330 ACTIONS OF ANIMALS, 



as having some relation to motion ; for we call that 

 which is quick " animated or lively." 



And this liveliness of most of the animals, with 

 which we are familiar (though there are some that 

 have very little of it) gives a charm to the observa- 

 tion of animals far greater than we feel in that of 

 any other of the productions of nature. The most 

 magnificent tree, or the most beautiful flower, is but 

 a denizen of one little spot of earth ; but a quadruped 

 can range the whole country, a bird cross the seas, 

 and a fish circumnavigate the globe. There is a 

 notion of freedom about them, and that is always an 

 inviting notion. 



Besides, there is an apparent communicativeness 

 in animals which we cannot trace in any thing else. 

 Every thing that we can know about the other pro- 

 ductions of nature we must find out by labour, or 

 wait for with patience, till the " creeping pace of 

 Time" (which always appears slow when our wish 

 is fast) brings it about. But the animal comes for- 

 ward and tells its own story, thereby placing us in 

 the easy situation of spectators at a dramatic repre- 

 sentation ; and then, the acting of different animals, 

 or of the same animal under different circumstances, 

 is so varied that we never tire of them. 



Philosophically, we have no more reason to con- 

 clude that the action of any animal, however instan- 

 taneous and rapid it may be, is an original action, 

 than we have to conclude that the germination of a 

 seed, the growth of a plant, or the falling of a stone is 

 an original action ; because that which can begin its 

 action, or in any way change its state without cause, 

 must also have begun its existence without cause. 

 But still, as the action of the animal is so much more 

 rapid and varied than that of most other productions 

 of nature, and as it is produced in the animal without 

 any antecedent that we can see, it has so far the ap- 

 pearance of original action. When an animal runs, 

 there is a natural cause for it, as certainly as there 



