INSTINCT AND INTELLIGENCE. 



The reader will find these conclusions verified by many of the 

 examples which will be presently produced, but those who desire 

 a more complete demonstration must have recourse to the numer- 

 ous and beautiful memoirs of Frederick Cuvier, in which the 

 original observations are recorded. 



13. After having established the limits which distinguish the 

 degrees of intelligence of different orders of animals, Cuvier took 

 up the still more important question to fix the limit between 

 intelligence and instinct. 



Between these powers there is the most complete opposition. 

 All the results of instinct are blind, necessary, and invariable. 

 All those of intelligence, on the contrary, are optional, conditional, 

 and susceptible of endless modification. The beaver, which 

 builds its hut, and the bird which constructs its nest, act by 

 instinct alone. The dog and the horse, which are educated so as to 

 understand the signification of several words uttered by those who 

 have charge of them, do so by the exercise of intelligence. 



All the results of instinct are innate. The beaver builds its 

 hut without having learned to do so. It is urged by a constant 

 and irresistible force. It builds because it cannot help building. 



All the results of intelligence arise from experience and in- 

 struction. The dog obeys his master, only because he has learned 

 to do so. He is a free agent, and obeys because he wills to obey. 



In fine, the results of instinct are particular, while those of 

 intelligence are general. The industry and ingenuity which has 

 excited so much admiration in the beaver, is displayed in nothing 

 except the construction of his hut, while the same degree of 

 attention and thought, which enables the dog to obey his master 

 in one thing, will equally avail him to perform other acts. 



14. So long as these two powers of instinct and intelligence 

 were undistinguished one from the other, the manners and habits 

 of animals presented to the contemplation of the observer endless 

 obscurity, and the most perplexing contradiction. While in 

 most actions the superiority of man over other animals is apparent, 

 in many the superiority seems to pass to the side of the brute. 

 This paradox and apparent contradiction disappears, however, 

 when the boundary between instinct and intelligence is clearly 

 marked. Whatever proceeds from intelligence in the lower 

 animals, is incomparably below that which results from the intel- 

 ligence of man ; and on the contrary, all those acts of the lower 

 animals, which, supposing them to result from intelligence, would 

 require a higher degree of that faculty than man possesses, are 

 the mere effects of the blind mechanical power of instinct.* 



* Flourens' "De 1'Instinct et de 1'Intelligence des Animaux," p. 36. 

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