PSYCHOLOGY 263 



infancy of the earth after the cooling of our molten planet and 

 the appearance of atmosphere and water; if we must admit 

 that from primitive embryos the animal kingdom has developed 

 from lower to higher forms and that man has sprung from the 

 animal world ; if finally we must reject as inconceivable the 

 existence of an animal organism without a mind, matter with- 

 out spirit so we must bow to the inevitable conclusion that 

 the human mind evolved from the animal mind, the human 

 spirit from the animal spirit. 



These theoretical considerations are amply supported by 

 practical facts. If men of eminence like Darwin , Lubbock, 

 Romanes and Brehm after lifelong observation of animals 

 come to the conclusion that the psychical differences between 

 man and animals are of degree only and not of kind, their 

 judgment must be considered as of far greater weight than 

 the obstinate objections of opponents who, glued to their 

 writing-tables, build up a water-tight bulkhead between the 

 psychical equipment of animals and man. The opposition of 

 this tribe would be utterly silenced if they would only take the 

 trouble to acquaint themselves with the ontogeny (develop- 

 ment of the individual) and phylogeny (development of the 

 race) of the mind. 



The ontogeny of the mind has only been based on its true 

 foundations by the developmental studies of the last thirty years. 



If the possession of definite properties of perception and 

 movement in the unicellular organism are to be described as a 

 mind, the same must hold good of the ovum and spermatozoon, 

 from which the animal body is developed. If we regard the 

 process of fertilisation, where an attraction, a sort of selective 

 affinity, between the ovum and spermatozoon is manifest, as 

 the first degree of psychical activity there is no scientific ob- 

 jection possible. Now both parents, from one of whom is 

 derived the ovum, from the other the spermatozoon, have 

 their individual minds, and experience shows that the psychical 

 qualities of the new individual are derived from both the father 

 and the mother, so that the mind itself must be formed by 

 blending of the two factors, a blending which, as is well known, 

 may in the children of the same parents show every degree and 

 variety, and may result in the transmission through many 



