New-York tribune., 1905-08-13
SUNDAY MAGAZINE for AUGUST Is. 1905
THE SCIENTIFIC BA Is 7
ConHnu from pages
Continued from page 8

be. weighs and measures; the first smile,
word, tooth, step, are chronicled; all
the cunning sayings and characteristic
traits brought out; the aid of photog-
raphy is sometimes invoked
In a number of European cities each
child on entering school is given what
is called a health-and-study book. In
each the teacher from time to time enters
observations or queries concerning the
child. The school doctor, where such
a benefcient official exists, periodically
tests eyes, ears, nose, throat, chest,
nerves, digestion, and enters his remarks
and advice in this precious book. When
the child can write or draw, once a
month or so, coming perhaps in it's best
dress and well washed, he writes each
lesson of the day in his book, which thus
becomes the best possible record of his
progress through the year and some
times is made the basis of promotion
up the grades in place of all other ex-
aminatiOns. On satisfying the require
ments of the school law, in one city at
least, this book is stored away in the
Citv Hall to be referred to in case the
child later comes in conflict with the
law In others they are given to the
child or it's parents. and become a
precious aid to self-knowledge and even
to the choice of calling.
The young child is a creature of in
stinct. feeling and perception, and the
power of mind and thought comes far
more slowly and later than is usually
supposed. Children are extreme literal
1ctc nd ,o1o fol hoy or1r1 1y-
saving things in the most naive way
that provoke a sense of humor in adults.
One of the hardest and latest things to
learn is what to take seriously and what
is figurative.
Children are victims of scores of fears
of strangers, large teeth and eyes and
suggesting the period when it
seemed doubtful whether men or the
larger mammals We're to be lords of the
earth. Some have phObias of insects,
thunder, darkness, which their vivid
fancy believes filled with monsters some
times fully developed and individual,
and the soul of some seems SCARED and
scared and their lives intimidated and
doomed to restrictions because of their
innate cowardice.
~ Ill Ol WIFI dll lIS SYMPTOMS
is a strange thing A child is crossed
or thwarted and suddenly grows red
in the face, screams. scratches, spits,
bites. wells. and becomes furious little
beast, and then, prestoi the nervous
storm passes and he smiles and all is
sunny again. This, too, points unnis-
takably to the past and the accumulated
effects of resistance to the point of fury
against all that Obstructed. and education
largely consists in teaching children to
fear, to be angry, to pity and to love
Alright. These master passions, that
make Our whole life their sport, bless it
if rightly focused, and make it wretched
if turned toward wrong objects
Special and prolonged studies have
been made upon children's feelings to-
ward objects of nature-the sky that
suggests inhnity and a unit over all, the
moon which still is an object of alteration
to the home or lOvesick maiden who
talks to it and to whom it means un-
utterable things, our nearest celestial
De1Uh bOr which Socrates himself thO,rob+