304 FACULTIES OF BIRDS. 



is implied a little above, that I wish the word reason 

 to be understood, wherever it occurs in this Essay, 

 viz. the discursive faculties, wholly depending on out- 

 ward evidence for its conclusions. Hence, if there be 

 any actions which are performed with every indication 

 of design, forethought, and wisdom, which are not 

 the result of instructions nor of individual experience, 

 but of a power operating above the consciousness of 

 the creatures, and directing it with unerring certainty 

 to some specific ends by means far beyond its com- 

 prehension, whether in man or in the brute, these 

 actions are instinctive ; and, on the other hand, if 

 there be any actions, which evidently result from 

 observation and instruction, indicating an intelligent 

 power of combining means and adapting them to 

 ends of which the creature is conscious, these actions 

 come within the province of reason *." 



Dr. Hancock elsewhere says, 4< In the lowest order 

 of animals the divine energy seems to act with the 

 most unimpeded power. It is less concentrated in 

 the successive links of the living chain upward to 

 man. The lowest animal has this divine power, not 

 of free choice, nor consciously; the holiest of men has 

 it also consciously and willingly, and it then becomes 

 his ruling principle ; his divine counsellor ; his never- 

 failing help ; a light to his feet, and a lantern to his 

 path t" 



IV. The late Baron Cuvier, in his description of 

 an orang-outang, distinctly states his opinion that 

 instinct depends on ideas not originating from sensa- 

 tion, but flowing immediately from the brain. " The 

 understanding," he says, " may have ideas without 

 the aid of the senses; two-thirds of the brute creation 

 are moved by ideas which they do not owe to their 

 sensations, but which flow immediately from their 

 brain. Instinct constitutes this order of phenomena : 

 * Essay on Instinct, p. 16. f Ibid. p. 5J3. 



