244 EVOLUTION AND MAN S PLACE IN NATURE 



direct his actions. Actions of this kind we attribute 

 to intelligence, as being beyond the functions of 

 organism. The intelligence here seen at work is 

 indeed commonly connected with the excitement 

 belonging to action. It does not show any beginning 

 of a power of comparison of ideas and objects. With 

 out this, Locke says, the mind is capable of very 

 little knoAvledge. If this be the utmost we can claim 

 for the animal most highly trained by man, the case 

 for evolution is not sustained. There does not ap 

 pear in the facts adequate explanation even for the 

 appearance of animal intelligence, and still less for the 

 appearance of rational power of man. 



The reference to compounding of ideas has proved 

 misleading. Such compounding is not mere agglom 

 eration, or fusion as by chemical affinity. Com 

 paring and compounding are here distinct parts in 

 a single process. Without comparing there is no 

 compounding, no building up of knowledge. We 

 place together marks known separately. A complex 

 idea is thus an organised conception, which can 

 have no place, even in germinal form, except on con 

 dition of comparison. Without exercise of this power, 

 the sensibility ends as the impression fades away. 

 The gate opening to that key which rational power ap 

 plies, remains barred in face of a humbler instrument. 

 Before this barred door, neither the natural power of 

 the animal, nor our power of training, proves sufficient. 

 Into this wider sphere of rationalised knowledge, none 

 of the higher mammalia can come. Where sight, 

 smell, or sound guides, animals can follow without 

 misgiving ; when general conceptions are formed and 

 expressed, their powers are of no avail. 



