beginning with the senses and proceeding through them to the mind. This idea was worked out much more fully and systematically by Froebel, who not only greatly extended the educational theories of his predecessors, but worked out their practical application. By crystallising his ideas in the kindergarten Froebel rendered one of his greatest services to education, for he has thereby provided an object lesson which appeals to the practical mind of thousands of teachers who otherwise would have regarded his principles as p.bstract theories and nothing more. The kindergarten is not simply a method for teaching young children. It is the application to their education of those laws which, as Froebel held, should govern the whole education of man. In designing the kindergarten, Froebel had constantly in view not only the children but the women who should be their teachers, and he desired intensely that his principles should be recognised not only in the school but in the home. Nine women out of ten spend the best years of their lives ija FROEBEL AND THE KINDERGARTEN in the education of young children. For such a task woman is specially fitted by her natural love for children, her patience, her tact, her fertility of resource, her power of intuition. But in training young children mind is needed as well as hecrt, and Froebel desired that all women, whether likely to be teachers or not, should find in the kindergarten a means of exercising and developing their natural gifts, of gaining {H-actical experience in the care of children, and of receiving such a culture of heart and mind as should convert instinct into insight. "My whole strength," he says, **is exerted to the work of getting the natural instinct and its tendencies more rightly understood and more acknowledged ; so that women may follow its leadings as truly as possible aided by the higher light of intelligent comprehension." What the kindergarten is capable of effecting in this way is abundantly witnessed by the enthusiasm and earnestness of Froebel's followers. As Mrs Wiggin writes, "many a girl has said when the purpose of the kindergarten began to dawn upon her, ^hat she then first understood the meaning of existence, and we doubt whether a more eloquent com- mentary on the value of the study could be made than such an exclamation from a young girl just entering life, with all its hopes and enchantments shining before her eyes." Froebel's Educational ideas. —Socrates said he could learn nothing from trees. Froebel, who loved Nature as the symbol of the invisible, always declared that a tree had been his teacher. The tree was to him the type of the unity of Nature, a conception which dominated all his teach- ing. The gradual growth in his mind of the means whereby his ideas might take visible shape he speaks of as the growth « of a beautiful tree of life within me," and when the name " kindergarten " occurred to him it seemed an inspiration. " Eureka, 1 have found it ! " he exclaimed. The idea which is now generally spoken of as the uniformity ot Nature, the idea of unity, the idea that there is nothing isolated in the universe, but that all things continually work together, inspired Froebel to study the laws oT Nature, FROEBEL AND THE KINDERGARTEN 133 and to try to find therein the methods of that work into which he threw all the great energies of his mind and heJirt, The tree was the symbol of unity. The growth of the tree symbolised to him the growth of the child. He saw that if the tree is to grow strong and graceftd after its kind, the conditions must be favourable ; that soil, and air, and sun- shine, and all healthy and stimulating influences must be com- bined with care and shelter from frost and cold, and too keen competition in the race for life, if beautiftil and harmonious growth is to be attained. But given all these, the growth of the tree is but an unfolding of its own inner nature. So, as he taught, must be the growth of the child. If the child is to develop towards an ideal manhood, he, also, from his youngest days must be encouraged to put forth his strength in right and usefiil ways. The unity in the life of every man means that every stage of development must be lived perfectly if the next is not to suffer. A perfect manhood can only grow out of a perfect childhood, and consequently to attempt to force on children ways which are not their ways, ideals which cannot be their ideals, forms of words which cannot have meaning for them, can only result in dwarfing their minds and pieventing therr ever attaining such stature as they should. Utterly rejecting the doctrine of the total depravity of human nature, he had faith to believe that the child might be trusted, with liberty and opportunity, to be the active agent in his own education. But by liberty he did not mean license. Again Froebel saw clearly how closely in every stage of development all the bodily and mental powers are intertwined, so that it is impossible to neglect any one without impairing all. In mental training he laid stress on the connection between feeling, knowing, and doing, and taught that side by side with the acquisition of knowledge must go the practical application of the knowledge acquired, and training in its application to good ends. An ardent student of science, Froebel saw the unity between the individual and the race, and in the study of the 134 PROEBEL AND THE KINDERGARTEN history of the race he sought for guidance in the means of individual culture, as indeed had to some extent been done by others before him. A believer in development or *ivolu- tion before the doctrine of the evolution of species was known, he recognised that in every