796 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



of the sublime. Therefore I think we are fully entitled to con- 

 clude that, so far as emotions are concerned, it can not be said 

 that the facts of animal psychology raise any difficulties against 

 the theory of descent. On the contrary, the emotional life of ani- 

 mals is so strikingly similar to the emotional life of man — and 

 especially of young children — that I think the similarity ought 

 fairly to be taken as direct evidence of a genetic continuity be- 

 tween them. 



And so it is with regard to instinct. Understanding this term 

 in the sense previously defined,* it is unquestionably true that in 

 man — especially during the periods of infancy and youth — sundry 

 well-marked instincts are presented, which have reference chiefly 

 to nutrition, self-preservation, reproduction, and the rearing of 

 progeny. No one has ventured to dispute that all these instincts 

 are identical with those which we observe in the lower animals ; 

 nor, on the other hand, has any one ventured to suggest that there 

 is any instinct which can be said to be peculiar to man, unless the 

 moral and religious sentiments are taken to be of the nature of 

 instincts. And although it is true that instinct plays a larger 

 part in the psychology of many animals than it does in the psy- 

 chology of man, this fact is plainly of no importance in the pres- 

 ent connection, where we are concerned only with identity of 

 principle. If any one were childish enough to argue that the 

 mind of a man differs in kind from that of a brute because it 

 does not display any particular instinct— such, for example, as 

 the spinning of webs, the building of nests, or the incubation 

 of eggs— the answer of course would be that, by parity of reason- 

 ing, the mind of a spider must be held to differ in kind from that 

 of a bird. So far, then, as instincts and emotions are concerned, 

 the parallel before us is much too close to admit of any argument 

 on the opposite side. 



With regard to volition more will be said in a future install- 

 ment of this work. Here, therefore, it is enough to say, in general 

 terms, that no one has seriously questioned the identity of kind 

 between the animal and the human will, up to the point at which 

 so-called freedom is supposed by some dissentients to supervene 

 and characterize the latter. Now, of course, if the human will 

 differs from the animal will in any important feature or attribute 

 such as this, the fact must be duly taken into account during the 

 course of our subsequent analysis. At present, however, we are 

 only engaged upon a preliminary sketch of the points of resem- 



* " Mental Evolution in Animals," p. 159. " The term is a generic one, comprising all 

 the faculties of mind which are concerned in conscious and adaptive action, antecedent to 

 individual experience, without necessary knowledge of the relation between means employed 

 and ends attained, but similarly performed under similar and frequently recurring circum- 

 stances by all individuals of the same species." 



