1 52 SLOTH. 



seem to us, in some respects, imperfect outlines of 

 organized life, and far removed from the possibility of 

 enjoyment; and were it not from the circumstance 

 of their inhabiting unfrequented regions, remote from 

 the sojourn of man, and where ferocious animals are 

 comparatively few, we should conjecture that their 

 race would soon become extinct. They appear de- 

 cidedly to be the lowest of the Mammalia, and to 

 form almost a connecting link between that order 

 and the reptile tribe. 



These conclusions naturally arise in the minds of 

 those who witness the movements of the Sloth when 

 in a captive state ; but they are, in a certain degree, 

 erroneous. They result from the limited views 

 which we are capable of taking, for limited they are ; 

 few naturalists have penetrated into the native re- 

 gions of the Ai, to observe his mode of life. His 

 species are undoubtedly perfect in their kind, and 

 equally capable of enjoyment with the animals that 

 surround them. Had Buffon consulted that autho- 

 rity before which the loftiest pretensions of human 

 intellect must bow, he would have learned that the 

 Deity hateth nothing which He has made, and that 

 consequently no animal has been created only to 

 be miserable; we believe that there is little misery 

 in the animal creation, unless inflicted by the 

 hand of man. To those which the Almighty has 

 especially assigned for our use, and for any abuse of 

 which a severe account will unquestionably be ex- 

 acted to those, indeed, unfeeling men have con- 

 trived to communicate no small portion of the misery, 

 which they have themselves created. Yet even 

 these poor suffering animals are happier than the 



