6 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



in quickly lowering the child backward. The fear of falling, 

 which shows itself on the child's first attempting to stand, comes, 

 it must he remembered, as an accompaniment of a new and highly- 

 strange situation. The first experience of using the legs for sup- 

 port must, one supposes, involve a profound change in the child's 

 whole bodily consciousness a change which may well be accom- 

 panied with a sense of disturbance. Not only so, it comes after a 

 considerable experience of partial failings, as in trying to turn 

 over when lying, half climbing the sides of the cradle, etc., and 

 still ruder bumpings when the crawling stage is reached. These 

 would, I suspect, be quite sufficient to produce the timidity which 

 is observable on making the bolder venture of standing.* 



Fears excited by visual impressions come later than those ex- 

 cited by sounds. The reason of this seems pretty obvious. Vis- 

 ual sensations do not produce the strong effect of nervous shock 

 which auditory ones produce. Let a person compare the violent 

 and profound jar which he experiences on suddenly hearing a 

 loud sound with the slight surface agitation produced by a sud- 

 den movement of an object across the field of vision. The latter 

 has less of the effect of nervous jar and more of the characteris- 

 tics of fear proper that is, vague apprehension of evil. We 

 should accordingly expect that eye-fears would only begin to show 

 themselves in the child after experience had begun its educative 

 work.f 



At the outset it is well, as in the case of ear-fear, to keep before 

 us the distinction between mere dislike to a sensation and a true 

 reaction of fear. We shall find that children's quasi-aesthetic dis- 

 likes to certain colors may readily simulate the appearance of 

 fears. 



Among the earliest manifestations of fear excited by visual 

 impressions we have those called forth by the presentation of 

 something new and strange, especially when it involves a rupture 

 of customary arrangement. Although children love and delight 

 in what is new, their disposition to fear is apt to give to new and 

 strange objects a disquieting if not distinctly alarming character. 

 This apprehension shows itself as soon as the child has begun to 

 be used or accustomed to a particular state of things. 



Among the more disconcerting effects of the ruder departure 

 from the customary we have that of change of place. At first 

 the infant betrays no sign of disturbance on being carried into a 



* Prcyer seems to regard this as instinctive. Op. cit., p. 131. 



f M. Perez (op. cit., p. 65) calls in the evolution hypothesis here, suggesting that the 

 child, unlike the young animal, is so organized as to be more on the alert for dangers which 

 are near at hand (auditory impressions) than for those at a distance (visual impressions). I 

 confess, however, that I lind this ingenious writer not quite convincing here. 



