IMAGINATION 



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IMAGINATION 



What the Imagination Is. It is easier to 

 tell what the imagination does than to tell 

 what it is. Many definitions have been given 

 and some of them seem to convey opposite 

 meanings. One school of psychologists con- 

 siders memory to be a form of imagination. 

 The followers of this school call memory the 

 reproductive imagination, and what is ordina- 

 rily considered imagination, the constructive 

 or creative imagination. However, the most 

 recent authorities consider these activities of 

 the mind as distinct. We may say then that 

 imagination is that form of mental activity 

 which constructs mental images different from 

 those actually experienced. Memory recalls 

 images of past experiences as they occurred; 

 imagination projects our ideas and experiences 

 into the future in tnodified form, the form 

 which we wish them to take. The office clerk 

 on a small salary sits in his lonely room and 

 constructs a future in which he sees himself 

 as a wealthy man owning a large business 

 and a beautiful home, and the vision is so 

 clear that then and there he resolves to be- 

 come wealthy and influential. From that 

 time on he leads a life devoted to a definite 

 purpose. The schoolboy sees himself as a 

 college student and puts forth his effort in 

 preparation for entrance to the school of higher 

 grade, and so on. It is through the imagina- 

 tion that we form our ideals or project our- 

 selves into the future. When these ideals are 

 adopted we put forth our efforts to attain 

 to them; hence imagination is the power that 

 leads one or makes one progressive. 



Many who do not realize what the imagina- 

 tion does consider it merely as the power of 

 fancy and hallucination. Nothing could be 

 further from the truth. To be sure it is 

 through this activity of the mind that we de- 

 rive our fancies and daydreams, and the child 

 creates the world of myths in which he largely 

 lives, but the imagination grows as the mind 

 develops and soon leaves the world of myths 

 and dreams for that of realities. We should 

 .regard the imagination as one of our most 

 precious possessions. 



Childhood. Early in life the child begins to 

 combine his experiences into original mental 

 products. He weaves his world of fancy and 

 happily dwells therein, although it often dif- 

 fers widely from the world of reality. The 

 stick becomes a horse, a bundle of rags a baby, 

 and blocks and papers may form a collection 

 of wild and domestic animals. From the third 

 to about the eighth year, myths and fairy tales 



afford the greatest enjoyment because they 

 harmonize so closely with the child's mythical 

 world. To him at this time these myths are 

 more true than the actual facts discerned by 

 his elders. The child's craving for myths and 

 fairy tales should be satisfied, both for his 

 present and his future good. These tales em- 

 body for him the greatest truth. Moreover, 

 without a knowledge of folklore he cannot in 

 after years comprehend the best in literature 

 and act. "The language that Homer and Virgil 

 and Spenser and Shakespeare and Dante and 

 scores of others of the past have spoken is 

 jargon to him who has no understanding of 

 the simpler, obscure and forgotten masters, 

 who in the folklore of the people of all times 

 have left a world of rarest story for the chil- 

 dren of ages yet unborn." 



Because of their limited knowledge and ex- 

 perience children often make exaggerated 

 statements or statements which have no foun- 

 dation of fact. Those unacquainted with child 

 psychology are prone to regard such state- 

 ments as falsehoods and to brand children as 

 "little liars." This is a gross error. The child 

 describes the mental pictures his imagination 

 creates. These pictures are real to him, and 

 in his narrations he has no thought of misrep- 

 resentation. It does not follow, however, that 

 children should be left without guidance in the 

 development of the imagination. Unless the 

 child is led to correct his mental pictures as 

 he gains in experience and to use reason and 

 common sense in the exercise of his imagina- 

 tion, the habit of exaggerating may become so 

 firmly fixed that he cannot break it off. Such 

 a one in due time becomes a "professional 

 liar." At the age of twelve the child should 

 have his imagination so trained that he can 

 construct mental pictures which conform to 

 existing facts, that is, he should be able to 

 give accurate and reasonably complete de- 

 scriptions of what he has read or what is told 

 to him. 



Maturity. The products of the imagination 

 may be divided into two classes, the real and 

 the unreal. The mature mind has its flights 

 of fancy and all are given more or less to day- 

 dreaming and "building castles in Spain." This 

 dreaming is natural, and unless carried to ex- 

 cess, beneficial, for it is a means of fashioning 

 our ideals. The imagination of a well-bal- 

 anced mind, however, is employed in creating 

 the real. In this way we use our imagination 

 in business, in invention and scientific discov- 

 ery, in developing systems of government and 



