On Animal Instinct : in its Relation to the Mind of Man. 323 



or from wouiuls upon the human frame, is a common necessity of the 

 actor's art, and it is not often really well done. The tricks of the 

 theatre are seldom natural, and it is not without reason that " theat- 

 rical" has become a proverbial expression for false and artificial 

 representations of the realities of life. It was therefore with no small 

 interest tbat on this, as on many other occasions, I watclied the 

 perfection of an art which Mrs. Siddons might have envied. The 

 labored and half convulsive flapping of the wings, the wriggling of the 

 body, the straining of the neck, and the whole expression of painful 

 and abortive effort, were really admirable. AVhen her struggles had 

 carried her a considerable distance, and she saw that they produced no 

 effect in tempting us to follow, she made resounding flaps upon the 

 surf^ice of the water, to secure that attention to herself which it was 

 the great object of the manceuvre to attract. Then, rising suddenly 

 in the air, she made a great circle round us, and returnmg to the spot 

 renewed her endeavors as before. It was not, however, necessary ; 

 for the separate instinct of the young in successful hiding effectually 

 bafiled all my attempts to discover them. 



Let us now look at the questions wdiich these several exhibitions of 

 animal instinct cannot ftiil to suggest ; and first let us take the case of 

 the young Dipper. There was no possibility of imitation here. The 

 rivulet beneath the nest, even if it had been visible to the nestlings, 

 had been dry ever since they had been hatched. The river into which 

 it ordinarily flowed was out of sight. The young Dippers never could 

 have seen the parent birds either swimming or diving. This, therefore, 

 is one of the thousand cases Avhich have driven the "experience "school 

 of philosophy to take up new ground. The young Dipper here cannot 

 possibly have had any experience, either through the process of 

 inciijient effort, or through the process of sight and imitation. Nature 

 is full of similar cases. In face of them it is now no longer denied that 

 in all such cases "innate ideas" do exist, and that "pre-established 

 harmonies " do prevail in nature. These old doctrines, so long ridi- 

 culed and denied, have come to be admitted, and the new philosophy 

 is satisfied with attempts to explain how these " ideas " came to be 

 innate, and how these harmonies came to be pre-established. The 

 explanation is, that, though the efficiency of experience as the cause 

 or source of instinct must be given up as regards the individual, we 

 may keep it as regards the race to which the individual belongs. The 

 powers of swimming and diving, and the impulse to use them for their 

 appropriate purpose, were indeed innate in the little Dipper of 1874. 

 But then they were not innate in its remote progenitors. They were 

 acquired by those progenitors tlirough gradual effort — the trying 



