32 THE PLAY OF ANIMALS. 



or any other problem. Metaphysics, or the first sci- 

 ence, as its original name signified, should rather be 

 called the last science. It belongs to the end rather than 

 to the beginning of an inquiry. So it will be at the close 

 of my book on human play that I shall speak of the 

 metaphysical side of my subject, if at all. For surely 

 whether its use is justifiable or not, the time is past when 

 it could be appealed to as a means of approaching a sub- 

 ject before empirical research was attempted. The 

 merely metaphysical grounding of phenomena will never 

 again suifice. 



As a result of this empirical tendency we see a strong 

 opposition to the transcendental-teleological view arise 

 in the second half of our century. It assumes the form 

 of a double criticism, a negative and a positive. The 

 one wishes to eliminate the word instinct altogether 

 wherever possible. The other gives to it a new meaning, 

 no longer involving the supernatural. 



The repudiation or rejection of the conception of in- 

 stinct arises from the fact that the attempt is made to 

 explain all instinctive acts as the result of individually 

 acquired experience and reflection. Of the many who 

 have adopted this view, I notice only the more modern.* 



Turning first to the great work of Alexander Bain, 

 The Senses and the Intellect, we find there a long chap- 

 ter on instinct, but in it no mention is made of the 

 actions which we are usually accustomed to speak of as 

 instinctive. Only reflex movements, such as heart beats, 

 breathing, coughing, sneezing, gestures, etc., are referred 

 to. Bain's view of real instinct is first developed in the 



* For older scholars holding this view, see Fr. Kirehner, Ueber 

 die Thierseele, Halle, 1890, and L. Biichner, Aus dem Geistesleben 

 der Thiere, third edition, Leipsic, 1880. 



