Page:Home Education by Isaac Taylor (1838).djvu/197

 But again: this same faculty gives evidence of its activity by the way in which its operations are connected with graphic representations of familiar objects. To this subject I have already alluded, and to avoid the appearance of repetition, will here only observe that, by the aid of very rude sketches, adapted to the purpose, the curious reader may, if he pleases, and in the way of experiment, satisfy himself as to the extent and exactness of a child's conceptive power. It would be easy to specify a hundred modes in which this experiment might be varied. I must however pass on to notice the still more striking proof furnished of the refinement which the conceptive faculty reaches, at a very early age, by the electric velocity, and the precision with which images stored in the mind connect themselves with arbitrary signs, that is to say, with words.

This curious subject, familiar as it is to those conversant with mental philosophy, and familiar too, as a common fact, to every one, may deserve a little attention from the reader who hitherto has not much thought of it. We take then the instance of a child of three years old, and one of only ordinary intelligenceany family may furnish a parallel example. Accustomed to the objects of a rural and in-land home, he accompanied his mamma, let us suppose, a year ago, to a gay watering place. At different times, during the intervening months, the striking objects of that world of wonders have been recalled to his recollection in vivid language; and now, if questioned concerning these objects, and many others therewith associated, although the questions are varied as much as we please in phraseology, and although new points of view are taken, he will convince his catechist that there is present to his mind's eye a not obscure set of picturesof the sea, in its changing aspectsof the bathsof the buildingsof the equipagesof the downs. Or show him, unexpectedly, a view of the Pavilion, or of the chain pier, and it will be unquestionable