THE VEGETABLE AND ANIMAL KINGDOMS. 145 



early generations is the half-pitying benevolence which we 

 daily bestow upon childhood. It follows that the still earlier 

 generations antecedent to the perfection of the human type, 

 ought to be regarded with an extension of this same feeling 

 the modification of it which humane natures daily exemplify 

 in their treatment of the inferior animals. Our children, it 

 may be said, are the representatives of the first simple and 

 impulsive men of the earth : the lower animals represent the 

 earlier pre-human stages of life. The right conception of the 

 case is, that in these stages we are not to look for what is 

 venerable, but, on the contrary, for what is humble and ele- 

 mentary. We are to expect but the primitice of man's mas- 

 terful life something not even ascending to the dignity of 

 " the infant mewling in its nurse's arms." If thus prepared, 

 we should experience no shock on hearing that the human 

 form was preceded genealogically by others of humbler 

 aspect, no more than we are on learning that every indivi- 

 dual amongst us passes through the characters of the inverte- 

 brate, fish, and reptile, before he is permitted to breathe the 

 breath of life. A deep moral principle seems involved in 

 the history of the origin of man. He is the undoubted chief 

 of all creatures, and as such may well have a character and 

 destiny in some respects peculiar and far exalted above the 

 rest ; but it appears that his relation to them is, after all, one 

 of kindred. Along with his authority over them, he bears 

 from nature an obligation to abstain from wantonly injuring 

 them, and as far as possible to cherish and protect them. 

 Good men feel this duty, as if it were a command from a 

 source above themselves. It seems to them, that if the help- 

 lessness of childhood calls for kind and gentle treatment, 

 much more does the essentially weaker character of the dumb 

 creature. And if the innocence of infancy is touching, still 

 more so is the even more harmless character which (over- 

 looking carnivorous instincts implanted in certain families for 

 a wise purpose) attaches to the lower animals. It is common, 

 under the influence of prejudice, to do gross injustice to the 

 characters of these denizens of nature's common. We do not 

 sufficiently reflect on their respectable qualities. Yet we 



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