294 MENTAL FACULTIES SEC. 



to man, and among different human races it is obvious that 

 the rate of development is nearly inversely proportional to 

 their standard of culture, and clearly both are under the 

 influence of climate. The preceding considerations explain 

 how certain constitutional predispositions in a single direc- 

 tion, such as musical talent, arithmetical talent, etc., can 

 appear at so early an age (phenomenal children), and are so 

 frequently hereditary. Such faculties approach most closely 

 in character to the instincts of animals ; they are due to the 

 inheritance of the results of practice, although occasionally 

 such talents may arise from favourable sexual mixture, from 

 crossing. Just as in animals, men with such special faculties 

 are by no means necessarily possessed of great general mental 

 power ; on the contrary, other mental faculties often diminish 

 to a corresponding degree, simply because only the special 

 powers can be employed or applied in the struggle for exist- 

 ence. Thus in many cases it is not the nations which stand 

 highest in culture in which musical talent, for instance, has 

 become quite general. I mention only the gipsies, Magyars, 

 and Tschechs. The latter nation has, besides the services 

 rendered by its wandering musical companies, done another 

 great service to mankind, it has contributed the invention 

 of the dance known as the polka. 1 For the Tschechs are also 

 born dancers. The resemblance to instinct in such inherited 

 talents, in the musical talent of such nations, shows itself 

 especially in the fact that it is not a case of the higher 

 music, of faculty for lofty composition, but merely of the 

 inheritance of the faculty of performing the ordinary music. 



REFLEX ACTION AND INSTINCT 

 It is customary to connect the idea of instinct with nervous 



1 It was invented by a peasant girl, who danced the step for her own pleasure. 

 Cf. R. Andree, Tschechische Odnge, 1872, p. 272, asserted on the authority of A. 

 Waldau. 



