For child or man play gives more complete self-
expression than work. It is therefore so wonderful a test
of character. When we do what we like to do because we
like it, we show what we mean and care for. Groethe
understood this in portraying the common people in Faust,
When he desired to show the meaning of their lives he
chose, not the six days of their compelled action in obe-
dience to the wills of others, but the one day of glad free-
dom to do as they pleased. It is then that what they really
care for appears.^

As play is the most expressive form of action, so it gives
a growth, both in power to do and power to appreciate,
that does not come in equal measure from work. When
we compel ourselves to an action we grow in power to
compel ourselves, but in the action itself we are hampered
by the friction involved. When the action itself is attrac-
tive and our whole interest is absorbed in it, the growth in
power is greatest; for we go forward most rapidly in mas-
tering the diflSculties of the action when our attention is not
forced by the will, but held by the charm of the action
itself.^ Similarly with appreciation: our work initiates

» Faustf part I, scene II.
* *' What children acquire in the spontaneous, intense, self-directed
use of their faculties is always more valuable than the results of a
less eager though more prolonged attention to enforced tasks." —
President Eliot, More Money for the Public Schools, p. 72.