child the history of the race is summarised, tlence he concluded that knowledge of the stages of dev oment through which the race had passed would indicate che stages, and hence the necessary material of instruction for every stage, of child life. But the study of the race meant something more than this. Froebel's idea of unity meant to him that in all Nature and in all the history of man there was to be seen the unfolding of an eternal divine plan. Hence the education of an individual child along the lines of race progress meant to that extent a furtherance of this plan, and in the possibility of raising the child into consciousness of his unity with others and with the race, and to a knowledge of the universal interdependence, he found the highest incentive to mdividual wifort. For in no other work, he thought, does man become so truly a fellow- labourer with God. Self' Activity, — If the end of education be to train man's powers in harmonious development, how can this be done? To Froebel there seemed to be only one answer possible — by exercise. This answer is one which meets us everywhere in Nature, for it is universally true that every organ is maintained in efficiency and power by exercise, and that every organ that is not exercised tends to degenerate and disappear. The blind fish of the mammoth caves, the sightless Crustacea of the great depths, die flightless birds of Australasia, the wingless insects of many oceanic islands all teach us a lesson which is too frequently ignored. Many teachers have endeavoured to educate the child by training some of his powers only, while others were neglected. Children have been made to learn words, rules, formulse which they could not understand on the plea that the exercise would at least strengthen their memories, and when at last they have been thoroughly drilled into work of this kind they have been PROBBEL AND THE KINilBRGARTEN 135 blamed for "learning like parrots," though they "could none other '* They have been made to sit still, to suppress their energies, to control at least the activity of their bodies, and when at last they have learned the lesson of listlessly allowing their minds to wander, have been scolded and punished for laziness and inattention. To get over these and other defects in educational methods Froebel thought out the process of self-activity, and the symbol of self-actmty he found in the chUd's play. Although Froebel was *« nrst to make a systematic use of play for the education of children, he was not the first to see the falsity of the popular view that children's play is merely a means of passing the time. Here, for example, are two well-known quoutions from Plato, which are often cited in this connection, and whose spirit is in close accord with Froebel's teaching :— " Play has the mightiest influence on the maintenance and the non-mainten- ance of laws ; and if children's plays are conducted accordmg to laws and rules, and they always pursue their amusements in conformity with order, while finding ipUasvxe therem, it need not be feared that when they are grown cp they will break laws whose objects are more serious." And again :— «« From their earliest years, the plays of children ought to be subject to strict laws. For if their plays, and those who mingle with them, are arbitrary and lawless, how can they become virtuous men, law-abiding and obedient? On the contrary, when children are early trained to submit to laws m their plays, love for these laws enters into their souls wiUi the music accompanying them, and helps their development. By the study of children's play we learn how the har- monious development of the child takes place before he comes to school. When a child is at pUy he is not merely receiving impressions but he is also forming ideas,— all his actions are expressive of these ideas. The child not only "learns to do by doing," but he "grows by doing. bo wbeii he goes to school bis receptive powers should be developed not by the teaching of words only, but by shewing him things, and allowing him to handle them, and find out 136 PROEBEL AND THE KINDERGARTEN as much as possible about them for himself; his reflective powers should be guided to connect this knowledge with what he already knew so as to enlarge his ideas; and his executive powers should be trained in giving expression to these ideas. Froebel believed that play was the most serious occupation of young children. In play, he says, "we see the whole future life of man epitomised, the secret recesses of dawning mind are therein revealed to us as in a mirror. Healthy unforced play results in an intensified pleasure in existence for the child ; he is then at peace with himself and all the world. In it lies the germ of all human goodness ; it is the growing point out of which all true service in after life springs." " Whether the future life shall be pure or sullied, peaceftil or rent with passion, industrious or indolent ; whether it shall be a kind of dull vegetative existence, or a life ftiU of high conscious purpose ; a life at peace or at war with society ; all these questions are raised and in fact determined by the nature and the conditions under which a child plays." Froebel therefore set himself to study the playing child that he might discover the meaning and the value of the different forms of the play activity. He collected the traditional baby-plays and songs which he found in use among the German peasant mothers. These games and songs he adapted for use in the kindergarten aid supplemented by others which he invented to serve special ends. A collection of such games and songs he afterwards published in *« The Mother Play" (Die Mutter