Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 14.djvu/616

598 which express the most salient qualities of objects, or the part which produces the principal and dominant impression. A little girl twenty months old called the decanter vé (verre, glass). A little child two years old called all dogs wa-wa, except his grandfather's dog, which he did not call by his own name, but only distinguished it from others. Some one made for him a little rounded figure of paper; he said tété, the name by which he designated the bosom of his nurse. Intelligent children often forget words that have no meaning for them; children of less intelligence, on the contrary, sometimes replace ideas by words. The mania for jabbering syllables without signification is common with children, even the most intelligent. No doubt they rest from the effort of mind that their first essays in talking cost them in making this noise, which, without requiring any exertion, charms and stuns their ears.

—The notion of self may be considered, to a certain extent, as hereditary, and already existing among the impressions of foetal life. It is developed little by little. The personality of little children is concentrated in the sphere of emotion. They do not know distinctly either themselves or anything else, but they are sensible of the presence of objects, and they are sensible of themselves living, feeling, and acting. At three months the notion of personality is already outlived. When children begin to speak of themselves they employ the third person. M. Perez does not conclude from this that children are unable to separate their personality from external objects. The words I, me, Paul, Charles, etc., alike express the notion of personal individuality; they designate the personality of the child, a personality that he well knows. When between two and three years old the sentiment of personality is affirmed and exaggerated. A child was very delicate before the age of twenty-six months. His self-love had to be corrected. When eight years old he fell, and before getting up he walked on all-fours, making believe that he had not fallen. At another time he stumbled on the staircase, and rolled over two or three times, purposely bumping his head with a noise. He pretended to have fallen for fun. He was usually pedantic, egotistic, and conceited, but from time to time would show sympathy and diffidence.

—The child has not the absolute idea of good and bad; but he has the objective idea from the age of six or seven months. For him that which is permitted is good, that which is forbidden is bad. A child seven months old had learned from its mother, who had scolded and shaken it, that it ought not to cry to be taken up or held in arms if its wishes were not immediately granted. When ten months old the child began to get up itself in a hesitating way—a moral being. A little child of eleven months obeyed his father very well, particularly when asked to do anything for the amusement or pleasure of others. For little children, the moral law is incarnated in