ORDER PACIIYDERMATA. 363 



those Jaws by which everything is, and continues its being, 

 would be attended with an instantaneous subversion, if not 

 annihilation of all things, we have not often occasion to 

 notice any very particular special interposition for some 

 partial purpose ; any suspension of common consequences 

 for a particular object, except in the case of instinct, which 

 seems to display a sort of immediate communication be- 

 tween the creature and the Creator, almost without the 

 instrumentality of final causes. 



Instinct, properly speaking, supplies the place of reason, 

 and dictates to the passive mind what reason would other- 

 wise suggest for the preservation of the creature, in whose 

 favour it operates ; if this creature were left to its own 

 unassisted resources, its limited inefficient faculties would 

 not enable it to maintain its existence ; casualties, and the 

 ordinary but unceasing operations of mutability, would soon 

 sweep it from the surface of the earth, did not a higher 

 power in the shape of instinct interfere for its preservation. 



If this be so, we may expect a priori to find that the 

 existence or extent of the instinctive faculty is proportioned 

 to the deficiency of reason, and this we believe to be the 

 case. It has been much questioned whether man, in whom 

 reason, however vitiated, however perverted, sits paramount 

 on earth, is endowed at all with instinct; nor is this ques- 

 tion easy of solution. Association, education, and habit, 

 obliterate in a great measure the traces of instinct in the 

 adult, that is, assuming instinct to have any place at all ; 

 that it has however, especially when the immaturity or 

 deficiency of reason require, is most probable. 



This question rather appertains to the zoological history 

 of man. To illustrate the relative situation of the lower 

 animals, it may be necessary however to advert to it for 

 an instant here. The sole objects of instinct being, as we 

 believe, preservation and propagation, and these objects 

 being, generally speaking, within the reach of reason, we can 



