OF NATURAL HISTORY. 165 



Other, or communicating the ideas and feelings they poflefs 

 in common. The language of gefture prepares for that of 

 articulation ; and fome animals are capable of acquiring a 

 knowledge of articulate founds. They firft judge of our 

 thoughts by our geflures ; and afterwards acquire the habit 

 of connecting thefe thoughts with the language in which we 

 exprefs them. It is in this manner that the elephant and the 

 do^ learn to obev the commands of their mafters. 



Infants are exactly in the fame condition with brutes. 

 They underltand fome of our geilures and words long before 

 they can articulate. They difcover their wants by geftures 

 and inarticulate founds, the meaning of which the nurfe 

 learns by experience. Different infants have different modes 

 of exprelling their wants. This is the reafon why nurfes 

 know the intentions of infants, though they are perfe<5lly un- 

 intelligible to ftrangers. Yv^hen an infant, accordingly is 

 transferred from one nurfe to another, the former inflru6^ts 

 the latter in the geftures and inarticulate language of the 

 child. 



The idea of a machine implies a feledl combination of the 

 common properties of matter. The regularity of its move- 

 ments is a proof that they are totally diftin6l from animal or 

 fpontaneous motion. A machine has nothing analogous to 

 fenfation, which is the loweft charadteriftic of an animal. An: 

 animated machine^ therefore, is an abfurd abufe of terms. It 

 confounds what Nature has diftinguiflied in the moft unam- 

 biguous manner. The inftindts of brutes are, in general, 

 ftronger, and lefs fubjeiSl to reftraint, than tliofe of man. 

 The reafon is plain : They have not an equal number of in- 

 ftinfls to curb, counterbalance, or moderate their motives to 

 particular adlions. Hence they have often the appearance of 

 acting by mere impulfe ; and this circumftance has led fome 

 philofophers to confider brutes as machines. But th ey re- 

 fie(5t not that children, favages, and ignorant men, a(Si: nearly 



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