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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

W. B. DRUMMOND, M.B., CM., M.R.C.P.E.
Physician to the Western Dispensary, Edinburgh

>• ■'

Valentine. Dundee

THE AGE OF INNOCENCE

From a Piiturc by Sir Joshua Kcynolds

M CO R v^-^^'.o>:o<----<ii 0»sU- '.

1901 «1» eO-weiiblNGTON* 6TR€CT* VircST

All rigktt reserved

TREFACE

This little book ii intended as an introduction to the study
of the physical and mental development of the child. The
work is elementary in scope and practical in aim» aiid the
bearing of the resulu of child-study on the , ■'ucation a* > ■
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.

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

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-

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

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

NATURE AND NURTURE

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

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.

:;hild study

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

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

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-

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

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

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.

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

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."

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

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

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

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

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

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.

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

Cream.

4
7
1*5

0*2

87-3

8 to 20

3*4
o*6

84 to 72

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

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.. <nes found. Dr Still recently
examined nineteen samples of centrifugal cream obtained in
London, and found an average of as much as 48 per cent, of
fat.

There is a more important difference between human milk
and cow's milk than the difference in percentage composition
shown in the table. This lies in the character of the proteid
matter. In each case the proteids are composed of a mixture
of albuminoid substances, but in cow's milk **"* principal
proteid is casein which in the child's stomacl g' -.^ rise to
a firm dense curd, while in mother's milk the principal proteid
is a form of albumin which gives rise to a loose, flocculent,
and more easily digestible curd.

In order that the mother may have a good supply of milk,
she should have a plain, nutritious, and abundant diet in
which milk has a considerable share, and as soon as possible
she should have a sufficient amount of outdoor exercise daily
to preserve her own health and digestion. She should
practise good habits of nursing from the outset. It is of the
greatest importance that she should have a quiet undisturbed
night. The baby should never be allowed to go to sleep at
the breast, nor should it sleep in the same bed as its mother.
Occasionally the mother's milk does not agree with the infant,
even although the rules for nursing are being attended to.
If the milk is too rich, as it may be in the case of strong
healthy mothers who have good appetites and take little
exercise, the baby is apt to suffer from indigestion and colic.
The milk in these cases can often be made to agree if the
mother slightly reduces her diet, takes more exercise, and
nurses the baby at somewhat longer intervals. Occasionally
some special article of diet, especially wine or beer, may be
to blame for the indigestion. A more common fault is £(x
the milk to be poor in quality. This may be shown in ^any
ways, especially by the failure of th^ kifant to gain u ,ht

THE CARE OF THE INFANT

steadily and sufficiently. If the insufficiency is only slight,
a more generous diet and especially a larger supply of meat,
aided possibly by tonics and more abundant fresh air, may
put matters right. If not, the breast-milk may be supple-
mented by the use of some suitable infant's food, but the baby
ought not to be weaned if it can be avoided.

Contrs'indlcations to Nursing, — The principal
contra-indications to nursing are absence of breast milk ;
delicacy of the mother so that the strain of nursing is too
great ; the existence in the mother of some infectious disease
such as consumption. The milk of very nervous women,
and especially such as are given to worrying, will sometimes
disagree to such an extent as to coutra-indicate nursing. >

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

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

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

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 ' . <!hould take from fifteen to twenty minutes over a
meal. '' : bottle should then be taken away from him,
empti d. .d thoroughly cleaned, after which it may be kept
in cola water in which a little boracic acid has been dissolved,
until it is again required.

The amount of milk required for each feeding for twenty-
four hours is shown in the accompanying table : —

Age.
I week,

f month, .

3 months, .

6 months, .

9 months, .

12 months, .

The Use of Food other than Milk, — By the time
the baby is seven or eight months old some additions may be
made to the diet, but there should be no hurry in doing so
if the child seems satisfied and is steadily gaining in weight.
Still the use of some form of starchy food, such as oat flour,
or of one of the proprietary infants' foods, once or twice

At each Feeding.

In:

t4 hours

I-I^ OZ.

- 1 5 OZ.

z\ oz.

25 oz.

4 OZ.

6 oz.

32 oz.
36 oz.

7 oz.

8 oz.

42 oz.
-48 oz.

THE CARE OF THE INFANT

daily, is often advantageous, but there must be no diminution
in the amount of n^.ilk given.

Infant foods are nowadays used to such an enormous
extent that some of their features must be briefly referred to.
Most of the foods of this class have the advantages of being
easily prepared, easily digested, and readily taken. Practically
all of them, however, are greatly deficient in fat, and many
of them contain a considerable percentage of starch. Their
nutritive value is greatly inferior to properly prepared cow's
milk, and although many of them may be of considerable
value for temporary use, there can be no doubt that when
continued for a prolonged period as the exclusive diet, they
are frequently the cause of rickets or of infantile scurvy.

The most commonly used infant-foods may be grouped as
follows : —

1. Milk Foods: Allen Sr Hanbury's Food, No. i and

No. 2 ; Nestle's Food.

2. Malted Foods : Allen & Hanbary's Food, No. 3 ;

Horlick's Malted Milk; Savoury and Moore's
Food; Mellin's Food. These foods are prepared
from flour which has been malted so as to convert
the starch wholly or partially into soluble carbo-
hydrates.

3. Farinaceous Foods : Ridge's Food ; Robmson's Patent

Barley ; Scott's Oat Flour.

Diet between the Tenth and Eighteenth Months.

— During this period the diet should still be chiefly com-
posed of milk, and should include about two pints or two and
a half pints of fluid per day. The milk may still be slightly
diluted by adding one-fourth or one-fifth part of barley water or
thin gruel made from oats, wheat, or barley. Other forms of
food should be used in moderation as an addition to, not as a
substitute for, milk. Porridge now becomes an excellent
article of diet. It should be made of the medium oatmeal,
thoroughly cooked, and eaten with milk. Porridge made
of coarse oatmeal, rolled oats, or Quaker oats is not at all

THE CARE OF THE INFANT

suitable for young children. Farinaceous puddings, bread
and milk, rusks, soups thickened but without vegetables,
are all suitable. Eggs lightly cooked are extremely valuable,
and highly nutritious. Ripe or cooked fruit may be given
occasionally towards the end of this period, but should be
admitted with great moderation, and all skins, seeds or stones
must be excluded with great care.

Diet for Older Children — Till the end of the second
year the child should have about two and a half pints of
fluid daily, as in the last period. This may be given in five
feedings. The other foods mentioned may be gradually in-
creased in amount, and in addition a li'tle fish or chicken or
an egg may be given at the mid-day meal.

From the third to the sixth year four meals should usually
be given daily, the first and the third being more substantial
than the others. The diet should be light, varied, and
palatable. It should include a large amount of milk. Meat
should be included once a day. Salted and preserved meats,
new bread, most green vegetables, nuts, pastry, and preserved
fruits should be excluded from the diet.

During school life children require a very abundant diet.
Meals should be given at regular times, and the children
shoxild neither be allowed to dawdle at them nor to scramble
through them. As a rule some animal food should be given
twice a day, and the two more substa.Hisl meals should not
come too close together. The childish love of ** goodies "
should be met by including a fair amount of sweet things in
the diet, especially in the form of cooked fruit such as stewed
or roasted apples, or stewed prunes, or ripe fruit such as
grapes, oranges, or pears. Sweetmeats r-e best allowed
as an addition to meals. Chocolate is one cf the best forms.
The late Dr Milner Fothergill used to recommend toffee
when made at home with the best sugar and butter. So
made it is not merely a " goodie,'' but an excellent article
of diet, supplying both sugar and fat. Whil^ children should
be encouraged to eat the fat with their meat, they should not
be compelled to consume greasy articles of diet. Fat is most

THE GROWTH OF THE CHILD

1 1

readily taken and most easily digested in the form of milk,
cream, and butter. Jam or jelly should be given in modera-
tion as an addition to bread and butter, not as a substitute for
the butter. At any rate the old nursery rule, " butter with
the first piece," should be adhered to. The diet of all
young children should be very plain and simple in character.
"Tasty" articles should be excluded entirely, if for no
other reason than that they are apt to make the children
discontented with the plain and wholesome food with which
they are perfectly satisfied so long as they have never had
anything else.

When children show any disinclination for wholesome
articles of diet, this should not be too readily yielded to, as
the sense of taste is easily trained to like dmost anything
that is taken habitually. This is especially important in the
case of milk for which children leaving babyhood sometimes
show a distaste. However, it is not wise to insist on more
than a small quantity of the food objected to being taken.
If a large quantity is given the sense of disgust is apt to be
intensified.

CHAPTER V

The Qrowth of the Child

A HEALTHY infant at the time of birth weighs some seven
pounds. It should be vigorous wud well nourished, as
evidenced by its warm extre.oities, the comfortable rounded
contour of its limbs, its lusty cry. Its limbs move about
freely, and its hands will clost with some firmness on anything
placed within their grasp. Ail its movements, however, are
quite aimless. It cannot sit without support, and its head
falls limply to whatever side the child is turned upon. The
eyelids are only half opened. The eyes are quite expression-
less, and often move independently, so that the child appears
ij squint. The shape of the infant differs considerably from

THE GROWTH OF THE CHILD

that of the older child. The head is relatively very large, and
its circumference is greater than that of the chest The face
is small compared to the rest of the head. The trunk is
relatively long compared to the limbs, the abdomen is large
and protuberant, and the chest is small. The arms are
relatively very large as compared with the legs. The
changes in proportion which take place with growth have
been pointed out by Quetel.i. In the adult the head is
double the height of the head at birth, while the trunk is
three times, the arms are four times, and the legs five times
the length of tlie corresponding parts at birth.

Weight— During the first few days of its life the infant
loses a few ounces in weight. This loss is usually made up
by about the middle of the second week, and after this time
there should be a steady gain in weight. A daily or weekly
record of the baby's weight is often very valuable, for loss of
weight, or even failure to increase, may be the first indication
of the onset of some illness, or may shew that the infant's
food is not sufficiently nourishing days or weeks before this
would be evident in the appearance of the child. The
weighing can very readily be carried out by laying the baby,
when stripped for its bath, upon the pan of a spring balance.

The daily increase in weight should average f to i ounce
for the first five months, and J to f ounce for the rest of the
first year. At the age of four or five months the baby's
weight should have doubled ; at the age of twelve months it
should have trebled. After the age of one year the increase
in weight is less steady. It is usually about six pounds in the
second year, four and a half pounds in the third year, and about
four pounds a year for some years afterwards. Between the
eighth and the eleventh year the increase averages about six
pounds a yoar. Up to this time the boys weigh more than the
girls, but now the girls increase in weight more rapidly and pass
the boys, who do not overtake them until the fifteenth year.

Height — At birth the infant measures about twenty inches
in length. The growth in length is especially rapid during
the first two or three months. At the end of the first year

THE GROWTH OF THE CHILD

the infant has increased eight inches in height, yet it is not
till the sixth year that the child attains to double the height
he had at birth. Boys grow slowly from seven to thirteen,
when a rapid acceleration in the rate of increase takes place
and continues till the seventeenth year, when it drops to a
slower rate than before. In girls a similar increase occurs at
an earlier period, from twelve to fourteen, but the rapid
increase in weight continues till fifteen or sixteen.

