NERVOUS And endocrine control 141 



At the same time, even the quantitative differences must not be over- 

 estimated. The complexity of normal human activities as compared with 

 those of animals does not give us a just basis for measurement. In both men 

 and animals most behavior is'a matter of habit. Having learned to do a 

 thing, we can thenceforth do it without having to think about it. Our 

 thinking ability is only brought into play when we are confronted by new 

 situations. The civilized man can do more things than the savage because 

 he has had an opportunity to learn to do more things. All the tests which 

 have been applied to the two to date seem to show that their innate mental 

 ability is approximately the same. In the same way, men have better oppor- 

 tunities for learning than apes and this puts them far ahead. The superior 

 mental equipment of men is responsible for the existence of this wealth of 

 things to be learned, but the vyealth has been produced by many brains 

 working over many generations. It could not have been created by any one 

 mind. The son of a civilized man, if he grew up in complete isolation, 

 would be nearer to an ape in his behavior than to his own father. 



THE ENDOCRINE CONTROL OF THE BODY * 

 MICHAEL F. GUYER 



Human behavior is not confined to a mentor in a bony capsule at the 

 upper end of the spinal column; the whole body participates. The extent 

 to which this is true can be fully appreciated only after acquaintance with 

 the remarkable part played by certain internal secretions — hormones as 

 they are called technically — in our physical and mental well-being. So 

 spectacular and obvious are some of the effects of these that public interest 

 has been aroused, with the result that there has been a rather wild exploita- 

 tion of this field in the press under such captions as, "The Chemistry of 

 the Soul," "The Glands of Destiny," "Rejuvenation through Monkey 

 Glands," and equally sensational titles. If one accepts at face value the 

 twittery eloquence of the professional word shngers who write under 

 such headings, then this is surely the date of the endocrine glands! We 

 used to dream of romance, with each yearning soul finding its unerring 

 way to its predestined mate; we now talk of propinquity and hormones. 

 We used to preach thrift; of late we have been practicing New Dealism 

 which feeds us by destroying our food and protects us from penury by 

 squandering our savings (in this connection there is a suspicion of hyper- 

 trophy of some endocrine gland which has to do with bone deposition in 

 the head region). We used to hear of sin; we next found psychoanalysis 

 with its slogan of unsatisfied self-expression; but now the devil turns out 



* Reprinted from Speaking of Man, by Michael F. Guyer with the permission of 

 Harper and Brothers. Copyright 1942, by Michael F. Guyer. 



