The Dawn of Mind 233 



ordination of hand and eye. This great gift follows from the fact 

 that among monkeys the fore-leg has been emancipated. It has 

 ceased to be indispensable as an organ of support; it has become 

 a climbing, grasping, lifting, handling organ. The fore-limb has 

 become a free hand, and everyone who knows monkeys at all 

 is aware of the zest with which they use their tool. They enjoy 

 pulling things to pieces a kind of dissection or screwing the 

 handle off a brush and screwing it on again. 



Activity for Activity's Sake 



Professor Thorndike hits the nail on the head when he lays 

 stress on the intensity of activity in monkeys activity both of 

 body and mind. They are pent-up reservoirs of energy, which al- 

 most any influence will tap. Watch a cat or a dog, Professor 

 Thorndike says; it does comparatively few things and is con- 

 tent for long periods to do nothing. It will be splendidly 

 active in response to some stimulus such as food or a friend or 

 a fight, but if nothing appeals to its special make-up, which is 

 very utilitarian in its interests, it will do nothing. "Watch a 

 monkey and you cannot enumerate the things he does, cannot 

 discover the stimuli to which he reacts, cannot conceive the raison 

 d'etre of his pursuits. Everything appeals to him. He likes 

 to be active for the sake of activity." 



This applies to mental activity as well, and the quality is 

 one of extraordinary interest, for it shows the experimenting 

 mood at a higher turn of the spiral than in any other creature, 

 save man. It points forward to the scientific spirit. We cannot, 

 indeed, believe in the sudden beginning of any quality, and we 

 recall the experimenting of playing mammals, such as kids and 

 kittens, or of inquisitive adults like Kipling's mongoose, Riki- 

 Tiki-Tavi, which made it his business in life to find out about 

 things. But in monkeys the habit of restless experimenting rises 

 to a higher pitch. They appear to be curious about the world. 

 The psychologist whom we have quoted tells of a monkey which 



