between the highest men of the highest races and the lowest savages,
are connected by the finest gradations. Therefore it is possible that
they might pass and be developed into each other.
My object in this chapter is to shew that there is no fundamental
difference between man and the higher mammals in their mental
faculties. Each division of the subject might have been extended into a
separate essay, but must here be treated briefly. As no classification
of the mental powers has been universally accepted, I shall arrange my
remarks in the order most convenient for my purpose; and will select
those facts which have struck me most, with the hope that they may
produce some effect on the reader.
With respect to animals very low in the scale, I shall give some
additional facts under Sexual Selection, shewing that their mental
powers are much higher than might have been expected. The variability
of the faculties in the individuals of the same species is an important
point for us, and some few illustrations will here be given. But it
would be superfluous to enter into many details on this head, for I
have found on frequent enquiry, that it is the unanimous opinion of all
those who have long attended to animals of many kinds, including birds,
that the individuals differ greatly in every mental characteristic. In
what manner the mental powers were first developed in the lowest
organisms, is as hopeless an enquiry as how life itself first
originated. These are problems for the distant future, if they are ever
to be solved by man.
As man possesses the same senses as the lower animals, his fundamental
intuitions must be the same. Man has also some few instincts in common,
as that of self-preservation, sexual love, the love of the mother for
her new-born offspring, the desire possessed by the latter to suck, and
so forth. But man, perhaps, has somewhat fewer instincts than those
possessed by the animals which come next to him in the series. The
orang in the Eastern islands, and the chimpanzee in Africa, build
platforms on which they sleep; and, as both species follow the same
habit, it might be argued that this was due to instinct, but we cannot
feel sure that it is not the result of both animals having similar
wants, and possessing similar powers of reasoning. These apes, as we
may assume, avoid the many poisonous fruits of the tropics, and man has
no such knowledge: but as our domestic animals, when taken to foreign
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