2 T/ie Scottish Naturalist. 



remarkable thing here, and what is much to our present pur- 

 pose, is, that these mental manifestations are exhibited in man 

 in the unconscious state — in states in which not only will is in 

 abeyance, but in which even consciousness is absent ; i.e., they 

 appear in an entirely automatic manner. I say this is to the 

 present purpose, because the phenomena exhibited in these 

 unconscious states, — whether abnormal, such as dreaming) 

 somnambulism or insanity, or normal, — for the mind works in 

 this so-called latent or unconscious manner as a regular function 

 of its life, — show something so closely resembling the whole 

 psychical manifestations of animals, that it is impossible to resist 

 the conviction that in such unconscious cerebration or latent 

 operation of mind we have so far a clue to the secret of the 

 animal soul. Had Des Cartes been acquainted with the uncon- 

 scious action of mind (it was Leibnitz that gave it prominence 

 in philosophy, as it was Laycock and Carpenter, that found for 

 it physiological basis), it is not to be doubted he would have 

 employed it to explain what simple reflex action of the organism 

 leaves unexplained. Nothing is more surprising than Mr. 

 Huxley's declining to utilise automatic mental action in dealing 

 with the manifestations of a psychical nature in animals — 

 nothing more surprising except the fact that, so declining, he 

 yet allows in animals the existence of ideas, images, and other 

 " states of consciousness." 



Undoubtedly the human soul must supply the key for open- 

 ing the mystery of the animal soul ; and, apparently, in the 

 human soul, what is to be looked to for the desiderated fruitful 

 analogy is, more especially, the phenomenon of action, spon- 

 taneous, unconscious, and undetermined by the will of the 

 agent. The comparative psychologist ought to narrow the 

 parallel between the two orders of intelligence to this region of 

 action, and give it special study. Failure to take proper account 

 of the unconscious automatic action of the human intelligence, 

 or even to make mention of so significant a fact, is quite 

 common both with philosophers and scientists ; and it must 

 be held that this oversight — this almost exclusive recognition 

 of self-conscious self-determined mind, is fatal, and so long as 

 it is persevered in must continue to be fatal, to any successful 

 result in dealing with the animal problem. 



Even Calderwood in his " Handbook of Moral Philosophy," 

 says (p. 104), "Whether in lower forms of life there may be 

 feelings or sensibility apart from consciousness, and by mere 



