Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 53.djvu/828

804 that have to do with the simpler occupations of preceding generations.

How important, then, is play! I attach to it great importance, for in order to live out the fullest life it is necessary that the individual go through the life of the race; without play it is not possible to achieve full-orbed manhood and womanhood. It is an interesting fact—of which, however, I do not know any scholarly investigation having been made—that the plays of the children of any given race are related to the complexity of the life of the race—that the children in highly civilized races have a far higher play life than do those of savage life. The plays in civilized lands certainly last during a greater number of years; there is more to rehearse than there is in the savage life. Not only is the period of infancy prolonged in civilized life, but we have already crowded back into comparative youth those plays that do not come to savage children till later.

Adults who never played as children are woefully handicapped in many directions—handicapped by the inability not only for recreation, but for many of the psychical activities that enrich life. My own father played but little as a boy. During later life he tried to play, but it was work. It was pathetic to see him try to play lawn tennis. It was easier and more agreeable for him to study Sanscrit than to bat a ball over a net. His hands were never trained to all the nice adjustments involved in the use of tools. He never understood mechanical things, and this I believe was somewhat related at least to his not having, from the years of seven to twelve, the kind of plays that I have spoken of as belonging to this period.

Play during childhood and adolescence represents the form of activity that alone can secure a whole-souled later life. Play is spontaneous, whole-hearted, from inner not from outer causes. It is the poetic or creative in the individual at work. Duty can never secure the same work that play can from a child. This spirit is the true spirit for life. So long as one is driven by outside forces, by the consciousness of duty, the whole self is not engaged. But when one's work is done in the play spirit, with the enthusiasm and delight of the plays of childhood, then we have the fullest development of and product from the adult. The capacity for this appears to be related to the play life of childhood and youth. To love one's work better than any other occupation, to go into it with all the play spirit, is indeed to be a poet in one's own line. What relation do the facts of which we have been speaking bear to the physical education of children?

The development of the brain may be assisted and helped much by such manual training as is now being done in some public schools. Quick sense perceptions and rapid co-ordinations demand plays and games and places for them. The child is going through the {{hws|out-of-| that have to do with the simpler occupations of preceding generations.

How important, then, is playl I attach to it great importance, for in order to live out the fullest life it is necessary that the individual go through the life of the race; without play it is not possible to achieve full-orbed manhood and womanhood. It is an interesting fact—of which, however, I do not know any scholarly investigation having been made—that the plays of the children of any given race are related to the complexity of the life of the race—that the children in highly civilized races have a far higher play life than do those of savage life. The plays in civilized lands certainly last during a greater number of years; there is more to rehearse than there is in the savage life. Not only is the period of infancy prolonged in civilized life, but we have already crowded back into comparative youth those plays that do not come to savage children till later.

Adults who never played as children are woefully handicapped in many directions—handicapped by the inability not only for recreation, but for many of the psychical activities that enrich life. My own father played but little as a boy. During later life he tried to play, but it was work. It was pathetic to see him try to play lawn tennis. It was easier and more agreeable for him to study Sanscrit than to bat a ball over a net. His hands were never trained to all the nice adjustments involved in the use of tools. He never understood mechanical things, and this I believe was somewhat related at least to his not having, from the years of seven to twelve, the kind of plays that I have spoken of as belonging to this period.

Play during childhood and adolescence represents the form of activity that alone can secure a whole-souled later life. Play is spontaneous, whole-hearted, from inner not from outer causes. It is the poetic or creative in the individual at work. Duty can never secure the same work that play can from a child. This spirit is the true spirit for life. So long as one is driven by outside forces, by the consciousness of duty, the whole self is not engaged. But when one's work is done in the play spirit, with the enthusiasm and delight of the plays of childhood, then we have the fullest development of and product from the adult. The capacity for this appears to be related to the play life of childhood and youth. To love one's work better than any other occupation, to go into it with all the play spirit, is indeed to be a poet in one's own line. What relation do the facts of which we have been speaking bear to the physical education of children?

The development of the brain may be assisted and helped much by such manual training as is now being done in some public schools. Quick sense perceptions and rapid co-ordinations demand plays and games and places for them. The child is going through the {{hws|out-of-|out-of-door}}