In these pages the "Child in Primitive Culture" has been considered in many lands and among many peoples, and the great extent of the activities of childhood among even the lowest races of men fully demonstrated. That the child is as important to the savage, to the barbarous peoples, as to the civilized, is evident from the vast amount of lore and deed of which he is the centre both in fact and in fiction. The broader view which anthropologists and psychologists are coming to take of the primitive races of man must bring with it a larger view of the primitive child. Still less than the earliest men, were their children, mere animals; indeed, possibly, nay even probably, the children of primitive man, while their childhood lasts, are the equals, if not the superiors, of those of our own race in general intellectual capacity. With the savage as with the European of to-day, the "child is father of the man."

The primitive child, as language and folk-lore demonstrate, has been weighed, measured, and tested physically and mentally by his elders, much as we ourselves are doing now, but in ruder fashion—there are primitive anthropometric and psychological laboratories as proverb and folk-speech abundantly testify, and examinations as harassing and as searching as any we know of to-day. Schools, nay primitive colleges, even, of the prophets, the shamans, and the magi, the race has had in earlier days, and everywhere through the world the activities of childhood have been appealed to, and the race has wonderfully profited by its wisdom, its naÏvetÉ, its ingenuity, and its touch of divinity.

Upon, language, religion, society, and the arts the child has had a lasting influence, both passive and active, unconscious, suggestive, creative. History, the stage, music, and song have been its debtors in all ages and among all peoples.

To the child language owes many of its peculiarities, and the multiplicity of languages perhaps their very existence. Religion has had the child long as its servant, and from the faith and confidence of youth and the undying mother-love have sprung the thought of immortality and the Messiah-hope that greets us all over the globe. Even among the most primitive races, it is the children who are "of the Kingdom of Heaven," and the "Fall of Man" is not from a fabled Garden of Eden, but from the glory of childhood into the stern realities of manhood. As a social factor the child has been of vast importance; children have sat upon thrones, have dictated the policies of Church and of State, and from them the wisest in the land have sought counsel and advice. As oracles, priests, shamans, and thaumaturgi, children have had the respect and veneration of whole peoples, and they have often been the very mouth-piece of deity, standing within the very gates of heaven. As hero and adventurer, passing over into divinity, the child has explored earth, sea, and sky, descending into nethermost hell to rescue the bones of his father, and setting ajar the gates of Paradise, that the radiant glory may be seen of his mother on earth. Finally, as Christ sums up all that is divine in men, so does the Christ-Child sum up all that is God- like in the child. The Man-Jesus stands at the head of mankind, the Child-Jesus is the first of the children of men. All the activities and callings of the child, the wisdom, the beauty, the innocence of childhood find in folk-belief and folk-faith their highest, perfect expression in the Babe of Bethlehem. True is it as ten thousand years ago:—

"Before life's sweetest mystery still
The heart in reverence kneels;
The wonder of the primal birth
The latest mother feels."

Motherhood and childhood have been the world's great teachers, and the prayer of all the race should be:—

"Let not (the) cultured years make less
The childhood charm of tenderness."