I think, then, that we may give the little child the benefit of the doubt, and not assign his rough handling of sentient things to a wish to inflict pain, or even to an indifference to pain of which he is clearly aware. Wanton activity, the curiosity of the experimenter, and delight in showing one’s power and producing an effect, seem sufficient to explain most of the alleged brutality of the first years. Probably the same considerations apply to those milder forms of annoyance which children are apt to practise on other people and animals alike. That a child early develops a decided taste for ‘teasing’ is, I think, certain. But whether carried out by word or by action this early teasing seems to be in the main the outcome of the love of power, the impulse to impose one’s will on other creatures. We must remember that these wee beings feel themselves so subject to others’ power that they are very naturally driven to use all opportunities of shaking off the shackles, and exercising for themselves a little domination. Cruelty, that is the impulse to inflict pain, where it appears, grows up later, and though it has its roots in this love of power ought to be distinguished from it. We have now looked at one of the dark sides of the child and have found that though it is unpleasant it is not so hideous as it has been painted. Children are no doubt apt to be passionate, ferocious in their anger, and sadly wanting in consideration for others; yet it is consolatory to reflect that their savageness is not quite that of brutes, and that their selfishness and cruelty are a long way removed from a deliberate and calculating egoism. _Germs of Altruism._ It now remains to point out that there is another and counterbalancing side. If a child has his outbursts of temper he has also his fits of tenderness. If he is now dead to others’ sufferings he is at another time taken with a most amiable childish concern for their happiness. In order to be just to him we must recognise both sides. It must not be forgotten here that children are instinctively attachable and sociable in so far as they show in the first weeks that they get used to and dependent on the human presence and are miserable when this is taken from them. The stopping of an infant’s crying at night on hearing the familiar voice of its mother or nurse shows this.