sness, and the laws of
physical growth, as bearing upon mental development. In all these
cases, however, there is again a greater and a less exactness. The
topics with the reports of results which I am going on to give may be
taken, however, as typical, and as showing the direction of complete
knowledge rather than as having in any one case approached it.

Before we take up particular questions, however, a word may be allowed
upon the general bearings of the study of the child's mind. I do this
the more willingly, since it is still true, in spite of the hopeful
outlook for positive results, that it is mainly the willingness of
psychology to recognise the problems and work at them that makes the
topic important at present. To investigate the child by scientific
methods is really to bring into psychology a procedure which has
revolutionized the natural sciences; and it is destined to
revolutionize the moral sciences by making them also in a great
measure natural sciences. The new and important question about the
mind which is thus recognised is this: _How did it grow?_ What light
upon its activity and nature can we get from a positive knowledge of
its early stages and processes of growth? This at once introduces
other questions: How is the growth of the child related to that of the
animals?--how, through heredity and social influences, to the growth
of the race and of the family and society in which he is brought up?
All this can be comprehended only in the light of the doctrine of
evolution, which has rejuvenated the sciences of life; and we are now
beginning to see a rejuvenation of the sciences of mind from the same
point of view. This is what is meant when we hear it said that
psychology is becoming "genetic."

The advantages to be derived from the study of young children from
this point of view may be briefly indicated.

1. In the first place, the facts of the infant consciousness are very
simple; that is, they are the child's sensations or memories simply,
not his own observations of them. In the adult mind the disturbing
influence of self-observation is a matter of notorious moment. It is
impossible for me to report exactly what I feel, for the observation
of it by my attention alters its character. My volition also is a
complex thing, involving my personal pride and self-consciousness. But
the child's emotion is as spontaneous as a spring. The effects of it
in the mental life come out in action, pure and uninfl