cen 
a a in, 
INSTINCT. 
salmon, returring to the spots where they were 
bred after their long migrations, are clearly 
analogous. 
But in such cases it is obvious that the pos- 
Session of reason could not have enabled these 
animals, alone and unassisted, to find their 
way; neither was the result properly referable 
to instinct, this term being properly applicable 
only to the feeling of attachment which 
rompted the return home, not to the know- 
ledge which the animals somehow acquired 
where their home was to be found. The only 
term properly applicable to the acquisition of 
this knowledge is intuition, and they should be 
added to other facts, which shew that in va- 
rious instances animals acquire, by the exercise 
of their senses, information as to external 
things, more obviously distinct from the sensa- 
tions themselves, than those perceptions which 
Dr. Reid has so clearly shewn to be strictly 
intuitive inferences, drawn by the human in- 
tellect from the intimations of the senses. 
There is yet another fact well ascertained of 
late years regarding the instincts of animals, 
which we must not omit to state, because it is 
the only one which gives plausibility to the 
notion of Darwin, that sensations and experi- 
ence would explain the whole phenomena of 
instinct. This is the fact, which seems well 
ascertained as to certain animals at least,— 
which is very probably true of man, and sus- 
ceptible of important practical application in 
his case,—that the acquired habits of one gene- 
ration may become instinctive propensities in 
the next. Thus it has been often observed 
that the progeny of well-trained pointers learn 
to point with very little instruction. It is 
stated by Darwin that dogs in the wild state, 
both in Africa and America, have been observed 
not to bark, that they gradually acquire that 
note from European dogs ; and that the latter, 
when turned loose, retain it for three or four 
generations, and gradually lose it ; and it has 
been ascertained that in South America, when 
horses which had been taught to amble had 
been allowed to run wild, their progeny for two 
or three generations continued to practice that 
pace, and then lost it.* Of the existence of 
such acquired instincts, therefore, there can be 
no doubt; but it need hardly be said that it is 
quite incompetent to explain the perfect uni- 
formity and the skilful contrivance observed in 
the instincts of animals; both because its ope- 
ration seems too limited, and because that sup- 
position would only remove the difficulty as to 
the continuance of the instinctive operations 
from: the present to the early generations of 
animals. 
In reviewing the varied phenomena of which 
we have given this hasty sketch, it is impos- 
sible not to be struck with the very important 
share which they occupy in the provisions by 
which the earth’s surface is made a scene of 
continual activity and change. It is interest- 
ing to reflect on the different powers, to the 
__* This principle has been lately investigated and 
illustrated by Mr. Knight, in a paper read before 
the Royal Society of London. 
23 
operation of which we can trace the unceasing 
changes continually taking place around us, 
and particularly on the gradation, and very 
gradual transition that may be observed, from 
those by which inanimate matter is continually 
moved and changed, up to those which ema- 
nate from the intellect of man. By the ori- 
ginal impulse given to the world, and by the 
laws of gravitation and of motion impressed 
on al! matter, the greater and more striking 
movements of the inanimate world around us 
are continually determined ; and by the laws 
of chemistry, these movements are made sub- 
servient to constant changes in the composition 
of the inanimate world. Again, by the laws 
which were impressed on the lower class of 
living beings at the time of their introduction 
into the world, and by the consequently in- 
cessant reproduction of vital affinities, which 
it is in vain to attempt to resolve into the che- 
mistry of dead matter, a constant succession 
of living vegetable structures is determined, 
merely by the agency of air and water, heat 
and light, on those already existing. By the 
peculiar chemical operation of these living 
structures, the air, the water, and all the ma- 
terials of the earth’s surface are subjected to 
pee and continual changes, implying slow 
ut incessant movements, which seem clearly 
to indicate attractions and repulsions, peculiar 
to the state of vitality. It is still perhaps 
doubtful whether in the case of vegetables a 
property of vital contraction is to be added to 
the active powers of nature. In immediate 
but still obscure connection with the lowest of 
the vegetable creation are the lowest of the 
animals, where we see the first and slightest 
indications of sensations, and the feeblest mo- 
tions consequent on sensations, which we judge 
to be similar to those that we ourselves ex- 
perience and excite; and here also the vital 
power of contraction, on which the whole life 
and- activity of animals essentially depends, 
first clearly manifests itself. Then tracing the 
animal creation upwards, we find that the 
world contains an infinite number and variety 
of sentient beings, the provisions for whose 
enjoyment we may well believe to have been 
the main object of Providence in all the ar- 
rangements on the surface of the earth; and to 
which are granted, in a pretty uniform grada- 
tion, more and more of the sensations and 
mental faculties by which nature is made 
known, and of the powers by which she may 
be controlled, until we arrive at the intellect 
and the capacity of Man. 
It appears farther that the maintenance, and 
reproduction, and the very existence of these 
animal structures are entrusted in part to the 
sensations of which they are made susceptible, 
and to the voluntary powers with which they 
are invested; but that the introduction of these 
spontaneous powers into the regulation of their 
ceconomy is so very gradual, that it is hardly 
possible to say where the movements which 
result only from physical (although vital) 
causes terminate, and those which are excited 
by mental acts begin;— hardly possible, for 
example, to say, at least as to many animals, 
