MENTAL, POWERS. 77 



Ity; they practice deceit and are revengeful; they are sometimes 

 susceptible to ridicule, and even have a sense of humor; they 

 feel wonder and curiosity; they possess the same faculties of 

 imitation, attention, deliberation, choice, memory, imagination, 

 the association of ideas, and reason, though In very different de- 

 grees. The individuals of the same species graduate in intellect 

 from absolute imbecility to high excellence. They are also 

 liable to insanity, though far less often than in the case of man.™ 

 Nevertheless, many authors have insisted that man is divided by 

 an insuperable barrier from all the lower animals in his mental 

 faculties. I formerly made a collection of above a score of such 

 aphorisms, but they are almost worthless, as their wide difference 

 and number prove the difficulty, if not the impossibility, of the 

 attempt. It has been asserted that man alone is capable of 

 progressive improvement; that he alone makes use of tools or 

 flre, domesticates other animals, or possesses property; that no 

 animal has the power of abstraction, or of forming general con- 

 cepts, is self-conscious and comprehends itself; that no animal 

 employs language; that man alone has a sense of beauty, is liable 

 to caprice, has the feeling of gratitude, mystery, &c. ; believes in 

 God, or is endowed with a conscience. I will hazard a few re- 

 marks on the more important and interesting of these points. 



Archbishop Sumner formerly maintained" that man alone is 

 capable of progressive improvement. That he is capable of in- 

 comparably greater and more rapid improvement than is any 

 other animal, admits of no dispute; and this is mainly due to 

 his power of speaking and handing down his acquired knowledge. 

 With animals, looking first to the individual, every one who has 

 had any experience in setting traps, knows that young animals 

 can be caught much more easily than old ones; and they 

 can be much more easily approached by an enemy. Even 

 with respect to old animals, it is impossible to catch many 

 in the same place and in the same kind of trap, or to 

 destroy them by the same kind of poison; yet it is im- 

 probable that all should have partaken of the poison, and 

 impossible that all should have been caught in a trap. They 

 must learn caution by seeing their brethren caught or poi- 

 soned. In North America, where the fur-bearing animals have 

 long been pursued, they exhibit according to the unanimous 

 testimony of all observers, an almost incredible amount of 

 sagacity, caution and cunning; but trapping has been there so 

 long carried on, that inheritance may possibly have come into 

 play. I have received several accounts that when telegraphs are 



so See 'Madness in Animals,' by Dr. W. Lauder Lindsay, in 'Journal 

 of Mental Science,' July 1871. 

 31 Quoted by Sir C. Lyell, 'Antiquity of Man,' p, 497. 



