ORGANIC MOVEMENTS 109 



Thus the lack of the power of resolving data seems to 

 be the reason of the rather low mental state of animals ; 

 all the other differences between the acting of men and the 

 acting of animals are consequences of this fundamental 

 diversity. 



But we should not learn very much more for our 

 philosophical purposes by entering more deeply into this 

 subject, and I therefore must leave the further study of the 

 differences in the acting of the highest animals and of man 

 to your personal meditation. 



Higher Invertebrates 



Acting of the type found in apes and in dogs seems by 

 no means restricted to the higher vertebrates only : many 

 insects, not only ants and bees but also beetles, seem to be 

 capable of actions of almost the same degree of complexity. 

 Many of you know, I suppose, that Sir John Lubbock, now 

 Lord Avebury, has carried out numerous beautiful experi- 

 ments about the experience of ants. I need only remind 

 you of his " bridge-experiment," for instance. He found 

 what modern students of the behaviour of dogs and apes 

 have found also : there is acting, but so-called abstraction 

 is almost completely lacking. 



We can now assert with perfect confidence that the old 

 view was very mistaken which regarded the behaviour of 

 ants and bees as quite like the behaviour of a human 

 society. Acting is of a far less high degree in these 

 creatures than it is in man, but their instinctive life is 

 developed in a much higher degree, as we know ; in a degree 

 in fact that is almost inconceivable to us. We of course 



