38 MENTAL STATUS 



of the study of the simple preceding that of the complex in 

 comparative psychology. And hence it is obvious that the 

 student of comparative psychology should begin his enquiry 

 by the systematic investigation of the simplest forms, earliest 

 stages, first glimmerings of mind, reason, or intelligence, as 

 illustrated in or by 



1. Man: (a) the child of civilised races; (6) lowest or 

 savage man. 



2. Other animals : (a) in their lowest forms ; (6) the 

 young of the higher groups. 



Such a study of the germs or rudiments of mind in man 

 and other animals should be gradually followed up by obser- 

 vations on the psychical condition of 



1. Man in all stages of savagery, barbarism, and civi- 

 lisation, and 



2. Other animals, in their different species, genera, and 

 classes, beginning at the lowest, and ascending step by step 

 in the zoological scale. 



In the mental and moral condition of the human child, 

 even of the most highly civilised races and of the most 

 virtuous and talented individuals, the following points are 

 specially noteworthy : 



1. The language of the infant consists at first of mere 

 cries or calls, similar in character and object to those of other 

 animals, and particularly of their young. It is by imitation 

 of the sounds they hear that infants learn to speak. 



2. Consciousness is only gradually developed. 



3. There are no innate ideas (Melia). Infants acquire 

 their earliest ideas at least, as other animals probably do, 

 from their senses and sensations. 



4. Infants are wholly occupied at first with the objects 

 of special sense and sensation. The infant desires only the 

 gratification of its physical wants (Pierquin). 



5. They are governed by instinct, appetite, passion, un- 

 controlled by judgment and conscience (Elam). 



6. There is no religious sense ; it has to be created and 

 cultivated. 



7. The same must be said of the moral sense, or con- 

 science, so that moral responsibility cannot be said to exist. 



8. Education and time are necessarv to the development 



