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PROFESSOR HENRY WEBSTER PARKER, ON 



sensation) are known as vegetal, and are so recognised even 

 in popular language, as w4ien we say that a person of 

 inactive mind " simply vegetates." But the same might be 

 said of every animal below man, because its distinctively 

 animal endowments, nerve and muscle (or their equivalents), 

 are subordinated to nutrition and reproduction, whereas in 

 completely developed man all functions are subordinated to 

 mind. Thus he stands alone. 



2. Fundamental plan, in animals above radiate structure, 

 is a criterion of rank chiefly as it lias to do with the presence 

 or absence of an internal skeleton. The nervous system will 

 be referred to later. Vertebrates are, as a branch, superior 

 to invertebrates in the profound modification of the whole 

 structure and its powers by an endoskeleton. For this 

 reason the splendid wing of a Morpho butterfly falls below 

 the fin-hke wing of a penguin. In respect to man, in him 

 alone the vertebrate plan rises to its high ideal — the spinal 

 column indeed a column, hfting his large brain and libera ting 

 and supporting the fore limbs for all the uses of that brain. 

 Thus he stands high and apart. 



3. Type may be mentioned next, not in the above sense ot 

 plan, but as referring to forms that embody the most charac- 

 teristic features of theu^ group, whether or not they are more 

 highly endowed in every point. Not the raptorial dragon- 

 fly, nor Hercules beetle, nor the sylph-like butterfly, but the 

 bee and ant lead their sub-order, because they best realise 

 its ideal, namely, in compactness, mouth-parts, activity, 

 remarkable instincts, and other points. Teliosts are inferior 

 to sharks and ganoids in some respects, but are the most 

 fishy of fish. The singing birds are now placed first in their 

 class because they are the ideal birds, though not the most 

 splendid, nor so kingly as the raptores that once usurped their 

 place. 



Of departures from type, something will be said under 

 another head. A remark comes in here that, if man be 

 claimed as the typical " primate " in a group with anthro- 

 poids, their departure from his ideal type sets him apart more 

 than any identity of parts can bring him near in kind. That 

 their so-called families, including lemurs, have as great or 

 even greater visible differences among themselves does not 

 bridge the chasm between him and the gorilla and chimpanzee, 

 on this zoological principle of rank. They, too, are a type, 

 and of something very different from him. Ordinal values 

 are not always equal, nor the same in every class, but it may 



