184 DARWINISM STATED BY DARWIN HIMSELF. 



where is it ? " she at once takes it as a sign that some- 

 thing is to be hunted, and generally first looks quickly 

 all around, and then rushes into the nearest thicket, to 

 scent for any game, but, finding nothing, she looks up 

 into any neighboring tree for a squirrel. Now, do not 

 these actions clearly show that she had in her mind a gen- 

 eral idea or concept that some animal is to be discovered 

 and hunted ? 



It may be freely admitted that no animal is self-con- 

 scious, if by this term it is implied that he reflects on 

 such points as whence he comes or whither he will go, or 

 what is life and death, and so forth. But how can we 

 feel sure that an old dog with an excellent memory and 

 some power of imagination, as shown by his dreams, 

 never reflects on his past pleasures or pains in the chase ? 

 And this would be a form of self-consciousness. On the 

 other hand, as Biichner has remarked, how little can the 

 hard-worked wife of a degraded Australian savage, who 

 uses very few abstract words, and can not count above 

 four, exert her self-consciousness, or reflect on the nature 

 of her own existence ! It is generally admitted that the 

 higher animals possess memory, attention, association, 

 and even some imagination and reason. If these powers, 

 which differ much in different animals, are capable of 

 improvement, there seems no great improbability in more 

 complex faculties, such as the higher forms of abstraction, 

 and self-consciousness, etc., having been evolved through 

 the development and combination of the simpler ones. 

 It has been urged against the views here maintained that 

 it is impossible to say at what point in the ascending 

 scale animals become capable of abstraction, etc. ; but 

 who can say at what age this occurs in our young chil- 

 dren ? We see at least that such powers are developed in 

 children by imperceptible degrees. 



