148 Insthict. 



dividual of that flock and impressed upon the oth* 

 ers by a system of instruction, or it was worked out 

 at some time, by some ancestors of the present flock, 

 and continued till it became a habit of the whole 

 species to operate according to this plan. A thing 

 must be done for the first time before it can become 

 a habit ; and it must be often repeated, before it 

 can become a habit for the individual even ; and 

 much longer before the habit could become heredi- 

 tary, if at all. So that the doctrine that Instinct 

 is formed through the influence of the experiences 

 and habits of ancestors, only removes the difficulty 

 one step farther back. Nor does it change the 

 matter to say that the result we now see is the ef- 

 fect of minute changes brought about through 

 great cycles. Each change was a step, and when 

 the process was complete through many steps, it 

 represented the same powers in the species as 

 though the steps had been taken in a generation. 

 A cotton-mill is the result of great experience con- 

 tinued through many generations of men ; and it 

 also represents the contrivance of hosts of men in 

 the present and past ages to meet the wants which 

 experience suggested. But the cotton-mill to day, 

 is as truly a product of human thought, as though 

 the present generation had built one now for the 

 first time. And the first machine invented showed 

 the same kind of power in the inventor as the last 

 and most complicated. So we say that these 

 manifestations of Instinct among social animals, 

 taken as a whole, or divided into the greatest num- 

 ber of steps possible, must be the result of impulse 



