ON THE HABITS OF ANTS. 



LECTURE IV. 



II. 



Mr. Geote, in his Fragments on Ethical Subjects, 

 regards it as an evident necessity that no society can 

 exist without the sentiment of morality. " Every one," 

 he says, " who has either spoken or written on the subject 

 has agreed in considering this sentiment as absolutely 

 indispensable to the very existence of society. Without 

 the diffusion of a certain measure of this feeling through- 

 out all the members of the social union, the caprices, 

 the desires, and the passions of each separate individual 

 would render the maintenance of any established com- 

 munion impossible. Positive morality, under some form 

 or other, has existed in every society of which the world 

 has ever had experience." 1 



If this be so, then ants must be moral and accountable 

 beings. I cannot, however, urge this myself, having 

 elsewhere attempted to show that, even with reference 

 to man, the case is not by any means clear. 



As regards ants, various observers have recorded in- 

 stances of attachment and affection. In various memoirs 



1 III. p. 497, 



H 2 



