696 
REVIEW — ILLUSTRATIONS OF INSTINCT. 
but howl ; and in countries where the dog returns to a savage, he 
forgets to bark, and learns again to howl. It is remarkable, too, 
and will perhaps explain why barking should ever have become 
the natural language of a dog, that the wild sounds of some of the 
kindred species, as the wolf, fox, and jackal, resemble the dog’s in 
its domesticated state.” 
Coming to the concluding chapter of this interesting work, we 
find it commencing with the following well-merited encomium on 
the fore-knowledge of that great luminary of medicine, John Hunter. 
“ In the earliest stages of science the importance of anatomy to 
the successful practice of medicine and surgery must have been 
evident ; but it was not till the laws of physiology had become a 
severe study, that a knowledge of the structure and development 
of the lower animals was found to be essential to a right under- 
standing of their economy. The importance of this inquiry was 
first appreciated in our times by the illustrious John Hunter, a 
man so much in advance of the attainments of the age in which 
he lived, that his advocacy of this study subjected him to the 
sneers of men whose names are now remembered only as bye- 
words of reproach and shame.” 
“ Examples have already been given to shew, what indeed is 
obvious to daily observation, that the instincts, feelings, thoughts, 
and aspirations of men and animals vary according to the con- 
ditions of youth and age, and to other constantly occurring and 
recurring influences ; and as the events of life necessarily increase 
our knowledge, and make up what is commonly called our expe- 
rience, the usual mode of accounting for the changes to which all 
habits are liable is by referring them to these influences. This 
may be correct in part, but it is not universally so; and even 
where its operation is unquestionable, there is still another principle 
at work, to which experience itself is indebted for the wisdom it 
attains. This is the intimate dependance of the bias or impulse 
of the mind, and its capacity for intricate inquiry and clear con- 
clusion, upon the condition, and especially upon the firmness, of 
the mental organ.” 
“ It may help us to an understanding of that obscure and dis- 
puted subject — the primary intention of the creation of animals — 
to suppose that they were made to manifest certain conditions of 
being , which should be strictly temporal, without aspirations after 
or capacity for intellectual improvement, and the dread of future 
evil. It is a condition plainly unprepared to enter into and enjoy 
a higher state ; and by this want of moral responsibility animals 
are saved from falling lower than they are. The limit to the 
degradation of the brute is the line strongly drawn by Nature, 
beyond which it cannot pass — that a violation of instinct will be 
