22 Habit and Instinct. 



is "congenital" dependent on heredity; that which may 

 be acquired is also, at all events, limited by heredity. 



A somewhat similar objection may be urged on slightly 

 different grounds. A great number of habitual activities 

 and acquired modes of dealing with what is frequently 

 presented in experience result from a gradual limitation 

 of what was at first a varied and exuberant output of 

 activity. If we watch a young puppy or kitten learning 

 gradually to deal effectively with some difficulty in its 

 extending environment, we see that it puts forth its 

 activities at first in a somewhat random and indefinite 

 fashion. It tries to effect its object in a number of 

 different ways, many of which are ridiculously inadequate 

 and hopelessly unsuccessful. But gradually it finds that 

 certain efforts are more satisfactory in their results than 

 others ; these are repeated, and thus by successive 

 limitations of the originally numerous and relatively in- 

 definite trials the exuberant efforts are narrowed down to 

 those which bring success ; these become habitual through 

 repetition, a definite mode of procedure results, and we 

 say that it has acquired a specific and well-adapted habit. 

 Now, such acquisition may be regarded, by those who are 

 sceptical as to the validity of any real distinction between 

 what is congenital and what is acquired, as after all only 

 the selection or rejection of these or those among many 

 congenital activities. Suppose, to put the matter in a 

 somewhat different and at the same time a concrete 

 form, that a baby baboon exhibits a number of con- 

 genital limb movements ; each in itself of a relatively 

 definite kind, but without relation to, or co-ordination 

 with, other movements ; and further suppose that, as the 

 result of its individual experience, ten per cent, are 

 selected and co-ordinated so as to form an acquired 

 activity for the carrying out of some specific object, 





