io2 OF INSTINCT. SECY. XVI. 2. 



But all thofc actions of men or animals, that are attended 

 with confcioufnefs, and feem neither to have been dire&ed by 

 their appetites, taught by their experience, nor deduced from ob- 

 fervation or tradition, have been referred to the power of in- 

 flindl:. And this power has been explained to be a divine fome- 

 thing) a kind of infpiration ; whilft the poor animal, that pofiefT- 

 es it, has been thought little better than a machine ! 



The irkfomenefs, that attends a continued attitude of the body, 

 or the pains > that we receive from heat, cold, hunger, or other 

 injurious circumftances, excite us to general locomotion ; and our 

 fenfes are fo formed and conftituted by the hand of nature, that 

 certain objefts prefent us with pleafure, others with pain, and 

 we are induced to approach and embrace thefe, to avoid and 

 abhor thofe, as fuch tenfations direft us. 



Thus the palates of fome animals are gratefully affected by the 

 maftication of fruits, others of grains, and others of flsfh ; and 

 they are thence mitigated to attain and confurne thofe materials ; 

 and are furniflied with powers of rnufcular motion, and of di- 

 geftion proper for fuch purpofes. 



Thtk/enfations and defires conftitute a part of our fyftem, as 

 our mufcles and bones conftitute another part : and hence they 

 may anke be termed natural or connate ; but neither of them can 

 properly be termed injhnftive ; as the word inftin^t, in its ufual 

 acceptation, refers only to the aftions of animals, as above ex- 

 plained ; the origin of thefe aftions is the fubjed of our prefent 

 inquiry 



Tiie reader is entreated carefully to attend to this definition 

 of inJlinBive aBions^ left by ufing the word inftincl: without ad- 

 joining any accurate idea to it, he may not only include the nat- 

 ural defires of love and hunger, and the natural fenfations of 

 pain or pieaiure, but the figure and contexture of the body, and 

 the faculty of reafon itfelf, under this general term. 



II. We experience fome fenfation, and perform fome ac- 

 tions before our nativity; the fenfations of coW and warmth, 

 agitation and relt, fulnefs and inanition, are inftances of the 

 former ; and the repeated ftruggles of the limbs of the foetus, 

 which begin about the middle of geftation, and thofe motions 

 by which it frequently wraps the umbilical chord around its 

 neck or body, and even fometimes ties it in a knot ; are inftan- 

 ces of the latter. (Smellie's Midwifery, Vol. I. p. 182.) 



By a due attention to thefe circumftances many of the ac- 

 tions of young animals, which at firft fight feemed only referable 

 to an inexplicable inftinft, will appear to have been acquired like 

 all other animal actions, that are attended with conicioufnefs $ 



iy 