und Kose-Lieder), and on them are founded all the games played in the kindergarten to-day. Froebel regarded this as the most important part of his educational work. "He who imderstands what I mean by these songs knows my inmost secret." While these games are intended to exercise the senses and train the muscles in harmonious movement, they are more particularly directed towards the child's future development. They feed his imagination and cultivate his feelbg, and especially awaken the social instinct, and help him to some dim sense PROBBBL AND THE KINDERGARTEN 137 of moral relations. The games are interspersed with little songs which help to shew the child the meaning of the game, and accompanied '• y simple melody which develop the child*s natural love for music upon the educational value of which the kindergarten lays great stress. An essential feature of Froebel's system is that the kindergartner, in carrying on her work, must have such a perfect comprehension of the ends to be served, and such a perfect command of the child-mind through his natural imitativeness and suggestibility, that the games, although taught by her, must yet be chosen and played with perfect spontaneity by the children. They must be the free expression of their self-activity. The games and songs, the various k^wuergarten occupations, the naming of objects used and the conversations about them, all lead on naturally to other means of expression, and drawing, Mrriting, and reading are reached through the active instinct of the child and his growing imagination constantly prompting him to seek fuller and more adequate means of representing his ideas. In using drawing as a means of expression Froebel was following a natural instinct of the child who always tends to use drawing in this way, just as primitive man made scratchings and drawings on pieces of bone or tusk, not for the sake of artistic effect, but to tell a story. Drawing as a means of expression is a great stimulus to the child's powers of observation. In the first attempts at representation the child tends to draw not what he sees or might see, but what he knows to be there, thus illustrating the fact that perception is really an act of judgment. For example, in drawing a table he will represent all four legs, not recognising that only two or three should be visible ; or in representing a face in profile he will draw the eye as seen from the front or may even insert both eyes. As he learns to notice the incongruity between his drawings and the real things he is led to observe objects more carefully in different positions, and even, in time, to gain some practical knowledge of perspective, though this is to be regarded as a sec^^ry result. Yc f children as a rule take great '^^ hrawmg in this way, illustrating 138 FROEBEL AND THE KINDERGARTEN scenes and actions that have interested them, or pictorially telling stories which have been narrated to them. Drawing is now being recognised as a very valuable educational method long after the ordinary kindergarten age, but when the age of nine or ten is reached there is often a marked falling off of mterest or even a dislike of this means of expression. This may be associated with a growing sense of the artistic value of drawing, or may be connected with the development of the critical mood, which often at this age causes a diminution in the relish for fairy tales. The child being introduced by means of the games and occupations to some understanding of order, measure, form, size, relationship, number, the way is paved by the concrete knowledge thus obtained for the further study of arithmetic and mathematics, in which the children should continue to find problems for themselves as well as to solve them. By self-activity, therefore, Froebel meant much more than the exercise of the child's activity in various forms of co- ordinate movement. It is a well recognised fact that in matters of technical skill merely theoretical instruction is comparatively valueless. All occupations which require the skilful use of the limbs such as drawing, or wood-carving, or modelling, can be learnt only by practice. It has also been recognised to some extent that such acquirements have a higher educational value on account of the patience and perseverance which their perfect execution involves. But the process of self-activity involves more even than this. It requires that the child's activity should be so used as to afford exercise for his originative powers, so that the whole of the self may be active. It is not enough that the child be receptive of ideas. It is not enough th t he should be able to express the ideas of others. He must learn to form ideas of his own and to express them in nis own way, for only thus can he be trained to a rounded harmonious use of his powers. How the child may be rightly guided in his years of weakness without doing violence to his spontaneity is what the kindergarten claims FROEBEL AND THE KINDERGARTEN 139 to teach. It may seem to some that Froebel took too hopeful a view of child-nature. It may seem that in laying so much stress on the development by exercise of the native instincts and tendencies of the child, and thus training him by making "the inner become the outer," he did not realise sufficiently the existence of evil tendencies as well as good. But indeed Froebel did not fail to realise the necessity for control, only he believed that to rule a child's will by coercion or by fear was to attempt to obtain the fruit of obedience without planting the seed. So before the child is old enough to reason he would awaken the spirit of obedience through his natural trust and love. He would have