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Instinct is reflex action into which there is imported the 
element of consciousness. The term is, therefore, a generic one, 
comprising all those 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 circumstances by all individuals 
of the same species. 
Reason or intelligence is the faculty which is concerned in 
the intellectual adaptation of means to ends. It therefore implies 
the conscious knowledge of the relation between means employed 
and ends attained, and may be exercised in adaptation to 
circumstances, novel alike to the experience of the individual and 
to that of the species. 
It follows from the above definition of Instinct that a stimulus 
which evokes a reflex action is at most a sensation, but a stimulus 
which evokes an instinctive action is a perception. 
The most important point to observe is, that instinct in- 
volves mental operations. For this is the only point that serves 
to distinguish instinctive from reflex action. Reflex action is 
non-mental, neuro-muscular adaptation to appropriate stimuli ; 
but instinctive action is this and something more. ‘There is in it 
the element of mind. No doubt it is often difficult, or even im- 
possible, to decide whether a given action implies the presence 
of the mind element ; that is, conscious as distinguished from 
unconscious adaptation. But this is altogether a separate matter, 
and has nothing to do with the question of defining instinct in a 
manner which shall be formally exclusive, on the one hand, of 
reflex action, and on the other of reason. It is difficult, if not 
impossible, to draw the line between instinctive and reflex action. 
But at least the difficulty may be narrowed down to deciding in 
particular cases, whether or not action falls into this or that 
category of definitions. There is no reason why the difficulty 
should arise on account of any ambiguity of the definitions them- 
selves. 
Bearing in mind these definitions, we will now proceed to take 
some examples of instinct, and first we will take some cases in 
which the actions appear to be injurious to the actor either 
personally or relatively. The writer then gave several illustrations 
of these actions taken from the conduct of soldier termites, flesh- 
flies, sheep, and others, in addition to the following instances. 
M. Fabre pierced a hole in the cell of a bee below the part 
where it was working and through which the honey at once 
began to exude. The poor, stupid little bee, however, never 
thought of repairing the breach. She worked on as if nothing had 
happened. In her alternate journeys she brought first mortar and 
then honey, which, however, ran out again as fast as it was poured 
—— 
EEE 
