The Things Which Remain: An Address To Young MinistersGoodsell, Daniel A. (Daniel Ayres)
Religion
The Things Which Remain: An Address To Young Ministers
Goodsell, Daniel A. (Daniel Ayres)
Theology, Doctrinal
[Sidenote: Men and Brutes.]
[Sidenote: What Brutes Have.]
It is true that much is common to men and brutes. They walk the same
earth; breathe the same air; are nourished by the same food, which is
digested by the same processes. Their life is transmitted by the same
methods, and their embryonic life is strangely similar. It is also true
that there are strong mental resemblances. Both love and hate; are
jealous and indifferent; are courageous and cowardly; they perceive by
similar organs; record by similar mnemonic ganglia; and are within
certain limits impelled by the same motives. Nor can a measure of reason
be denied to animals. While much of what appears to be mental life is
automatic and unconscious response to an external stimulus reaching a
nerve-center, yet within limits they deliberate; they exercise choice;
and determine routes and methods.
[Sidenote: Man Above Brutes.]
[Sidenote: Habits of Animals.]
[Sidenote: Limits of Brute Intelligence.]
[Sidenote: Limits Continued.]
But when all this is said, man rises almost infinitely beyond the
highest brute. Man can stand outside of himself; contemplate the
movements of his own mind; watch the play of motive upon energy and
will, and know himself as no brute can ever be trained to do. Nor have
brutes the ganglia, lobes, or convolutions which house and direct such
powers; and no tribe of mankind has been found without them, however
undeveloped. Very limited, indeed, is the use of natural forces or of
supplied materials in the life of a brute. The birds pick up feathers,
hair, twigs; but no bird provides such things by deliberate prevision
and co-operation with nature. What animal sows that he may reap? The
so-called agricultural ants gather what they have not sown, and reap
what they have not planted. Man sows that he may gather; breeds that he
may use; and accomplishes civilization by an ever-increasing mastery and
adaptation of natural forces. An insect may float with the current on a
chip; but what one ever put a chip into the water? A beaver may build a
dam; but what beaver ever turned the heightened water on a wheel? The
dog may lie in a sunny spot; but what dog ever created artificial heat
or condensed by a lens the sun's heat on a particular point? The hen may
lay and incubate an egg; but what hen ever invented an incubator to
save her long sitting in one pose or place, or studied the development
of life in and from the egg she produced? The ox may select the richest
pasture; but never dreamed of creating a rich pasture by the culture and
fertilization of which he is the chief source. The tiger chooses and
slays his prey; but does not know how to propagate, develop, and safely
mature the animals on which he feeds. All animal life below man must
locate where its food abounds, or follow that food in its migrations or
seasonal changes. Man alone stores and transports his food, creating
commerce by his mastery of climate.
[Sidenote: Man Parts Company.]
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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