■SO 
THE DESCENT OF MAN. 
Pap.t I. 
mere force of inheritance, without the stimulus of either 
pleasure or pain. A young pointer, when it first scents 
game, apparently cannot help pointing. A squirrel in 
a cage who pats the nuts which it cannot eat, as if to 
bury them in the ground, can hardly be thought to act 
thus either from pleasure or pain. Hence the common 
assumption that men must be impelled to every action 
by experiencing some pleasure or pain may be erro- 
neous. Although a habit may be blindly and implicitly 
followed, independently of any pleasure or pain felt at 
the moment, yet if it be forcibly and abruptly checked, 
-a vague sense of dissatisfaction is generally expe- 
rienced ; and this is especially true in regard to persons 
of feeble intellect. 
It has often been assumed that animals were in the 
first place rendered social, and that they feel as a con- 
sequence uncomfortable when separated from each other, 
and comfortable whilst together ; but it is a more pro- 
bable view that these sensations were first developed, in 
order that those animals which would profit by living 
in society, should be induced to live together. In the 
same manner as the sense of hunger and the pleasure of 
eating were, no doubt, first acquired in order to induce 
animals to eat. The feeling of pleasure from society 
is probably an extension of the parental or filial affec- 
tions ; and this extension may be in chief part attributed 
to natural selection, but perhaps in part to mere habit. 
For with those animals wbich were benefited by living 
in close association, the individuals which took the 
greatest pleasure in society would best escape various 
dangers ; whilst those that cared least for their com- 
rades and lived solitary would perish in greater numbers. 
With respect to the origin of the parental and filial 
affections, which apparently lie ' at the basis of the 
social affections, it is hopeless to speculate ; but we 
