COSMIC PHILOSOPHY 



Near the close of his first edition of the " Ori- 

 gin of Species," Mr. Darwin predicted that the 

 establishment of his theory would eventually 

 place the science of psychology upon a new 

 basis — that of the acquirement of each mental 

 faculty by slow gradations.^ We seem now to 

 have fairly started upon the path which leads 

 to this desired goal. For while, among the 

 mental operations above analyzed, some are pe- 

 culiar to the highest human intelligence, there 

 are others which are shared by the highest and 

 the lowest human intelligence. Others — as the 

 simplest inferences, several complex perceptions, 

 and all the most simple ones — are shared by 

 all human intelligence with the intelligence of 

 apes, dogs, horses, and indeed of the majority 

 of mammals, many birds, and possibly some 

 lower animals. Others, again — as the simplest 

 perceptive acts implied in recognizing a sensa- 

 tion — must be shared with all those animals 

 whose nervous system is sufficiently complex to 

 allow of their having any consciousness what- 

 ever. While others, finally — as the simplest 

 sub-conscious groupings of primitive psychical 

 shocks — must be shared by humanity with all 



1 Mr. Darwin has since recognized that this new basis is 

 already well laid by Mr. Spencer. See Origin of Species, 6th 

 edition, p. 428. Indeed the Principles of Psychology, upon 

 which the present chapter is almost entirely founded, was first 

 published in 1855, four years before the Origin of Species. 

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