Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 17.djvu/644

626 given inherited faculties; should take account of their diversities; should not measure all children with the same measure; and should not train them after the same model. It would be desirable in respect to this point if a number of men well versed in physiology should, independently of each other, carefully observe as many infants as possible, and compare results; or if the fathers of children, friends to each other, should mutually exchange observations upon their own children. It would be well for individuals to keep a day-book of the acts of their children from their birth upward. I can say from my own experience that hardly a day passes in the first two years in which something does not occur worthy of notice in its bearing upon mental development. The study must begin with the observation of the sensations and movements of the child. There can be no mental activity without sensation to excite it by giving impressions, and affording a basis for remembrances and comparisons. The sensations are preceded by the movements which begin even before the child is born. The reciprocal action of sensation and movement leads us a step further, to the beginning of the development of the will. As soon as the will becomes effective, the intellect reveals itself, and at last the point is reached when inclination becomes a controlling influence; the feelings assume a real form, and the child begins to communicate its own purposes through speech. The first cry of the new-born child has been regarded by some as an expression of the will, and even as an appeal for relief from pain. This can not be, for a being born without understanding, in the first moment of consciousness, can not be capable of entertaining such purposes as this expression would imply. A more probable theory is that it is the result of a reflex action, like the sounds with which animals respond to a pleasing excitation, as the rubbing of the back, or like the laughter which is provoked by tickling. Frequently the child sneezes instead of crying; and this is a purely reflex action, following an irritation of the nerves of the nose.

The first motions of the limbs of the child give to the unprejudiced observer an impression of aimlessness. The changes in the expression of the face seem to result from what are more like voluntary muscular movements; but when we remember how helpless are the motions of the infant in other respects—that it will be months before it can hold up its head or take hold of any thing, or do any other simple act which seems natural to grown persons—this supposition seems no longer probable. Of what nature, then, are these singular muscular contractions which are never observed again in the whole later life, and the parallels of which are only seen in animals suddenly awakened from their winter slumbers, or occasionally from ordinary sleep? No external cause of disturbance is present to irritate the nerves of motion and the contractile fibers, and so provoke reflex movements. The sleeping infant stirs as the waking one does, only less often and more sluggishly. We can not ascribe the movements at this early period of life to attempts