Probably a good many persons older than the two boys named below would
be puzzled to explain many of the conventions which they, nevertheless,
implicity obey. It is one of the curious manifestations of the
regulative instinct that we yield such humble submission to what are
oftentimes meaningless customs. On the other hand, this imitative sort
of regulation of one’s habits may often lay a foundation for desirable
conduct where a rational method applied in the beginning would have
failed utterly. The danger is that when the questioning period arrives
there may be only superficial answering of the oft-repeated question,
“Why?”