OF APES. 71 



fliort, forms a language which will foon extend 

 as the family augments, and will always follow, 

 in its improvement, the progrefs of fociety. As 

 foon as fociety begins to be formed, the educa- 

 tion of the infant is no longer individual, fmce 

 the parents communicate to it not only what 

 they derive from Nature, hue likewife what they 

 have received from their progenitors, and from, 

 the fociety to which they belong. It is no long- 

 er a communication between detached indivi- 

 duals, which, as in the animals, would be limited 

 to the tranfmiffion of fimple faculties, but an in- 

 ilitution of Vv'hich the whole fpecies participate, 

 and vvhofe produce conftilutes the bafis and bond 

 of fociety. 



Kven among brute animals, though deprived 

 cf the ientient principle, thofe whole education 

 is longeft appear to have moil intelligence. The 

 elephant, which takes the longeft time in acqui- 

 ring its full growth, and requires the fuccour of 

 its mother during the whole firll year of its ex- 

 iflence, is alio the moll intelligent of all animals. 

 The Guiney-pig, which is full grown, and ca- 

 pable of geiierating at the age of three weeks, is 

 for this realbn alone, perhaps, one of the moft 

 if upid fpecies. With regard to the ape, whofe 

 nature we are endeavouring to afcertain, how- 

 ever limiiar to man, he is fo flrongly marked 

 with the features of brutality, that it is diifln- 

 • guilhable from the moment of his birth. He is 

 then proportionally ilronger and better formed 



than 



I 



