Page:Mind (Old Series) Volume 11.djvu/188

ON THE STUDY OF ANIMAL INTELLIGENCE. 177 knowledge of the social eject than of any individual eject. We may know a good deal of human psychology and yet find it exceedingly difficult to learn anything of our neigh- bours' minds and true characters. We gain the information on which we base our ejective inferences in two ways : (a) Through Verbal Utterances. (6) Through Conduct. Even setting aside intentional deception, we are constantly liable to serious errors of interpretation. When I was at school a school-fellow was severely caned. He came to his seat pale and with clenched teeth. " Did it hurt much ? " I whispered. " Hurt ! who cares for pain ? " he replied. " He caned me for a lie I never told." My interpretation had been entirely erroneous. So too in the case of public characters. The saying and doings of Mr. Gladstone are before the world. But how wide is the difference of in- terpretation by different sections of the community. We say that this is due to prejudice. But what is prejudice but the colour of the subject which inevitably tints every eject that it frames ? 9. We may therefore say (a) That all our knowledge of human minds other than our own is necessarily ejective. (b) That our systems of human psychology hold good only for the philosophers who frame them. (c) That they hold good in a diminishing degree for minds of successively lower development. (d) That our ejective inferences concerning our neigh- bours' motives, minds, and characters are liable to error. (e) That our ejective inferences concerning the motives, minds, and characters of human beings (such as savages) whose lives are passed under social conditions widely different from our own must of necessity be still more liable to error. 10. We now pass on to the further position (a) That all our knowledge of animal minds is of necessity ejective. (b) That our ejective inferences concerning their motives, minds, and characters are so largely liable to error as to render the drawing of them unprofitable for purposes of scientific investigation, except in so far as they may aid the objective study of habit and activity. But first as to the question of their possessing minds at all. Prof. Max Miiller tells us (Chips <&c., iv. 559) that " according to the strict rules of positive philosophy we