IS79J 
between Man and Brute. 
147 
is done before 45, and 80 per cent before 50. “ The golden 
decade of a man’s life (the interval between his thirtieth and 
fortieth year) alone represents nearly one-third of the work 
of the woild. The advantage of the period from 20 to 
30 over that from 50 to 60 is very striking, and will cause 
surprise.” 
In short, from a careful biographical examination, it fully 
appears that in the individual man — so far at least as his 
present life is concerned — there is no indefinite and continued 
progress. His powers of body and mind are developed 
together, and simultaneously — or nearly so — they decline. 
The same law applies to him as to the lower animals, and, 
if we take into account the different term of life of each 
species, all have their “ golden epoch ” about the same part 
of their career. 
To man, then, brutes exhibit no well-marked contrast, 
but a decided similarity. In the earlier part of life they 
are, like ourselves, capable of progress ; they observe, learn, 
and retain faCts, and to a certain extent they draw conclu- 
sions from such observations. By-and-bye their faculties 
are blunted, and, like man, they become stationary. That 
in them stagnation may set in somewhat earlier than it does 
in civilised man is not impossible. But this is a mere 
difference of degree, not of kind. It is very easy for the 
rhetorician to exclaim — “ The brute soon attains a degree 
of perfection which he can never surpass, and were he to 
live a thousand years he would still be the same.” This is 
no less exaCt a portrait of the human species than of the 
gorilla, the dog, or the ant. As far, then, as individual 
progress is concerned, man and beast differ merely in 
degree. 
There is also among mankind a national or tribal progress 
distinct from that of the individual and that of the species, 
but, like them both, not unlimited in its extent and duration. 
Historians tell us how a small community has, if unchecked 
by hostile circumstances, grown up into a great empire, and 
how, again, it has declined and come to ruin. For such 
national decay they assign a variety of causes, according to 
their political and social prepossessions. In one case the 
calamity is ascribed to luxury ; in another, to the toleration 
of slavery or of usury ; in others, to the importation of 
foreign-grown corn, to the non-recognition of “ woman’s 
rights,” or to the existence of vivisection, and other the like 
springs, which to examine would be a departure from our 
purpose. But whatever share of blame may attach to such 
causes, we should seek for the main source of the evil in the 
