202 THE GROUNDWORK OF SCIENCE

Martha Obrecht * was deaf, dumb, and blind, and was

confided to the care of the nuns at a convent at Larnay

(Poictiers) when eight years old. Then, by intelligent and

patient instruction, she was enabled gradually to acquire the

power of apprehending and expressing intellectual concep-

tions, and highly abstract and lofty ideas, with distinct and

clear moral and religious notions. She was also taught not

only to read but also to write perfectly well.

When first received she was a living, almost inert, mass,

with no means of communicating with her fellow creatures,

though she emitted cries and made certain movements in

response to impressions she received. The first thing was

to give her some means of communication, and this was

done by making her touch different objects, and then

touching her in different ways appropriate to each object,

so that each mode of touching became a sign to her of that

object. Thus, when a piece of bread was given her, she was

made, as it were, to cut her left hand with her right. Very

soon when hungry she began to make that sign herself.

When she did anything wrong she was slightly pushed away,

and she thus soon learnt to push away from her things she

did not like ; and so little by little from one point to another

her intellectual development was slowly completed.

It may be, as it has been, objected to these facts that they

show no more than the influence on an infant of a long

line of ancestors all capable of speech. But, as we before

remarked, there could have been no inherited nervous

structure and conditions specially related to gesture -lan-

guage. Yet it was exclusively by gesture-language that the

latent intelligence of Martha Obrecht was developed.

Thus thought is evidently the cause, and not the effect,

of language.

* See Apologie Scientifique, by Canon F. DUILHE DE SAINT-PRQJET, Tou-

louse, 1885, pp. 374-3 8 7.

Martha Obrecht * was deaf, dumb, and blind, and was

confided to the care of the nuns at a convent at Larnay

(Poictiers) when eight years old. Then, by intelligent and

patient instruction, she was enabled gradually to acquire the

power of apprehending and expressing intellectual concep-

tions, and highly abstract and lofty ideas, with distinct and

clear moral and religious notions. She was also taught not

only to read but also to write perfectly well.

When first received she was a living, almost inert, mass,

with no means of communicating with her fellow creatures,

though she emitted cries and made certain movements in

response to impressions she received. The first thing was

to give her some means of communication, and this was

done by making her touch different objects, and then

touching her in different ways appropriate to each object,

so that each mode of touching became a sign to her of that

object. Thus, when a piece of bread was given her, she was

made, as it were, to cut her left hand with her right. Very

soon when hungry she began to make that sign herself.

When she did anything wrong she was slightly pushed away,

and she thus soon learnt to push away from her things she

did not like ; and so little by little from one point to another

her intellectual development was slowly completed.

It may be, as it has been, objected to these facts that they

show no more than the influence on an infant of a long

line of ancestors all capable of speech. But, as we before

remarked, there could have been no inherited nervous

structure and conditions specially related to gesture -lan-

guage. Yet it was exclusively by gesture-language that the

latent intelligence of Martha Obrecht was developed.

Thus thought is evidently the cause, and not the effect,

of language.

* See Apologie Scientifique, by Canon F. DUILHE DE SAINT-PRQJET, Tou-

louse, 1885, pp. 374-3 8 7.