10 MAN THE ANIMAL 



same connection is the finding of the recent National Health 

 Survey carried out by the U. S. Public Health Service. This 

 survey indicated that of all chronic diseases afflicting the popu- 

 lation of the United States the category "Nervous and mental 

 diseases" took first rank In respect of both number of invalids 

 and number of working days lost because of chronic illness. 

 These diseases of the central nervous system were found to be 

 responsible for nearly twice ( 1 .9 times) as many chronic invalids 

 as heart diseases j three and a half times as many as all forms of 

 tuberculosis together, 4.4 times as many as hardening of the 

 arteries and high blood pressure j 7.8 times as many as diabetes j 

 and almost ten (9.6) times as many as cancer. It would be hard 

 to find a better illustration of the biological rule that a price Is 

 always exacted for the benefits that go with evolutionary 

 specialization. In this same connection it Is also worth noting 

 that Malzberg, a careful and critical statistical student of the 

 insane, has recently come to the conclusion that in New York 

 State at the present time there is occurring a relative increase In 

 the incidence of mental disease, not very great In amount nor In 

 his opinion warranting at present too serious eugenic concern, 

 but still real. 



The capacity for articulate sfeechy which Is unique to man, has 

 plainly been valuable to him biologically. It seems a fair ap- 

 praisal to say that it may well have been more responsible than 

 any other single factor in the development of his particular type 

 of social organization. Indeed the eminent Sanskrit scholar 

 William Dwight Whitney was quite positive on this point, say- 

 ing In the first series of his Oriental and Linguistic Studies 

 (1873, p. 296) that: "The specific moving power to the working 

 out of speech was not the monkeyish tendency to Imitation, but 

 the human tendency to sociality." The available evidence seems 

 to Indicate that In the early stages of his evolution as a distinct 

 species man was probably not naturally much, if any, more 

 gregarious and cooperative than are the great cats like the lion 

 and the tiger at the present time, where such stable sociality as 

 exists is pretty well confined to the biological family group. The 



