394 MENTAL EVOLUTION IN MAN. 



of difference, we had first to dispose of certain allegations 

 which were either erroneous in fact or plainly unsound in 

 theory. This involved a rejection in toto of the following 

 distinctions — namely, that brutes are non-sentient machines ; 

 that they present no rudiments of reason in the sense of 

 perceiving analogies and drawing inferences therefrom ; that 

 they are destitute of any immortal principle ; that they show 

 no signs of progress from generation to generation ; that 

 they never employ barter, make fire, wear clothes, use tools, 

 and so forth. Among these sundry alleged distinctions, 

 those which are not demonstrably false in fact are demon- 

 strably false in logic. Whether or not brutes are destitute 

 of any immortal principle, and whether or not human beings 

 present such a principle, the science of comparative psychology 

 has no means of ascertaining ; and, therefore, any arguments 

 touching these questions are irrelevant to the subject-matter 

 on which we are engaged. Again, the fact that brutes do not 

 resemble ourselves in wearing clothes, making fire, &c., 

 clearly depends on an absence in them of those powers of 

 higher ideation which alone are adequate to yield such 

 products in the way of intelligent action. All such differences 

 in matters of detail, therefore, really belong to, or are 

 absorbed by, the more general question as to the nature 

 of the distinction between the two orders of ideation. To 

 this, therefore, as to the real question before us, we next 

 addressed ourselves. And here it was pointed out, in limine, 

 that the three living naturalists of highest authority who still 

 argue for a difference of kind between the brute and the man, 

 although they agree in holding that only on grounds of 

 psychology can any such difference be maintained, neverthe- 

 less upon these grounds all mutually contradict one another. 

 For while Mr. Mivart argues that there must be a distinction 

 of kind, because the psychological interval between the 

 highest ape and the lowest man is so great ; Mr. Wallace 

 argues for the same conclusion on the ground that this 

 interval is not so great as the theory of a natural evolution 

 would lead us to expect : the brain of a savage, he says, is so 



