86 The Recapitulation Theory and Human Infancy 



grimacing, the rolling of the head, cannot be brought under the 

 theory at all. 33 



The sucking and crying reflexes of the infant are obviously 

 adaptations. As for sneezing, yawning, coughing, and similar 

 reflexes, all these appear early and remain essentially unchanged 

 through life. Certain other reflexes and a number of physical 

 traits, were collected by Robinson, 34 and Buckman, 36 and offered 

 as illustrations of recapitulation. Examples of infantile adaptive 

 characteristics from these writers referring to the pithecoid 

 infantile condition are the clasping reflex, the supporting of the 

 body by the hands and arms, the thumb -like action of the big- 

 toe all having to do with the necessity of holding fast to the 

 hair of the mother in arboreal life. The very early "hide and 

 seek" propensity of babies is another example of pithecoid 

 recapitulation. Examples of physical traits are the baby's 

 snub nose, prognathism, remnant of lip furrow, tail mark, long 

 arms, position of the legs and feet, and the plantar lines. If 

 one should be disposed to grant a certain plausibility to these 

 cases of ancestral reference, there is still no necessity of assigning 

 them to the adult monkey or ape, where they are not obviously 

 infantile. They may very well resemble the adult because of the 

 infant ape's resemblance to its own adult condition and they 

 thus become illustrative of ancestral ontogenetic resemblance. 

 They may be compared with the many pithecoid vestiges remain- 

 ing in the human adult organization, and before any assertion of 

 greater antiquity of infancy as such can be made it is necessary 

 to show that they are representative of a very much larger group 

 of such vestiges than can be found in adults. This is to say, 

 the whole human ontogeny has pithecoid vestiges. Of course 

 infancy has its share. 



Other illustrations of recapitulation from the same source 

 are referred to the conditions of primitive man. The intensity 

 of fear in children, useless crying, shyness, the instinctive appeal 

 and clinging to the parent in the presence of strangers, these 

 recall the dangers of the early life of man. The greediness and 

 selfishness of children point to a considerable degree of parental 

 neglect and a consequent survival of those who managed to fend 



" Notes on the Development of a Child, Vol. I, p. 397, footnote. 

 "Nineteenth Century, Vol. 30, 1891; Vol. 31, 1892; North Amer. Rev., Vol. 159, 1894; 

 Brit. Med. Journ., Vol. 2, 1891. 

 Nineteenth Century, Vol. 36, 1894. 



