26 Comparative Psychology . {January, 
ralists, if we may so term them — that even the diredt im- 
mediate adtion of the Infinite Wisdom will not be aimless 
and capricious, but will be based upon definite principles 
which man may legitimately study and seek to comprehend. 
Thus to think and to adt was not the good pleasure of the 
“ Instindtarian ” school. In as far as they condescended to 
search into animal condudt, will, affedtion, they strove to 
bring phenomena into agreement with their preconceived 
notions of the Divine purposes. Professing to wonder at the 
goodness and the wisdom of God as displayed in animal life, 
they rather admired their own cleverness in detedting or in- 
venting cases of contrivance. It may be remembered that 
a sage of this class fancied he saw the foot of a bee perforated 
with tiny holes, and immediately pointed out this imaginary 
feature as a special design for enabling the insedt to sift the 
pollen of flowers ! 
But even this theory of “ instindt ” as diredtly implanted 
by God might have been turned to good use. Had men tried 
how far it would account for fadts it would at least have 
given definite diredtion to observation, just, for instance, as 
did the dodtrine of phlogiston. It would sooner or later have 
been perceived that animals ocasionally commit serious 
errors, even in adtions essential to the preservation of the 
individual species. Such instances were put on record by 
White, though he does not draw the obvious inference that 
a mistaken “ instindt” cannot have its source in Divine in- 
spiration. 
Another class, generally naturalists without any philoso- 
phical training, have carefully studied the habits of animals, 
but at haphazard, without any theory at all. This pro- 
cedure is no less faulty than the setting out with some 
vague assumption incapable alike of being verified or refuted 
by an appeal to fadts. Toomany ofourEnglish ornithologists, 
entomologists, &c., have adted in this manner, and in conse- 
quence their researches have not the charadter of a definite 
and purposive questioning of nature. 
Then, again, there have been speculations put forward by 
philosophers who made no attempt at observation or ex- 
periment. These men evolved out of their own conscious- 
ness certain notions concerning animal will and intelligence. 
Thus, Descartes considered beasts as pure automata, capable 
of feeling, but unconscious — a hypothesis which scarcely 
differs from that of the Instindtarians, and which points sig- 
nificantly in the diredtion of the “ unconscious clairvoyance ” of 
Prof, von Hartmann, and of the “ unconscious cerebration ” 
of Dr. Carpenter. It is scarcely needful to say that none of 
