1G0 LAY SERMONS, ADDRESSES, AND REVIEWS. [vin. 



of course — as ultimate facts which suggest no difficulty 

 and need no explanation . So far as all these common, 

 though important, phenomena are concerned, the child's 

 mind is in what M. Comte would call the "positive" 

 state. 



But, side by side with this mental condition, there rises 

 another. The child becomes aware of itself as a source 

 of action and a subject of passion and of thought. The 

 acts which follow upon its own desires are among the 

 most interesting and prominent of surrounding occur- 

 rences ; and these acts, again, plainly arise either out of 

 affections caused by surrounding things or of other 

 changes in itself. Anions; these surrounding things, the 

 most interesting and important are mother and father, 

 brethren and nurses. The hypothesis that these won- 

 derful creatures are of like nature to itself is speedily 

 forced upon the child's mind ; and this primitive piece 

 of anthropomorphism turns out to be a highly successful 

 speculation, which finds its justification at every turn. 

 No wonder, then, that it is extended to other similarly 

 interesting objects which are not too unlike these — to 

 the dog, the cat, and the canary, the doll, the toy, and 

 the picture-book — that these are endowed with wills and 

 affections, and with capacities for being "good" and 

 " naughty." But surely it would be a mere perversion of 

 language to call this a "theological" state of mind, either 

 in the proper sense of the word ''theological," or as con- 

 trasted with " scientific " or "positive." The child does 

 not worship either father or mother, dog or doll. On 

 the contrary, nothing is more curious than the absolute 

 irreverence, if I may so say, of a kindly-treated young- 

 child ; its tendency to believe in itself as the centre 

 of the universe, and its disposition to exercise despotic 

 tyranny over those who could crush it with a finger. 



Still less is there anything unscientific, or anti- scientific, 



