A STUDY OF LOWER LIFE. 57 



the operations of its life. Even in the case of the wonderful 

 operations exemplified by the ants, bees, and their allies, we 

 find pure examples of automatism (see note, p. 70). The 

 acts of these insects are in reality determined by surrounding 

 conditions ; and each insect, destitute of all previous know- 

 ledge, enters upon its duties and discharges them with un- 

 erring skill, immediately after its birth, and when it has attained 

 its full development. Here, therefore, there is no guidance by 

 experience, and there can be no intelligent appreciation or 

 consciousness of the nature of the duties performed. Indeed, 

 as Dr. Carpenter has well remarked, in speaking of the adapta- 

 tion of the insects to their duties, " the very perfection of the 

 adaptation again, is often of itself a sufficient evidence of 

 the unreasoning character of the beings which perform the 

 work for if we attribute it to their own intelligence, we must 

 admit that this intelligence frequently equals, if it does not 

 surpass, that of the most accomplished Human Reasoner." 



Amongst the higher animals, automatic acts are also 

 readily exemplified. The young of many aquatic birds e.g. 

 the dippers take to the water and swim and dive with as 

 great facility on their first immersion, as after a prolonged 

 experience. Whilst no less extraordinary is the instinctive or 

 automatic manifestation by young birds of certain traits of 

 character, such as those of counterfeiting helplessness or a 

 wounded state, or of remaining still and motionless, and pro- 

 tected by its colour, under the very eye and nose of the enemy. 



Turning, lastly, to the investigation of man's actions, as 

 a type of those of higher animals generally, we find that 

 physiology makes us acquainted with the presence of many . 

 automatic acts and movements in the common existence of 

 humanity. The earliest nutritive acts of the infant are purely 

 automatic ; they are performed without the slightest apprecia- 

 tion of their meaning, and without any intelligent conception 

 of their order and succession, that order and succession 

 being really determined by the outward or physical conditions 

 of the infant's life. The person who walks along the street 

 absorbed in a reverie or day-dream, but who, nevertheless, 



