2i6 REFLECTIONS ON 



The word animal, in Its common acceptation, 

 reprefents a general idea, compofed of particular 

 ideas which we derive from particular animals. 

 All general ideas include many different ideas, 

 which mere or lefs approach or recede from one 

 another ; and, of courfe, no general idea can 

 be precife or exad:. The general idea we have 

 formed of an animal, may be derived from the 

 particular idea of a dog, of a horfe, and of other 

 animals, from the power of volition, which en- 

 ables them to a6: according to their inclination, 

 and from the circumftances of their being com- 

 pofed of fleih and blood, from their faculty of 

 choofnig and of taking nouriihment, from their 

 fenfes, from the dillindion of fexes, and from 

 their power of reproducing. The general idea, 

 therefore, expreffed by the word animal^ includes 

 a number of particular ideas, not one of which 

 conftitutes the effence of the general idea : For 

 there are animals which have no intelligence, 

 no will, no progrefTive motion, no flefli or blood, 

 and appear to be only a mafs of congealed mu- 

 cilage : There are others which cannot feek for 

 (heir food, and only receive it from the element 

 in which they exift ; others have no fenfes, not 

 even that of feeling, at leafl in a perceptible de- 

 gree. Some have no fexes, or have both in 

 one individual. There remains nothing, there- 

 fore, in the properties of an animal, but the 

 power of reprodudlon, which is common to 

 both the vegetable and animal. It is from the 



whole 