all commands recognised as the expression of law by eliminating all caprice. Yet he would lead the child into obedience not to the felt pressure of law, but in the spirit of joy in voluntary service. He would try to starve tendencies to evil by denying opportunity for their exercise. But still more would he strive to discover and train the opposite good side of character, that evil might be overcome with good. Nature Study. — Froebel was an enthusiastic lover of Nature, and he would have every child learn to love her too. This deep love we find constantly expressed in his writings, and everywhere we notice two features of his teaching — his tenderness, and his love for symbolism. He had drunk deeply of the spirit of St Francis of Assisi, who " in his Catholic wholeness called the very flowers" his sisters. Like St Thomas a Kempis he believed that "if indeed thy heart were right, then would every creature be to thee a mirror of truth and a book of holy doctrine." Nature * was to him the garment of the invisible God, and he believed that if a child could be led to touch that garment hem virtue would come out of it, in the form of a moral and spiritual quickening of the child's life. His thought was that the child should be led to love all living things as play- fellows, to delight in their beauty, and to find in them ideas and symbols of truths. " From objects to pictures, from I40 FROEBEL AND THE KINDERGARTEN pictures to symbols, from symbols to thoughts," says Froebel, " leads the ladder of knowledge." The object of Nature study is to interest the child in the things about him and to develop his faculties. Froebel had no idea of teaching "science" to young children. The time for that is not yet, and the childish propensity to pull things to pieces in carelessness or idle curiosity is rather to be checked than encouraged. So by teaching the child how to treat the kitten, how to look after his pet animals, and especially by letting him have a little garden in which he might cultivate his own plants, he would develop in him a love for living things, and lead him to a new knowledge of his own powers, in learning how he could help these playfellows to a higher and more beautiful life. Thus little by little the child would grow into an appreciation of the spirit of Emerson's words, " Hast thou loved the wood-rose and left it on its stalk?" Such teaching enriches the child's thoughts and keeps alive his wonder power, it stimulates his imagination, it widens his interests, it exercises his observing powers, and creates in him a thirst for knowledge. In this, as in all his teaching, Froebel thought much of the development of the child's powers ; little of the mere imparting of knowledge. The Kindergarten. — In the practical carrying out of his educational ideas Froebel claimed that the child belonged both to the family and to the state. Hence one great aim of the kindergarten is to prepare the child for social life by letting him spend some hours of the day in a common fellowship. The means which Froebel provided for training the children are found in his " Gifts," his " Occupations," and his "Mutter und Kose-Lieder," that collection of children's games and songs which has been called the Kindergarten Bible. All these are definitely educational in purpose. They are not simply toys or games wjth which the children may be kept busy or amused, but are designed with special reference to the needs of the child to serve as means of exercising and developing all his powers. It would FROESEL AND THE KINDERGARTEN 141 be out of place to attempt to describe any of these individually, for Froebel's educational ideas as applied in the kindergarten can only be grasped by studying the various materials in their proper order of succession, in their connection with one another, and in their application to the developing faculties of the chUd. The « Gifts " are especiall> intended to be used in such a way as to attract his attention and stimulate his curiosity, to train his powers of observation, and so to develop his intellectual faculties. The " Occupations are designed to train the active application of the intellectual faculties to practical uses. The ^ames are of some value as physical education, but, used in conjunction with songs and stories, are specially designed to assist the child's ethicsd development by training him to sympathy and kindness, and to a sense of social relationships through play with other hildren of his own age. « Take the simplest circle game ; Illustrates the whole duty of a good citizen in a republic. Anybody can spoil it, yet nobody can play it alone ; anybody wan hinder its success, yet no one can get credit for making As to religious culture, the spirit of the kindergarten, so far as it is true to the spirit of Froebel's teaching, fosters the development of the religious mood, and helps to prepare the soil in which alone true religion can grow. Religion and morality are never separate in Froebel's teaching. Rehgion, in his belief, must be the foundation of all true education, but "religion is not an emotion or a dogma but a service. Hence he objected to any formal teaching of either religion or morality to young children, whose spiritual nature can only be injured by indoctrination in maxims and creeds in advance of the understanding and experience which alone can give them life. In place of trying to impress the forms of religion on the minds of the children, he sought to awaken the spirit of love and wonder and reverence in their hearts. Far from believing that there can be no real religious teaching which is not doctrinal, he strove to frame in his system, by «ymDol and parable, a presentation of religion from which the child 142 FROEBEL AND THE KINDERGARTEN may gather such suggestions and ideas as he is ready to receive. The ethical and religious end is fundamental in Froebers system, and the kindergarten is as a body without a soul in the absence of clear insight into his design that the children, vth'tlM believing that they are only hearing a story, or playing a game, or making some article of beauty or of use, are yet, all unconsciously to themselves, being trained to conform all their feelings, desires, and impulses to real goodness, and are being ** led by a way that they know not ** into some sense of allegiance to duty and to God. The Practical Results of the Kindergarten.