Page:Mind (New Series) Volume 15.djvu/192

178 w. H. WINCH : when he says : " Though in many cases this pleasurable con- sciousness has originally grown out of the representations of benefits to be gained, yet it has come to be a pleasurable consciousness in the object or act apart from anything be- yond ". But we may at least urge that if we confine ourselves to the individual life this does not represent the bulk of typical play. Common sense, where man is concerned, calls it work for work's sake, and not play at all. And other difficulties arise. Only within limits can what we call energy be drafted off from work channels to play channels, and vice versa ; and the greatest difficulty attaching to the acceptance of the central doctrine of this theory lies in the fact that there is plenty of energy for play when none is available for work. The playful child in school is often not a being of superior, but of deficient energy ; and the ex- tremely playful ways of the town product, known variously as gamin, larrikin, peeky-blinder, Bowery boy, hooligan, are very familiar. His superfluous energies are not remarkable for quantity, one would suppose. Nor would any one, who had successfully incited young animals to play when appar- ently thoroughly tired out, lay very much stress on the necessity for superfluous energy. We must, I think, notwithstanding its plausibility, deny that the surplus energy theory covers more than a few of the facts and fails to account for the majority of them. IX. PHILOSOPHY OF PLAY (ii.) PREPARATION THEORY, i. The hypothesis last considered represents an attempt to give us the condition of the possibility of play, but does not attempt to account for the forms which play assumes. Such an attempt is made by the preparation theory. There is, apparently, no difficulty in holding these two theories in conjunction, and this seems to be the position of Mr. H. Eutgers Marshall, who writes : " Nature has formed within us tendencies to direct these energies into channels that give practice in directions in which skill is, or will presently be, of value to us. It is a commonplace that the plays of children make them ready for activities of after life ; the girl's plays with dolls tell of future maternal activities ; the boy's plays correspondingly tell of the world's battles he is to wage, often indeed re- flecting the actual physical contests in which he would take part were he not held back from barbarism by the civilisation in which he lives. In like manner the plays of mature men