362 PHYSIOLOGY AND HEALTH. 



ance. Tn this .order, the appetites appear first, next the 

 muscular power, then the senses, and lastly the moral and 

 mental faculties ; and a person successively eats, and moves, 

 and observes, and reflects. 



834. The child enjoys the use of his senses. He wants 

 things visible and tangible. His perceptive faculties are 

 developed before his reflective. He observes before he rea- 

 sons. He learns better from things that he can see and 

 touch, than from descriptions of things which are not present 

 to his senses. He can better give his attention to insects, 

 flowers, and other natural objects, than to any abstract prin- 

 ciples of which he may not see the application or the use. 

 When these simple matters are taught, and the child learns 

 the uses and the relations of such things as he can see and 

 feel, and when these studies are sufficiently varied and inter- 

 changed with muscular exercise and recreation, the brain is 

 not fatigued, but, on the contrary, grows stronger, and able 

 to undertake higher and more abstruse matters. 



835. In early life, .the brain and the mind are feeble, like 

 the other organs and powers, and are subject to the same 

 laws of exercise and rest. Children love action, but they 

 have little power of endurance. They dislike to confine 

 their attention long to one subject. They are fond of 

 change, for a variety of subjects exercises different powers. 

 They are soon weary of one kind of play or work, and want 

 another; they like to change their studies frequently; they 

 prefer small books and short stories. But the most agreea- 

 ble change for them is that of the powers arid systems which 

 are put in action. They love to use the brain awhile, and 

 then the muscles, and then these both together. They like 

 to study, then play, then work. 



836. The human brain, being subject to the same laws 

 that govern the whole physical system, cannot be premature- 

 ly strengthened and applied to labor, with more safety than 

 the arm or the stomach. Its growth, from the earliest in- 

 fancy to the maturity of manhood, is naturally slow and 

 gradual ; and it would be as injurious, to attempt to force the 



