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and every species of metallic magnificence. As he was busying himself on this momentous occasion, there passed by, to the pools of water, one of the royal elephants, about the size of a broad-wheeled waggon, rich in ivory teeth, and shaking, with its ponderous tread, the tailor's shop to its remotest thimble. As he passed near the window, the elephant happened to look in; the tailor lifted up his eyes, perceived the proboscis of the elephant near him, and, being seized with a fit of facetiousness, pricked the animal with his needle: the mass of matter immediately retired, stalked away to the pool, filled his trunk full of muddy water, and, returning to the shop, overwhelmed the artisan and his doublet with the dirty effects of his vengeance. Instances of memory in animals, and of the most tenacious memory, are endless. If an animal obeys the voice of his master, or loves the hand that feeds him, it is association. In what way can a sheep or a dog find his way back thirty pastor forty miles, over a country he has passed but once,

through by-paths, and over extensive downs? What is all this but the most acute attention, and the most accurate memory? A dog, to do this, must have paid the most accurate attention to cart-ruts, little hillocks, single shrubs, and the minutest marks which guide him in his course. Almost all animals are very diligent observers of places, and know them by a thousand criteria which we do not observe, and which, from the extent of horizon we comprehend in our view, we have no occa sion to observe. It must be from that same habit of observation, common to all animals, and from the same necessity he is under of observing attentively, that American Indians are able to find their way across the woods, in the very surprising manner mentioned by Mr. Weld, in his very sensible, judicious, and impartial Travels in America. They will penetrate through a wood of many leagues in extent, which they have not past for twenty years before, without deviating a single

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step from their former track: the fact is, they are compelled (like animals), from a consideration of their safety, to observe with the closest attention, and whatever is observed closely, is remembered tenaciously. Animals profit by experience, as we do, not so much, but in the same manner. All old animals are much more cunning, with much more difficulty caught in traps, and hunted with dogs, than young animals: an old wolf, or an old fox, will walk round a trap twenty times, examining every circumstance with the utmost attention; and those who deceive them, are only enabled to do so by every possible care and circumspection. They have abstract ideas, exactly as we have abstract ideas. When a huntsman whips a hare out of its form, he sees only an individual object; but he knows that this individual animal has qualities and properties common to a whole species; and the greyhound that pursues that particular hare, — be it little or be it big, — knows that it has properties common to all other animals, — that it is quick, cunning, and good to eat in the same manner, a dog that lives in a town, meets sometimes a man in a yellow coat, sometimes in a green one, sometimes a tall man, sometimes a short man, but he knows they are all men; each man excites in him nearly the same idea from the qualities he possesses, in common with all other men, and in spite of his own individual peculiarities. Locke says that animals have no universal ideas; that they do not abstract: but then, Locke was mistaken in supposing that men had universal ideas. Bishop Berkeley has demonstrated, and his demonstration is universally agreed to by every body, that it is nonsense to talk about universal ideas; that there are no such things as universal ideas; and that what we have called universal ideas are nothing but particular ones, accompanied with the notion that they are common to a species.

Then, again, for the affections of animals. They

grieve, rejoice, play, are ennuied, as we are; feel anger, as we do; parental affection, and personal attachment. There are stories in Smellie's "Natural Philosophy," and well authenticated, of a very serious attachment that subsisted between a dunghill-cock and a horse, who happened to be kept in the same paddock together. Every body has seen the lapdog and the lioness in the Tower; and I believe a lamb also has been kept in the Tower with the lions. In short, every body has innumerable stories to tell of the affections of animals; and the difficulty is, rather to abridge than to multiply them.

Now, if I am right in stating that animals have the same sort of faculties as man, the question immediately occurs of the origin of that distinction and superiority which man has gained over all other animated beings. One cause of that superiority I conceive to be, his longevity: without it, that accumulation of experience in action, and of knowledge in speculation, could not have existed; and though man would still have been the first of all animals, the difference between him and others would have been less considerable than it now is. The wisdom of a man is made up of what he observes, and what others observe for him; and of course the sum of what he can acquire must principally depend upon the time in which he can acquire it. All that we add to our knowledge is not an increase, by that exact proportion, of all we possess; because we lose some things, as we gain others; but upon the whole, while the body and mind remain healthy, an active man increases in intelligence, and consequently in power. If we lived seven hundred years instead of seventy, we should write better epic poems, build better houses, and invent more complicated mechanism, than we do now. I should question very much if Mr. Milne could build a bridge so well as a gentleman who had engaged in that occupation for seven centuries: and if I had had only two

hundred years' experience in lecturing on moral philosophy, I am well convinced I should do it a little better than I now do. On the contrary, how diminutive and absurd all the efforts of man would have been, if the duration of his life had only been twenty years, and if he had died of old age just at the period when every human being begins to suspect that he is the wisest and most extraordinary person that ever did exist! I think it is Helvetius who says, he is quite certain we only owe our superiority over the ourang-outangs to the greater length of life conceded to us; and that, if our life had been as short as theirs, they would have totally defeated us in the competition for nuts and ripe blackberries. I can hardly agree to this extravagant statement; but I think, in a life of twenty years the efforts of the human mind would have been so considerably lowered, that we might probably have thought Helvetius a good philosopher, and admired his sceptical absurdities as some of the greatest efforts of the human understanding. Sir Richard Blackmore would have been our greatest poet; our wit would have been Dutch; our faith, French; the Hottentots would have given us the model for manners, and the Turks for government; and we might probably have been such miserable reasoners respecting the sacred truths of religion, that we should have thought they wanted the support of a puny and childish jealousy of the poor beasts that perish. His gregarious nature is another cause of man's superiority over all other animals. A lion lies under a hole in a rock; and if any other lion happen to pass by, they fight. Now, whoever gets a habit of lying under a hole in a rock, and fighting with every gentleman who passes near him, cannot possibly make any progress. Every man's understanding and acquirements, how great and extensive soever they may appear, are made up from the contributions of his friends and companions. You spend your morning in learning from Hume what happened at particular periods

of your own history: you dine where some man tells you what he has observed in the East Indies, and another discourses of brown sugar and Jamaica. It is from these perpetual rills of knowledge, that you refresh yourself, and become strong and healthy as you are. If lions would consort together, and growl out the observations they have made, about killing sheep and shepherds, the most likely places for catching a calf grazing, and so forth, they could not fail to improve; because they would be actuated by such a wide range of observation, and operating by the joint force of so many minds. It may be said, that the gregarious spirit in man, may proceed from his wisdom; and not his wisdom from his gregarious spirit. This I should doubt. It appears to be an original principle in some animals, and not in others; and is a quality given to some to better their condition, as swiftness or strength is given to others. The tiger lives alone, - bulls and cows do not; yet, a tiger is as wise an animal as a bull. A wild boar lives with the herd till he comes of age, which he does at three years, and then quits the herd and lives alone. There is a solitary species of bee, and there is a gregarious bee. Whether an animal should herd or not, seems to be as much a provision of nature, as whether it should crawl, creep, or fly.

A third method, in which man gains the dominion over other animals, is by the structure of his body, and the mechanism of his hands. Suppose, with all our understanding, it had pleased Providence to make us like lobsters, or to imprison us in shells like crayfish, I very much question if the monkeys would not have converted us into sauce; nor can I conceive any possible method, by which such a fate could have been averted. Suppose man, with the same faculties, the same body, and the hands and feet of an ox, what then would have been his fate? Anaxagoras is represented by ancient authors as maintaining that man owes all his superiority

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