The increase in height in young children is much less
useful than the increase in weight as an index of physical
well-being.

Table shelving the Weight and Height from Birth to
the Fifteenth Tear,^

Boys.

Girls.

Height.

Weight.

Height.

Weight.

Birth

20 '6

nches

7-55 lbs.

20'5 1

nches

7-16 lbs.

6 months

1 25-4

i6-o ,,

25-0

'55 «

izmonthi

1 29-0

»o-s „

287

.9-8 „

1 8 month!

1 30-0

22-8 „

297

22-.0 ,,

2 years

32-5

265 »

32-5

^S'S »

3 M

35-0

3»-5 »

35-0

33'o ».

4 .»

38-0

35-0 M

38-0

340 ..

5 M

41-7

41-2 „

41-4

39*8 „

6 »

44-1

45-1 »

43-6

43*8 „

7 ..

46-2

49-5 ..

45*9

48-0 „

8 »

48-2

54-5 n

48-0

S»-9 ..

9 ..

50-1

6o'o „

49-6

57*5 »

lO „

52-2

66-6 „

5. -8

64-1 „

»» „

54-0

7*-4 .5

53-8

70-3 M

12 „

55«

79-8 „

571

8i-4 „

13 ..

58-2

88-3 „

587

^l'^ »

14 »

6i-o

99*3 »

6o'3

100-3 „

»5 »

63-0

II0-8 „

6i-4

io8-4 „

1 The figures are quoted from Dr L. Emmett Holt ("Diserses of
Infancy and Childhood "j

\ik

THE GROWTH OF THE CHILD

Si\

The Alimentary System, — The principal peculiaritiep,
of the digestive organs in the infant are the absence of teeth,
and the inability to ^^igest starch. For the first ten or twelve
months the child -should really be a suckling, receiving
Nature's food in Nature's way. At birth and for some time
afterwards the saliva is very scanty, and it is not till the teeth
are appearing that the power of digesting starch is developed
to any extent.

Teething — The milk-teeth at birth are akeady present
in the gums. Dentition usually begins when the infant is
about six months old. The first teeth to appear are the
lower central incisors. The upper incisors appear between
the eighth and tenth months. The other two lower incisors,
and the first molars, appear between the twelfth and fourteenth
months, so that the baby by this time should have twelve
teeth. After an interval the eye teeth are cut at about the
eighteenth month. Then there is a longer interval before
the second molars complete the milk-teeth at the age
of about two and a half years.

The second dentition begins at the sixth year by the
appearance of the first molars of the permanent set, often
called the sixth year molars. The appearance of four teeth
per year till the twelfth year completes the second dentition
with the exception of the wisdom teeth, which do not usually
appear till between the seventeenth and twenty-fifth years.

The proper care of the teeth is of the utmost importance
to the well-being of the child. The milk-teeth ought to
remain white and hard with no sign of decay until their
roots become absorbed, and they drop out to make room
for the permanent set. Early decay of the milk-teeth
is frequently associated with improper diet, and is often one
of the results of rickets. As the teeth are usually late
of appearing in these cases, it would be well to consult the
family doctor whenever the milk teeth fail to make their
appearance at the proper time. It has recently been alleged
that the constant sucking of the dummy-teat or "comforter,"
in which so many infants are encouraged to indulge, inter-

THE GROWTH OF THE CHILD

feres with the proper growth and development of the jaws
and consequently of the teeth. Thumb-sucking may also
cause malposition of the incisors. Nevertheless, when the
gums are actually causing irritation, it often gives the child
great relief to be allowed to suck an indiarubber ring, or even
his thumb, but great care should be taken not to allow such
practices to become habits.

When the teeth appear they ought to be kept very clean.
This may easily be done at first by washing them gently with
a little water and a soft brush. As soon as the child is old
enough he should be taught to use a tooth-brush regularly.
The tooth-brush should be very soft so as not to injure th'-
gums. An alkaline tooth-powder which is not gritty m?,
also be used.

Decay of the teeth is favoured by indigestion, by the use
of acid medicines or acid fruits, or by injudicious indulgence
in sweet things which probably injure the teeth by under-
going lactic fermentation in the mouth, and indirectly by
causing indigestion and acidity. If caries should attack any
of the teeth, even of the milk set, the child should at once
be taken to a dentist fo treatment lest other teeth should
become affected. Caries of the permanent set usually begins
in childhood, and early treatment will do much to prevent
trouble in after life.

A fiirther reason for the systematic treatment of dental
caries is this. Every cavity in a tooth is really an ulcer, and
lodges the organisms which produce suppuration. Conse-
quently every carious tooth is a possible source of blood-
poisoning. The actual danger of blood-poisoning from this
source is perhaps not great as long as the child is in good
health, although even then it is by no means hypothetical.
But if the child's powers of resistance are lowered by an
attack of illness the danger may become considerable, and
indeed it is now well known that many of the most serious
complications of such diseases as diphtheria and scarlet fever,
and many of the most trying symptoms of tubercular disease,
are not due to the special organisms causing these diseases.

THE GROWTH OP THE CHILD

but to a secondary infection of the system by these suppurative
organisms, or their products.

Teeth, like other organs, are the better for exercise.
Children should therefore be made to eat their own crusts.
Their diet should not be too largely composed of mince and
fish and puddings, but should contain a fair proportion of
articles which require to be chewed, remembering, however,
that the child's powers of mastication are not very good.
The habit of chewing even soft food is an important aid to
digestion, a process which is too often expected to begin in
the stomach instead of in the mouth as Nature intended.

Any disturbance of the digestive functions is of importance,
because it interferes in proportion to its severity with the
nutrition of the child. An acute disturbance, such as an
attack of indigestion due to improper diet, attracts attention

3uickly by producing such symptoms as vomiting, pain, or
iarrhoea. But a chronic interference with nutrition due to
some delicacy in constitution, or to an unsuitable or insufficient
diet, may fail to be noticed for a considerable period, unless
regular weighing of the child is being carried out. Disturb-
ances of the digestive system are not infrequently brought
about by cold, by wet feet, or by insufficient clothing of the
lower part of the body.

The regulation of the bowels is of the highest importance
for the preservation of health, and the mother should see
that regular habits in this respect are carefully cultivated.

Respiration and Circulation, — The lungs of the
child begin to expand with his first cry. They are relatively
small in early life, and are said not to attain their full expan-
sion forwards until the age of five or six years. In order
vhat the child may have strong healthy lungs, the first re-
quisite is abundance of active exercise in the open air. When
he runs about, the breathing becomes not only quicker but
deeper, so that fresh air is drawn deeply into the lungs, and
the active movements of the chest and of the diaphragm
greatly aid the increased action of the heart. The chest
type of breathing which is characteristic of women is pro-

THE GROV' TH OF THE CHILD

•tit

III

lii

bably, to a considerable extent,, a rociated with the nature of
their clothing. When growing [;ii is are indulging in active
exercise their dress should he lcc>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

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<i power.

^ xh-^^te 6cr 'o^y anti motor art is develop there is gi« oally
laid down Iso a eries of what are called association f s, by
wh ch He diffirt t area of thf brain aii.- brough' *< cte"an
with ore anothe Sc ne of those are d<'^nit and« of
nerve fibres whosf" '^'-sbc we can trace fror nlace place,
but in addition to th there appear in time to be wui Ked out
iiK»re or less definite paths of association, w nich we may
spc K of as physiological, through areas of the rt? n which
^ten paths can be discovered by the mic
.en the extreme complexity of these \ ^ ts con-

«riered, it is easy to understand how it '"? th.. , nervous

ceases are common in childhood. The nervous system is
ry unstable and excitable, and the power of control is
rry deficient. Hence the screaming fits, the outbursts of
assion, the severe headaches, the convulsions which often
esult from trivial causes, such as in the adu'*^ would pro-
duce no appreciable effect. In order that n mal develop-
ment of the nervous system may take place the child
should be shielded as hr as possible from all unnatural
excitement, the diet should be as simple as possible, and
especially should all stimulants, including tea and coffee as

THE GROWTH OF THE CHILD

well as alcohol, be strictly excluded. The surroundings
should be quiet and peaceful. Everything should be done to
secure ample rest and sleep, and any games or plays with
older children, any tickling or romping with grown up people,
any showing off in company which excites the child to such
an extent as to be followed by tears, or by disturbed and rest-
less sleep, should be curtailed or forbidden. Such care is of
course especially necessary in the case of children who are
naturally " nervcus," or who have any hereditary tendency to
nervous disorders. These children are sometimes difficult to
manage when young, ar'' often benefit by a change from the
home surroundings. When they go to school the effect of
lessons should be watched. The occurrence of restlessness at
nights, walking in the sleep. Irritability of temper, or loss of
appetite will often indicate that lessons should be stopped for
a time.

The same watchful care is necessary for any child who is
growing rapidly. Many children grow ** by fits and starts,"
and at such times a great strain is thrown on the circulation,
and if the brain is being taxed at the same time irritability,
inattention, apathy, and, later, sleeplessness give evidence of
mental fatigue, and ought to warn the guardians of the need
of more sleep and less mental application. The child should
not be allowed to work at lessons up till bedtime, but should
have at least an hour of recreation after lessons are over
before going to bed.

Sense Organs, — The eyes are the most important of
the organs of sense and the most liable to injury. The
principal cause of injury is not over-use, for the eyes are
being used as long as the child is awake, but improper use.
The eyes of the child differ from those of the adult chiefly in
that the power of accommodation is very much more perfect,
so that a child can easily examine small objects placed much
nearer the eye than would be comfortable for a grown person.
If our sight is normal we usually hold the book we are reading
at a distance of ten inches or more from our eyes. Although
we can read a printed page held closer to the eye we are

THE GROWTH OF THE CHILD

conscious of some strain of our accommodation m doing so.
But in the young child accommodation takes place so easily
that such strain is not felt to be uncomfortable. Now the
effect of this strain is to alter slightly the shape of the eyeball,
and the shape assumed is that of the short-sighted eye. If
this occurs only occasionally no harm is done, but if the child
is allowed day after day to strain his accommodation over fine
work — or indeed over auy work held too near the eye — the
growing eyeball will tend to assume the form which is so fre-
quently impressed upon it. It is not too much to say that
shortsightedness is almost always an acquired character,
though of course. some children acquire the condition with
very little provocation. It may then be laid down as a rule
that young children should not be allowed to do much fine
work, especially fine bead work; nor to read much small
type ; and, again, whatever work they are engaged in should
be kept as far away as convenient, and should be done in a
good light. These rules are of course doubly important if
there is any family tendency to near-sightedness.

