A NOTE IN REVIEW 



justifying the charge of anthropomorphism, to borrow 

 a word from human civics. Plato distinguished four 

 kinds of character-making " enthusiasm ' among men 



-prophecy, prayer, poetry, and love. These give to 

 human faculties the stimuli which urge man to achieve 

 his highest destiny. We might enlarge the list by at 

 least the element of patriotism, and thus mark another 

 likeness between man and social insects. For patriotism 



-that is, a supreme devotion to the commonwealth- 

 is the prevailing " enthusiasm ;; among ants, bees, and 

 wasps. With them one finds no discount laid upon 

 the communal workers and military guards. All, except 

 needful dependents, are laborers and warriors. All are 

 alike devoted to the civil welfare and defence. 



Many times and in many ways the devotion of ants to 

 their commune has been tested. The rule is well-nigh 

 invariable of instant and absolute self-abnegation, and 

 surrender of personal ease and appetite, life and limb, 

 to the public welfare. The posting of sentinels at gate- 

 ways is customary, and they are apt to know first the 

 approach of danger. With heads and quivering anten- 

 na^ protruded from the opening, these city watchmen 

 not only dispatch within all news of threatening peril, 

 but rush out with utter abandon to face the foe. With 

 ants patriotism is not " second nature"; it is instinctive, 

 inborn, seemingly as strong in the callow antling as in 

 the veteran brave. It has no second place. It is first, 

 always ! 



It must be confessed, however, that it is rigidly ex- 

 clusive. Racial catholicity is not an emmetorian virtue. 

 Ants are without that elastic hospitality which embraces 

 and assimilates all species of their family. Even the 

 slave-makers hold their domestic auxiliaries strictly 



299 



