CARNIVORA. 
59 
no difficult task to multiply such instances, if pains 
were taken to do so. These, and other similar facts, 
as that of the domestic hen bestowing all her assi- 
duity, apparent anxiety, and maternal affection, on 
chickens not her own, or on birds of a different 
genus 5 while they evince the special interposition 
of Providence for the propagation of animals, by 
providing for their helpless young •, show also, that 
what we call instinct, in such cases, is very different 
from reason ; and is an impulse acting on animals 
almost independent of volition, for the most im- 
portant of all purposes to them, their preservation, 
which may be misdirected, sometimes, perhaps, for- 
tuitously*, but much more frequently by human 
artifice. 
* If the assertion, Deus est anima brutorum” were literally 
true, this could never happen. 