The Ears,— Eren slight deafness interferes seriously with
the mental acquisitions of the child. Many cases of deafness
are due to an extension to the ears of some inflammatory
affection of the throat, or to the presence in the pharynx of
adenoid growths. All cases of sore throat, therefore, should
be placed promptly under medical treatment, and the pnarnyx
ought to be examined for adenoids in all children who are
always catching cold, who snore much at night, or who
habitually breathe through the mouth.

One other point witli regard to the ears deserves mention.
It has been found in a number of cases where children appeared
somewhat stupid and uninterested in their work, that they
were really slightly deaf, and that this deafness in some
instances was due to no defect in the hearing apparatus but to
want of cultivation of the hearing power, a fault quite amen-
able to treatment by practice in the habit of directing the
attention to the recognition of sounds.

THE SENSES

CHAPTER VI

The Senses

At the time of birth the child ia " mind blind." That is to
say, he is unable to interpret the various impressions which
reuch the brain through the organs of sense. This power
appears slowly and by degrees, because the higher parts of
the brain where the interpretation of sense impressions takes
place are undeveloped, and their fall evolution can only teke
place under the mfluence of the stimuli which reach them
from without. The extent to which the different senses are
active at the time of birth can be judged only by the effects
of stimulation, and the only effects which we are able to
gauge are movements. The interpretation of these move-
ments, however, is difficult, because many of them may be
called forth even though the exciting oimulus never reaches
consciousness. When a bright light shines into the eye
of a newly-born baby the pupil at once contracts. This
proves that the retina is sensitive, that iinpressions can pass
along the optic nerve to the brain, and there excite a respo •,
which can be transmitted to the muscles of the iris. Thm is
a purely reflex effect, and is not sufficient to prove that the
stimulus is felt by the child. If, however, a greater effect
is produced than can be accounted for as a simple reflex, for
example, if the child throws its head about and begins to cry,
then we may conclude that the stimulus has not been ex-
hausted in the passage round the reflex arc from the retina to
the pupil, but that a message has likewise been conveyed to-
wards the higher cortical areas of the brain which will become
the centres for vision. Even in the absence of this larger effect,
however, it is probable that whenever an appropriate stimulus
is applied to any of the sense organs, and is followed by an
appropriate reflex movement, this movement does not repre-
sent the entire result of the passage of the stimulus through
the short reflex circuit. Probably some impression is also

THE SENSES

carried towards the developing cortex, altliough it ib only
when this impression exceeds a minimum mtensity that its
existence is made obvious by the occurrence of such wide-
spread movements as are indicative of pleasure or discomfort.
When such a result does take place, it must not be regarded
as proof that the chUd is able to interpret the seat or nature

of the stimulus. ... - c

Taste —The sense of taste is particularly mteiestmg trom
this point'of view. It is usually said to be the fir^ to be
learned. There appears, however, to be a considerable
amount of variation among young babies in their reactions to
different tastes. Preyer says "the taste of sweet is plainly
preferred at the very beginning. The little countenance,
after the wetting of the tongue with glycerine or with a
concentrated solution of sugar, wears almost invariably an
expression of satisfaction. But let the tongue be touched
with a solution of quinine, warm and not too much diluted,
or with common salt, or let it be smeared with a crystal ot
tartaric acid, and movements of repulsion readily appear,
accompanied with choking, with screaming, and with an
expression of extreme displeasure on the face.

Here we evidently have something more than simple reflex
movements, but are we entitled to say that the chUd at this
early age is able to discriminate consciously between nice to
eat and nasty ? This would obviously be going too far,
although some psychologists make use of language which
implies surh a belief. The discriminative movements should
rather be looked upon as instinctive in character, and not
necessarily indicative either of liking or disliking. Ihis
view is supported by the fact that older babies wiU some-
times make grimaces on experiencing a novel taste, and
afterwards show signs of desire for more. A baby ot
eight months, on experiencing for the first time the t^
of mUk and scalded bread shuddered after each spoonfiil,
although he took the food without resistance (Mrs Beatty,
quoted by Miss Shinn). . . - r n ».

Taste is said, by Sigismund, to be the first of all the

THE SENSES

to yield clear perceptions which are stored up in memory.
This certainly is what one would expect, for the chief states
of pleasure in the life of a young baby recur many times daily
in association vrith feeding.

Smell. — The sense of smell is closely associated with
the sense of taste, and appears to be present to some extent
soon after birth. It is not distinctly separate from taste even
in the adult. According to Flechsig the centre for smell is
the first of the centres of the special senses in the cortex to
mature.

Touch, — ^ToLch has been called the universal sense. It
is present in a vague form even before birth. After birth
the sense of contact with soft warm surroundings evidently
awakens a pleasurable feeling before the power of discrimina-
tion is developed. The development of the sense of touch
proceeds very rapidly and not only aids the child in his
investigation of the outside world., but enables him to dis-
tinguish hinuelf, that is to say his body, from all other
objects.

The sense of touch is from a very early period particularly
keen in the lips and the tip of the tongue, and the tendency
of young babies to mouth and lick objects which are close to
them is a form of experimentation with this sense.. As the
hand becomes more and more the specialised organ of touch
the tendency to put things to the mouth except for the
purpose of tasting them declines.

The sense of temperature, due to the difference between
the temperature of the body and of the surrounding atmosphere,
is also conveyed by the skin. Children, like all young animals,
are very susceptible to changes in temperature, partly owing
to their defective powers of heat formation, and partly to the
comparatively large surface of the skin.

The muscle sense, by which we mean the sensations which
arise from movements of the muscles, is very vague during
the early weeks of life. It includes both sensations of move-
ment and sensations of resistance and is closely associated
with the sense of touch, as is seen for example in our manner

THE SENSES

«3

of investigating the roughness or smoothness, the softness
or hardness of different bodies. By the time the child is
three or four months old the muscle sense and the sense of
touch become very closely associated with the visual sensations,
and indeed greaUy assist the development of visual perception
through the strong propensity which now appears for touching,
handling, and looking at everything within reach.

Sight^At the time of birth the pupils react to hght,
and if the light is very brigh': the eyelids may be clo*®?, and
the child may appear to experience discomfort. Diffused
daylight has been diought to give pleasure even during the

first few days of life. .

The movements of the eyes at first are apt to be irregular,
the eyes being moved independently of one another, so that
the baby often appears to be squinting. This irregularity
gradually becomes less marked, but may be noticed occasion-
ally up to tiie third montii. The eyelids similarly may move
irregularly. During the first few days they are usually kept
only half open even when the child is awake.

For some time after birth the child cannot distinguish
objects. "He does not enter the world, as we do the
theatre, upon a scene all arranged in advance which the
spectator sees as a whole at one glance " (Compayr^). On
the contrary his field of vision is composed simply of dark
and light blurred patches with no distinct outiines. At
first the child simply stares into space. It is not easy to
tell whetiier he is really looking at anytiiing until die
accomplishment of following a slowly moving object with
the eyes has been acquired. Darwin thought his child
definitely looked at a lighted candle on the ninth day, and
Preyer's baby followed with his eyes a light moved slowly
from side to side on tiie twenty-third day. After tiiis the
child begins to look with attention at surrounding objects,
and to find pleasure in following with his eyes the faces of

people moving about. ^ , . • .

After sensations of light, sensations of colour begin to be
noticed. Many observations have been made on the recog-

THE SENSES

nition of colour by young children, but the results vary con-
siderably and hence it is not easy to generalise them.
Pleasure in various colours is manifested very early. Novelty
is frequently the most important factor in detennmmg choice
among colours exhibited experimentally. The principal
colours are distinguished before the child can talk, but tor a
Ions time after this there is often a confUsion between the
names of difiercnt colours. This may render the results of
experiments with colours doubtful, as the child may recog-
nise a colour but name it wrongly. Even with methods
of observation which do not involve the naming of colours,
confosion may arise from the child's misunderstandmg what
is required of him, as when he is asked to match colours
which have been shown to him. YeUow was found by Preyer,
and red by Binet, to be most easily recognised by children
they stvKJied in the third year.

It is only by slow degrees that a child learns to recognise
what an object is. The perception of soUd form and the
recognition of the distance of objects is closely associated
with the combined use of the senses of sight and touch.
Moving objects, and especially people, attract attention early,
and may be recognised at the age of a few weeks. In the
ninth week baby Hall recognised his mother ^s she was
entering the room by a door five feet distant; but movmg
objects in the street, fifty feet from the window, were
apparently unnoticed till the fifteenth week.

Some experience of distance is gained by grasping at
objects, and by the age of six months some children seem to
know when an object is within reach, and will not P»Jt out
their hand to take it if it is held out of reach. Older
children often persistently grasp at objects much beyond their
reach, but this does not necessarily mean that they imagine
the coveted body to be near enough to be taken hold of.
It is often obviously simply an expression of desire for what
they can ask for in no other way. However, the sense of
distance remains extremely vague until the child is able to
make his way about by himself, and several years elapse

THE SENSES

before he can form any clear notions of the distance of
things really far off.

The power to recognise solidity by the eye is likewise
gained by experience. At first the baby is apt to confuse
the plane and solid form, and to attempt to pick up figures
from the caipet or shadows moving on the wall. The dis-
crimination of solid form in the case of near objects develops
rapidly, but it is a long time before the child learns the sub-
stantiai character of distant objects. The reason for this is
not only that these are less familiar, but because they do not)
like near objects, rapidly change their apparent form with
the child's movements, and also because they produce practi-
cally identical image's upon the two retinae.

Heating, — At the time of birth air has not penetrated
to the drum of the ear, and until this takes place the child is
deaf, although he may be disturbed by loud jarring sounds,
such as the slamming of a door. According to Krohn, a
child may give unmistakable evidence of hearing within two
hours of birth, but, as a general rule, reaction even to loud
sounds is not noticed till the second or third day, and some
weeks elapse before the hearing is at all acute. This
temporary deafness is doubtless an advantage to the child
as it enables him to sleep peacefully without being disturbed
by the noises about him. Some degree of localisation of
sounds has been noted as occurring by the fourteenth day,
but it is difficult to be sure of this. Even in the adult
localisation of sound is very difficult. Preyer's child
turned towards sounds heard in the twelfth week, Darwin's
about the seventeenth, and Winfield Hall's in the twenty-first.

The sense of hearing becomes a source both of pleasure
and interest very early. New sounds, and especially musical
sounds, at once attract attention, and their power of making
a child stop fretting is daily taken advantage of in the nursery.
Very strange or very loud sounds, however, are peculiarly
liable to provoke fear. Children, like adults, vary very
greatly in the pleasure they take in hearing music.
Rhythmical sounds plea&e them, but they especially delight

THE SENSES

in lounds made by themselves, either in experimenting with
their own vocal organs or in making a racket with anything
that will serve the purpose. Children often delight m loud
chanting or singing widiout being able to follow a tune, and
will of^n sacrmce even rhythm to sense. For exam^e, a
child hearing his mother singing, ** Guide me, O Thou
great Jehovs^,'* began singing, ** Guide mamma, O Thou
great Jehovah." (Quoted by Miss Shinn.)

