270 PSYCHOLOGY. 



must see every one about them in distress. Another class of mind is 

 [influenced by] the love of ease ; and, therefore, to avoid something dis- 

 agreeable, is sufficient to make them affect to be unwell. Those who 

 are most addicted to this, kind of deceit, are women and children. 

 Women have it much stronger than men, because, from their birth, they 

 meet with more indulgences. They are not allowed to have the idea of 

 doing anything for themselves; by which means both the body and 

 mind become indolent, relative to action; but [they are] extremely 

 anxious to be pleased by others ; and, if not so, then they feel un- 

 happy. This is encouraged by men, till they are married; and the 

 wives seem never to learn that the way to gain is not the way to 

 keep ; whereby they become disappointed, and then begin to practise 

 arts either to excite jealousy or pity, but seldom admiration ; just as 

 they conceive the husband's mind to be most susceptible of. 



Children are nearly in the same predicament ; they are indulged by 

 their parents ; and, if allowed to keep company with the servants, they 

 are certain to become deceitful and to learn a thousand ways of imposing 

 on their parents. They are assisted by the servants, who sometimes 

 benefit by it ; or they, what is called ' curry favour with the young 

 brood.' This is even more the case with girls than with boys ; women 

 being better teachers of this kind of imposition than men. If from 

 such situations they go to the boarding-school, they stand but little 

 chance of being reclaimed. There are numbers to keep them in coun- 

 tenance. At school they are less indulged, being more tied down to 

 rules than they have commonly been, and a kind of private or mental 

 opposition commences. Whenever they are taken ill they are immedi- 

 ately brought home, and having once regained a footing at home they 

 endeavour to keep it. 



Master Woodcock, twelve years of age, had a fever attended with 

 rheumatic affection of the right knee. He was sent to the tepid sea 

 bath, which (we may suppose) cured him, for he came home fat and 

 jolly. However, the pain in the knee continued, and I was sent for to 

 see him. When he came into the room he was lirnping on the left leg, 

 while the right toe was turned in, from his limping. I conceived the 

 pain to be in his left side, but found I was mistaken. He could hardly 

 bear the knee to be pressed, it was so sore, nor straightened : he could 

 not bear the toe to be turned out ; and when I endeavoured to turn 

 the thigh out, which motion could only affect the joint of the thigh, he 

 could not bear it, although the knee was not, nor could be, affected. 

 But his limping on the wrong foot was enough for me 1 . 



1 [Mr. Hunter, on the morning of the day of his death, related to the house- 

 pupils in the work-room several whimsical attempts at imposition in children to 



