“All appeared new and strange at first, inexpressibly rare and delightful and beautiful.  I was a little stranger which at my entrance into the world was saluted and surrounded with innumerable joys....  I knew by intuition those things which since my apostasy I collected again by the highest reason....  All things were spotless and pure and glorious; yea, and infinitely mine, and joyful and precious....  I saw in all the peace of Eden....  Is it not that an infant should be heir of the whole world, and see those mysteries which the books of the learned never unfold?

“The corn was orient and immortal wheat which never should be reaped, nor was ever sown.  I thought it stood from everlasting to everlasting.  The dust and stones of the street were as precious as gold:  the gates were at first the end of the world.  The green trees when I saw them first through one of the gates transported and ravished me:  ... the skies were mine, and so were the sun and moon and stars, and all the world was mine:  and I the only spectator and enjoyer of it....  So that with much ado I was corrupted and made to learn the dirty devices of this world, which I now unlearn, and become, as it were, a little child again that I may enter into the Kingdom of Heaven.”

If this is what life means to the young child, and Traherne only records what many of us have forgotten there is little need for interference:  we can only spread the feast and stand aside to watch for opportunities.

The following extract is given from a teacher’s note-book:  it shows how many possibilities open out to a teacher, and how impossible it is to keep to a time-table, or even to try to name the activities.  The children concerned were about five years old, newly admitted to a poor school in S.E.  London.  The records are selected from a continuous period, and do not apply to one day:—­

PLANS FOR THE DAY WHAT ACTUALLY HAPPENED

Number Occupations.—­This will The children played, freely
be entirely free and the children chalking most of the time; those
will choose their own toys and threading beads were most
put them away. interested.  Again I noticed the
                                         lack of idea of colour; I found
                                         one new boy placing his sticks
                                         according to colour, without
                                         knowing the names of the colours. 
                                         The boys thought the soldiers
                                         belonged to them, and laughed at
                                         a little girl for choosing them.

Language Training.—­I have I realised this was a failure,

discovered that they love to for I asked the children to use imitate sounds, so we will play their boards and chalks for a at this.  They could draw a cat definite drawing, and they should and say “miauw,” and a duck and have had the time to use them say “quack.”  They could also freely and discover their use.  I imitate the wind. got very little information about
                                         their vocabulary.