682 ANNUAL REPORT SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTION, 1914. 
sion, he develops his organic, nervous, emotional, and intellectual 
powers in the process of gaining adjustment. 
Spontaneously curious about his own activities and those of nature, 
animals, and man, he imitates them all until he masters their emo- 
tional and ideational content. He is spontaneously a manipulator of 
things, a juggler of impressions, and he constructs with things and 
ideas. He is spontaneously linguistic and “talks’’ until he can ex- 
press what he observes, thinks, and feels. He is spontaneously social 
and enters into social relationships and organizations. He is spon- 
taneously suggestible and educable; he is a follower, an imitator, a 
hero worshiper, craving leadership and instruction in ways of acting 
that will satisfy his hungers and give him adjustment. 
This spontaneous expression of energy under the stimulus of 
hungers, controlled by instincts and modified by experience and social 
tradition and susceptible to leadership, is play. Play is not the popu- 
lar “just play’’ nor the schoolman’s “mere play.” It is identical 
with the child’s spontaneous living. Its relation to work will be 
considered later. 
If time permitted, it would be possible to show that play began to 
evolve with the capacity to use experience and choose ways of acting, 
i. e., with the beginning of the evolution of intellect. It is just as 
deep in meaning as either the intellect or the will. Its function is to 
develop the latent plastic powers of rational man and keep him 
flexible through adult life. Play is the central element in the scheme 
of human nature that makes volition possible. 
Infancy, biologically speaking, is a period for parental care during 
which time systems of nervous connections, feelings, and ideas are 
developed together through play in order that the nerve paths may 
be controlled in volitional or rational conduct.t Without play man 
is inconceivable; play makes volition and rational living possible. 
There is no meaning to the phrase ‘mere play,’’ for play is the most 
important activity in life. 
Play is nature’s method of education. Why? Because education, 
in its broadest sense, is identical with the process of living. More 
specifically, it is learning how to live through experience. But ex- 
perience comes only as the result of activity, and play is the funda- 
mental form of all developmental activity. It is spontaneous living. 
Out of the various reactions upon the environment that we call 
experience comes the development of the instincts and emotions and 
the experience that makes for knowledge, character, and adjustment. 
Schools, books, libraries, laboratories, and museums are only 
devices to give opportunities for activity. All these are worthless 
and the teacher is impotent without the activity of the individual to 
1 These theoretical interpretations are drawn from a forthcoming volume on the Nature and Function 
of Play. 
