2 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



When we pass from these elementary forms of pleasure and 

 pain to the rudiments of emotion proper as the miseries of fear, 

 the sorrows and joys of the affections we have still, no doubt, to 

 do with a mode of manifestation which, on the whole, is direct and 

 unreserved to a gratifying extent. A child of three is delight- 

 fully incapable of the skillful repressions and the yet more skill- 

 ful simulations of emotion which are easy to the adult. Yet, 

 frank and transparent as is the first instinctive utterance of feel- 

 ing, it is apt to get checked at an early date, giving place to a cer- 

 tain reserve. So that, as we know from published reminiscences 

 of childhood, a child of six will have learned to hide some of his 

 deepest feelings from unsympathetic eyes. 



This shyness of the young heart, face to face with old and 

 strange ways of feeling, exposed to ridicule if not to something 

 worse, makes the problem of registering its pulsations of emotion 

 more difficult than it at first seems. As a matter of fact, we are 

 still far from knowing the precise range and depth of children's 

 feelings. This is seen plainly enough in the quite opposite views 

 which are entertained of childish sensibility, some describing it 

 as restricted and obtuse, others as morbidly excessive. Such di- 

 versity of view may, no doubt, arise from differences in the fields 

 of observation, since, as we know, children differ hardly less than 

 adults, perhaps, in breadth and fineness of emotional susceptibil- 

 ity. Yet I think that such contrariety of view points further to 

 the conclusion that we are still far from sounding with finely 

 measuring scientific apparatus the currents of childish emotion. 



It seems, then, to be worth while to look further into the mat- 

 ter in the hope of gaining a deeper and fuller insight ; and as a 

 step in this direction I propose to inquire into the various forms 

 and the causes of one of the best-marked and most characteristic 

 of children's feelings namely, fear. 



That fear is one of the characteristic feelings of the child 

 needs no proving. It seems to belong to these wee, weakly things, 

 brought face to face with a new, strange world, to tremble. They 

 are naturally timid, as all that is weak and ignorant in Nature is 

 apt to be timid. 



I have said that fear is well marked in the child. Yet, though 

 it is true that fully developed fear or terror shows itself by un- 

 mistakable signs, there are many cases where it is difficult to say 

 whether the child is the subject of fear. Thus the reflex move- 

 ment of a start on hearing a sound does not amount to fear, though 

 it is akin to fear.* Again, a child may show a sort of aesthetic 

 dislike for an ugly form or sound, turning away in evident aver- 

 sion, and yet not be afraid in the full sense. Fear proper betrays 



* For an account of this reflex, see Preyer, op. tit, cap. 10, S. 1*76. 



