Instinct. 879 



stantly diminishing expenditure of force. This tendency is promoted 

 and clinched by natural selection. When the action comes to be per- 

 formed from nearly frictionless habit, and in unconsciousness, it is in- 

 stinctive. Instinct expresses the net results upon the organism of a 

 long line of superposed habitual actions. At one end of such line of 

 habit is reason and consciousness, at the other end, unconscious instinct. 

 Between the two extremes there is every possible gradation. The mo- 

 ment we begin the repetition of actions, we begin the establishment of 

 instincts. After awhile an action will become semi-instinctive; that is, it 

 will be performed in preference to another which is equally as reason- 

 able, and it is liable to be preferred to one much more reasonable. A 

 Mexican farmer, who all his life had used an antediluvian plow, with 

 wooden mold board and a straight stick for a handle, was induced to buy 

 a modern American plow, and the first thing he did with it was to saw off 

 the bent parts of the handles. The formation of the instinct is the 

 crystallization of the reason which started the habit in the first place. 

 So that the cerebral action, which necessarily precedes the muscular 

 action, is started by its accustomed stimulus, and performed with the 

 minimum of attention ; and consequently there being a minimum of 

 blood supplied to the organs involved, they are not in condition to be 

 influenced or changed by other stimulations, or considerations. In 

 other words, the reason for the instinct has become so strongly fixed, 

 that reasons against it cannot affect it. We say the person will not 

 listen to reason. He cannot. 



As we grow old our habits constantly tend toward this crystallization 

 into instinct. When an} action comes to be performed without con- 

 scious supervision, it is instinctive. We sometimes see an old lady 

 knitting, and at the same time reading. Attention to the knitting is 

 not required except in turning the corners, the movements in making 

 the stitches having become instinctive. So a person may learn to play 

 a number of tunes on an instrument so that the performance of any one 

 may be instinctive. An amusing case in point was that of the lady 

 who, while playing the piano for a social dancing party, fell asleep 

 from the effects of a little too much "refreshment," and continued to 

 play while entirely unconscious. She could be set going on any other 

 tune with which she was familiar, by piloting her fingers through the 

 first strain of the piece. This is instinct pure and simple ; more so 

 than we generally get it. Upon analysis, we shall find that both our 

 own actions and those of other animals are usually -mixed, being in 

 part reasoned and in part instinctive. If the lady in the above anec- 

 dote had remained awake, she might still have done her playing instinc- 

 tively and unconsciously, her attention being engaged with the move- 

 ments of the dancers, or anything else ; and the company would never 



