290 FACULTIES OF BIRDS. 



with the hypothesis which endeavours to prove the 

 close similarity, if not the identity, of instinct and 

 reason. 



I. The hypothesis in question, under various mo- 

 difications, was maintained among the ancients by 

 Pythagoras and Plato, and among the moderns by 

 Helvetius'% Condillac, Smellie, Hill, Hume, and 

 Darwin. Smellie says, " The great source of error 

 on this subject is the uniform attempt to distinguish 

 instinctive from rational motives. I shall, however, 

 endeavour to show that no such distinction exists, 

 and that the reasoning faculty is itself the result of 

 instinct." He considers instinct to be " every ori- 

 ginal quality of mind which produces feelings or 

 actions when the proper objects are presented to it. 

 Jt seems then to be apparent, that instincts are ori- 

 ginal qualities of mind ; that every animal is pos- 

 sessed of some of these qualities ; that the intelli- 

 gence and resources of animals are proportioned to 

 the number of instincts with which their minds are 

 endowed ; that all animals are, in some measure* 

 rational beings ; and that the dignity and superiority 

 of the human intellect are necessary results, not of 

 the conformation of our bodies, but of the great 

 variety of instincts which Nature has been pleased to 

 confer on the species t- 3 ' 



" Though animals, 5 ' says Hume, " learn many 

 parts of their knowledge from observation, there 

 are also many parts of it which they derive from 

 the original hand of Nature, which much exceed 

 the share of capacity they possess on ordinary occa- 

 sions, and in which they improve little or nothing 

 by the longest practice and experience. These we 

 denominate instincts, and are so apt to admire as 

 something very extraordinary and inexplicable by 



* De P Esprit, i. 2, &c. 

 f Phil, of Nat. History, i. 252, 8vo. Dublin, 1790. 



