514 THE SENSORIAL FUNCTIONS. 



bird. But how can we transport ourselves, even in 

 imagination, into the dark recesses of the ocean, 

 which we know are tenanted by multitudinous 

 tribes of fishes, zoophytes, and mollusca ? How can 

 we figure to ourselves the sensitive existence of 

 the worm or the insect, organized in so different a 

 manner from ourselves, and occupying so remote 

 a region in the expanse of creation ? How can we 

 venture to speculate on the perceptions of the ani- 

 malcule, whose world is a drop of fluid, and whose 

 fleeting existence, chequered perhaps by various 

 transformations, is destined to run its course in a 

 few hours ? 



Confining our inquiries, then, to the more intel- 

 ligible intellectual phenomena displayed by the 

 higher animals, we readily trace a gradation which 

 corresponds with the developement of the central 

 nervous organ, or brain. That the comparison may 

 be fairly made, however, it is necessary to distin- 

 guish those actions which are the result of the 

 exercise of the intellectual faculties, from those 

 which are called instinctive, and are referable to 

 other sources. The actions of animals appear on 

 various occasions to be guided by a degree of 

 sagacity not derivable from experience, and appa- 

 rently implying a fore-knowledge of events, which 

 neither experience nor reflection could have led 

 them to anticipate. We cannot sufficiently admire 

 the provident care displayed by nature in the pre- 

 servation both of the individual and of the species, 

 which she has entrusted not to the slow and uncer- 

 tain calculations of prudence, but to innate faculties, 

 prompting, by an unerring impulse, to the per- 

 formance of the actions required for those ends. 



