1. WE were taught in our childhood that man had reason,
while animals had instinct. What instinct precisely was,
was not, so far as my own memory goes, made particularly
clear. But it was generally understood to be a somewhat
mysterious power, the limits of which were exceedingly
ill-defined, while its workings were undoubtedly a con-
spicuous instance of that Providential ordering of things
whereby the fly is endowed with wings to escape the spider,
and the spider with jaws to devour the fly. I cannot find
a better statement of the traditional, popular, and, one
may say, pious conception of instinct than that given by
Captain Marryat Masterman Ready--a work written
for edification.

"'Instinct in animals, William,' continued Mr. Seagrave, 'is
a feeling which compels them to perform certain acts without
previous thought or reflection; this instinct is in full force at the
moment of their birth; it is the guidance of the Almighty's hand
unseen; it was therefore perfect in the beginning, and has never
varied. The swallow built her nest, the spider its web, the bee
formed its comb, precisely in the same way four thousand years
ago as they do now.'"

It may be said to be the breakdown of this conception
which made animal psychology possible as a science. As

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