All knowledge is derived through the exercise of the senses,
a fact which Bunyan has picturesquely expressed by speaking
of the various senses as the Gates of the City of Mansoul.
At the time of birth the higher parts of the brain are in such
a rudimentary condition that the actions of the in&nt very
closely resemble those of which an animal whose cerebral
hemispheres have been removed is still capable. That is to
say, they are chiefly reflex in character, and the child is unable
to interpret his sensations. Nevertheless the possibilities of
future organisation are already determined. According to
recent o^rvations it appears to be a fact that every cell
which will ever enter into the composition of the Iwain is
ahready present, but must await the arrival of app' /riatc
stimuli before it can ur'^vrgo further growth and organisation.
The limits of such growth and organisation are predetermined
by heredity. Unless the proper nerve cells are present, and
are moreover possessed of the requisite potentialities, no effort
at education in any determinate direction, no repetition or
concentration of the suitable stimuli, will attain success. But
however strongly we may insist upon the innumerable variations
in the congenital structure of the brain, nothing could be
further from the truth than the idea that die life of the child
is predetermined from its birth without reference to its sur-
roundings, and the influence of early training. Even in the
commonest of mortals the possibilities of mental and moral
growth are very numerous, and the fiinction of education is
to select among these m order that the energy of growth may
flow into the highest combinations.

THE SENSES «r

The possilnlity of individual adaptation to enTironment, or
b other words, the possibility of congenital tendencies being
modified by training, is not however wholly dependent upon a
sort of selection among the developing c :lls of the braip, but
rather upon the particidar lines of association which a^ j laid
down by exercise, and the particular combinations of cells
which thereby come to act together habitually. According
to Flechsig, who has recently studied the course of the
development of the brain in children, only one-third of the
cortex is directly connected either with the incoming impres-
sions from the organs of sense or with the mechanism of
movement. The fibres which pass from the cells in the
remainmg two thirds of the cortex do not pass either directly
or mdirectly to the periphery. They find their destination in
the cortical centres for the special senses, and therefore
Flechsig has suggested that these areas of the cortex are
concerned in the function of association and of th^ higher
mental processes. These association centres and the fibres
connected with them grow very slowly in early childhood,
their period of most rapid grovrth being apparently in
adolescence, after the sense centres have practicably reached
maturity. The acuteness of every one of our senses is
definitely dependent on the structure of the appropriate sense
organ. The improvement which takes place with practice
is chiefly mental. The man who can see best is the man
who understands most, and who therefore best knows what
to look for. The possibilities of improvement in any of our
senses are so great that it is probably not too much to say that
it would be physically impossible for any man to bring all his
senses to the perfection of which they are capable. A blind
child, for example, is not naturally endowed with any greater
refinement of his other senses whereby his deficiency may in
some degree be made up, yet under suitable, and often only
under very prolonged and very patient training, the senses of
touch and hearing become so acute as to awaken our astonish-
ment. But if the blind lose his seeing finger, no other can
take its place until it also has undergone training. An interest-

THE SENSES

iog illoatration of the bearing of the training of the senses upcm
mental development, and of the influence of the character of
uie stream of sense impressions upon the pattern of the associa-
tion meshwork, is furnished by a consideration of the intel-
lectual abilities of the blind. We have seen that the higher
cortical centres in the lM*ain develop under the influence of
stimuli from without. Now it has been calculated that of all
the stimuli from the outside world which reach the brain,
nine-tenths come from the organs of sight, so that the blind
are dependent on the remaining one-tenth for the scenery of
their mental world. Yet no one can imagine that these
figures represent in any way the intellectual difference between
the seeing and the blind, whose social and educational advan-
tages have been as similar as possible. Partly by the careful
training of his other senses, partly by the habit of calling up
the memories of past sense impressions, partly by the cultiva-
tion of the habit of reflection, the intellectual deficiency of the
educated blind is much le&a than one might expect. And
this really means that some of the possibilities inherent in his
brain structure are called into activity which, but for the
accident which deprived him of his sight, might have lain
dormant all his life.

Training of tlie Senses. — Childhood is acknowledged
to be the period for the education of the senses. The
education of the senses involves in the first place the control
of the organs of sense. The eyes must be properly directed
and focussed, for instance, before a clear image can be
obtained. But in the main the training of the senses is
a mental training. It is through his senses diat the child
gathers material for the mind to act upon. The spirit
of investigation appears early, and all day long during his
waking hours the child finds the keenest pleasure in touching,
hammering, handling everything he can lay his hands upon,
to find out what there is in it of noise, and colour, and strength,
and form. If the child is to make good use of these early
gathering years he must have abundant opportunity for
the exercise of his senses, and a little guidance in using

THE SENSES 69

them aright. Opportunity means absolute fieedcm to touch
and play with numbers of common things, things which, in
this first learning of the child, are valuable above all others
just because they are cor mon and at hand, and can be known
so as to lead to a knowl Agt of all things else in the universe.
Guidance the child also needs, because he has a gieat tendency
to rest satisfied with the identification of objects by some
salient feature, and to be blind to differences which are not
forced upon his attention. The discrimination of the
differences between objects is very important in order that
the child may learn to observe accurately, and define his
sense-impressions clearly. Although children are usually
credited with being good observers, it is astonishing how
frequently they go about the world without ever noticing
the most conspicuous objects in their neighbourhood, if their
attention has never been directed to them ; and associated
with this is their ignorance of the properties of the most
common objects. Dr Hall bases upon systematic studies,
which have been made on this subject, the statement that
" there is next to nothing of educational value the knowledge
of which it is safe to assume at the beginning of school life.
Hence the need of objects and the danger of books, word
cramming, and rote learning." The best preparation which
children can get for their future education is to become
acquainted with common natural objects. If the child lives
in the country there is abundant material always at hand, and
even in the town there is no lack. It is satisfactory to
notice that the Board of Education has recognised the value
and necessity of teaching of this kind in a circular just issued
to teachers in rural elementary schools. One paragraph
expresses very clearly the proper aim of such training.

•* One of the main objects of the teacher should be to
develop in every boy and girl that habit of inquiry and
research so natural to children ; they should be encouraged
to ask their own questions about the simple phenomena of
Nature which they see around them, and themselves to search
for flowers, plants, insects, and other objects to illustrate the

THE SENSES

lesaoui which they hate learnt mth their teacher. The
t<;acher should, as occasion oflers, take the children out of
doors for school walks at the various seasons of the vear, and
nwc simple lessons on the spot about animals in the nelds and
farmyaros, about pioughicg and sowing, dbout fruit trees and
forest trees, about birds, insects and flowers, and other objects

of interest/*

A more systematic study of form and colour and other
varieties of sense impression may be introduced by degrees.
This should be done in such a way as to interest the child
and to secure his attention without producing fetigue. He
should be encouraged to make practical use of each new
acquirement, for instance, by noticing how the things about
him are built up out of combinations of the elementary forms
he has learnt, or by drawing or modelUng, or kindergarteu
occupations.

The training of the hand is closely associated with the
training of the eye. In the young child the hand is the
companion and interpreter of the eye rather than its servant.
A child who may look but who mustn't touch will often look
without seeing. If the eye say to the hand, «* Thon art not
of the body," the eye itself will be the ilrst to suffer. In
blind children great discriminative tactile sensibility is
developed by such exercises as sorting beads according to
sizes, and then by stringing these upon wires of suitable
thickness. Occupations of this nature would be unsuitable
for normal children, because they would naturally try to
aid touch by sight, and eye strain would readily be brought
about. The same criticism applies to some of the kinder-
garten occupations, which are admirable in other respects.
Drawing, and modelling in clay or plasticine, afford admir-
able means for the training of hand and eye, and of the
observing powers. Drawing, as a means of expression,
should precede writing. Its value is referred to more fully
in a later chapter.

The ear and the organs of speech are as closely associated
in their education as are the eye and the hand. In learning

THE MUSCLES n

to tolk the chad obttins abundant exercise of the orpns of
hearing in the discrimination of the different sounds which he
requires to reproduce. Sounds which the child confoses,
such as those 5f similar letters in words, should be repeated
as pi' inly as possible in order that he may obtain the distinct
impressions which must precede correct pronunciauon.
Systematic exercise of the ear by music and singing forms
an imporunt part of early sense training. Imhndual
differences are of course very great. Preyer «»~^<«« »
baby who could sing correctly every note given her from
the pi^no in .ler ninth month. DoubUess such an instance
is very exceptional, but, at any rate, all children should have
the advantage of training for such musical capacity as they

'^"te, smell, and touch in the passive form, are spoken of
by psychologiste as the lower senses, because they arc ol
cimparatively sUght importance in aiding mental growth, as
compared with th, higher senses of sight, hearmg, and touch
proper. The lower senses are connected cspeci^ly with
!«nJations which relate to the nutrition of the body, such
as hunger, thirst, warmth, coldness. Their trainingshodd
include the recognition of the wholesomeness of iood, the
closeness or otherwise of the air in a room.

CHAPTER VII
The Muscles

Onb of the standing puzzles of the world to a healthy chUd
is why it should be that grown people often ««"» ^j'^f ^
sit still when they might run about if they liked. « My legs
feel like running," says the boy. And so he runs, and
•mmps, and shouts, and fidgets because the members of his
todrcry aloud for exercise. His mind also, m his waking
ho Js, is never at rest. His mental activity consUnUy seeks
expression in action. His curiosity, his desire to touch and

THE MUSCLES

handle, his eagerness to experiment with whaterer is within
his reach, are all indications of a desire to fiad expression,
to *' make the inner become the outer." Some of the most
important reforms which are taking place in educational
methods are based on the theory that all true education
should seek not to suppress but to guide th<s self-activitv
of die child, which must be trained into right and ennobling
habits, and made to minister to the development of the
mind.

Classification of tlie Cliiid's Movements.— Tht

rarious movements of the child have been classified in various
ways. We shall follow here the arrangement of Professor
Preyer, who has given us a very full account of the subject.
He classifies the child's movements as impulsive, reflex, in-
stinctive, and ideational. I prefer to substitute the term
random, which I take from SuUy, for impulsive, as the latter
term has acquired a different significance in English psycho-
logical literature.

I. Random Movements, — In young infants we meet
with a kind of movement which is neither voluntary nor
obviously dependent upon any sensory stimulus. These
movements are spoken of as impulsive, random, or spon-
taneous. They are commonly explained as arising from
changes in the composition of the blood flowing through
the capillaries of the brain, but I should be more inclined
to attribute them to the liberation of energy from nerve cells
which, owing to the activity of the growth-processes going
on within them, are in a state of unstable equilibrium and
ready to be fired off, as it were, on the slightest stimulus from
the body, or to overflow from the mere accumulation of energy
within themselves. Examples of movements of this class are
found in the stretching of the limbs of young babies, in the
sudden twitches and starts when undisturbed, in their grimaces
when asleep, and in the movements of the eyeballs when the
eyelids are closed. Movements of this kind are most marked
in very young children. In older children they are not easily
distinguished from other classes of movement, but may be

THE MUSCLES

seen during sleep. Possibly their function is to be found in
the exercise they afford for the motor paths from the brain to
the muscles, for the muscles themselves, and for the paths of
muscular sensation.

