Читать книгу The Origin of Thought and Speech онлайн

65 страница из 72

Whilst making a short résumé of remarks which Noiré and other learned writers have made on animals, I also propose to draw a comparison between the two who are so closely connected—the superior and inferior animal.

Darwin was not alone in his endeavour to prove that there exists no essential difference between man and beast; some have even asserted that the intelligence of certain animals is not only equal to, but at times, superior to that of man. We must be on our guard, however, against those numerous anecdotes which have led even philosophers astray; we will also divest our minds of prejudice and preconceived notions, that we may introduce some order into ideas which have been disturbed by superficial observers and the makers of false systems, those enemies of true science; let us candidly own the smallness of our knowledge concerning the mind of an animal; we do not in the least know how they philosophise, nor how an ox recognises his stable door. Instead of having recourse to animals and seeking to draw parallels between their mental faculties and ours, let us examine ourselves to find out what passes in our own minds. We shall then discover that we never in reality perceive anything unless we can distinguish it from other things by means, if not of a word, yet of a sign; that is till we have passed through the four stages of sensation, perception, conception, and more important than all, for our present purpose, of naming. When it is once acknowledged that concepts are impossible without words, and that man alone amongst organised beings possesses the power of language, and that the mental faculties of animals are different from ours in kind, and not only in degree, it naturally follows that a genealogical descent of man from animals is an impossible assumption.