48 THE PLAY OF ANIMALS. 



in individual life which have become reflex through 

 practice and repetition; the piano player reaches for the 

 right key '^ mechanically/^ intuitively, though at first 

 he could make the same movement only under the con- 

 trol of conscious will. In just the same way inherited 

 instinct depends on a " lapsing of intelligence " (Lewes), 

 but instead of being accomplished in a single life, it pro- 

 gresses in such a manner that the conscious practice 

 of earlier generations becomes the reflex activity of 

 later ones."^ This is what is meant by the common desig- 

 nation of instinct as inherited habit or hereditary mem- 

 ory. I cite only a few examples: Preyer and Eimer use 

 these expressions in defining instinct, and L. Wilser calls 

 it hereditary skill or aptitude, f Wundt says, " Move- 

 ments that originally appeared as simple or compound 

 acts of the will, but later, either in the life of the indi- 

 vidual or in the progress of race development, have be- 

 come partially or entirely mechanical, we call instinctive 

 acts." X Th. Eibot,* with Lewes, calls instinct " con- 

 science eteinte/' and Schneider refers what he recognises 

 as hereditary in instinctive acts to the practice and habit 

 of ancestors. || Thus he explains our instinctive fear in 

 the dark as the inheritance of acquired association: 



* This interesting passage is from Leroy : " What we regard as 

 entirely mechanical in animals may be ancient habit perpetuated 

 from generation to generation." Lettres philosophiques sur I'in- 

 telligence et la perfectibilite des animaux, new edition, Paris, 1802, 

 p. 107. 



f W. Preyer, Die Seele des Kindes, Leipsie, 1890, p. 186. Eimer, 

 Entstehung der Arten, i, p. 240. L. Wilser, Die Vererbung der 

 geistiiren Eigenschaften, Heidelberg, p. 9. 



X W. Wundt, Vorlesungen fiber die Menschen- und Thierseele, 

 second edition. 1892, p. 422. [Eng. trans., p. 388.] 



# L'Heredite psychologique, fifth edition, p. 19. 



II G. H. Schneider, Der thierische Wille, Leipsie, 1880, p. 14G. 



