904 Dynamic Theory. 



Whenever an instinct is disturbed by a distracting stimulation, so as to 

 cause a hesitation or balancing to take place before a will is made up 

 and action initiated, the process is reasoning. Obviously, therefore, 

 as instinct is supplanted by an increase of the reasoning faculty, the 

 conditions must become less favorable for the successful transference of 

 mental impressions. Furthermore, the more complicated and detailed 

 the idea to be conveyed, the less complete and satisfactory will be its 

 transference. And this would lead to a supplementing of this mode of 

 communication with signs addressed to one or more of the senses; in 

 short, the adoption of language. In time, this method has, through its 

 superior qualification for the conveyance of ideas, almost superseded 

 the direct method. The latter may be said to be the language of in- 

 stinct, while articulation, or other sign language, is the language of the 

 intellect. Those animals which are in a middling position, whose ac- 

 tions are largely instinctive, and who yet possess a considerable degree 

 of intelligence, it may be conjectured use both mediums of communica- 

 tion. Such are the great body of the mammals and birds. 



CHAPTER LXXX. 



LANGUAGE. 



It has already been observed that the ordina^ senses of animals are 

 as sharp as those of men, and in many cases sharper. From what was 

 said in last chapter, it even seems probable that they are endowed to a 

 much greater extent than we are, with a telepathic sense. It might be 

 asked, then, why, since all intelligence depends on the senses, are not 

 the lower animals as intelligent as man? Intelligence arises from a con- 

 version of the ethereal motions of the environment into ethereal motions 

 in the brain. Consequently, other things equal, it is in proportion to 

 the character and the amount of the environment, no two environments 

 being the same or equal. A man living in a great city has a greater 

 environment than one living alone on a small desolate island. So it is 

 >bvious that by means of language the environment of the individual 

 .s increased. The advantage of this is so great that it far more than 

 offsets even a large deficiency of sensory acuteness. Language is a 

 vast acquisition even to a savage, for it extends his environment so as 

 to cover that of his neighbors for a great distance around, and he may 

 be told what goes on in the next tribe at the same time that he sees 

 what goes on in his own, and a traveler may bring him knowledge of 

 far distant countries. This advantage is increased a thousand fold in 

 the case of the civilized man, by means of writing and printing. The 

 environment of a man who avails himself of the use of a great modern 

 library, is practically the whole earth, and part of the sky. 