2. Reflex Movements, — So many of the most im-
portant funcuons of the body are carried out by reflex action
that we are not surprised to find that many of the reflexes
are already established at the time of birth. Swallowing,
sneezing, hiccoughing, the contraction of the pupils in a
bnght light may serve as examples. The first cry of the
child on entering the world is regarded by Preyer as of
reflex origin, a yiew much more reasonable than that of
Kant who speaks of it as a cry of indignation and wrath, or
than the common view that it is due to pain. As Darwin
and Preyer point out it is not uncommon for respiration to
begin with a sneeze instead of with a cry. Doubtless the
imperfect aeration of the blood at the time of birth pkys an
important part in establishing the process of respiration by
rendering the respiratory centres more excitable. The in-
hibition of reflex movement is very important, as through it
the will develops on the negative side. This is seen in the
control of the bladder and bowel which children acquire to
some extent during the second half year.

3. Instinctive Movements, — Under this heading
Preyer includes a somewhat varied iteries of activities some of
which are hardly distinguishable frr-n reflex movements, while
others, if instinctive in origin, are only thought to perfection
with the co-operation of intelligence.

Sucking is an example of a complex movement which is
present at the time of birth and can be readily excited by
placing a finger in the mouth upon the tongue. The
principal reason for regarding sucking as something more
than a simple reflex is that the stimulus required to produce
it varies considerably at diflerent times. This however might
be due simply to the excitability of the nerve centre being
increased by hunger. The movement seems to fit Dr
Spencer's definition of instinct as compound reflex action.

THE MUSCLES

Seixtng, — At the time of birth the babj hands close
with remarkable force upon an3rthing placed within their
grasp, so that, as Dr Louis Robinson has recently shewn, the
baby may actually be suspended hanging from one's finger by
the power of its own grasp. Dr Robinson suggests that we
find here a survital of the instinctire clinging of the babe to
its mother amongst our arboreal ancestors. True seizing of
an object with desire, guided by sight and not merely by
contact, is not noticed for many weeks, usually in the fourth
month (sixteenth to eighteenth week in several cases observed).

Raising the Head. — During the first few weeks of
life impiUsive movements of the head may be noticed, but
when the child is lifted up or turned about the head bobs
loosely from side to side. Towards the end of the second
month the head may occasionally be held for a few seconds
in equilibrium, and in the succeeding weeks the power of
doing so increases rapidly, and we now note one of the
earliest manifestations of will in the raising of the head to get
a better view.

Sitting. — By the fifth or sixth month, occasionally
earlier and often not till later, children are able to pull
themselves up into a sitting posture, or even to sit unsupported
for a few moments. The power of sitting rapidly increases,
but the child should not be allowed to sit long without
support. Children of seven or eight months when out
riding will often pull themselves up into a sitting posture in
order to see passing objects better. When they do this
they should be made comfortable with pillows and allowed
to look about, but should again be laid in the horizontal
position as soon as they shew signs of getting tired. By
the ninth or tenth month many children delight to sit
independently.

Locomotion. — The earliest attempts at locomotion vary
considerably in char?!oter. Creeping proverbially precedes
walking, but many children never creep. Some roll from one
place to another, others hitch themselves along in a sitting
posture. Some children find a difficulty in controlling the

THE MUSCLES

direction of locomotion. Both Miss Shinn and Mrs Hall
note that on several occasions the effort to creep retolted in
a backward movement so that, to the baby's disgust, the
desired object only got further and further away in its
attempts to reach it. The first efforts at standing may occur
very early (twenty-third week for Baby Hall), when the
baby takes a delight in " feeling its feet," as the nurses say.
The power of standing alone is seldom noticed before the
eighth month, and then only for a minute or two. The first
attempts to walk usually occur between the ninth and the
eighteenth months. The time depends partly on the strength
of the child, and partly on the attempts which have been
made to teach him to walk. Children who have young
companions to play with usually begin to walk early. At
first the baby supports himself by the wall or by articles of
furniture; then, often quite suddenly, excited perhaps by
some older child or by the sight of some plaything, he staitt
off by himself and walks or trots unsteadily but successfully
to the desired goal.

When children desire to creep they should be allowed to
do so freely. Walking will come in good time. There can
be no harm in giving a child lessons in walking by supporting
him under the arms or letting him hold a finger in each hand
for support while he attempts to make his way forward, but
go-carts should be prohibited because they allow the weight
of the child to be borne for too long a time by the legs, and
also because the pressure on the child's chest hinders proper
development and may produce deformity.

4. ideaiionaJ Movemeats,—ijtidtr this heading tue
included imitative, expressive, and deliberative movements.
As they are dependent even in their simplest forms upon sense
perception they are necessarily somewhat late in appearmg.

Imitative movements almost always begin during the sec(md
half of the first year. Those r/hich have been noticed earlier,
such as the crying of a young baby when it hears another
infent crying, are of somewhat doubtful nature. During the
second year, and especially after the eighteenth month,

THE MUSCLES

imttauve movements become very numerous and occur qiute
unsolicited. They are much more complex in character than
those observed in the first year, the child noticing all the
actions of those about him and striving to repeat them, h}w-
ever little he understands their meaning. He finds great
pleasure in putting on his father's hat, in shaving with a piece
of stick, in feeding and dressing and washing his toys. He
imitates closely the expressions and gestures of those about
him, and thereby lays the foundations of good or bad habits
which may continue to grow with his growth. It becomes
therefore of the greatest importance that those who have
charge of the child should be of refined habits of speech and
manners. In these imitative actions cf the baby we find the
foundation of the make-believe plays (school, shop, etc.)
which give such delight to older children.

The expressive movements are at first indicative simply
of pleasure or pain. The smiling, laughing, and crowing
accompanied by movements of the limbs are early indications
of pleasure, while drawing down the comers of the mouth
and wrinkling the forehead indicate the onset of tears.
Shaking the head in negation or refusal, nodding in affirma-
tion, pointing, pouting, kissing, shrugging the shoulders, are
other examples of expressive movements. The movements
indicative of the simpler emotions such as wonder, anger,
fear, are all frequently manifested before the imitative habits
of the child are well developed. Just for this very reason
the emotional character of those about the child is of the
greatest importance, for when the child imitates, as it will,
the displays of emotion by others, the emotions themselves
are imaginatively reproduced, and unquestionably impress
themselves upon the child's character.

The deliberative movements illustrate the gradually advanc-
ing control of the will over movements which have already been
performed refiexly or instinctively or as random movements.
The order in which control comes to be exercised over the
various movements has attracted a good deal of attention in
recent years, and the results are held by some authorities to

THE MUSCLES

indicate the advisaUlity of altering some of the current methods
of teaching young chUdren, especially the teaching of writing
and drawing, and some of the kindergarten employments.
The principal observations which have been made appear
to indicate that the large movements, on the whole, precede
the finer movements, and that movements involving the simpler
forms of co-ordination precede those which are more complex.
The simplest movements we can perform usually require the
co-operation of several muscles belonging to a single group,
but more complex movements may require the co-operation
of two, three, four, or more groups of muscles. It has been
objected to this statement of the evolution of movements that
a young baby can grasp firmly before it can direct the move-
ments of its arm so as to carry a spoon successfully to its
mouth, and this fact is said to be opposed to the idea that
movements tend to develop ''from the centre outwards."
No fault can be found with this observation, but the inference
is not justifiable. The early clasping of a baby's hand on
whatever is placed within it is merely reflex or instinctive,
and even when the action is performed deliberately it is a
movement of a very simple kind. On the other hand, when
the baby grasps a spoon and carries it against its cheek
instead of to its mouth the fault does not lie simply in a
misdirection of the large movements of the arm and fore-
arm, but in a failure to carry out accurately a very complex
co-ordination involving not only the movements of all the
joints of the upper limb, but also of the eyes through which
a visual judgment must be formed of the allowance to be
made for the length of the spoon.

The different plays in which children indulge from baby-
hood onwards illustrate very well the gradually increasing
control over the muscles, for every new acquirement is a
joy to the child who delights to repeat it again and again,
n a baby the simplest movements are illustrated in the joy
of shaking a rattle or hammering on a tray. Even such
movements are at first performed very imperfectly, being
interrupted by impulsive moveineots, and liable to be stopped

THE MUSCLES

by anything that attracts the baby's attention for a moment,
so that the plaything is dropped on the floor. This soon
becomes a new source of pleasure, and the baby shows the
greatest delight in throwing everything that is given to him
on the floor, and repeating the operation as often as possible.

The Training of tiie Musdes. — The great propensity
of children for ** doing " renders any special training of the
muscles unnecessary, at least in early years and in healthy
children. Only give ths child proper outlets for his activity
and the development of muscular ability and power will take
care of itself. All the fiivourite nursery games and toys have
their value in exercising not only the muscles but the minds
of the children in difFerent ways, so that in their play they
pick up ideas of form and colour, of size, of number, of
weight, and so on.

Play. — This seems the most appropriate place to consider
the meaning and the value of j'-y, although the treatment of
the subject must involve at least tne menticm of other questions
besides the development of muscle.

Tlte Reason for Play. — The fiivourite theory of play,
up till recent years, has been that which we owe to the poet
Schiller. According to this theory play is an overflow of
high animal spirits, an outlet for excessive energy, a surplus
of life. To this ijieory Herbert Spencer added the idea of
imitation as explaining the forms which play is woat to take.
To these theories the principal objection is that they are too
simple. They do not cover all the facts. We shall come
to a better understanding of the meaning of play if we con-
sider it from the point of view of evolution. We have
already seen reason to believe that the principal characteristic
of the infant, and to a very much smaller degree of the young
of some of the higher animals, is its educability, and that the
appearance of this character has been rendered possible chiefly
by the period of babyhood which allows the young to be fed,
and cared for, and shielded ftom danger while they are ac-
quiring powers which would otherwise have been inherited as

THE MUSCLES

instmcts. These powers being individually acquired are less
stereotyped than instincts. The waning of instinct has meant
the waxing of intelligence. Play is the means whereby indivi-
dual powers are acquired ; it is the apprenticeship for the work
of life; it has permitted the development of individuality ; it
has given scope for variation and for individual adaptation to
difierent environments ; it has favoured the growth of intelli-
gence and thereby permitted man not only to choose, but to
some extent to make, his environment and thereby assist in his
own evolution. A little child at play is « at his lessons."
The lesson book is the world. The task is just to learn " all
about everything."

The Forms of Play,— I have said that in the history
of the race instinct has gradually been replaced by intelli-
gence. As it has been in the race so is it in every child.
Nature never forgets her past, and so we find all the
primitive forms of instinct reappearing in the child's play,
and gradually by their exercise giving place to the intellectual
powers. The play period may be roughly divided into three
terms which are not sharply divided from one another but
which are very characteristic. The first period is that in
which the child is gaining mastery over his bodily powers,
and is characterised chiefly by the restless spirit of childhood.
It includes the first six or seven years. The second period,
extending from the seventh to the twelfth year, sees the
strengthening of the intellectual powers. Its spirit is that of
emulation, and this ^irit dominates the favourite games of
boyhood. In the third period the social spirit develops, and
the characteristic games are those in which the boy plays not
for himself but for hip team.

