22 ANIMAL INTELLIGENCE 



It is to be remembered, however, that each marked 

 advance in progress has been made by the few great 

 intellects that have appeared, and only accepted, not 

 originated, by the many; that but for permanent 

 records in language, much of man's civilisation would 

 have been lost as rapidly as acquired; that man's 

 civilisation is the growth of thousands of years, 

 beginning with a condition of things scarcely if at all 

 higher than that now known to some tribes of animals ; 

 that what any child becomes is really largely depen- 

 dent upon the training it receives ; the child of the 

 savage, and that of the civilised man, can not be com- 

 pared any more than the latter and the inferior animals. 

 Now, the reverse of all this holds for the lower animals. 

 So far as any systematic training from man is concerned, 

 they are very much as they were thousands of years 

 ago. Before it were possible absolutely to compare the 

 highest man and the highest animal, it would be 

 necessary that for ages the effect of culture should be 

 tried on the lower animals. The astonishing results 

 achieved in the lifetime of a single animal, and the 

 results attained by the creation of hereditary specialists 

 as among dogs, put the whole matter in a light that 

 shows our usual comparisons to be somewhat unfair. 

 If the highest among dogs, apes, and elephants be 

 compared with the lowest among savage tribes, the 

 balance, whether mental or moral, will not be very 

 largely in man's favour indeed, in many cases, the 

 reverse. 



We are not contending for the equality of man and 

 the rest of the animal kingdom ; even assuming that 

 the child and the dog have equal advantages, the child 

 will still be in many respects superior to the dog ; but 

 we are desirous of pointing out how much has been 

 overlooked in all these comparisons between man and 

 the lower animals. It will be noticed, that all those 



