Mind in the Lower Animals. 181 



mals survives the destruction of their bodie?. Bat we have no 

 clear revelation on this subject. The Bible, the only pretended 

 source of authority on such subjects, so far as revelation is con- 

 cerned in them, makes no statement bearing on it, at least none 

 equaling in clearness those made in respect to the future existence 

 of the spirits of men. It would seem not unreasonable, that if the 

 spirits or minds of the lower animals are endowed with immor- 

 tality, that it would have been for some 'pui'pose^ probably a 

 moral one. And since men and. the lower animals sustain to each 

 other such close relations in this life, the purpose in conferring 

 immortality on the souls of the beasts would probably have some 

 relation to man, and hence, would naturally find some expression 

 in the Bible, which has so much to say of the hereafter of men. 

 But no such statements occur. By a mere observation of animals, 

 and a simple scientific study of the phenomena they present, it is- 

 not possible to arrive at clear and logical conclusions on this sub- 

 ject, unless, perhaps of a kind unfavorable to the view which 

 affirms their immortality. It is true, such modes of reasoning do 

 not prove that animals do not have immortal souls, but it at least 

 raises a reasonable presumption against such a view. 



2. Again it is said, that the mental phenomena of lower animals 

 do not require the agency of mind to explain them, for they have 

 been referred almost by common consent, from the earliest times, 

 to insiinct Men and animals differ, as regards their actions and 

 their knowledge, chiefly in this : Animals do not as a rule 

 learn to do, or to know what their modes of existence require 

 them to know, or do what they need to do, and their actions there- 

 fore are usually as well performed at first as at last. Their actions 

 are automatic, or they are done without purpose or foresight of the 

 animal. It is thus with the walking of animals when first born, 

 with their breathing or their sucking. A chicken, not yet out of 

 its shell, will peck at, and swallow a fly ; a serpent, when it first 

 escapes from its egg, will on the instant, seek a retreat under a 

 stone, or stick, or clod, if there is any show of violence or danger. 



The bee builds its cell, the bird its nest, the spider weaves its 

 web, just as perfectly at first as at last. All these things and 

 thousands more are done by these and other animals prior to ex- 



