STUDIES OF CHILDHOOD. 815 



So much as to the several manners and circumstances of child- 

 ish lying. In order to understand still better what it amounts to, 

 how much of conscious falsehood enters into it, we must glance at 

 another and closely related phenomenon the pain which some- 

 times attends and follows it. 



There is no doubt that a certain number of children expe- 

 rience qualms of conscience in uttering falsehood. This is evi- 

 denced in the well-known devices by which the intelligence of 

 the child thinks to mitigate the lie, as when on saying what he 

 knows to be false he adds mentally, "I do not mean it," "in my 

 mind," or some similar palliative.* Such dodges show a meas- 

 ure of sensibility a hardened liar would despise the shifts and 

 are curious as illustrations of the childish conscience and its 

 unlearned casuistry. 



The remorse that sometimes follows lying, especially the first 

 lie which catches the conscience at its tenderest, has been remem- 

 bered by many in later life. Here is a case : A lady friend 

 remembers that when a child of four she had to wear a shade 

 over her eyes. One day, on walking out with her mother, she was 

 looking, child-wise, sideward instead of in front, and nearly 

 struck a lamp-post. Her mother then scolded her, but presently, 

 remembering the eyes, said, " Poor child, you could not see well." 

 She knew that this was not the reason, but she accepted it, and 

 for long afterward was tormented with a sense of having told 

 a lie. Miss Wiltse, who tells the story of the mythical snake, 

 gives another recollection which illustrates the keen suffering of 

 a child when it becomes fully conscious of falsehood. She was as 

 a small child very fond of babies, and had been permitted by her 

 mother to go, when invited by her aunt, to nurse a baby cousin. 

 One day, wanting much to go when not invited, she boldly in- 

 vented, saying that her aunt was busy and had asked her to 

 spend an hour with the baby. " I went," she adds, " not to the 

 baby, but by a circuitous route to my father's barn, crept behind 

 one of the great doors, which I drew as close to me as I could, 

 vainly wishing that the barn and the haystacks would cover me ; 

 then I cried and moaned I do not know how many hours, and 

 when I went to bed I said my prayers between sobs, refusing to 

 tell my mother why I wept." \ 



Such examples of remorse are evidence of a child's capability 

 of knowingly stating what is false. This is strikingly shown in 

 Miss Wiltse's two reminiscences, for she distinctly tells us that in 

 the case of her confident assertion about the imaginary snake 

 with ring and bell she felt no remorse, as she was not con- 

 scious of uttering a lie. But these sufferings of conscience point 



* See Stanley Hall, op. cit., p. 68 f. f Loc. cit. 



