e imperative necessity be
recognized of studying the mystery of life which conceals its source,
but continually expands its forces.

The invisible but real source of health and healing is always there,
at the climax of all efforts; and the palpitating energy which springs
inexhaustibly therefrom is the only reality which makes evident this
revival of the living. This medical science and this mystery cannot
but form a unity.

It is probable that this will be brought about by that science which
studies the health and the maladies of the soul. If this should
discover that the soul, too, is corruptible, subject to disease and
death, that it has its laws of health and its _vis medicatrix naturae_,
treatments tending to respect and aid this precious force of life
should multiply immeasurably; and at the same time the mysterious
source whence it gushes should impose itself on modern medicine, as
the question of immunity has done. Then life, morality and religion
will be indissolubly united.

* * * * *

Let us now turn to children of two and a half and three years old, who
touch everything, but especially those objects which they evidently
prefer, the most simple objects, as, for example, a square block of
paper, a square inkstand, or a round, shiny bell. All things which
"are not meant for them."

Then the mother comes and takes them away; half caressing, and at the
same time tapping the little hands, she calls out, "Don't touch!
naughty!" I once was present at one of these many family scenes, which
pass unnoticed. The father, who was a doctor, was sitting at the
writing-table; the mother was holding in her arms a very small child,
who was stretching out its little hands to the various objects upon
the table. The doctor said, "That child is incorrigibly naughty,
although it is so young. However much its mother and I try to cure it
of this fault of touching my things, we never succeed." "Naughty!
naughty!" repeated the mother, holding its little hands tightly, while
the child threw itself back, howling, and throwing its feet about as
if it wished to kick.

When children are three or four years older, the struggle becomes more
severe: they want to _do_ things. Those who observe them carefully
discover that they have some "tendency." They wish to imitate what
their mother does, if their mother is a housewife. They willingly
follow her into the kitchen, they wish to share her work, to touch her
things, and