The Montgomery advertiser., 1907-03-17
BY MRS. MATLocK.

Bf MRS. MATLOCk.
 Tn a paper on Child Character, read by Mrs. Matiock before the Moth CTS Union here a few weeks since, she had the following to say of imagina- tion In the chiid
 There is nothing more interesting in the growth of the child than the de- veiopment of his imagination. As his memory images become more stable they also become forced from definite time and place associations. In this way they become more flexible and subject to his will, and presently we md him making alterations, picturing himself as doing something this morn ing that he has not done in a month; making little plans of what he will do after dinner. and in this way show ing his power to manage images. Then suddenly he becomes conscious of his power and forthwith launches boldly out into riotous sea of imaginings. Sometimes, indeed, he becomes swamp ed or on the other hand he mistakes his bouyant fancies for the dry land of facts. but by degrees he learns to control them, and to see their limita- tions.
 The systematitc forming of new com binations mentally by the child occurs first in listening to stories, but this does not come until after he has learn ed to tell little stories of his own life what he has seen on his walk, what he did at grandma's, and so on. He forms vivid images of these stories, as is shown by his insisting upon the same words and facts in the story every time they are told
 "Only after this does he invent sto- ries of his own, but once started, he carries his storytelling to great length. The stories, like all his other fancies, are improbable and inconsist- nvtt 4N 4fo kY.N 7n4 to h htr1 x.rfAh 4o narrow experience. There is nothing incredible to him about the hole in the stone being the abode of fairies. so he both accepts and invents fairy tales and myths with equanimity. As his experience widens and he learns more of the world about him, his wild irnag- inings give way to others that are more in agreement with, fact and so less conspicuous.
 There seems to be at times a real Illusion in these fancies, The child will lose himself in them for the mo- ment. He always starts with some ac- tiaai object and proceeds to adorn 1t with his fancy As persons interest children most, they tend to personify, all objects. Along with this personify- ing of all objects is the tendency to look upon them all as made for the use of people or even of the child. One little girl thought that the flowers opened to please her, and that the sun came up to light her. It is difficult in such cases to know how far child is accepting literally the fgurative statements of other people, and how far he Is imagining.
 Tt is equally hard to draw the line between imagination and reason. Thus, if child sees a certain object his fancy at once forms pictures of how the object came to be what it is
 The induction does not seem to be different in nature from the working hypothesis of the scientist
 Tt is also often difficult to distin- guish between the playfulness of the imagination and lying. 4 child will sometimes comes home and rule off long stories about what he has been doing, and seeing; which have little or no truth in them. This tendency will last for months at time. The thing one should look for in such a case, is the motive Does the child intend to deceive you or is he just playing with images. and asking you to play, too?