CHAPTER VI.

ON LEARNING TO SPEAK.

THE rapid progress which children generally make in speaking, towards the conclusion of the second year, renders this a remarkable epoch in childhood. They attempt to articulate every thing, though of course these attempts vary much in their degree of success. Already do we perceive, when we observe the great difference exhibited by children in the power of speaking, how unequally the gifts of nature are distributed. This art requires the conjoint exercise of many faculties, moral as well as physical; and if one of these be wanting, an obstacle is opposed to its progress. Thus, a good ear is necessary to appreciate sounds, and supple organs to articulate them: intelligence is required to comprehend words, and memory to retain them. It is not often that a child possesses all these qualities in an eminent degree; but when he does, he will speak with tolerable fluency at two years old.

Nothing, perhaps, is more interesting than to watch the gradual breaking forth of the intellect

from the mist in which it is at first enveloped; to see it springing forwards at the acquisition of every new expression, and making each attainment the step to a still greater. As yet almost strangers amongst the objects by which they are surrounded, children soon feel the necessity of making themselves masters of the words which are the signs of these objects, and which will furnish them with the means both of thinking and communicating their thoughts. They enter on a more intellectual existence an existence in which images, and the tumultuous desires excited by them, still reign; but into which, from this time, a more tranquil element is introduced.*

. When children have once begun to speak, with what astonishing rapidity do they advance in this attainment! Daily acquiring and using new words, they soon venture even on long sentences, and the amusement they find in talking is inexhaustible. At the sight of any object which interests them, they repeat its name over and over again, with a delight and satisfaction which we can hardly understand. We may often hear them relating to themselves any little inci

* Here follow in the original some observations on the first words uttered by children, on their use of the different parts of speech, &c. &c., which the translator has omitted; as, though interesting in themselves, they do not appear to bear very directly on the subject of education,

dent which has struck them, their eyes sparkling with the delight and pride which this power of prolonging their impressions produces. If arrested in their progress by any difficulty in articulation, shame and anger are displayed in their countenances, and they are not satisfied till they have achieved the pronunciation of the formidable word. When first learning to speak, children are indeed easily pleased; they are content if they can articulate the single accented syllable which has attracted their attention. But by degrees they become more fastidious; they begin to correct their enunciation, and are not happy till they have acquired the remaining syllables of the word.

It would almost seem as if there were an especial dispensation of Providence to enable children to learn to speak; but as their minds advance in intelligence, the gifts which have been previously bestowed on them-as transient as they are remarkable in their nature lose their former value. Children of five or six years old learn few new words. We find, when they begin to read, that many terms, which they must continually have been hearing in conversation, are perfectly unintelligible to them. Having acquired a certain stock of words, sufficient for their purposes, they are satisfied, and desire nothing more. They have learnt how to name such things as interest them, and are

indifferent as to any others. They are even sometimes led by a sort of instinct to reject new acquirements, which might, perhaps, interrupt their enjoyment, or disturb their tranquillity. They are happy—and what should they wish for more? They live in peace and security, as if in the bosom of an enchanted island, and the waves of the external world resound unheeded around them.

We find a great difference in the comparative ease with which individual children express themselves; but this does not always depend on their greater or less degree of intelligence. Sometimes an agreeable and flowing utterance proceeds only from a talent for retaining certain set phrases, whilst a more laboured and less regular mode of speaking denotes an inward working of the mind, an anxious desire to suit the expression to the thoughts. This circumstance should not make us less hopeful as to the future; for, though a memory for words is not in itself an undesirable thing, it frequently leads those who possess it in any great degree, and who have not much taste for exercising their understanding, to be content with words instead of ideas.

As one sign is sometimes used by children to designate many objects, so is one object often represented to them by many signs; and for this reason they learn different languages with great

facility. Sounds are connected together in their memory like images, and one word brings in its train all those by which it had previously been accompanied. Hence they are not apt to confound together different idioms in their little sentences; and if the same person always address them in the same language, there is little danger of any confusion: the idea of this person becomes associated in their minds with a particular mode of speaking, and they soon learn to employ the same mode in replying.

From this circumstance we derive a convenient method of facilitating to children an acquisition, of some importance certainly, though one which does not appear to me to add much to the progress of the intellect; at least, not in any proportion to that produced by the regular study of a language. It may indeed be doubted whether the mere practical knowledge of a language contributes much to the developement of the mind. We do not find that the inhabitants of frontier districts, who generally learn two languages at the same time, excel other men in acuteness of mind; nor amongst the people of northern nations, where children are frequently brought up in the habit of speaking several different languages, do we meet with more instances of striking genius than elsewhere; though they often possess a remarkable facility of comprehension. The study of this subject