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[watertank]

The human infant, like billowy summer clouds, invites different perceptions. Montaigne, who saw sixteenth-century infants suckling goats, regarded the life form as an animal. Locke perceived a pristine block of marble ready to be sulpted. Freud's infant was avaricious, while Erikson and Bowlby, wearing rose-colored glasses, portrayed an innocent, gentle, helpless creature looking for care and affection. Each description was an intuition that felt right because of the historical moment in which it was introduced. ibid. 73