e several classes into which the
children are divided. I shall confine myself at first to those
differences which are more hereditary and constitutional.

_First Period--Early Childhood._--The first and most comprehensive
distinction is that based on the division of the life of man into the
two great spheres of reception and action. The "sensory" and the
"motor" are becoming the most common descriptive terms of current
psychology. We hear all the while of sensory processes, sensory
contents, sensory centres, sensory attention, etc.; and, on the other
hand, of motor processes, motor centres, motor ataxy, motor attention,
motor consciousness, etc. And in the higher reaches of mental
function, the same antithesis comes out in the contrast of sensory and
motor aphasia, alexia, sensory and motor types of memory and
imagination, etc. Indeed the tendency is now strong to think that when
we have assigned a given function of consciousness to one or other
side of the nervous apparatus, making it either sensory or motor, then
our duty to it is done. Be that as it may, there is no doubt that the
distinction is throwing great light on the questions of mind which
involve also the correlative questions of the nervous system. This is
true of all questions of educational psychology.

This first distinction between children--as having general
application--is that which I may cover by saying that some are more
active, or motile, while others are more passive, or receptive. This
is a common enough distinction; but possibly a word or two on its
meaning in the constitution of the child may give it more actual
value.

The "active" person to the psychologist is one who is very responsive
to what we have called Suggestions. Suggestions may be described in
most general terms as any and all the influences from outside, from
the environment, both physical and personal, which get a lodgment in
consciousness and lead to action. A child who is "suggestible" to a
high degree shows it in what we call "motility." The suggestions which
take hold of him translate themselves very directly into action. He
tends to act promptly, quickly, unreflectively, assimilating the newer
elements of the suggestions of the environment to the ways of
behaviour fixed by his earlier habits. Generally such a person, child
or adult, is said to "jump" at conclusions; he is anxious to know in
order to act; he acts in some way on all events or suggestions, even
when no cours