— The kindergarten is specially intended to utilise the two or three years of childhood which precede the time of entrance to the primary school, and of its real educational value for children between three or four and six years of age there can be no reasonable doubt. Most of Jiie criticisms to which the kindergarten may be allowed to be open depend upon the fact that for its right employment the system makes very special demands upon the teacher. Froebel's ideas, as Mr Quick remarks, are not so easily got hold of as his " gifts," and if the teacher is not possessed by nature, education, and special training of the necessary qualifications, the kindergarten may easily become mechanical and formal, impose upon the child's individuality instead of developing it, and lose to a large extcui its power for good. But this is no real objection to Froebel's system, for nothing can make the education of young children in any real sense of the term anything but difficult, and if the kindergarten has emphasised the absolute necessity of culture and training for all teachers of young children, and the impossibility of a single teacher taking sole charge of sixty or seventy children just coming out of baby- hood without injuring them, let it be counted to it for a merit. As to the actual achievements of the kindergarten it must be remembered that the main object of the system is not to instruct, but to develop the child s powers, and so to prepare him for the period of school life. Nevertheless, in striving FROEBEL AND THE KINDERGARTEN 143 to promote the harmonious expansion of the child's whole nature, the kindergarten may claim to produce very tangible results \nthout appearing to aim directly at them. Amongst these results we may especially mention the following :— 1. The child's senses are cultivated, and through them his mind is awakened. 2. In playing with the gifts the child gams considerable knowledge of arithmetic— counting, addition, subtraction, multiplication, etc. .1,1. 3. In an experimental way he gains a pracucal knowledge of form, size, and proportion. He knows something of horizontal, vertical, sloping, straight, and curved lines; of triangles, squares, and oblongs ; of spheres, cylinders, cubes, prisms, and this knowledge prepares the way for an intelligent comprehension of geometry'. 4. The occupations not only allow the child to acquire individual experience by producing and reproducing something of his own, but they lay a foundation for the manual training which is coming to be recognised as an essential part of any intelligent system of education. 5. By means of conversation, stories, and singing, the child's vocabulary is greatly mcreased, his pronunciation is improved, and he is taught to express his own thoughts freely and correctly. 6. Drawing is encouraged as a means of expression, and the training of the eye and hand so obtained greatly simplifies the acquisition of reading and writing. 7. The child's whole environment and training in the kindergarten foster the development of his sense of beauty. 8. The co-operative work of the kindergarten, the games, and the rational method of discipline, shew the child the nature of his acts in relation to others, and promote his moral and social training. Such are some of the more obvious results which can be claimed by a good kindergarten, and if children could come to school with such a grounding it is evident that the work there would be greatly facilitated, especially if the teacher 144 FROEBEL AND THE KINDERGARTEN appreciated the value of Froebel's ideas, and had heart enough and head enough not only to instruct but to train. In conclusion, one other aspect of kindergarten work must be referred to, namely, the place of the kindergarten as a philanthropic agency. Remembering what has been said in previous chapters as to the influence of nurture in drawing out the possibilities latent in the child's nature, we may regard the kindergarten as an artificial environment specially designed to furnish the child with liberty and opportunity for the exercise by means of which alone his faculties can develop. Whatever the kindergarten is capable of doing for the child who comes from a refined home where all other influences co-operate in furnishing opportunity for healthy bodily and mental exercise, it is obvious that it is most needed for those whose opportunities are least, and whose early education is left to ignorance and chance. Considering the vacuity of mind and the lack of interest with which such children often enter upon school work, it is somewhat surprising that a system which, in good hands, is capable of so much as the kindergarten should have come to be regarded m this country as little more than a luxury for the rich. Fe"^ things shew more plainly than this how completely we are still dominated by the old conception of education as a process of pouring knowledge into the mind. In many countries there are free kindergartens, especially