Keeping these points in mind let us consider play as an
instinct. Space will only permit of the very briefest summary
of the facts. The chief instincts or impulses appearing in
play are : —

(i) The instinct of movement: kicking, gesticuiatmg,
g^nmacing; cooing, crowing, laughing, babbling, talking,
singing; running, jumping, climbing.

«o THE MUSCLES

(2) The instinct of action : skipping, hoops, tops ; kitet;
xide-a-cock-horse ; dancing in its simpler forms.

(5) The instinct of construction : sand, mud-pies, blocks,
scribbling, drawing, modelling; scissors and paper, pen-
knives, carpenter's tools, carving.

Note how many of these childish enjoyments lead on to
the hobbie& and occupations of adult life. Think of the
climbing instinct in the baby, in the schoolboy, in the young
man ; the favourite dances at different ages ; the pleasure in
making something, whether it be a mud-pie, or a toy boat,
or a carved picture-frame, or a rood-screen, or a cathedral.

(4) The instinct of investigation: dropping things, rattling,
hammering, teasing, destroying. The instinct to experiment
is one of the most interesting, and if rightly guided, one of
the most valuable of the child*? impulses. We find it dis-
played in the counting cut games ; in foretelling the future
by counting plum otones or daisy petals ; in telling the time
by the number of putfs required to blow the down off a
<• clock." We und it also in the make-believe games where
the child preterms to be a dog in order to find out what it
feels like to be a dog. By experiment the child learns to
what extent he may discount his nurse's threats, and discovers
exactly how far it is safe to disobey his nurse, bis mother,
and his father. The destructive impulses, so manifest in
many children, may be perversions of the instinct to construct,
or may be manifestations of the instinct under consideration.
However troublesome this destructiveness may be there is,
generally speaking, nothing "wicked" about it. It indicattsi
in part the lack of proper channels for activity, and in part
the ignorance of the child who must do something, and
therefore does whatever comes to hand.

(;) The instinct of imitation : imitating souuds (harkingt
mewing, etc.), gestures, actions ; pretending to be a horse, a
tiger, an engine ; dressing up, acting ; make-believe plays —
circus, shop, school.

(6) The instinct of power : games of skill — tops, marbles,
battledore and shuttlecock, ball games. Aunt Sally, qaoits,

THE MUSCLES

deck quoits ; many card games ; draughts, chess ; the hunt-
ing instinct— chasing balls} butterflies, cats, carriages ; hide-
and-seek, hunt the slipper, tig, king. Jack's in his castle,
hounds and hares, paper cfausses, steeple chases, racing,
jumping, vaulting.

In this group we find most of the ^vourite games of young
schoolboys, games which owe much of their attraction to the
spirit of emulation which they foster, whereby each boy is
stimulated to do his best, to develop to the highest possible
point his strength, and his swiftness, his accuracy of hand and
eye, his skill in doing difficult things. This aspect of boys'
games is worthy of study by teachers who desire to banish
die spirit of emulation entirely from the class-room.

(7) The social instinct. Amongst the earliest manifesta-
tions of this instinct are the little girls' doll-plays and the
love of doll's houses and playthings of the domestic type :
teasetc, weights and scales, toy shops. These perhaps should
rather be considered early in<ucations of the maternal instinct,
but little boys often enjoy playing vnth dolls, at any rate in
the absence of their sisters. The social instinct in its wider
form is prett}' late in appearing, and the games in which it takes
form are by far the most important type of the play activity.
The chief of these games are cricket, football, lacrosse, hockey,
base-ball. These games not only demand the expenditure of
energy, strength, and swiftness, and soundness of wind. In
each there is something difficult to be done, something which
is worth doing only because it is difficult. In order that this
may be done, pluck and perseverance and skill are required.
Yet these are not enough. The race is not to the swift nor
the victory to the strong. That tht game may be won each
boy must know the necessity of obedience to law, he must
control his temper, he must subordinate individt^al self-asser-
tion to the good of the whole. Always he must play for
his side, never for himself. All these games also foster the
Hoy's spirit of loyalty to his fellows, to his team, to his school.
V/hen properly organised they do more than aiight else to
establish a wholesome esprit de corps in a school.

mem

THE MUSCLES

Bicycling tor CbUdren — The bicycle must be admitted
to be one of the greatest boons which we owe to an age of
mechanism, and especially to the town dweller who is enabled
to get fresh air, exercise, and change of scene with a facility
hitherto impossible. As an exercise for children, bicycling
has both advantages and limitations. Amongst the latter may
be placed its tendency to interfere with games.

No child should be allowed to cycle under the age of seven
years, and in a hilly district, or one where the roads are rough,
even that is probably too young. The cycle should be very
light, and the bearings should run very smoothly. The gear
should be very low, and should be suited to the development
of the child, the build of the machine, and the nature of the
roads. The machine should be carefully adjusted to the child.

The saddle should be sufficiently broad, and it should have
either no peak or a peak so soft as to obviate any risk of
injurious pressure even during the jolting on a rough road.
The seat should be well over the pedals so as to take advan-
tage of the weight of the body in riding, and its height should
be so adjusted that the heel can just rest easily on the pedal
at its lowest point. The handle bars should be sufficiently
high and should curve sufficiently far back to allow the child
to sit upright with ease. One bicycle should not be common
property among a number of children who differ considerably
in size.

Clothing should be adapted to the nature of the ex'/rcise,
but it is probably unnecessary to enter into details on this
subject now that cycling has become universal.

The principal dangers of cycling (apart from accidents),
arise from riding too steep hills, riding against a strong wind
especially when tired, riding too far, and ridmg too fast. All
these are especially to be guarded against in the case of children
who a-e not in good form for severe exercise. It may not
be out of place to say that after an illness cycling should be
indulged in with very great caution, and the form attained
before the illness reacquired by degrees.

The Dangers of Qames.— Games have of course their

THE EMOTIONS

clangers but these may be minimised bv the exercise of a little
care and common sense. The risk of accident can be greatly
lessened by just sufficient supervision to ensure that rutes are
strictly adihered to. In games which involve the trial of
strength or endurance, children should only pUy with those
who are apjn-oximately their own equals, size, weight, and
proficiency m the game all being taken into account. This
is especially important in games involving prolonged and
severe exertion or sudden strain, and in games where the
competitive element is a feature. The danger of strain is
greatly increased if a boy is much out of training, for
instance, after an illneas. In long races, steeplechases,
cycling, a boy is constantly tempted to overstrain himself,
while in the tackling in football a t udden strain is endured
which is thrown especially on the organs of circulation and
may do serious damage to the heart if there be any weakness.
Hockey has recently become very popular in girls* schools,
and frequently, as I am told, to the great advantage of all the
work of the school. Hockey, however, is a decidedly fast
game, and a girl who undertakes it should be sound of vrind
and limb. While it undoubtedly suits some girls admirably
it should not be taken up too suddenly by a girl who is not
in the habit of taking regular active exercise.^

CHAPTER VIII
The Emotions

Nowhere is the closeness of the connection between mind
and body more manifest than in the emotional states, whose
outward display in the youngest children is identical with their
bodily expression in the adult. Some of the emotions occur
at such an early period that there is no possibility of their
expression being in any way due to imitation. Their origin,
their mode of expression, and their significance must be

1 Some further remark* on play will be found in Chapter XII.

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STANDARD REFERENCE MATERIAL 1010a

(ANSI and ISO TEST CHART No. 2)

THE EMOTIONS

sought In the domain of instinct. They are forms of instinc-
tive reaction to the objects that excite them. The character-
istic features of the emotions of young children are their
direct dependence on the presence of the exciting object ;
their entire dominance of the child's consciousness for the
time being; their fiigitiveness ; and their independence (in
the absence of experience) of intellectual or voluntary control.

Fear, — The time at which the first manifestations of fear
are noticed varies very considerably. Very young infants may
exhibit a sort of innate or organic fear, startmg, trembling,
and bursting into loud screams at any unusual sensation,
especially if startled by a sudden loud noise, such as the
whistle of an engine or the banging of a door. Fear was
exhibited by Mrs Hall's baby in die fifth week on being
laid down when naked, and again in the same week when
first bathed by the mother who held him less firmly than the
nurse had done. The same baby was frightened by a strange
&ce in the sixteenth week, by being taken into £ strange
house m the twentieth week, and by hearmg a fog-horn
in the twenty-eighth.

In the early months of life sounds produce fear more
readily than uniisual sights. Darwin's baby was usually
pleased at strange noises but, when four and a half months old,
was frightened on hearing a loud snore. Fear of falling when
being dandled may be exhibited in the fifth or sixth month,
and again when learning to walk, even by children who have
never actually fallen.

Fear at unusual sights soon develops after the child has
begun to take stock of his surroundings. Preyer notes fear
of a dog, which however was barking, at nine months, of
persons dressed in black, at seventeen months, and of the sea
at twenty-one months.

Dr G. Stanley Hall has published an elaborate *< Study of
Fears," ^ in which he comes to the conclusion that, in the
fear experiences of childhood, we find reflections of long
distant ages of life in the world. Amongst the princi;

* Jtmer. Jour, uf PtycM,^ vol. viii., 1897.

THE EMOTIONS H

fears he menuons fear of water, of wind, of darkness, of
thunder and lightning, of animals, of fiir, of big eyes, of teeth,
dream-fears, fear of ghosts, horror of being alone. " We
have two hundred and twenty-three cases," he says in another
article,^ ** which shew that children during their first year of
life have an instinctive fear of fur. It is not because they see
it, but because they touch it. They sometimes have fits if
they touch it. It is touched, and there is some apparatus
there which causes convulsions in a child who touches the fur.
Another common cause of fear is big eyes ; making big eyes
at children frightens them. Why should a child be afraid of
big eyes, of an owl, for instance ? Another terror to a young
child is a great display of teeth. If the teeth are false,
and show a sUght motion, the fear is very manifest. How
can we explain such things? ... I am persuaded after a
careful study of this, that here we have some of the oldest
things in the human soul that take us away back, so that we
call those fears rudimentary organs. . . . These fears are
traces of a long struggle which we know the human race
went through vath animals with big teeth, big eyes, and fur,
that were sometimes threatening to exterminate the human
race.**

Between the ages of three and seven sleep is frequently
disturbed by fright. Bad dreams occurring during sleep dis-
turbed fi'om whatever cause often take their colouring from some
slight fright actually experienced. They are not unimportant
as they often make the child timorous dirough the day, even
to a more marked extent than the real occurrence did.
Preyer's child, when two and a quarter years of age, was
shewn some little pigs to give him pleasure, but when he saw
them begin to suck tihe teats of the mother he became greatly
terrified thinking they were biting her. This sight ap-
parently impressed the childish imagination very strongly, and
Preyer notes that ** the fear became so great in the course of
the fourth and fifth year that the child sometimes cried out
in the night and imagined that a pig was going to bite him."

