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that wherever adaptation is found, the conviction of the 
human mind is immediate, universal, and absolute, that there 
was enoug’h of foresight and skill to produce that adaptation. 
But we never ascribe such foresight and skill, such intelligent 
purpose, to physical nature. Nature furnishes the stone and 
the iron ; but nature does not make the hammer, the knife, 
the axe, the spear. Nature abounds in materials of which 
man can build himself a house ; but beyond the cave in the 
earth and the leafy covert in the wood, she provides nothing 
for his habitation. The crude material lies in the lap of 
nature ; but the shaping of this material to any use or end 
requires a degree of intelligent purpose of which we do not find 
in inorganic nature any trace or suggestion. Hence as against 
inorganic nature, the presumption does hold a priori, that 
man, as a creature of intelligence, is alone capable of making 
an implement, of transforming inorganic matter into a tool 
for use. 
But this presumption from the nature of man does not 
hold as against other animals. For, though intelligence 
must be presupposed wherever we perceive adaptation, yet 
whether other animals than man possess the kind or degree 
of intelligence requisite to fashioning an implement for a 
specific purpose, is a question of fact that only observation 
can determine ; and observation has decided this in the 
negative. There is no instance on record of any animal 
making an implement for a special use or end. There are 
animals and birds that use the materials of physical nature 
with much ingenuity and skill in building their houses and 
nests. It is enough to instance the intelligence of the beaver 
in adapting stone, wood, earth, and water to his wants, and in 
surmounting the obstacles to his task in some less favourable 
site. There are tribes of Simiae that use stones and sticks 
for cracking nuts or as weapons of defence. But all this is 
far removed from the making of implements for a purposed 
use. The beaver chooses his stones and breaks or twists his 
sticks ; but he never shapes a stone with which to cut and 
shape a stick. The chimpanzee takes a stone to crack a 
nut ; but he takes it up a stone, and lays it down again a 
stone ; he never shapes it to a hammer, fits it with a handle, 
to be reserved for this special use. The baboon throws a 
stone to wound or frighten his enemy. He never shapes 
the stone to a spear-head or a battle-axe, to be kept by him 
for the service of war. No animal goes beyond using the 
crude material that nature furnishes. He may use this skil- 
fully and well, adapting it to his own necessities ; but he 
does not improve upon nature, does not change the form of 
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