NATURE AND ANIMAL LIFE 



All the larger movements of humanity are proba- 

 bly as much the result of the operation of natural 

 law as are the movements of the animals. A man 

 feels free to choose this or that, to emigrate or stay 

 at home, to undertake this or that enterprise or to 

 let it alone; yet that which finally determines his 

 course, influences his will, is quite beyond the reach 

 of his will ox his consciousness. He does certain 

 things because he is of a certain race and family, 

 because he lives in a certain age and country, be- 

 cause his hair is red or black, because his health is 

 good or bad. He is a Democrat or a Republican 

 because his father was so before him. He is skeptical 

 because he lives in a skeptical age; he is a fanatic 

 because he is surrounded by fanatics; he wears a 

 derby hat because all his neighbors do; he gesticu- 

 lates because he is a Frenchman; he growls because 

 he is an Englishman; he brags because he is an 

 American. The many influences that work over his 

 head and under his feet, and that stream upon him 

 from all sides, are all unknown to him. 



The animals are all so wise in their own sphere, 

 the sphere of instinct, in doing the things that they 

 have to do in order to survive and perpetuate the 

 species, that one is always astonished at their stupid- 

 ity outside that sphere when a new problem pre- 

 sents itself; as when a robin and a phcebe each built 

 three or four nests on a timber under a porch, be- 

 cause there were three or four places in a row just 

 141 