> Tram. lilhtit See. for Child Study ^ vol. ii., XS97.

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 *<so that at the
name moment he saw my face and heard my voice " ; in
the thirty-first week at the clapping together of a fan ; in the
thirty-fourth, at an imitation of the voices of animals ; in the
forty-fourth, at a strange face near ; in the fifty-second, at a
new sound ; in the fifty-eighth, at a lantern.

Curiosity is closely allied to wonder on the one hand, and
to fear on the other, a relationship which is manifested in the
lower animals, even in fishes, by the tendency alternately to
approach and dash away from a strange object. On its
appearance in the young child it is at first almost entirely
sensual, yet it is a welcome sign of the child's mental
development, ^a Tracy says, "it consists of a sort of
chronic hunger for new sensations, which impels the child
constantly to handle, examine, taste, and otherwise exj. :ri-
ment upon all objects that come within his reach."

Anger, — While fear may be regarded as the instinct of
self-preservation in its passive form, anger msiy be considered
as the active form of the same instinct. Like fear, r.iger ap-
pears early, often in the second month. Its outward mani-
festation includes flushing and swelling of the face, and an
impulse to inflict injury on the cause of the emotion. Thir>
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

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

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

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

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

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 *<the placing of a napkin under his chin was alwiays
followed by food, for he closed his eyes and opened his
mouth." By the eighty-seventh day he had learned "that
after his bonnet was put on he was taken out for a ride, and
greeted both his own and his mother's bonnet with joy."

INTELLECT

These are examples of association by contiguity, or perhaps
by succession in time. Similar examples might be furnished
of association by resemblance in appearance or sound long
before the child is able to talk.

Even logical association in a rudimentary form may be
noticed in this period. In association by succession we find
the germ of the idea of causality. A baby of five months
who has burned his finger in a candle flame will afterwards
recoil at the sight of it. Darwin's boy at ten months had
learned to look behind for the object which caused a shadow
to fall upon the wall in froat. Preyer's boy had learned by
the time he was seventeen months to make practical use of
such observations, for he fetched a travelling-bag to stand upon
in order to get some playthings which were out of his reach.

A clear understanding of the principles of association is of
great practical importance. As Perez says, " It is association
which makes the unity of our mental existence, by establishing
a natural bond between all the various parts of which it is
constituted ; and it is to association that we must look for the
formation of the habits, judgment, character, and morality of
children." Whenever a small child's attention is noticed to
be aroused he should be allowed to gaze without interruption
at the object of interest, and to touch and handle it, as in this
way he is helped to form a habit of attending, and thus
receiving distinct impressions. The intellectual development
of phlegmatic children who manifest little pleasure in things
about them is often much improved if they have their atten-
tion called to many objects of interest, and especially if they
are permitted the companionship of more lively children.
On the other hand, the lively impressionable child whose
attention continually flits from one object of interest to
another should have little to observe at a time, and be made
to observe that little well. Toys which can be built up into
numerous combinations, such as ** bricks " or the kindergarten
blocks with dove-tailed ends, have a distinct value in training
the attention and forming the mind.

In all the teaching of children nothing which it is desired

INTELLECT

that the child should remember should be allowed to remain
isolated. Every new fact should be linked to old facts ; if
possible to both old and new activities. The things which
a child remembers best are those which form the greatest
number of associations in the mind ; and these are they which
are most mteresting, which arouse attention, and which are
repeated in as many ways as possible. The rational associa-
tions between different facts are specially important for in-
tellectual development, and the young should be taught to
find these out for themselves. They do so to a very large
extent with all the things they learn for themselves by their
own observation, but when they come to school work and
book studies they are often quite extraordinarily blind to the
existence of any connection of subjects with one another, or
with things outside, and for this the teaching must be held
wholly to blame. Mr Quick ^ tells us that in an elementary
school he once put some questions about St Paul at Rome.
He asked in what country Rome was, but nobody seemed
to have heard of such a place. " It's geography ! ' said he,
and some twenty hands went up directly ; their owners now
answered quite readily, " in Italy."

imagination, — By imagination is meant the power of
calling up before the "mind's eye" sensations previously
experienced in the absence of the original stimulus. When
such images are represented in their original setting we call
the process reproductive imagination. When parts of several
originals are combbed in a single picture, the imagmation is
called productive or creative. We can have no imagination
of sensations we have never experienced, but all our senses
have their own special imaginations. Not only can we
imagine things we have seen, but we can call up a mental
image, more or less distinct, of all kinds of sensible experiences.
Such images are frequently very vivid, as everyone knows
who has ever been troubled by a tune continuing to ** run in
his head." Persons who are lacking in one of their senses
naturally think in terms of the others. A blind man who
1 << Essays on Educational Reformers," R. H. Quick, M.A., 1890.

INTELLECT

has never seen can imagine objects only in terms of their
shape, consistence, roughness, weight, and so on. He can
form no visual images. One blind man asked if scarlet was
not something like the sound of thunder.

The inquiries of Mr Galton and others have shewn that in
different people the character of the imagination varies very
greatly. Some persons are able to call up very vivid mental
pictures of things they have seen, while others have thb
power in only a very slight degree. They may " remember "
things seen, but cannot ** picture" them in their mind's eye.
So in other persons the images of sounds, or of muscdar
sensation, or of touch may be particularly strong.

It seems probable that, when we call up in our imagination
past events, we are really exercising the same nerve structure*)
as were concerned in receiving and interpreting the original
sensations. But if so, how do we distinguish the mental
picture from the reality? William James explains this by
the hypothesis that when the cells concerned are excited
by intracortical currents, that is to say subjectively, weaker
explosions may be produced than currents from the sense-
organs occasion. '* To the strong degree of explosion corre-
sponds the character of * vividness' or sensible presence in
the object of thought, to the weak degree that of * faintness '
or outward unreality." In support of this he notes the
difficulty often experienced in distinguishing whether very
faint impressions are real or imaginary ; *< of a baby crying m
a distant part of the house, we are uncertain whether we still
hear it, or only imagine the sound."

The childish imagination is characterised especially by its
vividness, and this no doubt is due to the strong impressions of
which the child is daily the subject. To every healthy child
" the world is so fiill of a number of things " that every day is
a new day and not merely an old day over again. But before
a child is able to reproduce past impressions he must hive had
time to form them clearly, and the passage of reproductive
into productive imagination can only take place after he has
had sufficient experience to create a mental world for himself.

100

INTELLECT

That very want of experience which restricts the childish
imagination in so many ways no doubt aids in giving objec-
tivity to their mental images. Many children even up to the
age of four or five have considerable difficulty in distinguish-
ing between their dreams, their own imaginings, and real events,
and not infrequently they will tell most circumstantial stories
of adventures they have net with which really have a very
slender foundation in fact. In this there may be no intention
to deceive, yet truthfiJness is too essential a virtue for such a
habit to be safely left to work its own cure without assistance.
The proper method of discipline for such childish exuberance
of the imagination is to develop in the child a sense of the
practical value of accuracy, and of the moral value of truth.
The greatest care may be necessary lest such a child should
be unjustly punished for falsehood.

The imagination of children has free play in their dreams.
"Dreams," says Perez, "are the poems of children." The
events of the day reappear, but strangely jumbled together,
and mixed with fantastic details. The influence of dreams
in giving rise to painful emof.ons or increasing the nervousness
and timidity produced by a fright or by threats has already
been referred to.

At an early period the imagination of children leads them
to notice analogies between different objects, and helps them
to understand the world about them. A child a year and a
half old who had been accustomed to play with the kinder-
garten balls one day swung them to and fro like the pendulum
of a clock, while he said « Tick-took, tick-took." Another
child, two years of age, who had learned to bow ceremoniously
to his friends, was seen one gusty morning looking with
puzzled interest at the swaying branches of a tree. Suddenly
his face cleared, and he too began to bow. " How dc i "
he said, « how do ! " (Harrison.) Another, seeing a crust
dipped in a cup of tea, exclaimed delightedly, " Ba ! Ba » "
(Bath!). (Sully.)

The mimetic play of children illustrates very well both
their exuberance of fancy and the limitations imposed by

INTELLECT

lOI

want of knowledge. In such play the chi' ' requires some
material objects with which to exercise his in . entive imagina-
tion, but onen prefers playthings of his own contrivance to
the verisimilitude of purchased articles which cham his fanr-.
" We don't like buyed dolls," snys Budge, in •* Helen 6
Babies."

While toys thus assist the play of the imagination, fiction
and poetry are of great value by permitting the child to share
the imagination of others. Even Rousseau, who declares,
"I hate books, they only teach people to talk about what
they don't understand," acknowledged the futellectual value
to the child of Robinson Crusoe, which was to form for a
long time tbe whole of Emile's library. To be of value to
the child, tales should not be mere reproductions of the*.r
own experiences. Indeed such tales only please very young
children. With the growth of experience children delight in
the free play of their imagination in regions where the ideas
and activities of the inhabitants are bound neither by the hum-
drum of custom nor by the laws of a prosaic world. What
are all the legends that have come down to us from a far-oflP
past but a record of how in all ages man has felt that he ought
to have dominion ** to the ends of all the earth " ; that though
the forces of Nature might slay him, yet was he mightier than
they ?

Up the age of ten years fairy-tales and folk-lore of this
description appear to be of preponderating interest, but after
this the rapid growth of the critical spirit gradual) - changes
the centre of interest from the marvellous to the advent vous.
The aesthetic aad ethical value of all good fictional literature
is closely bound up with the imaginative and intellectual.

The enormous growth of a special literatiu-e for children in
recent years has in many ways been a great boon, but it can
hardly be denied that it has also made it a little more difficult
for children to lorm any permanent friendships among their
books. A chiid who is wantcnly supplied with books, all
too carefiilly written down to his level, can have little chance
of gaining any natural appreciation of style, or of overcoming

I03

INTELLECT

the initial effort required to read books which have a place
among the classics. Perhaps the simplest way o/ gaining a place
in the child's affections for some works of permanent value is
to read thenf aloud to him and talk about them. Many of
the great works of literature may thus weave themselves into
the family life, and attract and interest a child long before he
would care to read them for himself, and at a later period
when he does read them old associations render the reading
easy and pleasant, and greater knowledge and culture lead to
the appreciation of beauties previously unseen.

Judgment in its simplest form is involved in perception,
or the recognition of objects before us. Such judgments are
formed at a very early period of life in direct response to
dominant sensations, which the chile* learns to recognise, and
they, in turn, suggest past associated experiences. These
suggestions, proceeding thus by the process of association
by contiguity, call forth reactions on the part of the child
which are, in fact, rudimentary acts of reasoning of a very
direct and practical nature. Such actions, being neither reflex
nor instinctive, and preceding conceptual ideation, have been
termed receptual by Romanes. A recept is an idea which
is an advance on a percept, but less general or abstract than
a concept. It is just such a vague and indefinite generalisa-
tion as we may suppose an animal, or a young child with a
very limited vocabulary, to be capable of. A water-fowl, in
adopting different modes of alightmg on water or on land,
evidently has one recept corresponding to a solid and another
to a fluid. Man, abstracting the qualities of these recepts
and bestowing names upon them, raises them to the rank of
concepts nd renders them available for productive reasoning,
althoug **so far as the practical purposes of locomotion are
concerned, it is, of course, immaterial whether or not he
thus raises his recepts into concepts." ^

Association by contiguity is the law in accordance with
which the receptual mental activities of children ai carried
1 Romanes, "Animal Intelligence."

