Animal Life and Intelligence

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Kentish Plover with Eggs and Young. From the Exhibit in the British Natural History Museum.
C. LLOYD MORGAN, F.G.S.,
PROFESSOR IN AND DEAN OF UNIVERSITY COLLEGE, BRISTOL; LECTURER AT THE BRISTOL MEDICAL SCHOOL; PRESIDENT OF THE BRISTOL NATURALISTS' SOCIETY, ETC.
AUTHOR OF ANIMAL BIOLOGY, THE SPRINGS OF CONDUCT, ETC.
BOSTON, U. S. A. GINN & COMPANY, PUBLISHERS. 1891.
TO MY FATHER.

There are many books in our language which deal with Animal Intelligence in an anecdotal and conventionally popular manner. There are a few, notably those by Mr. Romanes and Mr. Mivart, which bring adequate knowledge and training to bear on a subject of unusual difficulty. In the following pages I have endeavoured to contribute something (imperfect, as I know full well, but the result of several years' study and thought) to our deeper knowledge of those mental processes which we may fairly infer from the activities of dumb animals.
The consideration of Animal Intelligence, from the scientific and philosophical standpoint, has been my primary aim. But so inextricably intertwined is the subject of Intelligence with the subject of Life, the subject of organic evolution with the subject of mental evolution, so closely are questions of Heredity and Natural Selection interwoven with questions of Habit and Instinct, that I have devoted the first part of this volume to a consideration of Organic Evolution. The great importance and value of Professor Weismann's recent contributions to biological science, and their direct bearing on questions of Instinct, rendered such treatment of my subject, not only advisable, but necessary. Moreover, it seemed to me, and to those whom I consulted in the matter, that a general work on Animal Life and Intelligence, if adequately knit into a connected whole, and based on sound principles of science and of philosophy, would not be unwelcomed by biological students, and by that large and increasing class of readers who, though not professed students, follow with eager interest the development of the doctrine of Evolution.