438 



SCIBJS'CE, 



[Vol. IX., No. 222 



Tchardghoni in the course of the eighteen months, 

 but houses and cottages for enployees, a line of 

 telegraph, and sand-sheds, were also established. 

 The object of the sand-sheds is, of course, to pro- 

 tect the line against sand-storms, which constitute 

 one of the difficulties with which it has to deal. 

 Active preparations have been made for the con- 

 struction of the remaining section to the Amu 

 Daria : the necessary workmen have been col- 

 lected, a large mass of materials has been brought 

 together, and General Arrenkoflf expects to com- 

 plete the whole line through to Amu Daria bj 

 Nov. 15. 



LETTERS TO THE EDITOB. 



*^*The attention of scientific men is called to the advantages 

 of the correspondence columns of SCIENCE /or placing promptly 

 on record brief preliminary notices of their investigations. 

 Twenty copies of the number containing his communication 

 will be furnished free to any correspondent on request. 



The editor will be glad to publish any queries consonant with 

 the character of the journal. 



Correspondents are requested to be as brief as possible. The 

 writer'' s name is in all cases required as proof of good faith. 



Comparative psychology. 



Peess of work has prevented me from replying be- 

 fore to a certain form of presentation, in Science for 

 April 1, of my paper published in the Popular sci- 

 ence monthly for March, on comparative psychology, 

 and which really amounts very largely to a mis- 

 representation not only of what I think, but of 

 what I actually expressed in the address referred to 

 above. 



It is assumed throughout by Science that I have 

 ignored Professor Morgan's view of the case as to 

 the study of animal intelligence, for it is stated that 

 " he [the writer] has not faced this argument," etc., 

 and ' ' These limitations and considerations carry 

 with them many consequences, but we can find in 

 Dr. Mills's address no evidence that he has ever 

 given them any consideration." 



A few extracts from my own paper, followed by 

 others from Professor Morgan's (in Mind for April, 

 1886), will test this matter. I am quoted in Science 

 as saying, "Animals are the ' poor relations ' of man; 

 the latter is one of them, not only in body, but in 

 mind. In not a few respects they are not only equal, 

 but superior, to man." Professor Morgan says, " I 

 am, moreover, fully persuaded that my four-footed 

 friends have feelings and emotions distinctly akin to 

 and dimly foreshadowing my own ; " " I by no means 

 deny the existence of animal mind ; " etc. 



Again he says, " A material difference in the ratio 

 of the senses must, we may suppose, make a material 

 difference in the mental product." He then alludes, 

 as I do myself after the very passage Science quotes 

 from my paper, to the superiority of the senses in 

 the animals below man ; for though Science, refer- 

 ring to my use of the expression ' lower ' animals, 

 says ironically, " We presume he uses the adjective 

 * lower ' merely in deference to a custom of some 

 antiquity," I have explicitly stated that it must be 

 conceded that man as a totality stands at the head of 

 the animal world, as the following extract will show : 

 * ' The assumption that man is only accidentally the 



superior of the brute would but lead to confusion, 

 for it must be admitted that there is a scale, and that 

 man ranks first. We are simply desirous of doing 

 the lower creation that justice which we feel assured 

 has not yet been allowed them, and of seeing the 

 human family interested in those that we think scien^ 

 tific investigation is proving constantly are much 

 more our fellow- creatures than has generally been 

 supposed." " We are not contending for the equality , 

 of man and the rest of the animal kingdom," etc. 



Again, Science represents me as saying that "mauL 

 has only developed a superiority to the brute be- 

 cause of his social tendencies, resulting in the di- 

 vision of labour," etc. 



Now, what I did actually write was as follows : 

 " Man's present superiority over the lower animals 

 is traceable in large part to his eminently social ten- 

 dencies," etc., which is a very different thing; and 

 I have elsewhere in the paper called attention to 

 many other agencies which have tended to make man 

 the supreme animal. 



Professor Morgan holds, that, strictly, the only 

 mind one can know is his own mind ; that at best 

 human psychology is a "psychology of sages, but 

 not of savages ; that all our knowledge of human 

 minds other than our own is necessarily ejective ; 

 that our systems of human psychology hold good 

 only for the philosophers who frame them ; that our 

 ejective inferences concerning our neighbours' minds, 

 motives, and characters, are liable to error." 



Now compare with this the following from my own 

 paper: " And at this point allow me to indicate a 

 danger that should make us cautious and modest in 

 attempting to explain the behavior of animals. We 

 infer from our fellow-man's behavior similarity of 

 motive and mental processes to our own under like 

 circumstances. AVe find, the more experience we 

 have, that we are often at fault as to both. And 

 when we are more free from the thraldom of so- 

 called systems and methods in education, we may 

 learn that the activities of the human mind cannot 

 be reduced in all persons to precisely the one plan, 

 like so much clock-work. This may mar somewhat 

 the completeness and beauty of our philosophy of 

 education, but it may also in the end conduce to 

 human progress by providing the greater freedom, 

 and end in insuring an individuality of character 

 which seems to be now rapidly disappearing. Now, 

 if individual men so differ in psychic behavior, how 

 much more is it likely that still greater differences 

 hold for the lower animals! An objection may be 

 based, however, on this to the whole study of com- 

 parative psychology. The objection holds to some 

 extent even for human psychology ; but, as we infer 

 similarity of behavior in men to denote similarity of 

 inner processes, so are we justified in the same as 

 regards the lower animals, though it must be con- 

 ceded somewhat less so. We must always be pre- 

 pared to admit that there may be psychic paths un- 

 known and possibly unknowable to us in the realm 

 of their inner life. But if we regard man as the 

 outcome of development through lower forms, ac- 

 cording to variation with natural selection — in a 

 word, if man is the final link in a long chain bind- 

 ing the whole animal creation together, we have the 

 greater reason for inferring that comparative psy- 

 chology and human psychology have common roots. 

 We must, in fact, believe in a mental or psychic 

 evolution as well as in a physical (morphological) 



