running jump.

Finally, on this theory, play becomes a thing for evolution to
cultivate for its utility in the progress of animal life, and for that
reason we may suppose it has been perfected in the remarkable variety
and beauty of form which it shows.

On the psychological side, we find a corresponding state of things.
The mind in the young animal or child gets the main education of early
life through its play situations. Games have an extraordinary
pedagogical influence. The more so because they are the natural and
instinctive way of getting an education in practical things. This
again is of supreme utility to the individuals.

Both for body and mind we find that play illustrates the principle of
Organic Selection explained above. It makes the young animal flexible,
plastic, and adaptable; it supplements all his other instincts and
imperfect functions; it gives him a new chance to live, and so
determines the course of evolution in the direction which the playful
animal represents. The quasi-social and gregarious habits of animals
probably owe much of their strength to the play-impulse, both through
the training of individual animals and through the fixing of these
tendencies as instincts in various animal species in the way just
mentioned.

In another place below I analyze a child's game and draw some
inferences from it. Here it may suffice to say that in their games the
young animals acquire the flexibility of mind and muscle upon which
much of the social co-operation, as well as the individual
effectiveness, of their later life depends. With children, it is not
the only agency, of course, though its importance is not less. We have
to carry the children further by other means; but the other means
should never interfere with this natural schooling. They should aim
the rather by supplementing it wisely to direct its operation and to
extend its sphere.

CHAPTER IV.

THE MIND OF THE CHILD--CHILD PSYCHOLOGY.

One of the most interesting chapters of modern psychology is that
which deals with the child. This is also one of the topics of general
concern, since our common humanity reacts with greater geniality upon
the little ones, in whom we instinctively see innocence and
simplicity. The popular interest in children has been, however--as
uncharitable as it may seem to say it--of very little service to the
scientific investigation of childhood. Even to-day, when a greater
body of valuable results are being