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Show 46 THE DESCENT OF MAN. PART I. " character say yes or no-to the devil with him ; he is " onlv a stupid corpse." Dreaming gives us the best notio~ of this power ; as Jean Paul again says, " The "dream is an involuntary art of poetry." The value of the products of our imagination depends ~f cours.e on the number, accuracy, and clearness of our ImpressiOns; on our judgment and taste in selecting or rejecting the involuntary combinations, and to a certain extent on our power of voluntarily combining them. As dogs, cats, horses, and probably all the higher animals, even birds, as is stated on good authority, 14 have vivid dreams, and this is shewn by their movements and voice, we must admit that they possess some power of imagination. Of all the faculties of the human mind, it will, I presume, be admitted that Reason stands at the summit. Few persons any longer dispute that animals possess some power of reasoning. Animals may constantly be seen to pause, deliberate, and resolve. It is a significant fact, that the more the habits of any particular animal are studied by a naturalist, the more he attributes to reason and the less to unlearnt, instincts.15 In future chapters we shall see that some animals extremely low in the scale apparently display a certain amount of reason. No doubt it is often difficult to distinguish between the power of reason and that of instinct. Thus Dr. Hayes, in his work on 'The Open Polar Sea,' repeatedly remarks that his dogs, instead of continuing to draw the sledges in a compact body, diverged and separated when they came to thin ice, so that their weight might be more evenly distributed. This was often the first warn- 14 Dr. Jerdon, 'Birds of India,' vol. i. 1862, p. xxi. 15 Mr. L. H. Morgan's work on' The Ainerican Beaver' 1868 offers a good illustration of this remark. I cannot, however, a;oid thfnking that he goes too far in underrating the power of Instinct. CHAP. II. MENTAL POWERS. 47 ing and notice which the travellers received that the ice was becoming thin and dangerous. Now, did the dogs act thus from the experience of each individual, or from the example of the older and wiser dogs, or from an inherited habit, that is from an instinct? This instinct might possibly have arisen since the time, long ago, when dogs were first employed by the natives in drawing their sledges ; or the Arctic wolves, the parent-stock of the Esquimaux dog, may have acquired this instinct, impelling them not to attack their prey in a close pack when on thin ice. Questions of this kind are most difficult to answer. So many facts have been recorded in various works shewing that animals possess some degree of reason, that I will here give only two or three instances, authenticated by Rengger, and relating to American monkeys, which stand low in their order. He states that when he first gave eggs to his monkeys, they smashed them and thus lost much of their contents ; afterwards they gently hit one en~ against some hard body, and picked off the bits of shell with their fingers. After cutting themselves only once with any sharp tool, they would not touch it again, or would handle it with the greatest care. Lumps of sugar were often given them wrapped up in paper; and Rengger sometimes put a live wasp in the paper, so that in hastily unfolding it they got stung; after this had once happened, they always first held the packet to their ears to detect any movement within. Any one who is not convinced by such facts as these, and by what he may observe with his own dogs, that animals can reason, would not be convinced by anything that I could add. Nevertheless I will give one case with respect to dogs, as it rests on two distinct observers, and can hardly depend on the modification of any instinct. |