INTELLECT

103

on, and examples of the practical (reproductive) reasoning
of this kind of which even young infants are capable have
already been quoted. Even after children have begun
to talk, it is in reasoning of this kind that they excel ; but
no great advance can take place in the development of in-
tellect so long as the mind is bound by such habitual sequences.
The tendency of children to be struck by resemblances be-
tween different things and to reason by analogy, plays a much
more important part in their mental development.

When the child begins to talk, he at first uses words in a
very general way, not because he is able to generalise, but
because he is so open to resemblances, and so blind to
differences that the words he knows are called up by what-
ever reminds him of anything he has learned to name. He
continues so to apply his terms long after he is able to dis-
tinguish the individual things so named, but he is thus, by
making use of names, led all the more carefully to compare
and take stock of both the resemblances and differences
of objects which b«^emed ' similar. In this way he gradu-
ally acquires a stock of definite concepts, grouping things,
qualities, events into classes or k'' ds which furnish a basis
tor the higher rational processe;^ oy which conclusions are
reached not directly but mediately. In all this the child is
greatly helped by the mistakes he makes, by things not
answering to his expectations, and by hearing different terms
applied to objects he thought similar. He is thus compelled
to observe carefiilly, and to discriminate accurately the
elements of the thing before him. In proportion as he is
able to do this, his judgments and inferences become more
rational, because his train of thought is no longer run only on
the lines of association by contiguity, but he is able to pick
out resemblances from among apparent differences, to con-
centrate his attention on the quiaiities in the object of his
thought which are essential to his present purpose, and thus
to iMing new experiences under old generalisations.

Speech, — The acquisition of speech furnishes one of the
most intelligible examples of Nature's method of teaching.

I04

INTELLECT

aod of the role which is played by instinct and truniug
respectively. Nature educates by exciting cravings, by im-
planting instinctive tendencies, and by associating pleasurable
feelings with the exercise of normal functions. By these
means the difficult task of learning his mother tongue becomes
to the child a source of keen gratification and interest.

The first cry of the infant must be regarded as having only
the significance of z reflex, but, during the first few weeks
of life, modifications of the cry come to be expressive of
various elementary physical needs, and of the associated sen-
sations of disconifort. During the same period pleasurable
states begin to call forth the infantile babbling which, with its
accompanying smiles and gestures, is soon to constitute so
great a charm. The child soon begms to find pleasure in
exercising his voice, and in repeating, with great persistence
and often with a great variety of modulation, a few syllables
chiefly composed of vowel sounds (a, a) with the consonants
m, b, p, t (am, ma, ba, etc.).

All these significant sounds and gestures, common to the
children of different nations, and readily intelligible by any
adult, are obviously instinctive in character, and form the first
language of the child. They not only serve the useful
function of exercising the lungs and the muscles of respiration,
but also furnish a preliminary exercise for the v jcal organs.
During the first eight or nine months of life a large proportion
of the sounds afterwards to be required in speech can be
distinguished in the infantile babble.

During the second six months of life there is a marked
advance in the comprehension of words and gestures, and a
distinct step is taken when the child begins to imitate the
sounds he hears. The cadence and rhythm of conversation
is often closely imitated before the child attempts to pronounce
actual words, so that the babble hau a curious resemblance to
the sound of persons talking. Between the ninth and twelfth
months a few words are usually used with intention. The
speech at this time is of an interjectional character and re-
duplicated syllables are freely used — du-da, ma-ma, etc.

INTELLECT

105

During the third six months the advance is often rapid.
Various sounds used by the child may come to have a definite
meaning attached to them, and this is often spoken of as the
invention of words by the child. Many children now begin
to use short sentences, which, though expressing complete
ideas, are at first elliptical, e,g. Papa gone, for Papa has gone.
During this period alternate accelerations and retardations are
often noticed in the development of speech. The acquisition
of the power of walking may also interfere somewhat with the
progress of speech.

During the fourth six months rapid progress is made,
especially in the enrichment of the vocabulary. Nouns are
often stated to form from 60 to 80 per cent, of the words
acquired at this period. The number of verbs used is usually
very small. This appears to be due chiefly to the fact that
the subject and the object are the parts of the sentence which
require the most distinct expression in ' ords, the verb
being indicated by pantomime and intonauciO. Words are
not distmctly differentiated into different classes, so that any
part of speech may function as any other part, or single words
may express a whole sentence.

The rapidity of speech acquisition varies greatly in
individual children. Parents are often unduly anxious if a
child is late in learning to speak. Slowness in speaking is
not always a sign of want of intelligence, and the children
of cultured parents are not infrequently very backward in
this respect. For example, a child of my acquaintance, of
highly cultured parents, could scarcely speak a word at the
age of two years, but soon after this speech developed very
rapidly. Perez says on this subject, ** It seems to me that
the more intelligent a child is, the less he uses words, the
more necessary is it to him that words should signify some-*
thing if he is to learn them, and this is why he only learns
words in proportion as he gains ideas about objects." Preyer
connects the tendency to make use of words with other forms
of imitation. " Probably," he says, " those that imitate early
and skilfully are the children that speak earliest, and whose

io6

THE WILL

cerel»iun grows fastest but also soonest ceases to grow;
whereas those that imitate later and more sparingly, generally
learn to speak later, and will generally be the more intelligent.
For with the higher sort of activity goes the greater growth
of brain." It is at any rate certain that the instinct of imitation
frequently leads to the repetition of many words and phrases
whose significance is unknown. Many of these words are
afterwards forgotten, and many become associated with the
proper ideas, ^t there is a danger that, if the memory is too
early filled with words, these may to some extent take the
place of ideas — a danger which is by no means confined to
young children.

CHAPTER X

The WW

In the new-born babe there is no appearance of volition, but
as the child grows the will appears very gradually. The
only sign by which we can recognise the development of the
will is muscular movement. Willed or voluntary movement
presupposes the existence of ideas, and therefore cannot
occur until the development of the senses and of the intellect
is sufficiently advanced for the mind to be fiimished with
ideas which can be desired or willed. The development of
the will is, therefore, dependent upon preceding phenomena.
It must, however, be clearly understood that all that is to
be said as to the evolution of volitional control has reference
to sequence only, not to cause.

The simplest operations of the will may be said to be
concerned with two sets of phenomena ; on the one hand
with ideas, and on the other with movements. A voluntary
movement is the outward expression of an idea. In order
that a movement may be willed, tliere must be in the mind an
idea of the movement, and a desire to carry it out. When
a movement has been performed voluntarily a number of times

THE WILL

the idea of the end desired gradually replaces in consciousness
the idea of the movement.

In studying the development of volition in the child we
must therefore consider ( i ) how the mind is furnished with
ideas of movements, since these obviously must be present in
the memory before they can be desired; (2) how a given
movement is to be recognised as voluntary.

I. The Furnishing of tlie Mind with Motor
ideas, — Whenever a motor discharge passes from .the brain
two effects follow. The first and direct effect is the
occurrence of a muscular contraction. But this effect in its
turn becomes a cause and sends back to the brain a sensation
of movement. We have already seen that the young infant
in his waking hours is in constant movement, and that even
in slr.-p numeums movements, chiefly of the random kind,
occur. All these movements, we may believe, fi-om the
very first, furnish sensations of muscular activity, which blend
with all other forms of sensation in the consciousness of the
child during his waking hours. Amongst these movements
there occur and recur some which, often owing to their
association with particular sensations other than their own,
make a peculiarly deep impression on the awakening conscious-
ness of the child. Out of the general level of undifferentiated
muscular sensation such impressions rif 'p into clearer
consciousness, and produce a reaction '.e part of the

child which is the simplest form of atteu ^n. Attention of
this sort is not a voluntary act. It occurs apart firom the
operation of the will. It is simply a detention of the mind,
whereby certain impressions, instead of passing into oblivion,
" get taken," as it were, by the memory. The operation of
sucking, for example, may attract attention in this way at an
early period. As Perez says "the child delights in the
operation, and as it were listens and looks at himself and feels
that he is enjoying himself." As soon as such sensations
begin to attract the attention of the child movements un-
connected with the sensation tend to be inhibited, and
especially the random ones. At first this inhibition may be

io8

THE WILL

merely momentary, but even during the firrt few weekt of
life we find the random movemenu tending to disappear at
the sensations of the child become more ▼ivid, and acquire
a greater degree of directing power over his movements.
This inhibiting effect of attention is of great interest and
importance. We may indeed define attention as an adaptation
of the nerve structures to adnriit certain impressions to con-
sciousness to the exclusion of others, combined with a
tendency to limit the outgoing strain of motor impulses to
those connected with the impression or idea which fills
consciousness. The aa of attention in fact perniits certain
vivid or novel impressions to seize upon the consciousness of
the child, to have the child all to themselves as it were, so
that th' associated sensory and motor ideas are imprinted
together upon the memory. Through such recurring acts of
attention the memory of the child is gradually furnished with
a supply of motor ideas which in due course he will be able
to recall and deliberately will.

2. The Recognition of Voluntary Movement.—
A young child's ideas are thus seen to spring very directly
from the impressions which attract his attention, and they
tend to pass very directly into action. Such attention is at
first, as we have said, entirely passive. The attitude of the
child is that of an onlooker who experiences a degree of
satisfaction as he observes the idea to which he is attending
passing into r :tion. The movement becomes volitional when
the child is no longer content to be merely a passive spec-
tator, but interposes between an exciting sensation and a
movement his own desire and intention to perform. Catch-
ing sight of an imprefsion, if one may so say, as it rises above
the threshold of consciousness and brings with it the idea of
pleasurable movement, he throws himself forward upon it
with desire. "Let me do it myself," is his mental
attitude. So he wills and it is done. The first act of
volition is therefore an act of attention. The child wUIs to
attend to something which has first caught his attention. The
first voluntary movement is simply the outward sign of

THE WILL

109

the motor idea to which the child willt to attend. The
characteriftic feature of a Toluntary rooTement ii therefore
wrapped up within the consciousneM of the child. There
ii no criterion by which we can definitely ascertain when a
noa-yolitional movement is for the first time performed with a
will. Our only guide is the appearance of interest and desire
in the child's aspect, and this is a matter of interpretation.

Preyer fails to find proof of definite volldon before the
end of the third month. Probably we shall not be for
wrong if we say that about this period the will first mani-
festly beginu to assume some control. As the child's ideas
become more sharply defined, his desires become « > 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

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

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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

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

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

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

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

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

3-
4-
5-

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.

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