Aberrations of Instinct 



kind hold us in their grasp to leave us any 

 leisure for these amusements. That is how 

 the harsh experience of age impels us to 

 speak; that is how I should conclude, as I 

 bring my investigations to a close, if I did 

 not perceive, amid the chaos of my obser- 

 vations, a few gleams of light touching the 

 loftiest problems which we are privileged to 

 discuss. 



What is life? Will it ever be possible 

 for us to trace it to its sources? Shall we 

 ever be permitted to excite, in a drop of 

 albumen, the uncertain quiverings which are 

 the preludes of organization? What is 

 human intelligence? In what respect does 

 it differ from animal intelligence? What 

 is instinct? Are these two mental aptitudes 

 irreducible, or can they both be traced 

 back to a common factor? Are the species 

 connected with one another, are they re- 

 lated by evolution? Or are they, as it 

 were, so many unchangeable medals, each 

 struck from a separate die upon which the 

 tooth of time has no effect, except to destroy 

 it sooner or later? These questions are 

 and always will be the despair of every cul- 

 tivated mind, even though the inanity of 

 our efforts to solve them urges us to cast 

 them into the limbo of the unknowable. 

 107 



