The theory and practice of infant feeding, with notes on development, by Henry Dwight Chapin.

  • Chapin, Henry Dwight, 1857-1942.
Date:
1904
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: The theory and practice of infant feeding, with notes on development, by Henry Dwight Chapin. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the Augustus C. Long Health Sciences Library at Columbia University and Columbia University Libraries/Information Services, through the Medical Heritage Library. The original may be consulted at the the Augustus C. Long Health Sciences Library at Columbia University and Columbia University.

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    from the beginning, independently of the parent. The longer the infancy of an animal becomes, the greater the period of its teachability, and a slow growth means an increase in capacity for development and all the higher prerogatives. Thus the higher apes have a helpless baby- hood, when for two or three months they are unable to feed themselves or move about independently of the pa- rent. The human infant is distinguished from the high- est of the lower animals by the very long duration of help- less infancy and the marked increase in the size of the brain, and particularly in the extent of its surface. There is here a great increase in the size and complexity of brain organization that takes place largely after birth. Accompanying the rapid growth of the nervous system is that of the skeleton and various visceral organs. Dur- ing the first two years of life the brain not only doubles in weight, but increases marvellously in its convolutions and complexity. The infinite distance between man and the lower animals consists in the fact that in the former natural selection confines itself principally to the surface of the brain, and requires a long period of helpless infancy for this highly plastic work to be properly started and developed. Inherited tendencies are there, but the proper environment counts for much in this work so potent in future possibilities. It is evident that, correlated with his long period of helpless infancy, there must be a time of maternal care and watchfulness, if the race is to exist in health and vigor. Knowledge is required as well as care, for mistakes made at this time can never be completely corrected. The first few years of life are, biologically speaking, the most important ones we live. The begin-