Early childhood / by Margaret Mcmillan.

  • Margaret McMillan
Date:
1900
Catalogue details

Licence: In copyright

Credit: Early childhood / by Margaret Mcmillan. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    him to close his eyes. Before the end of the second week he trembles at any loud noise, and within the first month perceives many sounds. He hears then and sees. But how does he hear and see? Not like the grown-up person, certainly, or even like the child in the infant school. He differs from them notably in this, that he distinguishes little or not at all. The growing power to distinguish constitutes progress, and progress may be immense. For example, the expe- rienced musician can discern intervals of y-l-gth of a tone. The infant cannot at first distinguish even his mother’s voice I The painter sees innumerable tones and demi-tones of colour to which the untrained man is blind. The infant cannot even discern red from yellow, much less grey from blue, or blue from green! He lies like a larva, choosing nothing, refusing nothing. He absorbs impressions even while he is asleep, for the nerve cells are never quite irresponsive, never rigid, save in death. And from this dim sea of sub-con- scious life his feeble and wavering consciousness at last arises. How much he forgets I At the age of thirty he will not recall the first year of life and its experiences at all. Yet in him how much is remembered 1 What continuous living registration is taking place in the secret and hidden parts 1 The finer tissues of the brain
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