8G THE DESCENT OF MAN. Part I. 



scale are guided almost exclusively, and those which 

 stand higher in the scale are largely guided, in the aid 

 which they give to the members of the same community, 

 by special instincts ; but they are likewise in part im- 

 pelled by mutual love and sympathy, assisted appa- 

 rently by some amount of reason. Although man, as just 

 remarked, has no special instincts to tell him how to aid 

 his fellow-men, he still has the impulse, and with his 

 improved intellectual faculties would naturally be much 

 guided in this respect by reason and experience. In- 

 stinctive sympathy would, also, cause him to value highly 

 the approbation of his fellow-men ; for, as Mr. Bain has 

 clearly shewn, 20 the love of praise and the strong feeling 

 of glory, and the still stronger horror of scorn and in- 

 famy, " are due to the workings of sympathy." Conse- 

 quently man would be greatly influenced by the wishes, 

 approbation, and blame of his fellow-men, as expressed 

 by their gestures and language. Thus the social in- 

 stincts, which must have been acquired by man in a 

 very rude state, and probably even by his early ape-like 

 progenitors, still give the impulse to many of his best 

 actions ; but his actions are largely determined by the 

 expressed wishes and judgment of his fellow-men, and 

 unfortunately still oftener by his own strong, selfish 

 desires. But as the feelings of love and sympathy and 

 the power of self-command become strengthened by 

 habit, and as the power of reasoning becomes clearer so 

 that man can appreciate the justice of the judgments of 

 his fellow-men, he will feel himself impelled, independ- 

 ently of any pleasure or pain felt at the moment, to 

 certain lines of conduct. He may then say, I am the 

 supreme judge of my own conduct, and in the words of 

 Kant, I will not in my own person violate the dignity 

 of humanity. 



20 ' Mental and Moral Science/ 1868, p. 254. 