in America where many towns of moderate size have more of them than the whole of England, and where their educational value has come to be so fully recognised that their final adoption into the public school system is regarded by many as only a matter of t'me. The free kindergartens were started in the first instance for the sake of the children of the streets, that the years of their life before the public school is open to them might not be utterly wasted or worse than wasted, and year by year it appears that the value of their work as a social mission is being increasingly recognised in many ways. They serve, for example, as schools for training teachers and others in kindergarten work. To many a girl leaving school or college FROEBEL AND THE KINDERGARTEN 14S life they afford a needed outlet for the sympathy and energy which can only find expression in consecration to some human interest. They serve as object-lessons in education to parents, to teachers, and to school boards, and this is an important aspect of their work, for the faU value of Frocbel s ideas will only be understood when they are carried forward mto the education of the older nupUs. For the children themselves thty mean a step tow«.ds that at present fer-ofF educational ideal, equality of opportunity for every chUd ; they mean, if it be for only a few hours a day, an environment into which enters the beauty of form, of colour, of music, of story, and the personal influence of love, and patience, and justice, and truth ; they mean, if only for a few hours a day, an atmosphere of joyousness, of interest, of that productive self- activity, whose influence on future development is greatest in the early years of life. . . Does there seem to be some exaggeration m claiming a real educational value for such an influence brought to bear day by day on children so young ? It will not seem so, I thmk, to any who knows how true is Froebel's teaching that every stage of human development is conditioned by what went before, or who understands how the child's whole future life may be influenced by the outlets which his various instinctive unpulses find as they arise. Does it seem a vain dream th^ the kindergarten may have a mission among the degraded classes of our large towns, where it so often seems «« As if some lesser god had made the world But had not force to shape it as he would ? " Is it not here especially that we need Froebel's teaching that the best in life cannot be given but must be won, and t^t it never can be won if the early years of life are starved ? Even in the lowest strata of society the child, however handicapped by heredity, is yet human not only in shape but in promise ; human, also, in that educability which shews itself m adapta- tion JO whatever environment may press upon him. It does require fiuth, no doubt, to see that every child inherits 146 FROEBEL AND THE KINDERGARTEN something more than " the emptiness of ages " ; to see, with Froebel, that there u a divine idea for every child which education must find and develop. But to see this is to hope. Michael Angelo, it is said, one day saw a great block of stone in a quarry. " Send that to me," said he, ** I see an angel in it." TVKNBULL AMU SrSARS, FIIINTEBS, EDINBURGH. REFERENCES I. 2. 3- 4- 5- 6. 7- 8. lO. 1 1. 12. >3- 14. 16. 17- 18. 19. REFERENCES Adler, Felix. «« The Moral Instruction of Children." Baldwin, J. M. ** Mental Development in the Child and in the Race." Barnes, Earl. " Studies in Education." BusHNELL, Horace. " Christian Nurture." Chamberlain, A. F. «*The Child ; a Study in the Evolution of Man" (Contemp. Science Series). Compavr£, G. "The Intellectual and Moral De- velopment of the Child." Froebel, F. " The Education of Man." Froebel, F. " Letters on the Kindergarten." Froebel, F. "Mother Play" (Die Mutter und Kose-Lieder). Trans. Susan E. Blow (Inter- national Education Series). Groos, K. "Die Spiele der Menschen," Jena, 1 899. Harris, William T. " Psychologic Foundations of Education" (International Education Series). Harrison, Elizabeth. " A Study of Child Nature." Hall, Mrs Winfield. "The First Five Hundred Days of a Child's Life." [ChiU-Study Monthly, vol. ii., 1896.) ^^ Hughes, James L. " Froebel's Educational Laws (International Education Series). Marenholtz-Bulow, Baroness. "The Child and Child Nature." (Trans. Alice Christie.) Peabody, Elizabeth. "The Kindergarten." Perez, Bernard. "The First Three Years of Childhood." Preyer, W. "The Mind of the Child," 2 vols. (International Education Series). Preyer, W. "The Infant Mind" (International Education Series). REFERENCES 20. Radestock, Paul. •• Habit in Education." 21. Shinn, Millicent W. "Notes on the Development of a Child," Parts I. and II. University of California Studies. 22. Shirreff, Emily. "Home Education in Relation to the Kindergarten." 23. Sully, James. " Baby Linguistics." English Illus' trated Magaxtu.y 1884. 24. Sully, James. " Studies in Childhood." 25. Tracy, W. " The Psychology of Childhood." 26. Warner, Francis. " The Children ; Ho o Study Them." 27. WiGGiN, Kate Douglas, and Smith, Nora A. "The Republic of Childhood," 3 vols. 28. WiGGiN, Kate Douglas, and Smith, Nora A. "Children's Rights." Bibliographies of works on childhood will be found in Tracy (No. 25), and Chamberlain (No. 5). The latter gives over 700 Terences. The Temple Cyclopaedic Primers Small volames of condensed information introductory to great rabjectn, written by leading authorities both in England and abroad, adapted at once to the needs of the general public, and forming introductions to the special studies of scholars and studenu. 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